Picky Palate's Shrimp and Mango Quesadillas+ 10 Other Delish Cinco De Mayo Recipes

I really love mexican food whether it is authentic or american tex-mex. It's all good to me folks. Which is why I was really excited when Kita Roberts picked a couple of mexican-like dishes for this month's Pass the Cook Book Club. I'm going to keep the words in this post to a minimum because there's quite a few pictures!

I will say that these quesadillas made me realize that Jenny Flake of Picky Palate (the writer of this recipe) is some sort of genius. But seriously. I used the whole block of cream cheese instead of the 6 oz the recipe called for. My recommendation is to just use the 6 oz. because these are really rich and delicious. You could use the remaining two ounces for last month's cherry cobbler pizza recipe.

Oh and BTW, there are ten other mexican recipes perfect for celebrating cinco de mayo listed below the recipe for the Shrimp Mango Quesadillas.

Shrimp and Mango Quesadillas

Recipe Source: The Picky Palate Cookbook

2 tablespoons olive oil
1 (12-ounce bag) medium frozen raw shrimp, thawed, peeled, deveined, and tails removed
3/4 teaspoon salt, divided
1/2 teaspoon black pepper, divided
6 ounces cream cheese, softened
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
1/4 cup fresh cilantro, chopped
4 tablespoons butter, softened and divided
1 cup diced fresh mango
4 flour tortillas

Heat the oil in a skillet over medium-high heat. Add the shrimp along with 1/2 a teaspoon of salt and a 1/4 teaspoon of pepper. Cook, stirring constantly for five minutes and then remove from heat.

Using a hand mixer, combine the cream cheese, cilantro, cheddar cheese, remaining 1/4 teaspoon of salt and 1/4 teaspoon of pepper. Spread 1/4 of the cheese mixture on one side of each tortilla.

Put about 10 shrimp on one half of each tortilla. Top shrimp with 1/4 cup of diced mango and fold the tortilla over the shrimp and mangos. Brush one side of each quesadilla with 1/2 tablespoon of softened butter.

Heat an electric griddle to 350 degrees. Once it's hot, put the buttered side of the tortillas down on the griddle. Brush the other side of the tortillas with softened butter (1/2 tablespoon each). When the first side is golden brown (this should take 2-3 minutes), flip and cook for 2-3 minutes longer or until the second side is also golden brown.

Cream Cheese Enchiladas

Homemade Tortillas

Mini Mexican Pizzas

Slow-Cooker "Refried" Beans

Restaurant Style Salsa

Tamale Pie

Homemade Enchilada Sauce

Taco Pizza

Spicy Black Bean Dip

Brazilian Style Key Limeade

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you click on these links and purchase the product, it will not cost more for you but I will earn a tiny percentage of commission which helps me keep this blog up and running. Thank you!

If you like what you see, feel free to follow me on Facebook, Pinterest, and/or twitter.

Pass the Cook Book Club: Guy Fieri's Cherry Cobbler Pizza

Even though I totally procrastinated this month, I am really loving this cook booking club. Next month's recipes are from The Picky Palate Cookbook and they all look incredible so stay tuned.

Because I waited so long to get this post done I chose the easiest recipe on this month's list, and the one that I had the most things on hand for. I should have made the quinoa which had rave reviews on our cook book club facebook page, but I didn't (I am going to very soon though).

To be totally honest, this wasn't my favorite dessert ever. For starters I don't like cherries (but that doesn't stop me from tasting them all the time, to see if my taste buds have changed). I didn't love how loose and crumbly the crisp topping was either. I felt it needed a little more brown sugar and a little more melted butter to give it some substance. I wanted so badly for it to be like the crisp topping on my favorite apple crisp.

However, my husband loved this. Dessert pizza is always a win in his book. Next time I make it (because there will be a next time), I am thinking it will be with homemade peach pie filling and an adapted crisp topping that is more to my liking.

Cherry Cobbler Dessert Pizza

Recipe Source: Guy Fieri Food: Cookin' It, Livin' It, Lovin' It (He tops his with mascarpone cheese instead of icing. The crust recipe is adapted ever so slightly from Lauren's Latest)

Wheat Pizza Dough:

1 cup warm water
1 tablespoon honey or sugar
2 1/2 teaspoons active dry yeast
2 teaspoons salt
2 tablespoons canola or vegetable oil
1 1/2 cups bread flour
1 cup whole wheat flour *plus or minus a quarter of a cup depending on humidity

In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, stir the yeast and sugar (or honey) into the warm water. Let that sit for five minutes--- it should expand a little and look bubbly. Turn the mixer on low and add the oil, salt, and bread flour. Remove the whisk attachment and secure the bread hook. Add in the whole wheat flour. You might need a little more or a little less than a cup. When you are done adding flour you want the dough to be soft and look sticky but not actually stick to your hands when you touch it.

