Breakfast Bars

The Engineer had been hounding me to make breakfast cookies for about two weeks when I finally set aside a time to make them.  Then, low and behold, there were no rice crispies in the entire house.  Before mutiny erupted, I did a bit of fiddling with a few recipes, taking into account what ingredients actually were in the house this time and came up with a breakfast bar.  The nice thing about these bars is their versatility.  I also like bars versus cookies for saving time.  So, I give you the breakfast bar that saved the day:

You can add nuts, chocolate chips, coconut or any dried fruit...depending on what you have in your cupboard.  You could also mix in some spices or even flavorings like almond or orange. The bars are quite filling, though the boys in my family who have just entered the "I am always hungry" stage ate again two hours later.  They do that no matter what they eat, though.  

Breakfast Bars: 

1 stick butter

3/4 cup brown sugar

2 eggs

1 1/2 tsp vanilla

1 cup oatmeal

1 1/2 cups AP flour

2 Tbsp All Bran cereal

1 cup golden raisins

Beat the butter and sugar.  Add the eggs and vanilla or other flavoring and mix well.  Mix in the oatmeal, All Bran and flour followed by the raisins....or any other add ins.  Spread into a greased 9X9 pan.  Bake 350 degrees for 35 minutes or until golden brown.

Foodie Friday

Food on Friday

Friday Foods

I'm Lovin' It Friday

GCC Recipe Swap

Vegetarian Foodie Friday

Family Food Friday

Friday Favorites

Tweet

Foods for the Arizona Tourist

Every place has foods native to that region. The southwest is no different. Most of the cuisine is similar to Mexican, though the cuts of beef are bigger. Ours is a combination of cowboy and Indian (as in Native American) food, as well as a healthy helping of Mexican cuisine. There are places that irrigation has allowed better farming conditions, but all in all, this is still a desert area. Here are some foods you should definitely try if you ever visit Arizona:

1. freshly made tortillas (corn or flour)
2. chilies & peppers in any form: roasted, salsa, stuffed
3. anasazi beans (dramatic red and white heirloom beans)
4. nopales (cactus)
5. mesquite flour (gluten free, with a smokey flavor)
6. posole (a great soup)
7. prickly pear jelly or syrup
8. mesquite bean candy
9. pistachios...fresh from the farm
10. rattlesnake (though we natives don't actually eat it, tourists find it fun to eat)
11. chimichangas (there are two restaurants in AZ that claim to have invented them)
12. cheese crisps (like an open faced quesadilla, these crispy foods aren't on menus elsewhere)
13. Navajo tacos
    
    
    
    
    So what foods do you recommend from your neck of the woods?
    
    
    thursday-13.com

Tweet

Plum Apple Butter

We had a great harvest from our plum tree this year.  It's a Santa Rosa plum tree.  They are so delicious, but we really couldn't eat all of them.  I cooked up half of the remaining plums, pureed and froze them.  I liked the idea of a pseudo apple sauce...a plum sauce.  It was very tasty with the addition of some sweetener.  I used stevia, my family would prefer brown sugar.  Either way, it will probably end up in a cake.

The remaining plums were combined with an equal amount of apples and some spices and then simmered down to a thick fruit butter consistency.  I bottled it as you can see in the picture.   It will do well on peanut butter sandwiches as well as on roasts or in yeast rolls.  With the eight or nine bottles I ended up with, the possibilities are endless.

Apple Plum Butter
3 pounds plums, cut in half and pitted
3 pounds apples, peeled and cored
3 1/2 cups apple juice
1 Tbsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground cloves
1 tsp ground allspice
In a large pot, simmer plums and apples in apple juice until cooked.  Either use an immersion blender to puree all of the fruit in the pan, or let it cool and ladle it into a food processor a bit at a time and puree it that way.  Return it to the pot.  Add the spices and simmer until reaches the desired consistency.  Put it in clean jars with lids and use a boiling bath to process...20 minutes.

