When new cooking magazines arrive in the mail do you savor the moment when you can seek out the must-make-recipes?  When I read through the September, 2011 Southern Living magazine the Easy Skillet Apple Pie popped out as the recipe I-had-make-immediately. Since Georgia peaches are in season I switched apples for a combination of peaches and blueberries. To save a few calories, I decreased the amount of sugar and butter called for in the original recipe. The caramel-y goodness that resides under the bottom crust is soo delicious.

This recipe is fun for the whole family to prepare and enjoy together.

Easy Peach and Blueberry Skillet Pie

Ingredients

• 8 ripe peaches
• 2 cups blueberries
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/4 cup granulated sugar
• 1/4 cup butter
• 1/3 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
• 1  (14.1-oz.) package refrigerated piecrusts
• 2 tablespoons flour
• 1  egg white
• 2 tablespoons granulated sugar

Preparation

• Preheat oven to 350º. Peel peaches, and cut into 1/2-inch-thick wedges. In a medium bowl, toss peaches and blueberries with cinnamon and 1/4 cup granulated sugar.
• Melt butter in a 10-inch cast-iron skillet over medium heat. Add brown sugar, stirring constantly, 1 to 2 minutes or until sugar is dissolved. Remove from skillet from the heat, and place 1 piecrust in skillet over brown sugar mixture. Sprinkle flour on the bottom of the pie crust. Spoon peach mixture over piecrust, and top with remaining piecrust. Whisk egg white until foamy. Brush top of piecrust with egg white; sprinkle with 2 tablespoons granulated sugar. Cut 4 or 5 slits in top for steam to escape.
• Bake at 350º for 1 hour to 1 hour and 10 minutes or until golden brown and bubbly, shielding with aluminum foil during last 10 minutes to prevent excessive browning, if necessary. Cool on a wire rack 30 minutes before serving.

For tips on how to clean your cast iron skillet, check out these tips from Real Simple.

Recipe adapted from: Mrs. James Wright, Chattanooga, Tennessee, Southern Living
SEPTEMBER 2011

Awarding Winning Cupcake Recipe

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Chocolate and peanut butter is a winning combination. And when you bite into this cupcake from Chocolate Pink Cafe in Atlanta, GA you’ll know why members of the Atlanta Food Bloggers’ Alliance voted the Chocolate Peanut Butter Cupcake (click for pdf of recipe) their all-round favorite cupcake at a recent tasting.

Executive Pastry Chef Christian Balbierer is passionate about flavor – complex flavor layering in his sumptuous desserts. On a recent Sunday afternoon, he opened the upstairs social space at Chocolate Pink Cafe to over a dozen food bloggers to learn more about his fresh approach to using best quality chocolate and unique flavor combinations to make one of a kind delicacies — and to vote on their favorite cupcake.

Judging cupcakes is no easy task. We were asked to consider: Flavor. Texture. Presentation. Uniqueness. Best Overall. The 1st Annual Chocolate Pink Cupcake Contest was a workout for the senses and the taste buds. Here’s a sneak peak of the tasting fun!

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Round 1 Tasting Plate (L – R): Dulce de Leche, Strawberry Pop Tart, Chocolate Peanut Butter, Cookies & Cream

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Round 2 Tasting Plate (L – R): Chocolate Nutella, Chocolate Fudge, Sweet Potato Brown Butter, Pumpkin Maple w/ Bacon

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Like cupcakes?  Chocolate Pink Cafe invites you to personally sample a cupcake along with their other treats with this printable coupon or call to arrange an online order.

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Which were my favorites?!!  Strawberry Pop Tart, Cookies & Cream and Sweet Potato Brown Butter

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Meet some of our friends from the Atlanta Food Bloggers’ Alliance:

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• The Self Trained Chef
• Maggie Cubbler
• Ultra Foodie
• Red Velvet Confections
• Food Victorian
• Ever so Sweet
• The Constant Gobbler
• What’s 4 Dinner Tonite

May your holidays be filled with the sweet laughter of family and friends.

This oatmeal cookie recipe is just fabulous – loaded with cranberries, raisins, walnuts, and of course oatmeal!  I made them the other day but decided to make mini-cookies instead of regular sized.  A party for your mouth in one single bite!!

OATMEAL COOKIES

3/4 c butter, softened

1 cup packed brown sugar

1/2 c granulated sugar

1 t baking powder

1/2 t cinnamon

1/4 t baking soda

1/4 t salt

2 eggs

1 t vanilla

1 3/4 c flour

2 c quick cooking oats

1/2 c raisins

1/2 c sweetened dried cranberries

1/2 c chopped walnuts

DIRECTIONS:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  In a large bowl, beat the butter with a mixer for 30 seconds.  Add the sugars, baking powder, cinnamon, baking powder and salt.  Beat until combined, be sure to scrape the sides of the bowl.  Beat in the flour and the oats, and then add the raisins, cranberries and walnuts.

