Easy Butterscotch Cake

I've been buying cookbooks in thrift stores for a few years. One of the first ones I bought had a recipe for a butterscotch tea cake, and when I first tried to make this, I just took out the nuts and followed the recipe as close as I could. It still counts as my own recipe if that's all I did to change it, right?

I think so, and it's a good cake that even my dad likes, so it's going on the blog.

RECIPE:
- 1 box yellow cake mix
- 1 box instant butterscotch pudding
- 3 eggs
- 1/2 cup oil
- 1 cup water
- Cinnamon sugar

Combine first 5 ingredients in a mixer

Pour batter into a greased tube pan

Sprinkle cinnamon sugar all around the top and swirl it with a knife

Bake at 350 for 55-60 minutes

Yes, we use a Dairy Queen cake holder.

This cake is decorated with powdered sugar, but it doesn't need it. It can also be made into cupcakes instead.

Ginger Chicken

This kind of food is my favorite kind, even beating sweet stuff and McDonalds fries. Since I usually stick to the same thing when we order it, worried that I won't like something new and my parents would have wasted their money, I marked a lot of stir-fry recipes in all of the cookbooks in the house, just to find something that I'd like to try.

This came from a Taste of Home magazine, where it was originally a pork tenderloin recipe for two. It's good with pork, but my dad and I made it even better, and to feed our family. It isn't as good as what I order when we go out, but it's good enough that my brother, who is as much of a picky eater as I am, eats the chicken bits.

RECIPE:
- 1 or 2 tablespoons cooking oil
- 2 pounds of meat, chicken or pork tenderloin, cut into cubes
- 2 teaspoons minced garlic cloves
- 6 tablespoons soy sauce
- 1 teaspoon sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon ginger
- 2 cups water
- 6 teaspoons cornstarch
- Lots of white rice

Heat the oil in a skillet on medium-high heat.

Add meat and garlic. Stir-fry until the chicken is no longer pink.

Combine soy sauce, sugar, and ginger in a bowl, and add it to the skillet. Lower the heat to medium.

Combine water and cornstarch and add it to the skillet.

Cook for another 1 or 2 minutes.

Serve with hot cooked rice.

We usually put about half a bag of frozen carrots in this, but that's optional.

For those of you who only need one or two servings, I copied the recipe from the magazine so you didn't have to do math. Follow the same recipe with these numbers:

- 1 tablespoon oil
- 1/2 pound meat
- 1/2 teaspoon garlic
- 2 tablespoons soy sauce
- 1/4 teaspoon sugar
- 1/8 teaspoon ginger
- 1/2 cup water
- 1 1/2 teaspoons cornstarch

Eggnog Bread

Christmas is stressful for a lot of people. Since I am constantly stressed for no reason, giving me a reason is just a meltdown waiting to happen. My dislike of Christmas music and cold weather doesn't help.

But even with the stress, and the cold, and the music, and the inevitable breakdown, I don't hate Christmas. I just hate the Christmas season. On Christmas day, my stress goes back down to normal levels, and I can enjoy my family and the lights and the food.

Until then, I have to come up with coping mechanisms. Last year, it was distracting myself with video games. This year, it's eggnog. So I found a recipe using eggnog, changed it, and my test subjects loved it.

RECIPE

- 2 1/2 cups flour
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 1 tablespoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon nutmeg
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 beaten egg
- 1 1/4 cups eggnog
- 1/3 cup oil

Mix the flour, sugar, baking powder, nutmeg, and salt.

Mix the egg, oil, and eggnog.

Combine the two mixes and pour into 2 greased loaf pans. The book I got the original recipe from says "8x4x2-inch" loaf pans. I am terrible at judging pan measurements, so I used the easiest ones to reach and it turned out fine.

Bake at 350* for 40 or 50 minutes

Don't eat it without a plate or a napkin, because it leaves a lot of crumbs. This bread tastes even better with butter, just like a lot of breads.

Nutmeg Sugar Cookies

This is Christmas time, and it has been since Halloween, but with Thanksgiving behind us I thought I should start off the Christmas cookie collection with my own Christmas cookie recipe.

Nutmeg is one of my favorite spices. I put it in my tea, my pies, and when I found the recipe this one is based on, I decided I needed to put it in my cookies. Then I saw that that recipe was supposed to be rolled out and cut, and decided not to.

When I was first trying this recipe, I forgot how much flour I put in. As it turns out, not as much as I needed. So I changed the amount of flour from the original recipe and called it mine.

RECIPE
- 1/2 cup softened butter
- 1/2 cup shortening
- 1 1/2 cups sugar
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon nutmeg
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 cup sour cream
- 1 egg
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 3 1/2 cups flour
- A small bowl, a spoon, and extra sugar

Mix the butter and shortening until they're combined. Add the sugar, nutmeg, baking soda, and salt. When it's all combined, add the sour cream, egg, and vanilla. Add the flour last.

Scoop out the cookie dough and roll each ball in the bowl of extra sugar.

Bake at 350* for 10 minutes, and then they should look like this: