Brown Sugar Recipes

Pretty as a picture: Five summer recipes that taste as good as they look

Winter food is rich and dark: Pot roast, chili and stew.

Summer food is primary colors: Fresh tomato on a bright green salad, stir-fried bright yellow peppers, a bowl of sliced cantaloupe and honeydew.

When it comes to food, photos really can be enticing. Not only do they set our salivary glands into action, but our imaginations as well: I can make that. Wouldn't that look pretty on my table?

Here are some photos and recipes that hopefully will inspire you. They come from Nestle.

You can have your lemonade and eat it, too. Individually-sized pound cakes are dressed with a flavorful whipped topping and garnished with fresh lemon peel. Serve frozen for a refreshing anytime treat to stay cool this summer.

Frozen Lemonade Cupcakes

1 can (14 ounces) sweetened condensed milk

1 container (6 ounces) frozen lemonade or limeade concentrate (about 2/3 cup), partially thawed

1 tub (12 ounces) frozen light whipped topping, thawed

1 (10.75 ounces) frozen reduced-fat or fat-free pound cake

Grated lemon peel (optional)

Paper line 18 muffin cups.

Cut pound cake into 18 slices. Using 1 3/4 inch-round cookie cutter or appropriate size to fit into paper liners, cut slices into rounds (discard cake scraps or save for another use). Place cake rounds into paper liners.

Combine sweetened condensed milk and lemonade concentrate in large bowl; stir well. Stir a large spoonful of whipped topping into mixture. Fold in remaining whipped topping. Spoon evenly into liners. Freeze for 2 hours. Cover; freeze for several hours or overnight before serving. Garnish with lemon peel. Makes 18 cupcakes.

Sweet Heat Cucumber Salad

2 medium cucumbers, peeled, halved, seeded and thinly sliced

1/3 cup diced red bell pepper

1/4 cup fresh lime juice

2 to 3 tablespoons sweet chili sauce

2 tablespoons thinly sliced fresh basil

2 tablespoons diced red onion

1/4 teaspoon salt

2 to 3 tablespoons chopped unsalted peanuts

Combine all but peanuts in a medium bowl. Refrigerate for 1 hour. Sprinkle with peanuts before serving. Makes 6 servings.

Try to buy the freshest mozzarella you can find for this recipe; burrata is a soft, milky cheese that would work well here.

Recipe Request: Raw Sugar Browned Butter High Altitude Chocolate ...

Baking at altitude presents a bevy of problems in the final product, so I use the best book I could find: Susan G. Purdy’s “Pie in the Sky”. While I have yet to successfully bake a cake with one of her recipes, she really understands how to make great chocolate chip cookies! I want to give her credit for the recipe, which I have altered based on ingredient availability here in Peru.

The first change, and one I recommend you adopt with all chocolate chip cookie recipes, is to brown the butter in a fry pan instead of softening it to mix with the sugar and egg. The browned milk solids lend a nutty carmel flavor to the cookies, which I needed because there is no brown sugar in Peru…that I can find! When it comes to chocolate chip cookies, browned butter is an excellent substitution for the flavor of brown sugar, but if you’re lucky enough to have both, the cookie’s flavor is even better.

The second change is also because I can only find Azucar Rubio- Light coffee color, sugar in the raw, essentially.  It has a large grain that completely changes the texture of the cookie. Since we’re not using brown (fine, sticky grain) and/or white granulated sugar (small grain), I use a stick blender with the food processor blade attachment and give it a few pulses. It’s stil larger than a white sugar grain, but this medium grain gives the cookie a network of tiny sugar crunchies suspended in a perfectly chewy cookie! The grain size truly makes a difference and I urge you to try it!!

In a large bowl, blend all ingredients well with a wire whip.

Melt butter in a good sized fry pan or pot. Cook over high heat. It will foam up, stir it gently and slowly, it can overflow very quickly so keep an eye out and adjust the heat if necessary. If it begins to overflow, carefully move the pan away from the heat source and stir. The butter will take time to brown, possibly up to 15 minutes, but when it is time to brown, it happens fast. Keep stirring, gently and slowly and you will see the foam disappear then browned bits of milk solids will begin to rise as you stir them off the bottom. Get a nice coffee color then very quickly remove the pan from the heat. Be sure to have a large bowl ready to pour the butter into. It’s great if you have a high heat rubber spatula to scrape every last bit out, it is part of your recipe so try no to leave any behind. The butter will be hot and you should wait  at least 20 minutes or more for it to cool. You do not want to cook the egg when you add it!

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