Month: May 2016

SpongeBob SquarePants

Posted on by cartooncravings

Episode: Pizza Delivery
Krusty Krab Pizza /Krabby Patty Pizza

Even though I love doing my Cartoon Cravings thing, I’m still not really a big fan of writing. I can talk someone’s head off about shows I love, but when I have to put it down on paper or a screen, it gets tough. So I do tend to procrastinate a bit and that always leads me back to SpongeBob SquarePants. A lot of things I do always seem to connect with SpongeBob. (I hope it’s not just me.) I think that’s part of SpongeBob’s charm. Some things are so unexpected and other things hit so close to home that you can’t help but laugh at it. Yeah, a sponge living in a pineapple and working as a fry cook sounds pretty weird. But the world loves weird, because it seems like every person out there has at least heard of SpongeBob.

Now here’s my chance to tackle a show I’ve loved for years and has involved food since Episode One. Every time I turn around, the characters are at the Krusty Krab and Krabby Patties are showing up everywhere. And what do I do? I make pizza. I know. I couldn’t help myself. “Pizza Delivery” is in my Top 2 of Spongebob episodes. (“Band Geeks” takes the top spot by a slim margin.) And it really is the perfect way to describe my life. Oh, and I can’t forget the “Krusty Krab Pizza” song! Every time we have pizza in this house, someone is singing that song. By someone I mean me. And my sister. She takes care of the high notes for me. I’ll get to a good ol’ Krabby Patty sometime down the line, but at least it’s a Krabby Patty Pizza. Mr. Krabs mashes up Krabby Patties, so I figured it had to be a cheeseburger pizza. It’s just topped with mushrooms and pepperoni for an extra oomph.

Recipe makes 1 really large pizza or two 12-inch pizzas.

Ingredients

Crust:

1 ¼ cups warm water (105-115 degrees F)

2 ¼ teaspoons yeast

3 teaspoons sugar

3 tablespoons instant non-fat dry milk powder

1 ½ teaspoons salt

1 ½ tablespoons olive oil

3 cups bread flour

 

Sauce:

¼ cup, plus 2 tablespoons ketchup

1 ½ tablespoons mustard

1 ½ tablespoons mayonnaise

1 teaspoon sugar

 

Toppings:

Ground Beef:

½ pound ground beef

½ cup chopped onions

1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce

3 teaspoons of your favorite hamburger rub or spice combination

Up to 1 tablespoon of liquid smoke (Optional)

1 tablespoon olive oil

 

Use as much or as little of:

Shredded Mozzarella

Shredded Cheddar Cheese (Or use your favorite cheese combination.)

Dill Pickles

Mushrooms

Pepperoni

 

Directions

Crust:

In a small bowl, dissolve yeast and sugar in the warm water. Let rest for 5 minutes or until foamy. Combine flour, dry milk powder, and salt in a large bowl. Add olive oil and yeast mixture to flour. Stir to combine and form into a ball with your hands. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead for 10 minutes. Form the dough into a ball again and place in a large bowl. Lightly coat dough with oil and cover bowl with plastic wrap. Let the dough rise in a warm place for 2 hours or until it has doubled in size. Punch down the dough and flatten and stretch it into desired pizza size and shape. Let rest for 15 minutes on a lightly floured pizza paddle or on your pizza pan.

Sauce:

Combine ketchup, mustard, mayonnaise, and sugar in a small bowl.

Ground Beef:

Heat the olive oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add the onions, ground beef, hamburger rub, Worcestershire sauce, and liquid smoke. Cook until the meat has browned. Remove from heat and set aside.

Putting It All Together:

If you have a pizza stone, place it in the oven. If not, just make your pizza on the pan and place it in the oven once it is heated.

Preheat oven as high as it can go! Mine was at 550 degrees F.

Ladle desired amount of sauce onto crust. Layer dill pickles over the sauce. Spread the ground beef over the pickles. Add cheese. Top with mushrooms and pepperoni. Transfer the pizza from paddle to stone or place your pizza pan in the oven. Bake until crust is browned and cooked through. My pizza was in there for 15 minutes, but all ovens vary so you may have to adjust your cooking time.

