Spicy Crab Cucumber Cups

This weekend was full of good, homemade food -- And lots of it!

Friday: Venison Cheese Steaks & Smores
Saturday: Monte Cristos, Spicy Crab Cucumber Cups, Venison cheese burgers, spaghetti & Meatballs.
Sunday: Mini egg tartlets in Mini Phyllo Cups & pound cake

I planned the entire weekend around food, in case we didn't know what to do, we could at least know what we were eating for breakfast lunch & dinner. Not really considering that by the time we would get to the spaghetti and meatballs, we would be too full to even think about more food.

Never the less, Matt and I cleaned up around the house and went grocery shopping with a long list of ingredients needed for the weekend activities. The only thing not found at food lion -- Crab meat! So we headed on down to Captain Chris's and picked crabs that evening for dinner. He got the big boys, which had a ridiculous amount of back fin meat!

I really enjoyed how light and spicy these little Spicy Crab Cucumber Cups are. I found this recipe from pinterest but made it a little differently. Mainly sriracha sauce instead of Tabasco, and add in LOTS of old bay.

Spicy Crab Cucumber Cups


Ingredients

• 3 whole Long Cucumbers
• ¼ cups Sour Cream
• ¼ cups Cream Cheese
• ¾ cups Crab Meat
• 2 teaspoon Sriracha 
• 1 teaspoon Brown Mustard
• ½ teaspoons Salt
• 1 teaspoons Black Pepper
• 3 teaspoons Old Bay
• 2 teaspoon Chili powder

Remove the peel from the cucumbers using a vegetable peeler. Cut the cucumber into 1-2 inch rounds/slices.

Using a small melon baller, scoop out most of the inside seed part of the rounds. Note: You want to leave the walls and a thick portion of the bottom intact.

In a bowl, combine the sour cream and the cream cheese (softened) with a fork until well combined. Add the remaining ingredients besides the crab meat and stir until combined. Fold in the Crab meat.

Fill each of the cucumber cups with the crab dip. The melon baller worked very well for picking up the right amount of filling for each cup.

Sprinkle the top of each cup with a mixture of chili powder and old bay.

Refrigerate until ready to serve. Serve within 2 hours of making.


Note: Original recipe by Tasty Kitchen

Asparagus and Chicken Pasta

Mom and dad are out picking up Mom's new car and trading in my Wonda. It's kind of a bitter sweet day for me. How do you say good bye to your very first car? I need to make myself some comfort food with my favorite veggie -- Asparagus! That makes it healthy... right?

Asparagus and Chicken Pasta

Ingredients

• Asparagus
• Chicken
• Milk
• Vegetable Oil
• Cream of Asparagus Soup
• Pasta of your choice, I used Large Shells
• Shredded Swiss cheese

1. Add 2 tbsp of vegetable oil in a skillet on medium heat
2. Add in chicken cut to bite size pieces
3. Season with salt and pepper
4. Let cook for 10-15 minutes
5. Cut asparagus stalks to 1/2" - 1" bite size pieces
6. Add into the skillet with the chicken
7. Add 1/4 cup water and cover for 10 minutes
8. Add cream of asparagus soup
9. Add 1/3 cup milk
10. Add 1/3 cup of shredded Swiss cheese
11. Let simmer for 10 minutes
12. Add in cooked pasta
13. Garnish with uncut cooked Asparagus

And there you have it... and it was TASTY! 

xoxox,

Michie

Chocolate Dr Pepper Cake!

For Matthew's birthday and for the fact that I will be out of the country for it, I decided to make a cake demonstrating his two favorite things: Dr Pepper and PORTAL! Well maybe not his most favorite... but close. So I made this before I left. I was pretty proud of how it turned out... Minus the runny-ness of the icing. It made it easier to apply all the chocolate jimmies. I did not get to try it out, but I heard good things.

Dr Pepper Cake! Portal Style!

•  
• Ingredients
• 1 cup butter, 1 cup Dr. Pepper cola, 2 eggs, ½ cup buttermilk, 1 teaspoon baking soda, 1 teaspoon vanilla, 4 tablespoons cocoa, 1 ½ teaspoons cinnamon, 2 cups flour, 2 cups sugar
• 
• ICING
• ¼ cup butter, 3 tablespoons cocoa, Chocolate Sprinkles, ¼ cup Dr. Pepper cola, Little less than 1 box powdered sugar, Jar of Maraschino cherries, White Icing

Directions:

1 Heat 1 Cup of butter and Dr Pepper
2 Add the cocoa, cinnamon, flour and sugar to the butter mixture
3 Mix the eggs, buttermilk, soda and vanilla and add to the rest of the mixture
4 Pour into prepared 8 or 9 inch pans
5 Bake 30 minutes at 350 degrees.

DR PEPPER ICING 

6 Heat butter, Dr Pepper and cocoa stirring until well blended.

7 Stir in powdered sugar and a little cherry syrup

8 Frost cake by pouring icing on cake
9 Cover with Sprinkles
10 Make cheery supports with white icing
11 Place cherries