Talkin' Chow Playin' House

New Home

Hey, we’ve moved! Here is our new address: www.talkchowplayhouse.com 

Head on over and make yourself at home.  

Love,

Kara and Bri

P.S. This tumblr is still going to be around. It’s going to turn into a photo gallery.

Lime Rickey

Gulped one of these down at the Freedom Festival in Provo, Ut over the Fourth. It had been tooooo long. I just love grape and lime together all at once.

Here is my concoction (recipe will make 4 drinks):

4 drinking glasses

4 cups club soda

16 tablespoons grape syrup (I just bought mine from the kid at the snow-cone shack)

2 limes

Lots of ice

4 straws

Make these one by one. Squeeze half of a lime in drinking glass. Scoop in a decent amount of ice. Pour in 1 cup club soda and 4 tablespoons grape syrup. Rest your squeezed lime halve on top of ice. Don’t forget to drop in the straw. Follow these same steps for filling remaining glasses. 

P.S. My husbands bowling name is Lime Rickey. He’s so cool. 

Post by Bri

Popeyes w/ Hollandaise Sauce

So, our brother Jas called me last week with an idea for a post.  Now Jason is into all things food!  He loves to read about food, watch food tv, make crazy food concoctions and most of all EAT food!  He said to me, “hey, do you remember when Mom used to make us popeyes for breakfast?”  I said, “yep!”  So he says,  ” well, I was watching Paula Dean and she did popeyes with hollandaise sauce.  You should make them for the blog.” And man am I glad I did!  They turned out awesome!  I had the popeyes and the sauce done and ready to devour in less than 10 minutes FLAT!  It’s like a more laid back version of eggs benedict.  But with all the same great flavor!  A delicious, homemade breakfast has never been so quick and easy!

For the Popeyes:

Take a round biscuit or cookie cutter and press through the middle of your favorite bread.  Save the bread rounds to toast with your popeyes.  Put the bread in a pan or on a griddle over medium high heat.  Crack 1 egg for each bread slice and pour straight from the shell into the cut out center of the bread.  While that is cooking, make your Hollandaise sauce:

Into the blender and mix for 5 seconds:

3 egg yolks

1/4 teaspoon mustard

1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

2 drops of red hot sauce (tabasco or cholula)

Add and mix until slightly thickened:  (should thicken almost immediately)

1 stick of butter melted completely

Flip your popeyes to the other side to finish cooking.  Should be about 2-3 minutes per side.  Serve with toast rounds and drizzle with warm hollandaise sauce.  Sprinkle fresh dill over the top if you would like!

Hollandaise sauce recipe from Allrecipes.com

Post by Kar

It’s High Time for the Lime…

Ya know…the lemon has been a worthy and faithful ingredient to many a vinagrette, marinade, sauce, pudding, pie, tart, cookie, cake, frosting, glaze, etc, Etc, ETC!  Now I love lemon but what if we gave the good ol’ lemon a rest?  He deserves it! Let’s put his spunky and slightly sweeter cousin to work instead!  Try using lime in place of lemon in all of your fun summer recipes for a refreshing switch up!  But in the end, whichever citrus fruit you choose, you really can’t go wrong!

Post by Kar  

Dreamy Cake

I’ve had visions of a strawberry buttercream, frosted vanilla cake running through my head for the past few weeks. I imagined the frosting to be creamy with a hint of tartness from the strawberries and the cake to be moist, dense and very, very vanilla. This morning when I woke up, I had the overwhelming urge to make this cake that has been dancing around my head a reality.

The cake is a recipe I pulled from Martha Stewart. This particular cake recipe calls for Buttermilk and let’s let it be known that I’m a sucker for cakes with Buttermilk. I followed the recipe to a T. My only advice is to keep an eye on it— I wish I would have taken mine out 2 minutes earlier than I did.  

The frosting is by moi.

Fresh Strawberry Buttercream:

1 1/2 cups unsalted butter (a little cooler than room temp.)

