Heather Torrone - Savory Bites From Your Cake Pop Maker: 75 Fun Snacks, Adorable Appetizers and Delicious Entrees

Reinventing your favorite appliance to make treats that go way beyond sweets, Savory Bites from Your Cake Pop Maker offers recipes for whipping up mouthwatering appetizers, handheld sides and creative entrees. The books step-by-step directions and eye-popping photos show how easy it is to make any meal fun and festive with tasty bites like:

EGGS BENEDICT BITES

CHOCOLATE CROISSANT POPS

JALAPEO POPPERS

SPINACH-ARTICHOKE CHEESE POPS

CHICKEN CORDON BLEU

LOBSTER-SHRIMP RISOTTO BITES

SHEPHERDS PIE

FLANK STEAK FAJITAS

BLACK BEAN QUESADILLA POPS

MONTE CRISTO BITES

Savory Bites from Your Cake Pop Maker offers one-of-a-kind recipes that are perfect for everything from impressing party guests and providing movie-time bites to delighting kids at lunch and livening up dinner.

Copyright text 2013 by Heather Torrone. Copyright photographs 2013 by Judi Swinks Photography. Copyright design 2013 Ulysses Press and its licensors. All Rights Reserved. Any unauthorized duplication in whole or in part or dissemination of this edition by any means (including but not limited to photocopying, electronic bulletin boards, and the Internet) will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

Published by: Ulysses Press P.O. Box 3440 Berkeley, CA 94703 www.ulyssespress.com

ISBN: 978-1-61243-211-3 Library of Congress Catalog Number 2013931802

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Acquisitions editor: Kelly Reed Managing editor: Claire Chun Editor: Lauren Harrison Proofreader: Elyce Berrigan-Dunlop Production: what!design @ whatweb.com Index: Sayre Van Young Cover design: what!design @ whatweb.com Photographs: www.judiswinksphotography.com Stylist for featured recipes: Anna Hartman-Kenzler

NOTE TO READERS: This book is independently authored and published and no sponsorship or endorsement of this book by, and no affiliation with, any trademarked brands or other products mentioned or pictured within is claimed or suggested. All trademarks that appear in ingredient lists, photographs, and elsewhere in this book belong to their respective owners and are used here for informational purposes only. The authors and publishers encourage readers to patronize the quality brands and products mentioned and pictured in this book.

I grew up in a family of five girls, and we all had our fair share of playing kitchen. My sisters and I would mix things together from the refrigerator and dare each other to try it. After many years of being the one who had no problem trying anything, I developed a keen sense for what ingredients go well together, and which are just plain gross. With Savory Bites from Your Cake Pop Maker, I hope you enjoy trying it, too.

My obsession with these delicious morsels comes from their amazing ability to make meals into glorious, bite-size gastronomic explosions. And cooking in the cake pop maker is so fun and easy! Recipes cook in only a few short minutes, allowing you to serve delicious and simple dishes with relatively little effort. Savory bites combine all the best fresh, wholesome ingredients into tasty appetizers, breakfasts, and lunches. You can use ingredients most likely already in your fridge to quickly make the most impressive school lunches, tastiest breakfasts, and delicious last-minute nibbles for any surprise guests. Theyre the perfect way to feed a few individuals or a large number of guests with as little in the way of serve ware as a napkin. When youre cooking for a crowd, using a cake pop maker allows you to enjoy more of the party and spend less time preparing in the kitchen during your event.

These recipes reflect where I live, which is in a diverse community with an abundance of different ethnic dishes. It dawned on me while thinking of my favorite recipes that a majority of people may not have the same influences as I do. Im so excited to introduce a little of what Ive experienced, tasted, and found to be delicious with many others.

The recipes in this book use all types of dough. Some are as simple as cutting store bought biscuits in half, and some require combining a few simple ingredients from your pantry. The dough is generally divided before you begin assembling the pops. This allows your pops to be consistent in size and helps to keep the proportions manageable.

There are some great tools I recommend having on hand to help you make your pops quickly and easily:

A mini rolling pin to stretch out your dough pieces. They are sold at most craft stores or online. I have even borrowed my daughters Play-Doh rolling pin from time to time.

A couple flexible plastic cutting mats, usually sold in sets of three. They are worth it! I roll all my dough on them, and clean-up takes seconds since they go right in the dishwasher.

A plastic mini ruler will help you make sure your dough and food pieces are consistently the right size.

A 1-1/4-tablespoon-size cookie scoop. This will help you scoop ingredients right from the mixing bowl into the cake pop maker with as little work as possible.

The fork tool thats included with most cake pop makers is used to gently remove bites from the appliance.

Parchment paper is great to wrap any unused dough in and it is instrumental in preparing burgers, like those on .

Spray oil is a must to have on hand for many recipes (although some do not require it). I prefer to use organic sunflower oil to grease the wells of the cake pop maker, but you can also use vegetable oil spray. I often use organic olive oil spray as well.

Paper towels are essential for cleaning your cake pop maker, which may seem a bit overwhelming after cooking some of the greasier recipes in this book. However, if you blot any excess fat with a paper towel while the cake pop maker is still hot and then wait until the appliance has cooled completely, its not so hard to get those little bits off.

I hope you enjoy cooking from this book as much as I enjoyed working on these mini bites of perfection. The recipes are so good theyll make you stop whatever you are doing and start cooking!

This is a great recipe to get the kids involved. Its not only fun, but easy! Be careful about how tightly you squeeze the bread into a ball. Too loose of a ball will result in a messy pop. Too tight of a ball will make a pop thats not full and perfectly round. Makes 12 pops

2 large eggs

1 tablespoon milk

1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

6 slices bread

1/4 cup (1/2 stick) sweet cream butter, at room temperature

1/4 cup sugar

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon, or to taste

maple syrup or powdered sugar, to serve

1. Break the eggs into a small bowl, add the milk and vanilla, and whisk to combine. Cut all the crusts off the bread slices. Spread a little butter on half of each bread slice. Sprinkle the buttered portion of bread with sugar, and the entire slice of bread lightly with cinnamon. Cut the bread slices in half, for a total of 12 pieces that are each one-half butter sugar, and cinnamon, and one-half cinnamon only. Roll each bread strip into a ball and gently squeeze together.

2. Dip the balls into the egg and milk mixture. When the cake pop maker is hot, place 1 ball into each well. Cook for 4 minutes, until golden brown. Serve with maple syrup or sprinkle with powdered sugar.

VARIATIONS: Substitute the butter, cinnamon, and sugar for: 1/2 tablespoon cream cheese and 1 teaspoon strawberry jam; or 1/2 tablespoon peanut butter and 1 teaspoon Nutella.

Makes 24 pops

4 large eggs

1/3 cup half-and-half

4 slices white sandwich bread, cubed