Irish Bread Braid

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This Irish Bread Braid from Best Yummy Recipes, is super YUMMY! I used their cut finished loaf picture, because my loaf got cut and eaten before I had the chance to grab a pic. I went out on a limb with this recipe, on the search to find something, anything that my daughter will eat other than pizza. Neither my husband nor I are corned beef fans, however, the finished product photo from Best Yummy Recipes looked so delicious, that I just had to taste this bread! My braiding wasn’t too successful, I had to open a separate can of crust to patch holes, but other than that, this recipe was a cinch! The original recipe calls for Pillsbury Recipe Creations seamless dough sheet, which my grocery didn’t have, so I used Pillsbury Thin Crust Pizza. I purchased two cans, just incase one wasn’t enough, which it wasn’t. I also substituted the 2 red potatoes for 1 baking potato, because that’s what I had on hand. I’m not a huge fan of caraway seeds, so I negated them from the ingredients.

Ingredients
1 can Pillsbury Thin Crust Pizza dough sheet
6 ounces sliced corned beef
1 cup cooked fresh spinach
1 large baking potato, boiled, cooled and sliced
1 cup shredded white cheddar cheese
1 teaspoon olive oil
egg wash (1 egg beaten with 1 tablespoon water)
Cooking spray

Directions

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Prepare your potato before beginning this recipe to allow for potato to cool. I peeled my potato, boiled whole for about 10 minutes, allowed to cool and then sliced thin.
1. & 2. In a pan heat olive oil, add spinach, cook stirring continuously.
3. Spray cookie sheet lightly with cooking spray, unroll pizza crust onto sheet and add corned beef down the center of the dough.
4. Top corned beef with cooked spinach.
5. Top spinach with potato.
6. Top potato with shredded cheddar
7. & 8. Using a sharp knife or kitchen shears, cut 1-inch wide strips on long sides of dough (cut the same number of strips on each side) to within a 1/2-inch of the filling. Fold in short sides, then alternately cross strips over the filling to make a braid. (This is where I fell short, my braid started off well, but then began to not be as tight towards the middle and end. I had to open the second can of pizza crust to ‘patch’ the various holes.)
9. In a small bowl beat an egg with a tablespoon of water. Brush egg wash on top of bread. ( if using caraway seeds, this is when you should sprinkle them on top of your bread.)
10. Bake bread at 375 degrees for 25 minutes, or until the bread is a lovely golden brown. Allow to cool for 5 minutes before cutting with a sharp knife.

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I missed a hole on the side of my loaf, so a small amount of cheese leaked out of the side…no biggie;)
Even though my daughter didn’t want to even taste the bread, my husband and I thoroughly enjoyed it!
Give it a try, you’ll be glad that you did!

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Paint Stamps

I attempt to entertain Reagan’s requests to do various activities.  Lately, she has been asking to paint…’I paint’.  I’ve said this multiple times, but I really do need to get my butt in gear and get a variety of colors for my daughter to work with.  Blue and pink, although lovely, are getting a bit old.

Instead of pulling out the paint brushes, I decided that we would do some stamp painting with an apple, which turned into stamp painting with a potato, animal crackers and pretzels.  Who would have thought that food could be so much fun to paint with!  Our project got cut short, when daddy started watching a motorcycle race on the computer.  I was left high and dry by my 18 month old for her daddy and motorcycles… whatever floats her boat!

Materials:

The potato, animal crackers and pretzels were afterthoughts, so they aren’t pictured with materials.
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Paper

Knife

Paint- in our case…washable

Plate- or paint dish

Apple

Potato

Animal Crackers

Pretzels

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Reagan and I talked about the color of the outside of the apple and the various colors on the inside of the apple.  We talked about the stem and the seeds and how apple trees grow from apple seeds!  I then attempted to sing her the Johhny Apple Seed Song, which I butchered, thank god for youtube!  The apple that I used was small, so Reagan was able to hold the cut half in her hand.  I showed Reagan what to do and off she went!

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Earlier that day, I pulled out a bag of 6 or 7 potatoes that I had completely forgot about that needed to be trashed.  I brought one over to the table and talked to Reagan about why we couldn’t/shouldn’t eat the potato anymore.  I cut out different shapes and designs on various potato pieces to be used as stamps.

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Reagan spotted a few pieces of her left over snack on the table and asked to paint with them…’I paint pretzel and manimals’. So we painted with pretzels and animals!

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Reagan painted for about 20 minutes before she quickly moved to her daddy’s lap to watch motorcycle racing… a girl after her dads heart!

IMG_9214Excuse the random pizza slice…whatever it takes for Reagan to eat, even if it is while painting!