Cake... Well Sort Of....

A friend of mine just had a baby girl after having a girl, followed by 4 boys. My sister is throwing her a baby shower and I decided I would make her a diaper cake. I know it isn't really food, but since it is called a diaper cake, I figured I would count it. Besides, I'm still behind on my one recipe a month for this year, so this might help me when I count at the end of the year.

What you need:
63 diapers
Assorted Rubberbands
Ribbon
A Cake Plate
A stick
Hot Glue Gun

Take a diaper and roll it starting with the top end and rolling it towards the crease at the bottom of the diaper. Put a rubberband around the now rolled diaper to keep it rolled up. Repeat 62 more times. Create layers of the cake by rubberbanding the rolled up diapers together. The smallest layer will have one rolled diaper surrounded by 6 rolled up diapers. Put a big rubberband around all 7 diapers. To make the second layer, start with making a replica of the top layer and add 12 diapers to the outer edge with a rubberband. The bottom layer is made by creating the middle layer again and then adding 18 more diapers around the outer edge. Using the stick (be careful not to puncture diapers), stack the layers on top of each other. Use a ribbon to cover the rubberbands. Do not stick the ribbon to the diapers, but rather, hot glue the ribbon to itself. Decorate with whatever themed embellishments you choose and you are done. My friend is a huge fan of anything patriotic and even named her daughter Liberty, so I chose a patriotic theme for the diaper cake. For my first attempt, I don't think it looks half bad. :)

Funeral Potatoes

This recipe can be made in several different ways. I have made it twice now and both were pretty easy. One was with a crock pot and hash browns and the other was in the oven with actual potatoes. You could also make them with hash browns in the oven or with the actual potatoes in the crock pot. I guess it just depends on what you feel like doing.

Ingredients
2 cans cream of anything soup (I used potato, but chicken or anything would work)
1 small container of sour cream (I always use fat free. It still tastes great and no extra fat)
1 package of hash browns OR 6 potatoes cut up into chunks and boiled for about half an hour or until they are soft. You don't want them fall apart soft, but you don't want any of the raw cruchiness that they have.
Lots of cheese

In the crock pot, combine all ingredients except about a cup of cheese. Top with the remaining cheese and turn the crock pot on until the soupy mixture bubbles and the cheese is melted.

In the oven, combine all ingredients and pour into a 9x13 glass pan. Top with cheese and put in the oven at 350 degrees for about 30 minutes or until the soupy mixture is bubbling and the cheese is melted.

Salt to taste.

Super easy and you can't really go wrong with cheese and potatoes. :)
Also, just for fun, I used peppercorn cheese that we had got from the Cache Valley Cheese Factory in Utah. It was pretty good, but I have mostly had these with cheddar cheese or a mexican blend cheese.

BBQ Ribs

So, I'm sure by now, it is no secret that I love my crock pot(s)! I bought some ribs at the store and was looking for an easy way to make them. Well, I found a super simple crock pot recipe. It took me longer to wash the crock pot than it took to actually make the food. I took one onion and diced it and put it in the crock pot. I unwrapped my ribs and put seasoning on them. The recipe I found said to just use salt and pepper. While I intended to do that, I ended up putting a garlic and herb spice mix on them instead. Pour in a bottle of bbq sauce and turn the crock pot on. The recipe called for cooking on low for 8 to 10 hours. I didn't get them in as early as I wanted, so I put it on high. We ended up heading to Casa Grande for Brian to work and our quick trip turned into him working and me visiting with Stephanie and then when our husbands were done with work, we all visited for a while. Anyway, that means that my ribs cooking on high for 4 to 5 hours ended up cooking on high for about 9 hours. They still turned out amazing and literally fell off the bones when I tried to take them out. I had to scoop the meat out and Brian said they were delicious. I was dealing with heartburn at the time, so I didn't actually eat any. I will probably use creole seasoning next time to give them some more kick for the hubby. While I enjoy spicy, spicy things have been wreaking havoc on my esophagus lately, so I may have to wait to try some spicy ones. We used these ribs for just eating ribs, but with how tender the meat ended up, they would be really easy to shred the meat and use it in tacos or chimichangas or enchiladas or bbq sandwiches or anything you could think of really. I will definitely make these again and again. PS - The ribs were on sale at the grocery store, so they were super cheap too!!!! :)