Sriracha Honey Oyster Crackers

WOAH MAMA!
These could not be any easier and watch out you better make a triple batch of these bad boys cause once they start they won't stop eating these!
Sriracha is life bae, NO I'm kidding, I'll just go ahead at slap myself now for even attempting to say that.
I actually picked up these oyster crackers for a stew I am making, but I was looking at this big old bag of oyster crackers and thought no way are we gonna need all of those. Hummm what kind of appetizer can I create with these?!
I know I have issues.  One of my tag lines on some sort of forum is "I wonder if there is an outpatient program for addicts of appetizers?!"
Now I will be honest here, this was not fully my idea, I was cruzin' my good old pal Pintrest and came across this recipe that The Cookie Rookie came up with and it sounded right up my alley.  I just changed some amounts to my liking.
You should check her out, she makes some really great stuff!

Here is what you need:
1 stick of butter
1/2 cup vegetable oil
3 Tablespoons Sriracha
4 Tablespoons Maple Syrup, use your favorite!
1 1/2 Tablespoons Honey, I like to use a local brand, if you can get one in your neck of the woods
1 Teaspoon Seasoned Salt
10 oz oyster crackers

How to make them:
Preheat oven to 200
SO simple, warm up your oil and butter in a skillet
Once that is incorporated stir in the honey, salt, Sriracha & syrup
Make sure that gets all blended together, bring to a gentle boil
Now add the crackers, coat them well
Line a baking sheet, scatter out those oyster crackers evenly
Bake for 1 hour
I could tell just by the smell of these even before going into the oven how awesome they were going to taste, and I was right!

Hope you enjoy!

Mexican Street Nachos

You heard me right Mexican Street Nachos!  If you have never had Mexican Street Corn, you are missing out it is so creamy wonderful!  Roasted Corn people is frickin awesome, I don't know what kind of magic happens when you blacken that corn but mmmmm.....
I have only had Mexican Street Corn one time in a little Mexican restaurant in Stillwater, MN you can read about that here, Stillwater Eats.

Now you take that Mexican Street Corn and turn it into Nachos! 
It was game day all day at our house last Sunday, and this is what I whipped up, they were so good! 

This is what you need:
1 bag of tortilla chips, I picked some up at Sams club they were organic and like huge scoops
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoon cornstarch
2 tablespoon mayo
2 cans corn
3 green onions, chopped
1 tablespoon diced jalapenos
6oz feta cheese or queso fresco
2 cups montery jack cheese
1 cup sharp white cheddar cheesse
1 cup half and half
1/2 cup sour cream
1 lime
Paprika
Cilantro

How to make it:
If you have a cast iron skillet, I would use that to roast the corn, if not a frying pan will do.
Add your butter to the hot pan and fry up the corn until they blacken a bit, remove from heat and add the mayo, green onions and jalapenos.
In another pan heat your cheese, half and half, sour cream until melted at this point ad the corn starch to thicken up the cheese mixture, if that is to thick and more half and half.
Now I was not fancy or anything I just used a deep baking sheet piled up my nachos, next the corn mixture followed by drizzling on that creamy cheese, top with the nice big chunks of feta.
Sprinkle with paprika, chopped cilantro finally squeeze lime juice on top.
And serve!
If you want to be fancy pants use a nice large serving tray.
We really like this variation of nachos!
Enjoy!

Holiday Munchies!

A belated Merry Christmas to you all!
What a busy time of year this was!  I went to a few Christmas celebrations and brought a few appetizers to share.
The first party was at my sisters, I brought my Lumpia to share that went over very well and got gobbed up!

Next would be a trip to my uncles where of course I was asked to bring a couple appetizers, go figure!

I brought with Amy Thielen's Onion Chip Dip and I turned my new Wild Rice Stuffed Jalepenos from this summer, into Stuffed Mushrooms!

My last party was with my husband's side and that was a brunch, my mother in law brought a nummy cheese ball,one of these days I need to get a recipe for.  I made a brunch.

Today is all day football with the hubbie, I will be making Street Corn Nacho's!  I can't wait to try that!

