Pot Stickers…

A favorite in my family is Pot Stickers. When I was a child, my mother would make huge batches of this Chinese appetizer for dinner. There was five us and it was an all day process, pressing one teaspoon of the meat mixture at a time into the wrapper.

When my husband and I got married, my father-in-law thought he won the lottery, when he found I knew how to make these.  My father-in-law wore contacts and traveled several times a month for work. Air travel dehydrated him to the point his contacts would get uncomfortable to wear. He sound found that if he ate pot stickers, twenty minutes later his eyes would not be so dry.

To be honest, I always thought he was pulling my leg and used it as an excuse to get me to make them for him. It was not until I wore contacts, I was able to test his theory. I was surprised to find that my eyes did not feel as dry after eating them. Strange, I know! I would not recommend though you give up eye drops for pot stickers.

Today I made 100 hundred pot stickers for a friend of my husband. A few weeks back, we had them for dinner and my husband took the leftovers to work. There was more than enough so he shared them with his friends. On Thursday, I got a text from husband asking if I would consider making 100 pot stickers for this person.  At first, I laughed off the request until a response came that it was serious request. So I sat watching the Oakland A’s playing the Chicago Cubs and made pot stickers all afternoon.

Click this link for the recipe!

Peanut Butter Sauce...

Most of you know that I cannot stand peanut butter. My sister-in-law, Brandi loves it, almost as much as I detest it.

One of Brandi’s most favorite ways to eat peanut butter is on her ice cream. This is a two-step process of melting the peanut butter and then pouring on her ice cream. We all know what happens when you pour hot on to cold. Most times Brandi is left with a soupy melted mess, but she loves the peanut butter taste.

I know you are saying why not buy ice cream with peanut butter already in it. I guess I should back up and tell you, it does not matter what variety of ice cream she eats. The ice cream will be covered in peanut butter.

When you can fruit, you make a simple syrup to go into the jar with the fruit. If you have ever bought fruit cocktail on the label, it will state in heavy or light syrup. I took this idea of syrup and started to figure out how to mix it with peanut butter.

I ended up not making the syrup from scratch, I could not get the portions right to make a heavy enough syrup without sending the sugar levels sky high.

I next thought about mixing water to honey and thinning it down, before adding the peanut butter. The peanut butter would pick up the taste of the honey. I also worried, that even though I would thin the honey, it would crystallize. The thought of chunky honey crystals, in a peanut sauce does not sound pleasing to me.

So almost two years later, I was getting ready to make candied popcorn, my hand lands on the clear Karo syrup. This was the “ah ha” moment, when the angels are singing.

Want to know how to make this? Click here!