A few weeks ago, I headed up to Appleton to visit my cousin/best friend and celebrate the 4th birthday of her amazing son, Landon. This boy stole my heart the first time that I met him, and we are best buds every time I come for a visit. I love that he calls me "Auntie Sarwah" and asks me to come to things with him and play toys with him.
For his 4th birthday, Landon wanted a "rockstar" party (wockstawr - I love that little lisp) and his mom found some really fun decorations and figured we could make some more. Since Landon's favorite color is orange, we had orange cups and plates, and "Auntie Sarah" did her best to be artistic and create some fun tablecloths. Landon helped by adding the stickers.
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| Auntie Sarah's freehand guitar |
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| Music notes tablecloth - can't believe I remembered the clefs! |
We had pizza, fruit salad, veggies & dip, chips and garlic bread (which I was in charge of). I could have just taken the easy route and bought frozen, but what is the fun in that? I decided to go all out and base my garlic bread off
this recipe I found via
Pinterest. But because we were going to be eating and snacking throughout the night, I didn't want the bread to get all stuck together. I decided to just buy a loaf of bread and then slather it with a garlic butter concoction similar to
this also found via Pinterest. (Can you tell I love pinning things?)
Anyways, I stopped on my way up at Walmart to get some black frosting to decorate the cake as well as french bread and some seasonings. Silly Auntie Sarah left her entire tube of black glitter frosting from Halloween at home :(
(Sidenote: Did you know that not all Walmart's sell the same products and if you don't have a receipt, they won't even give you store credit if they don't carry it? Why can't they be more like Kohl's and take everything back?)
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| cheesy garlic bread ingredients |
I started by softening a stick of butter a bit in the microwave - not melted completely but definitely mixable with a spoon. I then guesstimated on seasonings and cheese to taste. We then slathered the mixture onto the bread and wrapped it up and put it in the fridge until ready to bake.
BIG MISTAKE!!!! It didn't even click at all that the butter would glue the bread pieces together and make it almost impossible to get apart (we didn't think to put wax paper in between). We tried putting the whole thing in the oven for a bit, but the bread was browning before we could pull them apart. I ended up slicing it again down the middle which meant one side had double butter and the other none! Luckily I could quickly whip up another batch of butter and spread it on the now vacant side.
If you want cheesy garlic bread, you can put cheese on top of the butter spread before cooking.
I then put it in the oven at 375 for .....? this is where I'm not really sure. We were cooking
Aldi's Take 'n Bake pizzas (amazing!) at the same time, so I know that if I said 10 minutes, you could end up with burnt bread and no one wants that. I guess cook it until the cheese is all melty-gooey-yummy and just starting to brown. Pull it out, let it sit for a few minutes and then hack it into slices like (
Toppers' stix)
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| Cheesy Garlic Bread |
My mistake ended up turning into great ooo's and aaaah's at the party as everyone loved the double butter side, even though it's really rich and indulgent. Extra laps around the park for everyone! Yep - not a healthy recipe folks! But definitely delicious.
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| Rockstar Cake |
We then had birthday cake with chocolate ice cream (what do you think - should I become a cake decorator with my mad skills?). Landon is on a gluten-free diet so his mom got him a GF chocolate cupcake with naturally dyed orange frosting from
Happy Bellies Bake Shop. I bought some almond granola while I was there because it was just that scrumptious!
Cheesy Garlic Bread Recipe
(best guesstimates that I can come up with but do it to taste)
1 loaf French Bread - sliced lengthwise down the middle to create two even halves (like a sub sandwich)
2 sticks butter or margarine
3 Tbsp finely grated Parmesan cheese (shaker style)
1 tsp Italian seasoning
1 tsp garlic salt
1.5 cups grated Italian blend cheese (or any favorite cheese)
Put sticks of butter in microwave for 15 sec. stir a bit. Then micro for 10 more seconds. Add the seasoning,
garlic salt and Parmesan and stir. Consistency should be like sour cream.
Spread half the mix on one half the
bread and do
the same on the other. Then, sprinkle half the shredded cheese over
half and do the same to the other. Bake at 375 (until done)
Take out and let sit for 5 min before cutting sizes to your liking.