New Years Eve is right around the corner, I will be making my annual Cowboy Caviar, got to have the black eyed peas to ring in the New Year & have good luck!
And also a spicy oyster stew for the husband.

Links to all the recipes are above.  I will be sharing soon with you all the Street Corn Nachos!

Hope you had a wonderful holiday season!

Stuffed Pull Apart Pizza Bread

Who does not like pizza, am I right!?
This Stuffed bread is a hit at any party.  I have another variation of this bread that I got from my Auntie Susie that you can read about here Stuffed Bread, and oh my gosh this post is OLD & done so poorly.  Thinking I need to redo that one!
Remember in one of my past posts that I had a big fail?  It was this but, I was going to do a pull apart monkey bread, most people make that in a bunt pan, well I donated mine years ago because I never used it.  So I thought I would use a Springform pan, umm ya don't do that the inside will not cook so you leave it in the oven longer and longer and longer because the center of the bread is still dough.  Once that is finally done the outside of the bread is charred black!
So, I have another idea for that Monkey Bread, another day my friends.
In the mean time I thought I would share this lovely fun party bread, all will like!
You can make it so many different ways too, I kept this one simple because my youngest is kinda picky and was going to be eating some of this.
Ill put a little bowl of added foods we grownups can add to ours if need be.

Here is what you will need:
1 Loaf of bread, not sliced.  I used a small sour dough today.  Italian would be nice.
3-4 Tablespoons butter
1 Teaspoon garlic powder
1 Tsp. onion powder
1 Tablespoon Italian seasoning
30'ish pepperonis
1 1/2 Cups mozzarella, shredded
Your favorite pizza sauce for dipping

How to make it:
Preheat your oven to 350
Slice your bread diagonal then cross cross in the opposite direction, while being careful not to cut all the way to the bottom.
Here comes the messy part, start stuffing butter into all the cracks in the bread, being careful not to rip your bread.
In a bowl mix all your seasonings, meat and cheese.
Now start stuffing that into the cracks of the bread.
Wrap the bread in tin foil, sorta making a tent with the foil so the cheese from the bread is not sticking to the foil.

Bake this scrumptious bread for 45 minutes.
Place your bread on a serving plate with a side of warm pizza sauce.
Let your guests rip a chunks of bread off.  But I would put a bread knife out also.
Like I said you can make this into what you want, ad some of your favorite pizza toppings.
I'm going to put out a little bowl of sliced black olives and banana peppers, and maybe some peppeochinis to add to ours today. Normally I would have stuffed that into my bread.

Hope you enjoy!
Also check out my other stuffed bread recipe.  Link above!

*note on the only photo I got of this appetizer, that is really crappy I may ad, I realized after we polished off half the loaf I never took a photo!  We were pretty hungry.  OPPS!!!

Roasted Garlic Asiago Cheese Ball

What would the holidays be without a classic cheese ball!?!
This bad boy is full of great flavor.
One of my favorite food smells next to bacon or onions frying would be roasted garlic, mmmm can't you just smell it?
I am all about quick and easy appetizers, and especially during the holidays.  There is so much going on, I love to cook but I want to make things go as smooth as possible.

There are only a few ingredients and a few easy steps to make this.
Also, bonus make a few balls at once, wrap them separately in plastic wrap pop into your fridge bring out when you have company or bring as a hostess gift.  Going to Aunt Mary's for Christmas? Bring a cheese ball and a box of your favorite crackers, she will love it!

Just for the record I do not have an Aunt Mary. ;)
I have so many cheeseball recipes it's embarrassing.  Sometimes I like to make the cheese mixture into something other than a ball, like a wreath, snowman, tree, lots of individual mini balls to name a few!

You can roll them in so many different toppings pecans, walnuts, chives, parsley, crushed pretzels, bacon bits, sesame seeds, red hots NO I'm kidding!!!  Unless you have no sense of taste or are pregnant do not add red hot candies.