Drop the dough onto an ungreased cookie sheet (I use parchment paper to put the dough on).  Bake for 8-10 minutes, or until the edges are brown.  Let the cookies cool on the cookie sheet for 1 minutes, then cool on a wire rack.

Guest Columnist: Kitri McGuire, Sokol Blosser Winery

As we enter 2009, Mama Says is pleased to kick-off a series of guest column features. Several times each month we will invite a variety of experts, friends and family to shares innovative ideas, thrifty tips, WOW gift ideas and scrumptious recipes.

In a Mama Says Thanksgiving column we mentioned pairing turkey with Evolution Wine from Sokol Blosser Winery.  That was the beginning of a wonderful relationship. We are pleased to have Kitri McGuire,Sokol Blosser marketing communications manager, as our first guest columnist. Mark your calendars, Evolution 13th Edition is scheduled for release on March 1, 2009 and will hit stores in the US soon after that!  In the meantime, chill, pour, sip Evolution 12 and enjoy some dessert.

Easy, Impressive, and Thrifty Poached Pear Dessert                                   – Kitri McGuire

To me, the key to great entertaining is being able to actually enjoy time with my guests!  If I’m slaving away in the kitchen, sweating over the timing of the courses or how I possibly could have forgotten 1⁄4 teaspoon of some specialty herb that makes or breaks a dish, it’s not fun.  So, I’m always on the lookout for simple yet extraordinary recipes that don’t require a lot of fuss or special, expensive ingredients.

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A friend told me about this recipe for poached pears in Mirielle Guiliano’s book, French Women Don’t Get Fat, and I just had to try it with Evolution wine from Sokol Blosser Winery, where I work. It was fabulous!  The best thing about the dessert is that I was able to easily prepare it before my guests arrived, then refrigerate the pears until I was ready to assemble the ingredients and serve.  Best of all, there was half a bottle of Evolution left over after the recipe, which I poured as a “dessert wine” for my guests.  You can learn more about Evolution wine at www.sokolblosser.com.  Enjoy, and cheers!

Poached Pears in Evolution

Serves 4

Ingredients

2 cups Evolution wine

1⁄2 cup sugar

2 tablespoons lemon juice

4 Bosc pears, peeled, halved, then cored

4 scoops of vanilla ice cream, or homemade whipped cream

Directions

1. Ina heavy saucepan, bring the Evolution wine and sugar to a boil.  Lower the heat and simmer for 5 more minutes.

2. Add the lemon juice and pears.  Flip the pears to make sure all sides are covered with the Evolution “juices”.  Cook for 10 minutes over medium to low flame.  Cool and refrigerate.

3. Bring the pears to room temperature before serving.  Add 1 scoop vanilla ice cream or homemade whipped cream to each serving.  Or, for extra luxury, serve each pear in a little pool of melted dark chocolate.

Thanks, Kitri. Best for 2009, Lynn & Iris

Favorite Things: Nellie & Joe’s Famous Key Lime Juice

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Sunday evening the Mama Says team gathered for a celebratory dinner at Mama Iris’s. Needless to say it was a very tasty evening and a wonderful opportunity for us to say thank you to our extended team.

John, our treasured web guru, mentioned that tart key lime pie was his favorite dessert. I was up for the challenge to make a delicious yet tart pie. Several years ago my friend Linda visited Key West, Florida and returned with a bottle of Nellie & Joe’s Famous 100% Key Lime Juice as a gift. This lime juice makes a wonderful key lime pie and is also fantastic in marinades, dressings and mojitos!

Key Lime Pie

Time: 45 minutes Serves: 8 Easy

Ingredients
For crust
1 1/4 cups graham cracker crumbs from 9 (2 1/4-inch by 4 3/4-inch) crackers
1 tablespoon sugar
5 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted

For filling
1 (14-ounce) can sweetened condensed milk
4 large egg yolks
1/2 cup bottled Key Lime juice
Zest from 1 lime

Optional toppings
Whipped cream
Blueberries
Lime wedges
Fruit compote

Preparation
Make crust:

Heat oven to 350°F. Stir together graham cracker crumbs, sugar, and butter in a bowl with a fork until combined well, then press mixture evenly onto bottom and up side of a 9-inch glass pie plate.

Bake crust for 10 minutes; remove from oven to cool. Leave oven on.

Make filling and bake pie:

Whisk condensed milk, yolks and lime zest together in a bowl. Add juice and whisk until combined; the mixture will thicken slightly.

Pour filling into crust and bake in middle of oven for 15 minutes. Remove from oven and allow pie to cool on a rack. The filling will set as it cools, then chill, covered, at least 8 hours. Serve with optional toppings.

Note: This makes a tart pie — to lessen the tartness, add an additional tablespoon of sugar to the crust and decrease the amount of lime zest in the filling.

Thanks for joining us in the kitchen,