Remove the pizza from oven. Slice and enjoy!

spongebob pizzasponge pizza

I’d be happy to eat the whole thing in one bite. I don’t need a Diet Dr. Kelp. Seriously, I will never forgive that guy for making SpongeBob cry. If I didn’t already like Squidward, his heroics right there would easily have won me over. The honor of having the first Krabby Patty Pizza is wasted on a jerk. And how come that pizza didn’t take off? It’s awesome! Maybe Mr. Krabs didn’t find it cost-effective. After all, he did ADD the mushrooms and pepperoni.

 

Tune in next week for more Cartoon Cravings!

Johnny Test

Posted on by cartooncravings

Episode: Johnny of the Jungle
Meatloaf Burritos

There are a lot of super geniuses out there in cartoon land. Although I do love them, I feel more at home with the less intelligent and the stupid folk. (I can’t imagine why.) I tried the science thing for a while and turns out, it wasn’t for me. It would be nice to have the brain power to invent gadgets and elixirs for the betterment of mankind. (Or at least myself.) Yeah, I’d probably make most of my stuff for the wrong reasons and end up doing more harm than good. Kind of like the disastrous combination of the Test kids. Just like Johnny, I’d run to the Lab whenever I have a problem, use something that I’m probably not supposed to, and destroy half of my city. I know it’s wrong, but it really does sound kind of fun. And Johnny’s daily life frequently includes a bunch of villains bent on his destruction who are a lot more misguided than evil. And they love a good competition. See, even more fun.

What’s not so fun about living in the Test house is dinner. Or should I just call it meatloaf because they don’t eat much else. Now I love a good meatloaf, (And I think deep down so do the Tests.) but eating one night after night after night gets pretty old pretty fast. That’s even if it’s edible. More often than not it’s too dry or disgusting. Just the word “meatloaf” strikes fear into any member of the Test Household, minus Dukey and Hugh, the meatloaf fanatic. Hugh spends most of his days at home, so he’s got plenty of time to perfect his meatloaf recipes. Instead of focusing on making one killer meatloaf, (I mean that in terms of taste, not the meatloaf monster.) he makes all sorts of meatloaf creations. He’s tried flavored meatloaves, meatloaf casserole, meatloaf pie, meatloaf balls, meatloaf parfaits, mini meatloaves, and meatloaf burritos. Wow, that is a lot of meatloaf. I see how it can get scary in the wrong hands. But I don’t eat meatloaf all that often, so all the possibilities are beginning to sound exciting. Plus, I really like saying “meatloaf burritos.”

Recipe makes six burritos.

Ingredients

Meatloaf:

1 pound ground beef or a mixture of beef and pork (I like using a ½ pound of each.)

1 tablespoon vegetable oil

1/2 cup onion

1/4 cup red bell pepper

1/4 cup orange bell pepper

1 teaspoon minced garlic

1 egg

1/3 cup bread crumbs

1/4 cup milk or heavy cream

1/2 tablespoon ketchup

1/2 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce

3/4 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon pepper

1/2 teaspoon cumin

1/2 teaspoon chili powder

1/2 teaspoon parsley

 

Glaze:

3 1/2 tablespoons ketchup

1 1/2 tablespoons mustard

3 tablespoons brown sugar

 

1 tablespoon vegetable oil

6 (8-inch) flour tortillas

Burrito Fixings- Cheese, Refried Beans, Etc. (Optional) I tried plain, with cheese, and bean and cheese, and they were all yummy.

 

Directions

Meatloaf:

Heat 1 tablespoon of vegetable oil in a small skillet over medium heat. Add onions and peppers and cook until soft and onions are translucent. Add garlic and cook for 30 seconds. Remove from heat and set aside to cool.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

In a large mixing bowl, combine the egg, bread crumbs, milk, ketchup, Worcestershire sauce, salt, pepper, cumin, chili powder, and parsley. Add the vegetables and meat and mix until combined.