Turn the mixer on high and let it knead for 6 minutes. Form dough into a ball and return it to the mixing bowl. Cover and let rise for two hours (or until double in size).

Pizza Toppings:

1 (21 ounce) can cherry pie filling
1 cup quick-cooking oats
2 tablespoons dark brown sugar
2 tablespoons butter, melted
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
a pinch of salt
1/4 cup sliced almonds

To prepare crisp topping, mix the oats, brown sugar, butter, salt and cinnamon together until crumbly. Stir in almonds. Set aside.

Preheat oven with a pizza stone in it to 425 degrees. Just for the record, an upside down cookie sheet works perfectly as a makeshift pizza stone. Roll prepared pizza dough into a large rectangle on parchment paper (about 8 by 12 inches and a quarter of an inch thick). Spread cherry pie filling over crust. Sprinkle oatmeal crisp topping over cherries.

Carefully slide pizza onto pizza stone in oven. Bake for 10-12 minutes or until crust is golden and cherries are bubbly. Prepare icing while pizza is in the oven. Drizzle with icing while pizza is still hot and serve immediately.

Cream Cheese Icing: 

2 oz cream cheese
2 tablespoons butter, softened
1 cup + 2 tablespoons powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1-2 teaspoons milk

Cream butter and cream cheese together until smooth. Add powdered sugar, vanilla, and milk. Whip until smooth and fluffy. If needed, add more milk until icing reaches desired consistency.

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you click on these links and purchase the product, it will not cost more for you but I will earn a tiny percentage of commission which helps me keep this blog up and running. Thank you!

If you like what you see, feel free to follow me on Facebook, Pinterest, and/or twitter.

Pass the Cook Book Club: Pioneer Woman's Perfect Potatoes Au Gratin

I am so excited for today's post because it is part of a new monthly feature I will be doing here at The Taste Tester. Kita, from Pass the Sushi, started a cook book club this year. Once every month I will review a recipe here from the cook book she has chosen for that month. Today I will be sharing a recipe from The Pioneer Woman's second cookbook, The Pioneer Woman Cooks: Food from My Frontier. 

Next month all of the members of this club will be reviewing recipes from Guy Fieri Food: Cookin' It, Livin' It, Lovin' It. So if you want to join in on the fun, click on the image below! You don't necessarily have to be a food blogger and you don't have to own any of the cookbooks Kita chooses (she emails three recipes from the book to everyone). If you would like to see other posts from food bloggers who participated in the club this month, you can scroll down to the bottom of this post.

Let me start by saying that the only thing I did not love about this recipe was that fact that it is LOADED with fat. I mean, hard core artery clogging fat. The recipe calls for one and a half cups of heavy cream and half a cup of whole milk. I thought about calculating the nutrition facts for myself but then I figured ignorance would probably be the best choice in this situation.

The good news about these potatoes is that they are perfect (like the recipe title boasts), creamy, perfectly seasoned, cheeeeeeeeeeesy and tender potatoes. There's really nothing better. Around Christmas and Easter my mom always makes a side dish called funeral potatoes. If you have not heard of funeral potatoes they consist of frozen hashbrowns, butter, onion, sour cream, cheese, and cream of chicken soup. They too are yummy, but after eating the Pioneer Woman's recipe for potatoes au gratin, I have decided that these will be my choice for a potato side dish at holidays because there's no cream of crap soup here. 

At some point I am also going to try making this side dish with cauliflower so that my brother can have a side dish to eat during our holiday feasts (he is type 1 diabetic). Whenever I give that I go I will add an update to this post and let you know how it turns out!

Perfect Potatoes Au Gratin

Recipe Source: The Pioneer Woman Cooks: Food from My Frontier

2 tablespoons salted butter, softened

4 large russet potatoes, scrubbed clean *not peeled

1/2 cup whole milk

1 1/2 cups heavy cream

2 tablespoons flour

3 garlic cloves, minced

1 teaspoon salt

fresh ground black pepper to taste

1 cup sharp cheddar cheese, shredded

2 green onions, thinly sliced

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Grease a 9x13 pan with the softened butter (yes, all of it). Cut the potatoes into sticks and then dice. Place potatoes in prepared dish.

Combine milk, heavy cream, flour, garlic, salt and pepper and whisk. Pour over the potatoes. Cover with foil and bake for 30 minutes. Remove the foil and bake for 20 more minutes. Just before serving sprinkle with cheese and return to the oven for 3-5 minutes or until the cheese is melted and bubbly. Sprinkle green onions over hot potatoes and serve.