I really, really, like The Holidays!

Even though it can be a time fraught with emotions and expectations, those same hopes make for positively Maximum Enjoyment on some more earthy fronts.

Like eating special Holdiay Food…

This year, I dedided to go with what I enjoyed best, and for loooow stress, what was easiest.

The dinner was basic: spiral ham, sweet potatoes with butter, green beans with a little vinegar and freshly ground black pepper, and some sourdough bread (and, heh, more butter).

But, since this is a Festival(!) there had to be some sweets there somewhere.

And while doing something completely unreleate, I found a simple, homely home solution: DUMP CAKE.

This was something that was just totally intriguing from the get go: one pan, one can, more butter, NUTS, and ice cream. (Lots of inspiration here: 30 Delicious Dump Cake Recipes.)

PEACH DUMP CAKE

You will need:

– 1 – 8×8" inch cake pan

– 1 (16 ounce) cans peach slices (I used lite syrup)

– 1 (18.25 ounce) package yellow cake mix (used only 1/2)

– 1/2 cup nuts of choice (I used PECANS!)

– about 1/2 cup butter

– ground cinnamon

1. Grease your baking pan with a little butter.
2. Empty peaches into the bottom of greased baking pan.
3. Sprinkle peaches with cinnamon to taste.
4. Cover with 1/2 of the dry cake mix and distribute evenly.
5. Sprinkle with nuts.
6. Cut butter into small pieces and place on top of cake mix.
7. Bake at 375 degrees F (190 degrees C) for 45 minutes. (Test with a toothpick for doneness).

Serve plain or with some lovely vanilla Ice Cream!

THAT’s IT!

If you want to make a bigger cake, use 2-cans of peaches & all of the cake mix, etc.

Unbelievably good! And you can make variations of this to infinity – you just substitute different fillings, nuts, etc and WOW!

PORTLAND SIDEBAR: one of my favorite things about settling into my new city has been discovering all the different grocery brands that are out there! Notice the awesome ice cream container (which had some pretty delish vanilla ice cream inside)…