Munchie Monday: Strawberry Lasagna

There is wonderful fresh produce near us at the Dorr Farms.  I like to go over there every week or two to find what they have available.  Right now they have broccoli (BEAUTIFUL LUSCIOUS BROCCOLI!!), kale, other greens, sweet potatoes, onions, honey, etc.  Their biggest seller is the strawberries!  Yes, strawberries.  For a Vermonter it is hard to believe that we could get strawberries out of the garden in March.

The Dorr Farms also has a Facebook page. I love to go there.  About a month ago they had a recipe for No-Bake Strawberry Lasagna on that page.  You can bet that I immediately downloaded the recipe and waited the two weeks until strawberries were ripe.  Yesterday we had Strawberry Lasagna for lunch.

 Here is the recipe.  I do not know where it originated but I found it on Dorr Farms Facebook page.  I will note below my changes.

No Bake Strawberry Lasagna

2 cups strawberries, sliced

2 cups heavy cream

1 8-ounce package cream cheese, softened

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 Tablespoons milk

1 package graham crackers, mashed into crumbs

1/4 cup melted butter

1/2 cup white chocolate chips

In mixing bowl, beat the heavy cream until stiff peaks form then set aside.

In another bowl, mix the cream cheese and sugar, vanilla extract, and milk until smooth.

Fold the whipped cream into the cream cheese mixture gently.

Mix the melted butter into the graham cracker crumbs.

Spread half of the buttered cracker crumbs into the bottom of a serving dish to form the first layer.

Spread half of the cream cheese whipped cream mixture over the top.  

Add a sprinkle of white chocolate chips then a layer of sliced strawberries.

Put the remaining graham cracker crumbs over the top then the remaining creamy mixture, white chocolate chips, and finally another layer of sliced strawberies.

Refrigerate for at least one hour, or until set.

THINGS I DID DIFFERENTLY

The first thing was that I forgot the vanilla and milk to mix into the cream cheese and sugar mixture.  It worked just fine.  I was using the KitchenAid mixer and the whisk attachment which worked extremely well.

I forgot also the chocolate chips on the first creamy layer. Oh well.  I did remember them for the top.  It was enough.  I did not use them all.

The requirement of "1 package graham crackers" was a bit confusing until I realized they meant one plastic-wrapped package of three in the box of graham crackers.

Also, I did not know what size pan to use so...I used the smaller pan.

Before placing in the refrigerator I covered with plastic wrap since the dish was going to be there overnight.  Cream picks up any erroneous flavors you might have around.  Since I had hoed out the refrigerator very recently I was not really concerned about that but thought: why not just do it?  We have the plastic wrap.  Probably enough to last until the end of the decade...since I talked Dear One into buying a Food Service box a couple of years ago!

The report on this Strawberry Lasagna:  it was very very good!  I used an 8 by 8 or maybe it is 9 by 9 pan.  It might have been smarter to use a slightly larger serving dish but the people who ate it all thought it was just fine. It was very thick, as you can see from the picture.  I myself did not eat a large serving and was completely satisfied.  After our guest and Dear One helped themselves, and Dear One finished his self-served bowl, he started forking out more from the pan. I thought that was pretty funny!  Our guest definitely felt part of the family with that kind of a performance!

Munchie Monday: Another (Semi-) Food Disaster

 When I went to Dorr Farms I picked up two sweet potatoes.  Because I was sort of in a rush, I put them in the air fryer to cook.  As it happens, they were not quite cooked when the timer went off.  Since Dear One is not totally fond of sweet potatoes, I just left them in the oven to "finish up" cooking then ate one of them which was, admittedly, slightly under-done.  The other one that definitely was underdone I put in the refrigerator.

The next day I removed the sweet potato from the refrigerator, sliced it into 1/2 inch slices and laid them out on a piece of parchment paper on a sheet pan.  With my very handy Yeti mug, I smashed them down to about 1/4 inch thick.  I had a small bowl with some leftover seasonings in it to which I added a little bit of olive oil.  Using the red silicon brush, I brushed the seasoned oil on top of all the smashed potatoes, covered them with grated parmesan cheese,  then put them in the air fryer.  I set it at 400 degrees F and 25 minutes.

Either the temperature was too high or the time was too long. Or maybe both.

Here they are!  You can see the parmesan cheese which  more or less melted down.

Actually, these are not as bad as they look.  The black bits are the potato skin. I always scrub potatoes within an inch of their lives then eat the skins, too.  In fact, one of  the delicacies of life is russet potatoes baked then cut in half, the innards scooped out and butter and salt put on the potato skins.  So good.  So bad for you. At least that butter is bad for me.  You can tell that by looking at me...oh, what am I saying?!  I never let people take pictures of me.  At least I prefer not to.  Which is, of course, not great for family history work...

I can hear you asking why I left these sweet potatoes to burn.  Well, I was busy on another project and I DID smell the potatoes but they only smelled like they were cooking, not like they were burning.  Lesson learned.  Multi-tasking is now beyond me.  And I say lesson learned, but I bet anything that it is not rock solid in my brain yet...more burn notices will probably come my way.

Yes.  I did eat them.  Not all the incinerated skins, though.  Not so tasty...

Wednesday Wonders: Sunflower Field

Yesterday I went to the Dorr Farm store to pick up some vegetables.  Dear One and I had driven over there on Monday to find they were closed that day, despite the website indicating they were open every day.  Dear One did mention the possibility of calling before we went but I was a limp rag on Monday and really wanted some fresh vegetables and blackberries so I did not bother to call. Oh well.

 When I went by myself yesterday to the farm it turned out that the blackberries were either not in season or all sold out...BUT we did get zucchini, yellow crookneck squash, new red potatoes, one cucumber (we don't like cucumbers normally but these from the farm may be good with hummus--after I make the hummus!), and one Cherokee Purple tomato.  

As we drove into the farm along one side of the road on Monday I took great joy in the big field of sunflowers with their heavy heads hanging.  Yesterday I stopped and took some pictures.  Here is one of them.

These flowers reminded me of a trip my sister and I took to New Mexico one year ages ago where we also found sunflowers at the side of the road. In that case they seemed to be the smaller brand of sunflowers and the fields stretched for miles.  They were ALL facing the sun as we drove by.  A very sweet image.

These sunflowers at the Dorr Farm appeared to be the large sunflower-seed plants.  It is so nice to see all the beauties in this world Our Father has given us to inhabit and enjoy.

On the way back from the farm I drove by the road home but it turned out okay because where I thought I was supposed to turn right I recognized the name of the road which I had seen on the CORRECT way home...so I got to drive the whole length of that road instead of just seeing the sign for it at the other end!  It was a lovely rural journey and I still made it back to known territory before the rain struck, which was nice.