Strawberry Shortcake Shooters

Have you ever had the shooter desserts at Applebee's? Well this is a take on those.  I love strawberry shortcake, but I wanted to keep myself from eating the entire cake.  So I thought why don't I make individual ones in a shot glass and then it's automatic portion control.  Well except for when you eat 6 of them...which is what I did.  This dessert is super simple and super delish!  To make it even faster, use yellow cake mix instead of making your own and add a little bit of strawberry extract to it.

Ingredients:
Cake:
2 cups sugar
4 eggs
2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 cup milk
3/4 vegetable oil
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 tablespoons strawberry extract

Strawberries:
1 quart fresh strawberries
1/2 cup strawberry jam

Cream:
1 pint heavy cream
1/4 cup white sugar
1 1/2 tablespoons strawberry extract

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Grease a loaf pan with cooking spray and set aside.

In a large mixing bowl, with an electric mixer, beat sugar and eggs together until slightly thickened.  Add flour, milk, vegetable oil, baking powder, vanilla and strawberry extracts.  Beat for one minute or until smooth.  Pour into loaf pan.  Bake for 40-45 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

Remove the stems of the strawberries and slice them.  Put in a large bowl and mix with strawberry jam.  Put in refrigerator until ready to serve.  It will make a strawberry syrup and the strawberries will soften slightly.

In a large, cold bowl, beat the heavy cream with an electric mixer.  After about 5 minutes, sprinkle in the sugar slowly while beating.   Continue to beat until it becomes very thick and forms soft peaks on your beater.  Pour in the strawberry extract and beat for another minute.  If desired, you can pour into a piping bag or into a ziploc bag.  Place in refrigerator until ready to use.

 Once cake is done, allow to cool for an hour.  Remove from pan and make 1 inch slices down the loaf.  Take each slice and using a shot glass, cut out circles of the cake.  To build your dessert, put one piece of cake in the bottom.  Cover with whipped cream.  Then top with a few strawberry slices.  Continue with one piece of cake and top off with whipped cream.

You can also just make a layer cake by making 2 8-inch rounds of cake.  Put all of the strawberries in between the two cakes.  Frost the entire outside with the whipped cream.

Chill for about an hour.  Serve and enjoy!

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Spinach Salad with Fried Goat Cheese

Ingredients:
Salad:
3 cups fresh spinach, washed and dried
10 strawberries, washed and dried
10 oz fresh goat cheese
1 egg
1/2 cup panko bread crumb
1/2 cup flour

Balsamic Dressing:

1/2 cup balsamic vinegar

1/2 cup olive oil

2 cloves garlic, pressed

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon pepper

Directions:
Cut the spinach into 1/4 inch slices and put on a sheet tray to chill in the freezer for 15 minutes.

Place the spinach in a large bowl once it has been cleaned and dried.  After the strawberries have been cleaned and dried, cut the stems off and slice into thin slices.  Toss these in the bowl with the spinach.

Set up a breading station.  The flour goes in the first plate, then beat an egg in the second bowl, and the panko bread crumbs are put into the third bowl. 

To make the dressing whisk all of the ingredients in a bowl and set aside until after the goat cheese has been fried.

Take the goat cheese out of the freezer and put it through the breading station.  First the flour, then into the beaten egg, then into the panko.  Set back on the baking sheet to freeze for 15 more minutes.

Heat a large skillet with canola oil just to cover the bottom.  Once the goat cheese is done freezing, take it out and put it in the pan.

After 3 minutes or until the bottom is golden brown, flip over the goat cheese.

Now you can dress the salad with the dressing.  I served the salad and goat cheese separately.  But either way, after 3 minutes on the second side, remove from the pan and set aside for the top of the salad.  After salad is plating, add the goat cheese on top.  Enjoy!

All photographs were taken by Emily Barbo!

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