What you need:
2 Heads of garlic
6 oz cream cheese, softened
1 Cup Asiago cheese, shredded
1/4 Cup greek yogurt
2 Tablespoons Parsley, chopped
1/4 Cup Pecans, chopped
Olive oil for drizzling
*A dash of liquid smoke, optional

How to make it:
Start off by preheating your oven to 400 degrees
Cut the heads off your garlic, exposing the cloves, peel away any loose skin
Place garlic heads face up in tin foil drizzle with olive oil, wrap garlic in the tin foil and roast for 40 minutes
While your garlic is roasting away, mix your cream cheese, yogurt, asiago cheese & a dash of liquid smoke (lq. smoke is optional), set aside
You're still waiting for your garlic aren't you?  Yup.  Ok well start chopping your parsley and nuts.
Place them in a bowl and set aside.
Once your garlic is done, now you need to wait for it to cool off.  Kinda a waiting game for this cheese ball process I guess huh?  Hummm maybe  not as fast as I thought it was.
Alright, I think your garlic is cooled off now, here is the fun part!  Squeeze each one of those little garlic cloves out of the casings into your cheese mixture.
Mix very well, you do not want big chunks of garlic so you might want to cut them up or if you have a food processor, use that.
Next, if you have disposable kitchen gloves you might want to get those out for this part.
Scoop up all that fragrant garlic cheese mixture and start forming into into a ball, working it back and forth in both hands.
Place that ball in plastic wrap and pop into your fridge for at least 1 hour.
Ding ding ding 1 hour is up, your cheese ball is now more firm.  Unwrap and roll in the nut and parsley mix.
Place the cheese ball on a pretty little serving plate and surround by your favorite cracker!
Hope you enjoy!

*Here's my excuse for not doing a new appetizer for a while, I had a big fail on a new aptz bite I was trying to come up with, that I will continue to work on.
I'm sure I will be asked to bring an appetizer to Christmas so mabye I will do a new dish & share that with you all soon!

The Iron Door Pub

Friday night date night, we went Uptown.  We don't do that to much anymore, I think the last time we did was at the late Boneyard, that has now closed.  Not to sure why, because that place was always hoppin' , food was great and the atmosphere was a ton of fun.  They even had valet parking.  Alright Ill stop dwelling on that.
Also another fun find that is now closed was The Cafeteria, I had only been there once but it was good stuff.
On to The Iron Door Pub, I found on Twitter a list The Growler put out Kind-Of-A-Big-Deal list, on hot spots in the Twin Cities.  Well really Minnesota.  That list contains awesome Beer, Spirits, Food & Culture. 
On that list was The Iron Door Pub.  This is on the corner of Lake Street & Lyndale, awesome location, tons of windows to watch all the busy happenings on the busy streets.
Total bonus, they have their own parking lot in the back, not super big but we got a spot.
Our server was totally on the ball, super attentive and funny as heck.  I got a skunky beer and he took that back with no problem and exchanged it at no extra cost. I love when there is no hassle. 
A large variety of local brews here, that is always a good thing!
There is a dart board and I think some games but I'm not positive about that. 
It was not very busy when we were there, around 7:30 on a Friday night, but that could just be because there are so many choices of places to eat in that area.
Husband wanted an appetizer, I told him he could choose.  I think that shocked him because I am the self proclaimed queen of appetizers. 
He picked the Warm Butter Nuts, I was like really, all those choices and that is what you pick?!? 
Well I did tell him, that he could decide. 
And if I go back over all of my restaurant reviews I think this has happened before.  You would have thought I learned my lesson.
But, to my surprise the Warm Buttered Nuts were really good!  We couldn't stop munching on them.  Really quite simple, a variety of nuts warmed up on a skillet in butter!  And those puppies stayed warm! 

Ok on to the grub.  the picture the Growler Magazine used to advertise this location was a Philly Cheese Steak, so that is what I had my mind set on.  I believe you get a chose of tator tots, fris or potato salad.
I picked fries.  The sandwich was huge!  Gotta say not my favorite, not to be gross but my first bite was very fatty, I could not chew it.  So hubbie loves leftovers!  Ya I didn't eat that :(  But I did love those nuts!

Husband got a huge burger, The Burger Royal', you know like in the movie, Pulp Fiction! 
Very clever!  Really a copy Cat version of The Big Mac. He choice tator tots.

I mean seriously that burger was BIG!  And he ate every last bite.  He said it was amazing.
The prices were good too.
I would for sure go back here, I'd just try something different.