Being on a spending freeze has definitely gotten me doing more in the kitchen, and it's been really fun!  Especially since my husband is willing to do the cleanup!  Bless his heart!  Oh, and did I mention that on top of everything else, our dishwasher broke?!?

Catherine LOVES to help bake.  In the past I would just let her watch from her highchair pulled up to whatever I was doing.  But now she is helping with lots of stirring, and she can't get enough of it.  Her latest phrase repeated over and over is "Gotta stir it up!"  She even has to stir the food on her plate at every meal now.

In the last few days I have made Mounds Bar Brownies (so rich!), Smores Bars (just made it up as I went along - used a sugar cookie dough as a crust and added chocolate chips, marshmallow creme and marshmallows), and Peach Slowcooker Oatmeal.

Tonight we made our own version of Red Lobster's Cheddar Bay Biscuits.  Those are one of the best things in the world (can I get an amen?); in fact they are the reason I go to Red Lobster!  I'm not a huge fish eater and usually get chicken there, ha!

Anyways, I started with this base recipe from the Top Secret Restaurant Recipes book.  (Warning: on my computer some annoying video started automatically playing at this site, and I couldn't find it anywhere to pause it, so I ended up just muting my whole computer.  Automatic videos or music is a HUGE internet pet peeve of mine, but that's another blog post.)

Then I researched a few other recipes, reviews, and comments online and ended up with this:


Cheddar Bay Biscuits:

2 1/2 cups Bisquick baking mix (I used Aldi brand)
1/2 stick cold butter
3/4 cup whole milk
1 cup+ shredded cheddar cheese (I actually grated it myself from a block of extra sharp)
garlic powder
Old Bay seasoning
dried parsley flakes
(sorry, I don't measure seasonings)

Cut the butter into the Bisquick mix with a large fork and knife.  Keep going til you end up with pea sized(ish) butter clumps.  Add the rest of ingredients and stir.

I used a small ice cream scoop and plopped onto cookie sheets and baked at 400 degrees for 12ish minutes (not sure here because I had to pull them out early because our oven was smoking.  Ha, turns out my sneaky daughter had turned up the oven to 490, yikes!).

While they're baking, melt in the microwave 2 tablespoons butter (I used margarine).  Dump in a bunch of garlic powder (Catherine just went to town here), more parsley flakes, and a pinch of salt.

Brush on top of hot biscuits (or somehow transfer with a spoon if you're like me and don't think you have a brush) and bake for another couple minutes.

Enjoy!  They are just as addicting as the real thing!