Recipe Exchange...Strawberry "Crumb Top" Pound Cake

Hey yawl!  I am SUPER excited to be sharing this recipe with you today!  Savannah with Hammock Tracks asked me to join in on a recipe exchange with her.  I was a little nervous at first as I have never been apart of one before...buuuuttttt....I decided that this was a great opportunity to try something new AND connect with a fellow blogger.  Total win - win situation in my opinion! 

The way this works if you (like me) have never been apart of a recipe exchange before is this...we both peruse each others recipe files until we find a dozen things something that we'd like to try making for ourselves.  After slobbering all over my keyboard drooling over several options that Savannah had to choose from, I settled on her Strawberry Pound Cake. 

I will not lie, the major driving force behind this is my oldest son's insatiable craving for strawberries.  This kid can put away a pound of strawberries for breakfast alone...then polish off another pound after soccer practice and STILL want more.  To say he loves strawberries is a bit of an understatement.

And while the rest of us like them...we prefer them in our oatmeal or drowned in powdered sugar and scattered on top of pound cake.  So when I saw Savannah's recipe to put them IN our pound cake...I was SOLD!

I have to admit, I tweaked her recipe just a wee bit but I truly believe it would have been just as delicious had I left it alone. 

The main change that I made was adding a cinnamon crumb topping...just look at all that crumbly goodness on there!

OH my word...This cake was TO. DIE. FOR!

I can not thank Savannah enough for introducing me to this AMAZING recipe! 

Do yourself a favor and go make a loaf of this cake...brew a cup of tea...and sit down in front of your computer and enjoy all that Savannah with Hammock Tracks has to offer!

You'll be glad you did!

Strawberry Pound Cake with Crumb Topping

by Savannah with Hammock Tracks

6022746

Ingredients (1 loaf)

Strawberry Pound Cake

• 2 large eggs
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 1/2 tsp almond extract
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 1 -1/2 cups all purpose flour
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 -1/2 cups strawberries, hulled and thinly sliced

Cinnamon Crumb Topping

• 1/4 cup COLD butter
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 1/4 tsp. cinnamon
• 1/4 cup flour

Instructions

Strawberry Pound Cake

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Spray (1) loaf pan generously with baking spray.

In mixing bowl, beat the eggs until light and fluffy, then beat in the oil until blended.

Beat in the sugars until well blended.

Add almond extract and mix until incorporated.

In a separate bowl, stir together the flour, baking soda and salt.

Beat all but 2 tablespoons of the dry mixture into the egg/oil mixture.

Add the strawberries to the remaining dry mixture and toss to coat the berries well.

Fold this mixture into the batter and pour into prepared pan.

Sprinkle Crumb Topping on top and press into with palm of hand.

Bake in oven for 60 min. or until toothpick inserted in middle comes out clean.

Cinnamon Crumb Topping

Cut in butter to sugars, cinnamon and flour to form crumbs.

Sprinkle crumbs on loaf.

Powered by Recipage

Bake Me Happy...Cinnamon Crumb Sticks

We have this local pizza place here named Double Daves.  Let me just start by saying, their pizzas are delish, but their Pepperoni Rolls ROCK!  Totally. Love. Them!  But I have to be honest and tell you that what calls us back there time and again is not the pizza nor the rolls.  It is their cinnamon sticks.  

There truly are no words to describe them. 

They are out of this world.  AH-Mazing!

We can eat a whole tray of these things before we even eat our dinner...then we want to take another tray home to snack on later.  We don't, of course, but we WANT to.  Ok, sometimes we do. 

Jeesh...don't be so judgy! 

Well, one day I was purusing the Internet and I found these totally awesome looking Cinnamon Crumby thingys that looked just like them!  So I had to make them and find out for myself.  (Forgive me for not linking back to the site I found them at as I have no idea where it was...I printed the recipe and stuck it in a folder and it doesn't say anywhere on it where it came from....grrrrrr). 

This recipe sat on my counter for a week as I tried to find sometime to make them. 

Then on Thursday, after my sons baseball practice, I came home to find these sitting on the counter.

Mr. AKM had come home from school early and decided to surprise us all with a little treat!

And not only did he make these awesome little snacks...which taste WAY better then Double Daves, he took pictures of the whole process. 

Isn't he the awesome-st EVER?  I think so! 

Just get a look at all that cinnamon and sugary goodness! 

YUM-O!

So if your looking for an easy, cinnamon-y, totally DELISH treat, you simply MUST make these!

Heck, if Mr. AKM can pull these off, anyone can!

Cinnamon Crumb Sticks

by Angi McCarthy

Keywords: dessert cinnamon

Ingredients

Cinnamon Crumb Topping

• 1/4 cup COLD butter
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 1/4 tsp. cinnamon
• 1/4 cup flour
• 1 can Pillsbury Cresent Rolls

Glaze

• 1/2 cup powdered sugar
• 1 Tbsp. softened butter
• 1 1/4 tsp. vanilla
• 1 to 1 1/2 Tbsp. milk

Instructions

Cinnamon Crumb Topping

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.