Roughly 4 cups confectioners sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 pinches salt

1 1/2 cups fresh strawberries, hulled and cut into small pieces

In a blender or food processor, puree strawberries until smooth. Set aside. In a medium bowl, using a hand mixer whip butter and salt until light and fluffy. Add confectioners sugar a cup at a time and whip. Make sure each cup is fully incorporated before adding another. When you are finished adding all your sugar, add vanilla and mix until incorporated. Now add strawberry puree tablespoonfuls at a time. I added about 6 tablespoons (if you have extra puree, use it for something else). Make sure you don’t pour the puree in all at once or your frosting will “break”.

When your cake has cooled completely, you are ready to frost. This frosting recipe should be the perfect amount for 2, 9 in cakes. In the cake recipe it says to place your first layer bottom side up and then the second layer bottom side down. I did this and it made for a stress free frosting process. As for other tips on frosting, I’m really not the one to ask. I think frosting a cake is an art in and of itself…and I am determined to master it some day…

Post by Bri

See you guys next week!

What is this?

I don’t know about you, but a long weekend always leaves me wanting more. Maybe that’s why it’s been hard to get back in the posting groove this week.

I just wanted to stop in real quick today and say Hi. We are going out of town tomorrow and won’t be back til Saturday night. I am hoping to get a post up tomorrow before we leave, but you never know what will happen when you have a spunky toddler and a nursing 14 week old.

Just for some fun, I thought I’d post a picture and see if you could guess what it is. I can’t wait to hear your guesses. And. If you guess right, I may just send you a little prize.

Love,

Bri

Favorite Stain Removers

Hope your fourth was jam packed with fun. Here’s a post to help you get back in the groove. 

For today I thought I’d share my two favorite stain removers. Summer is in full swing and these will definitely come in handy.   

Shout wipes! I’m sure I’m late to the party on these ones, but they are magic and I feel need a “shout” out. I carry a few packets in my purse.

Mrs. Meyers spot stain remover. This is my favorite weapon in the laundry room. The strawberry mango popsicles stains from the other day came right off my toddlers romper. I’ve yet to meet a stain it couldn’t remove.  

Post by Bri

Fourth Of July Layer Cake

WARNING:  This cake is NOT for the faint of heart!  It’s a little time consuming to make and requires PATIENCE!  But WOW is it worth it!  It is super duper rich and makes a beautiful finale to a Fourth Of July Bbque!

Preheat oven to 350 degrees, pam sides and bottom of four 9 in round cake pans.

2 White cakes mixes, follow instructions on box

Add 1/2 cup whole milk ricotta cheese

1 teaspoon almond extract

Divide batter into 2 bowls

Mix 1 bowl with 2 tbs red gel food coloring(make sure it is gel based, regular food coloring won’t give you the vibrance) and pour into 2 of the prepared cake pans.

Mix other bowl with 1-1 1/2 tbs royal blue food coloring and pour into other 2 cakes pans.

Bake for 24-30 minutes, cool in pans for 15 minutes, then turn out on cooling racks.

Note:  If you don’t have four 9 in cake pans laying around just do 1 cake mix at a time cutting the ricotta cheese and almond extract in half.  Once you have turned the 2 layers out on cooling racks, repeat with 2nd mix.

Swiss buttercream filling and crumb coat:

In a medium saucepan, stirring constantly, over medium heat dissolve:

1 3/4 cups granulated sugar

9 egg whites

Once sugar has dissolved,(about 3 minutes) pour into stand mixer and let whip on high speed until cooled to room temp.  Meringue will be thick and stiff peaks.

Add and mix in 1 at a time:

3 sticks of butter, softened

Then add 1 tsp lemon extract

Mixture will get soupy, don’t panic.

Mix on high for about 5 minutes until buttercream rethickens.  If it isn’t thickening, put it in the fridge for about 10 minutes.  Then resume beating on high until thickened.  I promise this will work.  