Transfer the meat mixture to a parchment-lined pan. I chose a 10 X 10. Shape the mixture into a loaf and bake for 20 minutes.

Make the glaze by combining ketchup, mustard, and brown sugar in a small bowl. Brush the meatloaf with the glaze and bake another 25 minutes or until the meatloaf’s internal temperature reads 155-160 degrees F. Remove the meatloaf from the oven and allow to cool for 10 minutes.

Putting It All Together:

Cut the meatloaf into 6 slices. Break up a slice and spread over a tortilla, along with anything else you want to add. Fold the sides and roll up the tortilla. Repeat with the rest of the meatloaf slices.

Heat vegetable oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Lightly brown the burritos on all sides and serve!

Johnny Test Burritos (2)Johnny Test Meatloaf Burritos

Johnny’s dad was really on to something with the whole meatloaf burrito idea. And mine don’t stink at all! Even my anti-meatloaf sister enjoyed her’s. Too bad, because then there’d be more for me. Now just because I made a yummy meatloaf, doesn’t mean I’m going to eat one every day. That’s where poor Hugh messes up. As for myself, I think I’ll have spaghetti for dinner.

Tune in next week for more Cartoon Cravings!

 

The Reluctant Dragon

Posted on by cartooncravings


Upside-Down Cake

When I was little, I loved so many cartoon characters so much that I truly believed they were real. I wanted them to be real and I shied away from anything that could prove otherwise. I find that really silly because the characters are real (They just exist a little differently than I do.) and I love them twice as much now that I know how much work was done to bring them to life. If I had seen The Reluctant Dragon when I was younger, then I would’ve come to realize that years ago. It’s fun and (Dare I say it.) educational watching Robert Benchley lead the viewers on a tour of Walt Disney Studios, and taking them through each part of the animation process from drawing, score and voice acting, foley, cameras, ink-and-paint, maquette-making, storyboarding, and ultimately animating. (Whew! That’s a lot.)

The cartoon that this movie all boils down to is The Reluctant Dragon. The Dragon would rather recite poetry than fight and is so peace loving, he has trouble breathing fire. (The Boy has to call him a Punk Poet to make him angry enough to do it.) He invites The Boy and Sir Giles, the Dragon Killer, to his picnic full of cakes and muffins and tea and jam sandwiches. Sir Giles, also being a lover of verse, is most interested in the Dragon’s poetic abilities and they recite poetry. My favorite poem in the short (And one of my favorite ever.) is “To an upside-down cake.” The entire thing is about how an upside down cake has problems because its top is on its bottom and its bottom is on its top. It’s truly beautiful. And “Radish so red” by Sir Giles is also lovely, but I’m more into cake.

Upside-down cakes can be just about any flavor, but I like pineapple the best. The Dragon doesn’t have any fruit on his cake, so it’s okay to just leave off the pineapple slices. I baked my cakes in 6-ounce ramekins, but jumbo muffin tins work too. (It’s just stickier getting the cakes out.)

Recipe makes 8 mini upside-down cakes.

Ingredients

½ cup (1 stick) butter, melted

1 cup brown sugar

3 large eggs

¾ cup sugar

¾ cup milk

¼ cup vegetable oil

1 ¼ cups flour

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 teaspoons baking powder

½ teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons pineapple juice (Optional)

8 pineapple slices (Optional)

 

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Divide the butter amongst the ramekins, so each one has 1 tablespoon. Add two tablespoons of brown sugar to each one and mix. Place a pineapple slice in each ramekin.

In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt. In a separate bowl, whisk the eggs. Then whisk in the sugar. Add the oil, milk, vanilla, and pineapple juice and whisk well. Add the wet ingredients to the dry and whisk until just combined. Divide the batter amongst the ramekins and bake for 30-35 minutes. Remove the cakes from the oven and let cool on a wire rack for 5 minutes. Run a knife around the outside of the cakes to loosen them. Invert each ramekin onto a plate. Once the little cakes are free, they’re ready to serve!

reluctantdragonReluctant Dragon Cake

A sweet, little upside-down cake may have cares and woes about its top and bottom being mixed up, but it should be more worried about me. You know, The Dragon and all the people get a happy ending, but I’m not so sure about that upside-down cake. Just like how I’m not so sure about Robert Benchley’s ending. He did get to meet Walt Disney, though. And I know that the animation process has changed a ton since The Reluctant Dragon, but it’s not any less magical getting an idea out of someone’s head and putting it on a large screen for the whole world to see.