Cut in butter to sugars, cinnamon and flour to form crumbs.

On an ungreased cookie sheet, separate crescent roll dough into (8) triangles.

Sprinkle crumbs on top of each triangle.

Bake at 400 deg. for 8 - 12 minutes.

Glaze

Blend all ingredients together, drizzle over Cinnamon Crumb Sticks after they are removed from oven.

Eat and enjoy!

Powered by Recipage

You may find this post partying in the following places:

Monday:  Debbie Doos - The Girl Creative - Skip to My Lou - Craft O Maniac - Lisa's Craft Blog - The DIY Show Off -Everything Under the Moon

Tuesday:  Not Just A Housewife - My Uncommon Slice of Suburbia - Clean and Scentsible - Crazy For Crust - recipes - Uncommon Designs

Wednesday:  Savvy Southern Style - Blue Cricket Design - Seven Thirty-Three - Someday Crafts - Michele Raven Designs/

Thursday:  Delightful Order - Something Swanky - Recipes - The How To Mommy - A Little Nosh          

Friday:  Dwell on Joy- Finding Fabulous - Chic on a Shoestring Decorating - Fingerprints on the Fridge - Shabby Nest - Whipperberry – Miss Mustard Seed - French Country Cottage - Sweet Tooth Friday (Alli-n-son), I'm Lovin' it Fridays (TidyMom), Friday Favorites (Simply Sweet Home), Latest & Greatest Friday (Days of Chalk and Chocolate), Bacon Time, Fusion Friday (Jane Deere Blog). 

The Reason...

Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder...

(or so I'm told)

My life has been hectic beyond belief lately.  Mr. AKM works during the day and goes to school full-time at night; therefore, I am, for all intents and purposes a single parent.  UGH!  How do people do that everyday?  For all those single parents out there…you totally ROCK!  Seriously.  You are so underpaid and monumentally underappreciated!

If I’m not at my full-time day job, I am running my kids all over the place for their sports practices and games.  Three days a week I INSIST on going to my yoga TRX classes.  They. Can. NOT. Be. Missed!  End of story.  If I miss my “me” time, it makes for one un-happy mama.  And if mama ain’t happy, ain’t NOBODY happy!  It’s true.  I admit it. I can be a bit of a pain in the ass difficult to live with if I don’t get my “me” time to sweat my ass off and relieve a little tension 3 days a week.  That’s all I ask for is 3 measly hours a week for myself. 

Lately, it has been difficult to get even that small amount of time for myself.  But I make it happen.  Most of the time.

But because I make that happen, something else in my life has/had to give.  I thought about offering my kids up as Tribute (Hunger Games anyone)??  But was promptly reminded by my husband that THAT would be unacceptable.  Really??  Ya think? 

So I passed on cleaning my house for three weeks straight.  I made the conscious decision to NOT clean my house.  Do any of you realize how difficult that is/was for a total neat freak to do?  It was painful people!  Seriously painful!  Then I found some adorable little dust bunnies playing peek-a-boo with me in the corner and had enough!  So, this past weekend, I cleaned house for THREE HOURS STRAIGHT.  So not cool! 

I’ve decided to go back to my weekly cleaning schedule.

I tried skipping on meals at night and making quickie sandwiches instead.  That was all well and good till about 8:00 at night when everyone was STARVING and mowing through containers of ice cream and other goodies to help fill the void of not eating a healthy meal. 

We are all 5 lbs heavier now.  So….

I’ve decided to start cooking meals on the weekend to have throughout the week to help combat this.

I have no time to work on projects…no time to bake.  There are at least 12 loads of laundry that needs to be done.  I need to help my oldest with his science project…my youngest with a book report…make lunches, cook dinners, clean the house, take the dogs for a walk, feed the dogs, the fish, grocery shop, mow the lawn, water the lawn and shovel something that resembles food into my own mouth.

I am constantly running against the clock to fit it all into one day.  And I realized that I was no longer finding joy in any of it. 

I was annoyed this past weekend that my kids insisted that I go see the Hunger Games with them.  All I could think of was the 4 hours that would be “wasted” not working on things that I needed to get done.  I resented THEM for wanting time with me. 

That realization sucked the breath right out of me.  There are people that would give up anything to have time with their kids.  Moms and dads fighting wars would surely give up all that they could to spend 4 hours with their child to watch a movie, parents that have lost their child, children that have lost their parents.  People that would give anything just to HAVE kids…and here I was resenting it.  I am not proud of that. 

So to get on to the point of this post…I have realized that burning the candle at both ends makes me a failure on all fronts.  I can not have it all without something falling through the cracks…and it seems that I have been the one falling through the cracks…which pulled everything else down with me. 

So, what I am saying is this…please pardon my absence occasionally while I figure out how to balance what I love with what I must do.  I promise to make the most of this time so that I have something substantial to offer to you when I do make a post.

So until then...God bless…