Tuesday Tastes

Delicious Dishes

Tasty Tuesdays

Tasty Tuesdays
Slightly Indulgent Tuesdays

Tuesdays at the Table
SOS September Challenge

Tweet

Homemade Gourmet Apples: Make Your Own Monday #38

This week it will be October.  Can you believe it?    That means that Thanksgiving and Christmas and all that those wonderfully hectic holidays bring will be upon us before we know it.  Have you thought about gifts?  Me, either.  I have so many projects going on with this blog and real life that I haven't given it a lot of thought.

I had a friend years ago that used to make gourmet apples every fall to sell at bazaars and to give as gifts.  She always started with huge Granny Smith apples and used only higher end chocolates and caramels.  Her apples weighed over 2 pounds by the time she was done and they were much sought after by all who knew her.  I looked online to see if they are still popular...and they are.  They retail for at least $12 and up to $19 before shipping!  You can make these for much cheaper at home.  What great gifts they'd be for friends, teachers and neighbors.  

Watch for caramels to go on clearance after Halloween.  You can usually find them for 75% off a week or two after Oct. 31.   Chocolate chips are due to be going on sale as all grocery stores gear up for baking season.  Nuts will be cheaper, too.  Look for sales and these babies will not cost you much at all to make.  

You will need: 

firm, fresh apples (no bruises, no odd shapes)

clean popsicle sticks

1 bag caramels (or more if desired)

2 Tbsp water for every bag of caramels

chocolate or other flavored chips

nuts, M&Ms, sprinkles or whatever you can think of

Stick the popsicle sticks into the apples at the blossom end. 

 Melt the caramels with water in a saucepan, stirring until smooth. Remove from heat.  Holding the apple by the wooden stick, twirl the apple in the caramel to coat. Let the excess drip back into the pan. Let sit on a buttered plate or cookie sheet to cool slightly. 

(note: this was not a dipped caramel apple, I molded the warmed caramels around the apples, but this is Not recommended as it does not stick to the apple and after the entire thing is made, the entire coating slips off the skin....not a pleasant end for all of that hard work...however this is the only picture I took at this stage, so you have to use a little imagination.)

 Melt chocolate chips in the microwave or in a double boiler.  Dip the apple into the chocolate and twirl the apple to coat with chocolate.  Roll it in the nuts, if desired.  Let cool slightly and roll in chocolate again...or another flavor of melted chips.  Coat with sprinkles or shaved chocolate or candy pieces.  Store in the fridge.

Homemaker Monday

Mouth Watering Monday

Made By You Monday

Monday IS Fun

Spotlight Wednesday

Recipe Swap Thursday

Tweet

PFB Challenge #2: Classic Greek

Thank you SO much to all of you who voted me through to the second challenge.

And here it is: Challenge Number Two: Make a classic dish; not French or Italian. Leave your comfort zone.

I asked my oldest son, The Musician, what cuisine he thought I should explore. He said Tahitian. Really, what kind of help was I actually expecting to get from a teenage boy?!

I thought about making a classic German dish, but as I am almost half German, I didn't feel like I would be venturing into the unfamiliar with that. British food, forgive me, isn't all that exciting and again is not a stretch. I am afraid Indian food would go to waste with my crew of taste testers (aka children). Japanese food would require access to fish not labeled “Chicken of the Sea” in a small landlocked Arizona town.

My options were running out, when it hit me. Greek food. Other than eating gyros periodically for lunch and drooling over recipes for spanakopita, I'd actually never made any. Certainly no one could argue that it was outside my comfort zone. In fact, the last time I ate Greek food at a real Greek restaurant, it was years ago, for my sister-in-law's birthday. She had found a little out of the way place south of Seattle and had all of the extended family gather there one evening. We all sat down at a great big family style table, had ordered our meals and were just getting down to the job of catching up on each others' lives when music started. Out from behind a veiled doorway, came a barely veiled woman. Belly dancing. All four sets of my sons' eyes widened as far as they'd go as that gyrating, not so svelte woman jiggled her way over to the table. I can't even tell you what we ate that night. I was too busy fielding questions and covering boys' eyes.

Yes, I definitely needed to revisit Greek cuisine... Even if it was only to make some new, more comfortable memories to associate with that lovely food.

