Recipes to Share...

My good friend Erin always posts a Recipe of the Week on her blog each week, and while I am far from a good cook, I love getting new ideas for things to try out. So here are a couple of things we have made in our kitchen recently...

Watermelon Fruit Basket
This isn't exactly a recipe, but it's a fun summertime thing to make! :)
We went to a picnic last weekend, and all of the guests were asked to bring a side dish or dessert. I didn't want to bring something that probably five other people had planned to bring, and I suddenly remembered this idea of a watermelon fruit basket from one of my baby showers last summer. We already had a watermelon in the fridge, so it was the perfect thing to bring to the picnic! Derek loves carving pumpkins, so he had a good time carving the basket. {If you just do a google image search of "watermelon picnic basket," about a thousand different images will pop up of different styles of baskets you can carve...there are lots of very elaborate ones out there!} After carving your basket & using a melon baller to scoop out of the watermelon meat, just fill your basket with the fruits of your choice! We used the watermelon balls, cut up strawberries, grapes, and blackberries.

Caramel Pie
I made a caramel pie for Derek for Father's Day this year. It is one of his fave desserts! This recipe is very similar to the caramel pie they have on the menu at O'Charley's, and it is sooooo easy!

Ingredients:
2 or 3 cans of Eagle brand sweetened condensed milk
store-bought Oreo pie crust
optional toppings--cool whip, hershey's syrup, chocolate chips, and/or nuts {Derek usually prefers only cool whip}

Directions:
Peel the paper labels off of the cans of condensed milk, and put them in a covered pot of water to boil for 3 hours {this is how the milk turns to caramel}. Throughout the 3 hours, I periodically check on the cans and stir them around. At the end of the 3 hours, take them out of the water and let them cool for at least one hour. Once cooled, use a spatula to get the caramel out of the cans and into the pie crust. Two cans is enough, but I usually do 2.5 for a little extra caramel. ;) Then place the pie into the fridge for several hours (at least 6 hrs I would say) to cool. Serve cold, and enjoy! It is super rich, but oh so tasty!