Friday Night Lights

Before we leave Texas my children needed to experience the Friday Night Lights.  I took them to a high school football game.  Not just any game, The Wurstbowl between the two New Braunfels high schools' teams.

Our New Braunfels Unicorns

vs.
the Canyon Cougars

We wore our Unicorn blue.  Alayna worked on signs and a cheer*.  She also used her credits in class to purchase a mini #1 finger.  I was in charge of the three Ts:  Tickets, Transportation and Treats (apple slices and a roll of mints).

It was an extremely fun night.  I did a lot of explaining as the game was played.  We followed the cheerleaders' calls, we stomped, we jumped, we yelled.  Many times I would catch myself yelling, "Go, Cougars!"  After all the years I have spent as a Cougar, high school, college and as an alumnus, it is a difficult habit to break.  We were having such fun, we didn't even leave after the halftime show as planned.

My goodness, the halftime show.  Nothing like my days at the Ranch.  Both marching bands performed their competition pieces with full formation movements involving the flag teams and baton twirlers (ours were twirling 3 batons each!).  The dance teams** performed their numbers, accompanied by their band.  All lead by the drum major and at least 2 assistant drum majors.  Watch this for an example.  Not this year's, but whoa!

The Unicorn thunderstix were a big success.  The best part of the game for Alayna?  The Unicorns won 30-27.  The best part for me?  I received a number of compliments on what wonderful children I have.  Oh, and the blinged Unicorn jersey I bought.

The most anxious part of the evening was getting all three children safely back to the van.  Out of the stadium lights, it is dark and there are a lot of people and cars.  Everyone stayed close, and as we went thru the non-parking lot where vehicles were driving and parked I had Alayna wave her thunderstix to be seen, even though, as she pointed out, it doesn't glow.  We made it intact to the van and chatted about the fun we had until my heart rate had returned to normal.  By then the traffic had cleared and we went home and to bed.

* Alayna's cheer
Blue is great
Blue is bright
Let's go, Unicorns!
You know how to fight!

** The New Braunfels dance team is called The Monoceras and Mystics, complete with Majors, Lieutenants and there is even a "social officer".

Apple Cider Doughnuts

This spring I was a tester for a gluten free recipe book, I'm even listed in the acknowledgments.  One of the items I made was struffoli which involved deep frying marble sized dough balls that are then piled up with a honey glaze drizzled over all of them.  Since I only did one test of the frying the oil was still "clean" and I stuck it in the freezer to make doughnuts some other time.

Now that we are moving it is time to clear out the freezer.  I decided, instead of throwing away this oil, I would make those doughnuts I had been planning for half the year.  I happened to purchase some apple cider and wanted a fun way to use it.  I did a Pinterest search for apple cider doughnuts and reviewed my previous gluten free doughnut pins.  Then I made a conglomerate recipe that I adapted to be gluten free.  Does that make it my own recipe?  I cooked them two ways.

Baked in my mini doughnut maker.

and fried in my defrosted oil.

Apple Cider Doughnuts

Ingredients

1 cup apple cider

1 cup rice flour

3/4 cups glutonous rice flour

1/2 cup potato starch

1/4 cup tapioca starch

1 tsp xanthan gum

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/4 tsp nutmeg

6 Tbs melted butter

1/4 cup brown sugar

1 egg

1/4 cup greek yogurt

1 finely diced small apple

Directions

Reduce apple cider to a syrup, roughly a 1/4 cup and let cool.  Stir together the dry ingredients.  Whisk butter sugar and egg.  Dump egg mixture, yogurt and apple in the middle of the dry ingredients and slowly bring together.  Knead the dough a bit.

Using a small cookie scoop, divide dough.  I was able to make 33 balls.  Fry for 4 minutes in 150-170° oil or bake for 5 minutes in doughnut maker.  Either one, you are trying to get a dark golden colour.

I glazed mine with a 1 cup powdered sugar/3 Tbs apple cider mix.

While both versions were very yummy, we all agreed that the fried doughnut holes were the best.

Brownie Batter Ice Cream

For months after I received my ice cream maker I attempted to make Brownie Batter Ice Cream.  I would make a batch of brownie batter from the Brownie Lady/Sacrament Brownies recipe we have.  I would make different modifications, omitting the marshmallows, baking powder, eggs, replacing the eggs, etc.  I adjusted the ratio of batter to ice cream base (baking the leftovers for brownies that were sometimes used as a mix-in for a brownie batter/brownie chunk ice cream).  All iterations resulted in yummy, chocolaty ice cream, but not THE brownie batter ice cream I was envisioning.

In March I pinned a recipe for brownie batter ice cream that simply used brownie mix -  DRY and added cocoa powder.  This was a novel concept to me, and exciting.  Except, I had moved on to other delicious ice cream creations.  I will share my Al-Mound of Ice Cream Joy recipe.  With Lex's corn intolerance I had also been on the hunt for a new brownie recipe (we have found two).  Until now.  This week I made my own version of brownie batter ice cream.  It was spot on to my imaginings and I had to stop myself from eating eat out of the ice cream maker to save for tonight.  I knew I needed to write this down before I lost my page of scribbled starting points, adjustments, ratios, etc or simply forgot what I did with all those numbers, especially the parts that weren't written down.

Brownie Batter Ice Cream

Ingredients
Base
1 (14 oz) can of coconut milk (we use GoldenStar brand)
1/4 tsp salt
3 egg yolks
3 Tbs brown sugar
1 1/2 oz dark chocolate (we use bittersweet chips from Ghirardelli)
1 tsp vanilla

Dry Mix
2 1/2 Tbs rice flour
1 Tbs potato starch
1/2 Tbs tapioca starch
3 Tbs brown sugar
1 Tbs cocoa powder
1/8 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cocoa nibs

Directions
Heat coconut milk and salt in a double boiler.  Put chocolate and vanilla in a separate bowl.  In another bowl, whisk together egg yolks and brown sugar.  Temper egg mixture with heated coconut milk (150-160°) then add to the double boiler.  As mixture reaches 160°, stir for 2 minutes.  Pour thru strainer into bowl with the chocolate and vanilla.  Stir to melt chocolate and combine.  Allow mixture to cool in refrigerator overnight.

Grind cocoa nibs to powder.  Mix together all dry ingredients with whisk.  Churn ice cream mixture and dry mix in the ice cream maker.  Try not to eat it all as you transfer it to a container for the freezer.