The fates (Greek reference intended, of course) smiled upon me, putting eggplant on sale, and making the dish choice easy. Moussaka. I am not Greek food ignorant, you see. I am just Greek food inexperienced. So, I Googled every recipe for moussaka I could find, read through every cookbook in the house and then went about making this classic dish...with all of the normal frugality my nature is inclined to include.

Moussaka: (loosely based on a recipe found in a community cookbook called I Love New York and another found on greekfood.about.com):

2 large eggplants, peeled and sliced into rounds ¼ inch thick

½ cup salt dissolved in 2 quarts water

olive oil

1 pound lean ground beef (I know it should be lamb, but beef is a suitable substitute on a budget)

½ onion, chopped

1 quart home canned tomatoes (29 ounces store bought diced), drained

2 Tbsp tomato paste

½ tsp oregano

1 tsp salt

½ tsp cinnamon

¼ tsp allspice

1 tsp garlic powder

½ cup red wine

1 Tbsp honey (this is dependent on the acidity of your tomatoes ~ mine needed it)

1 summer squash, chopped (optional, it was the last one from my garden and really wanted to be a Greek)

2 large baking potatoes (patA'tes – this is legal, there are several versions with these included)

¼ cup plain bread crumbs

grated Greek cheese, such as kefalotiri (I was able to find Parmesan in my town...'nuf said)

Soak the eggplant slices in the salted water for 30-45 minutes. Remove them from the water and drain on paper towels. Heat the olive oil in a large skillet and cook the eggplant on each side until lightly browned. Place on a plate for later use. Wash the potatoes, poke them a few times and then cook them in the microwave until tender. Let them cool down, then peel and slice. While the potatoes are cooking, brown the ground beef in a deep skillet or Dutch oven. Drain the excess fat if you are using 80% lean meat. Add the onions and squash and cook until the vegetables are soft. Add the tomatoes, tomato paste, spices, herbs, honey and wine. Simmer for 15 minutes, stirring once in a while to prevent sticking. To assemble, butter a shallow baking dish (9X13). Sprinkle bottom of dish with bread crumbs. Layer half of the eggplant on top of crumbs. Spread ½ of the meat sauce on top, then sliced potatoes, remaining eggplant followed by the last of the meat sauce. Pour the bechamel sauce on top of the meat, spreading lightly to reach all the edges evenly. Sprinkle with grated cheese. Bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for 45 minutes.

Bechamel sauce:

3 Tbsp butter

¼ cup AP flour

dash freshly grated nutmeg

½ tsp onion powder

3 cups evaporated milk (regular milk or even cream would be fine)

salt and pepper to taste

4 egg yolks (conveniently, my son requested a pie for later this week...the whites will become meringue)

In a large saucepan, melt the butter. Stir the flour into the butter over low heat for about a minute. Slowly whisk the milk into the roux, season and continue stirring until the sauce thickens. (Be patient, this is at least a ten minute process, if not longer). When it is thickened to your liking, add about ¼ cup of the sauce to the egg yolks to temper them (there is nothing worse than scrambled egg pieces in your white sauce!). Add the egg/sauce mixture back into the remaining sauce and heat through.

Egads! This was so good. The subtle spice in the meat sauce, the creaminess of the bechamel, the yummy flavors of the vegetables; I can see why moussaka is a must-make-at-least-once-in-your-life, classic Greek dish. Thank you Foodbuzz, for sending me to visit this delicious cuisine.

Tweet

Carrot Currant Doughnuts with Cream Cheese Filling

There are trends in food blogging.  Have you noticed that?  Someone will come up with a great idea and everyone else will run with it.  These doughnuts are, in fact, inspired by all of the carrot cake things I have seen lately.  Muffins, whoopie pies, cakes, cookies, you name it, there have been carrot cake versions.  This is simply my contribution. 