Place first layer on cake plate and put a thick layer of buttercream on top and crumb coat the sides.  Add next layer and repeat until all four layers have filling and the sides have been crumb coated.

Note:  Crumb coating is the process of spreading thin amounts of frosting around a cake to trap any cake crumbs from being exposed through the frosting.  Very important when you are making cake layers that are darker than your frosting.

Put the crumb coated and filled cake in the fridge to firm up.

Repeat buttercream recipe ONE.MORE.TIME!  I told you it was time consuming!:)  Take your chilled cake out of fridge and frost!  Then enjoy!:)

Original cake idea from the Whisk Kid.  She did a 6 layer rainbow version that is INSANE!

Swiss Buttercream recipe from the Whisk Kid

Cake tweaking by Kar:)

Post by Kar

Pudding Pops

I’m so excited that the weekend is here and even more excited that we get to celebrate Independence Day! The fourth of July is one of my very favorite holidays. I love all the excitement in the air. After I get this recipe posted we are running out to the store to buy fireworks and then heading down to a family party. I hope you all have some excellent plans in the works as well. Thanks so much for all your sweet comments and emails— they mean so much to Kara and I. This’ll be my last post until next week. Until then, pals. :)

Whatever happened to JELL-O pudding pops? I loved those things….especially the chocolate-vanilla swirl. For this recipe I used chocolate and vanilla instant pudding, but you could use any flavors you prefer. I think banana would be fantastic. 

Recipe:

1 small box chocolate fudge instant pudding mix

1 small box vanilla instant pudding mix

2 cups cold whole milk

2 cups cold half & half

12 3 oz paper or plastic cups

12 wooden popsicle sticks

For these pops I used 3 oz. cups as my molds. You can find them in the paper products aisle. Before you make your puddings. Take a cupcake pan and place 12, 3 oz. cups in each of the cupcake molds. Set aside. In a medium bowl pour in 1 cup whole milk, 1 cup half&half, and vanilla instant pudding. With a hand mixer blend on high for a minute or two. Set aside. In another medium bowl mix the remaining cup of whole milk and cup of half&half, and the chocolate pudding. Blend on high for a minute. Now you are ready to pour the puddings into the 3 oz. cups. Try and work quickly or the pudding will set up and make it harder to pour. I like to alternate pouring between the chocolate and the vanilla to create a swirl affect. Also, dipping and gently stirring a butter knife after pouring will help create a better swirl affect. Make sure not to over-fill. The pudding will expand as it freezes. When you are done pouring in puddings, position a popsicle stick in the center. Try and avoid pushing it all the way to the bottom. Gently try your best to cover and wrap the cupcake tin with plastic-wrap. Allow to freeze for at least 4 hours. When frozen solid and ready to serve, simply cut the cup away from the pudding pop and serve.

Recipe and post by Bri 

Toasted Mallow-Caramel Cookies

Ahhh…marshmallow and caramel…2 of my favorite foods!  Add some chocolate for good measure and shazaam!  Delicious!  I hope you enjoy these full flavored and textured cookies as much as I do!

Preheat oven to 375 degrees and grease cookie sheets 

For the cookie mix together:

1 german chocolate cake mix

1/3 cup vegetable oil

2 eggs

1/2 cup milk chocolate chips

Roll into 1 inch balls.  Place on greased cookie sheets and into the oven for 6-8 minutes.

For caramel:

Unwrap roughly 20-25 caramels and put in saucepan with 2 tbs canned milk.  Let caramel melt over med-low heat and stir often.  Spoon a heaping teaspoon full of melted caramel onto each cookie.

For Marshmallow:

Turn oven broiler on high and place 1 large mallow on top of each caramel covered cookie.  Put back into the oven, under broiler for 1-3 minutes until mallow tops are golden but still puffy.(not flat and melted)  Remove from cookie sheets to cool on wire racks.

Recipe and post by Kar