 

Tune in next week for more Cartoon Cravings!

Ewoks

Posted on by cartooncravings

Episode: The Curse of the Jindas
Taffy

I’m one of those lucky individuals who had been introduced to Star Wars at a very early age. I can’t even remember the first time I actually watched the movies, but I’ve seen them a ton. My parents loved them, so the tapes were always close at hand. After spending most of my life with Star Wars, I could mention like 6 million things I love about the franchise. But, I’m going to try to narrow all that down. Here’s a fun fact: When I was little, I wanted an Ewok. (I also wanted a droid, and Yoda, and to be a Jedi, and have Darth Vader be my friend.) But asking for an Ewok seemed to be the most reasonable thing for me to do. I thought I could take care of one. To me, they were cute, little teddy bears with attitude and I couldn’t get enough of them. I guess I wasn’t the only one because there’s a cartoon dedicated to the Ewoks. I found that out when I saw a tape at one of my local video stores. (Well, it was labeled as a film, so I called it the Ewok movie for years.) Animated Ewoks! It just can’t get any better! I rented that tape multiple times and always enjoyed it. Years later, I finally got to watch the series and I still gave it a thumbs-up. (I can overlook Season 2’s issues.)

I love getting a closer look at the forest moon of Endor and the daily lives of the Ewoks. Wicket W. Warrick will always be my favorite, but I’ve found that I identify most with his slower, klutzy brother, Willy. When the village is attacked by Master Logray’s Stranglethorn Plant, Willy runs to the bakery and tries to eat all the baked goods before the plant does. He also has a thing for taffy. (Actually, he has a thing for any kind of food.) When Wicket and the gang go to Mooth’s store to trade their surplus goods, Willy eats from a large vat of taffy and begins to make a sticky mess. Yeah, Ewoks and taffy seem like an odd pair, but that’s nothing compared to some things that’ve come out of the Star Wars universe.

Recipe makes at least 50 pieces of taffy. It depends on how big you cut them.

Ingredients

1 cup sugar

1/2 tablespoon cornstarch

1/2 teaspoon salt

2/3 cup corn syrup

1 tablespoon butter, plus more for greasing hands and pan

1/2 cup water

1/2-1 teaspoon extract/flavoring

Food Coloring

 

Directions

Butter a shallow pan or cookie sheet. In a medium saucepan, combine sugar, cornstarch, and salt. Add corn syrup, butter, and water and place over medium heat. Stir to combine ingredients until the mixture begins to boil. Attach a candy thermometer and cook until the mixture reaches 255 degrees F. Remove from heat and add flavor and color. Pour taffy onto pan/sheet.

Let the taffy sit until it’s cool enough to handle. Butter your hands and begin pulling. Pull the taffy until the color lightens and takes on a sheen. It should be difficult to pull by then. (This is when placed it in a small loaf pan for the picture.) For actual taffy pieces, roll the taffy into a long, thin rope and cut into pieces with kitchen shears. Wrap each piece in wax paper and they’re ready to devour!

Ewoks Taffy WillyEwoks Taffy

I did try leaving my taffy in the small loaf pan and just pulling some out when I want it, so I’ve gotten pretty sticky like Willy does. It’s a mess and gets tough after a while (Willy must be playing with hot taffy.) but I find it fun. I also love the versatility of taffy. I have no idea what flavor Willy’s taffy is and Sugarleaf Taffy could be anything, so I made some fruity and left some unflavored. And they both taste delicious. It’s too bad my parents never got me an Ewok. I could’ve shared my taffy with him. Oh well. More for me.

 

Tune in next week for more Cartoon Cravings!