I couldn't call them carrot cake doughnuts, though, because they are yeast doughnuts...it was too confusing.  I have seen carrot cake doughnuts, sold by a famous gourmet doughnut place in NYC.  I have seen them covered with cream cheese frosting and sprinkled with cute little orange rinds.  I wanted to be different.  I think it's a phase I am going through.  Anyway, I wanted to know why I hadn't seen any carrot cake yeast doughnuts.  After making them, I am still wondering.  They were pretty wonderful.

The dough is filled with carrots, currants, cinnamon and other spices.  The cooked doughnut is rolled in sugar while it is still warm.  The middle is filled with a basic homemade cream cheese frosting.  What' not to love?

Carrot Currant Doughnuts with Cream Cheese Filling: 

2 tsp instant yeast

1/4 cup warm water

1 tsp sugar

2 1/2 cups AP flour

1 egg

2 Tbsp butter, softened

1 1/2 tsp salt

3 Tbsp sugar

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp allspice

1/8 tsp cloves

1/2 cup finely shredded carrots

3 Tbsp currants

3 cups oil, for frying

sugar for rolling

1 8 ounce brick cream cheese

4 cups powdered sugar

1 tsp vanilla

In a small bowl, combine the yeast, warm water and teaspoon of sugar.  Set aside and let bubble for a few minutes.  In a mixing bowl, combine the flour, egg, butter, sugar, salt, cinnamon, allspice, cloves,  carrots, currants and yeast mixture until it forms a dough.  Knead for 8-10 minutes by hand or mixer.  Cover and let rise for 1 1/2 hours.  Punch down, and roll out to 1/4 inch thick on a floured surface.  Cut into circles or squares 2 1/2 inches across. 

(these aren't stacked..I don't know why those little ridges formed on the sides)

 Cover and let rise another 15 minutes.  Heat oil in a Dutch oven on the stove.  When a popcorn kernel pops in the oil, it's ready to cook the doughnuts (I think that's 350 degrees, but I have never had a deep fryer or electric skillet).  Put four into the oil at a time.  Fry for 40 seconds on each side.  Let drain slightly on paper towel or a wire rack.  Roll in sugar and let cool on a plate.  When cool, use a round frosting tip on a pastry bag to fill them with the cream cheese filling.

For the filling: beat the cream cheese, powdered sugar and vanilla until smooth.

Foodie Friday

Food on Friday

Friday Foods

Vegetarian Foodie Friday

I'm Lovin' It Friday

Friday Features

Family Friendly Friday

GCC Recipe Swap
Crafty Friday
The Pity Party

Tweet

Crazy Baking a Mile in the Air: Tips for High Altitude Kitchens

I live at an elevation over 5,000 feet. It is called the “high desert.” There is a mountain range just to the north that is almost 8,000 feet above sea level, but because my town is already so high, it doesn't look like more than hills. Being so high causes me to have to make a few adjustments when I cook and bake.  Here are a few interesting things you may not have known about elevated cooking and baking: 

• 
  
  The higher the elevation, the lower the temperature at which water boils. The 212 degree mark actually is the temperature that water boils at sea level. This being the case, you'd think that things would cook quicker, but because they are boiling at a lower temperature, it takes longer because the overall heat is lower.
• 
  
  If liquids boil at lower temperatures, it stands to reason that they are evaporating faster, too. So we have to add more liquid to recipes. Sometimes adding just one more egg will do the trick.
• 
  
  The atmosphere is thinner up here, so gases expand more...as in leavening gases in cakes. So we have to add less to recipes.
• 
  
  Have you ever noticed that there are “high altitude recipes” on the back of cake mixes? It's not only the baking soda and baking powder that behaves differently at high elevations, sugar changes, too. So, we have to add less to recipes.
• 
  
  In the cake mixes, you can't adjust the leavening and sugar, so the instructions have you add more flour to compensate.
• 
  
  Fats can pose a problem, too. If the gases are expanding and stretching the structure of the baked good, fats can concentrate, resulting in a bit of glop. Decreasing the amount of fat by even a tablespoon can solve that problem.
• 
  
  Another thing we high altitude bakers have to remember is not to over beat our egg whites. Again the air evaporates, the bubbles pop and the result is a baked brick.
• 
  
  For some reason, yeast behaves at all elevations and rarely has to be adjusted.
• 
  
  Other things to consider when cooking at higher elevations: potatoes and other dense vegetables take forever to cook unless they are cut into small pieces.
• 
  
  Beans. You'd think those tiny little things would cook just fine, but their cooking time actually doubles. Pressure cookers solve that problem.
• 
  
  Speaking of pressure cookers, canning (bottling) fruits, vegetables and all other things take longer. If you are using a boiling bath method, and the instructions say it takes 10 minutes, plan on 20 if you are at a higher altitude. If you are using a pressure cooker, plan on adding an additional 5-10 pounds of pressure when sealing the jars.
• 
  
  One last secret to high altitude baking is to use buttermilk, yogurt or sour cream in place of sweet milk as it raises the acidity of the batter. Acids hold in check some of the funky chemical reactions that the lower air pressure causes.
• 
  
  Finally, not all recipes will need to be adjusted. All cooking and baking is a matter of tweaking things here and there for taste as well as texture. If you have a recipe that just won't turn out, try some changes and see if it works better. However if it ain't broke, don't fix it!
  
  
  thursday-13.com

Tweet

Raspberry Marshmallow Custard Parfaits

My banana pudding idea morphed as most of my ideas usually do.  I didn't have any bananas and I did have frozen raspberries.  I also had some marshmallows that were ready to be used or turned into decorative rocks in the front yard.  Then, there was the can of Bird's custard mix that I bought to make a Daring Bakers' challenge that has been languishing in my freezer door...it begged to be included.

 I was reminiscing about a dessert my mom used to make when I was a little girl.  It had a layer of marshmallows and cream cheese folded into whipped cream upon which rested a layer of thickened raspberry sauce, and all of it was spread on a graham cracker crust.  It was one of my favorite desserts and then, it was moved off the rotation and was forgotten about.  That is, until I saw the homemade vanilla wafers, the raspberries and the marshmallows.  

Basically, I layered the cookies, a homemade raspberry sauce and a marshmallow cream cheese custard.  All five of my taste testers loved it.  The Thinker put up ten fingers and flashed them multiple times.  The Engineer kept looking at his empty sundae glass, trying  to figure out how to get his tongue all the way down to the bottom to lick it out.

Raspberry Marshmallow Custard Parfaits: 

11 ounces raspberries (fresh or frozen)

1/2 cup sugar (or less depending on how tart your berries are)

1 cup water, plus 2 Tbsp

1/4 cup cornstarch

2 Tbsp water

28 large marshmallows

4 ounces cream cheese

1/2 cup milk, plus 1 cup

1 Tbsp sugar

1 Tbsp Bird's Custard Mix

homemade vanilla wafers (or store bought, if you must)

In a sauce pan, boil the raspberries, sugar and 1 cup water.  Combine the cornstarch and 2 Tbsp water and then, while stirring, pour the cornstarch mixture into the raspberries.  Stir until thickened, remove from heat and let cool.  In a microwave safe bowl, combine the marshmallows, cream cheese and 1/2 cup milk.  Microwave, a minute at a time, until the marshmallows  puff up and the cream cheese melts.  Mix well.  In another microwave safe bowl, combine the sugar and custard mix.  Add the 1 cup milk and microwave a few minutes, until it boils and thickens.  Combine the marshmallow mixture with the custard mixture.  Crumble some vanilla wafers into the bottom of parfait glasses.  Layer the raspberry sauce and the custard.  Add more cookies as you desire.  Chill at least an hour before serving.

NOTE: You can use a regular small vanilla pudding mix instead of the custard mix, just make it up according to the package directions.  Or, you could use a homemade custard...if you have the time and inclination.

Tasty Tuesdays

Tuesdays at the Table

Tuesday Tastes

Delicious Dishes

Tasty Tuesdays (2)

Tweet

Homemade 'Nilla Wafers: Make Your Own Monday #37

(First off, voting for Project Food Blog opens today, September 20 and runs through the 23rd.   In order to advance to the next challenge, I need your vote.  If you aren't already a member of Foodbuzz, all you have to do is register and you can vote for me, or any of the almost 1900 bloggers who have entered.  Only 400 will advance.  As boorish as it may be to beg for a vote, I am asking.  Here is the link.)

There are two main recipes floating around the internet for homemade vanilla wafers.  One is more of a shortbread, made with egg yolks and the other is really light, made with egg white.  One is sliced after chilling and the other is piped with a pastry bag onto cookie sheets.  Neither worked for me.  1. I wasn't just about to end up with half an egg or two.  2. I wanted something I could just scoop with a tiny ice cream scoop right onto the pan and 3. I wanted the recipe to be frugal.

So.  I printed out both recipes and went to work.  In the end, I changed just about everything, but the results were perfect: a frugal, easy, non hydrogenated, no corn syrup added,  homemade version of 'Nilla wafers.

I just happened to have a box of no-name vanilla wafers in the back of a cupboard.  I got them out to do a taste and look comparison.  My version were exactly the same size and shape of "theirs."  Mine were a whole lot more buttery (owing, I am sure to the fact that I used butter and not a processed fat).  The store bought cookies were more uniformly brown.  Both were crunchy.  My taste testers thought the homemade were exponentially better tasting.  I will see how they work in a recipe when I attempt a variation on that old favorite "banana pudding without bananas."

Homemade Vanilla Wafers: 

1 stick butter

1/2 cup sugar

1 egg, large

1 Tbsp vanilla

1 1/4 cup AP flour

1 tsp baking powder

Cream the butter and sugar in a mixing bowl.  Add the egg and vanilla and mix well.  Combine the flour and powder and mix in.  Using the tiniest ice cream scoop known to man (or a 1/2 tsp measuring spoon), scoop the dough onto a cookie sheet.  (I used a silpat.  If you have one, I recommend using it)  You should get about 20-24 cookies on a pan.  Bake 350 degrees for 10+ minutes.  Let their color be your guide to their doneness.  You want brown edges and tan, crispy cookies.

Monday IS Fun

Mouth Watering Monday

Homemaker Monday

Made By You Monday
Something I Whipped Up

Spotlight Yourself Wednesday

Thursday Recipe Spree

Tweet

Saturday Stories: Military Service

Every family has veterans of whom they are proud.  Anyone who is willing to put their life on the line in the defense of their nation is to be lauded.  So many who have done so have ended up having to pay the ultimate price.

As I have done research into my family, I have found many family who have served.  Both the Good Guy and I have family that goes back to the initial colonization of the United States.  In fact, after pouring through records, I discovered that he and I are actually tenth cousins once removed.  How weird is that?   We both have people from New England.  We also both have family who came from Holland to New Amsterdam.  He has an ancestor who came to Virginia as an indentured servant in the 1600s.

Those who came over and became part of the first Americans went on to have family who fought in the Revolutionary War.  I have a great-great+ grandfather who fought with the minutemen in Concord.  The Good Guy has one who was at Valley Forge with George Washington.  After their service, these veterans were given land.  My people ended up in Western New York, while the Good Guy's went back to Virginia.

Almost a century later,  I found only one great-great+ grandfather who served in the Civil War, but I have a lot of holes in my family tree.  The Good Guy's family, for the most part, answered the call of the West and were pioneers who had left the East before the War Between the States.  I think I am glad that they had left the South before our ancestors were put in the position to fight each other.

I found the World War I draft registrations of my great grandfathers.  My great grandfather's brother went to France and never came home.  The Good Guy's grandmother's brother did the same thing.  Both are buried in military cemeteries over there.

World War II didn't claim any of my family.  I had some great uncles who served, but my own grandfathers weren't in the military.  The Good Guy's uncle was a tail gunner in the bombers who flew raids in Europe.  He was wounded and spent some time in a hospital in England.   Somewhere, in the family stuff at my mother-in-law's house are some of the letters a nurse wrote for him.

The Good Guy's father graduated from high school in 1945.  He joined the Navy, but didn't see any action.  He finished up his military service in the early 1950s, but spent most of his time in Nevada, not Korea.  My father was a career Air Force officer.  I have already written of some of his experiences in a B-52 in Vietnam.

If you haven't guessed by now, I love my family.  I love the ones I have known, but I have also developed a love for those who lived years, even centuries before me.  The more I find out, the more real they become.  When I find a picture of them, it is all the better.  It's so much fun to compare pictures of my brothers with those of long departed grandfathers.  There is a kinship I feel when I read records of service, land grants, even ship passenger lists that contain just the name of an ancestor.  Knowing when they lived and where, how they died or what they did for a living,  whether or not they gave up time to serve in the military, it all gives me a better sense of who I am and who I want to be. Tweet

One of the Many Variations of Chicken Bundles

What did we do before Pillsbury came up with crescent rolls?  Well, actually, we followed recipes like Julia Child's puff pastry recipe and everything was homemade.  Regular readers of my blog know that I prefer homemade over store bought 9 times out of 10.  Crescent roll sheets are for that tenth time.  The nights when I have to pick kids up from football practice only to get them to boy scouts an hour later.  The days that I have to spend in Phoenix, hours away from where I live, with a child at a specialist's office.  These are the  crazy, no time for anything, pull my hair out days the require store bought cheats.  Thank you, Pillsbury, for providing us with such cheats. (note: this is my own opinion, Pillsbury did not ask me to praise their product...in fact, I use generic as often as not)

So, here is my version of one of those recipes that makes it into every single community, church or school cookbook ever published: 

Chicken Bundles: 

3 cups cooked chicken, chopped (can use canned or rotisserie)

1 8 ounce brick of cream cheese

1 small jar pimentos

1/4 cup chopped green onions or scallions

1/4 tsp garlic powder

1/2 tsp thyme

2 packages Pillsbury crescent rolls or sheets

Combine the chicken, cream cheese, pimentos, green onions, garlic powder and thyme in a bowl.  Unroll the crescent rolls and pinch them together to form two rectangles (or if you are using the sheets, just unroll them). Cut the big rectangles into four little ones (that's a total of 8).  Spread 1/3 cup of mixture on four of the rectangles.  Cover with the other four.  Pinch the edges together with a fork.  Bake 400 degrees for 15 minutes.  

If you end up with a lot of leftover filling, open a box of Stove Top chicken stuffing, mix it up and spread it on top of the filling in a microwave safe casserole, heat and serve.  It's  just as quick and really tasty.

Food on Friday

Foodie Friday

Friday Foods

GCC Recipe Swap

Friday Features

Family Friendly Friday

I'm Lovin' It Friday
Crafty Friday

Tweet

Lil' Sassy Salsa Winner

The winner of the Lil' Sassy Salsa is #19, Belinda!!!

Please send me an email with your mailing information and I will get it off to you this week!!!!

Tweet

Some Cookbooks I'd Like to Read, Have, Own or Borrow

I have my eye on a few cookbooks. 

 I realize that I might already have one or two...hundred, but it is my opinion that I need more.  Not "I need!  I need!  I need!" like Bill Murray in What About Bob?  Rather, I need them to keep up with the latest scientific data available to those practicing in my field of expertise.  I need to know the latest trends in cooking, the fashionable flavors, the "in" foods, and so forth.  How else will I know what colors apples will be this season?  Where else would I find the newest shapes of forks?  Is there any other place to find the experts opinion on 350 degrees versus 375?  Really, it's obvious how much I need more cookbooks.

And, perhaps, there might be a little bit of "I need, I need" motivating my silly arguments.  But as long as I admit it, that's the first step, right?

Here are some that have caught my interest: 

1. Ratio: The Simple Codes Behind the Craft of Everyday Cooking by Michael Ruhlman
2. The Pastry Chef's Apprentice by Mitch Stamm
3. The Fearless Baker by Emily Luchetti and Lisa Weiss
4. The Baker's Four Seasons by Marcy Goldman
5. Feeding Dreams: An Edible History of Seven Immigrant Families in One New York Tenement by Jane Zieglman
6. Food Trucks: Stories and Recipes from America's Best Kitchens on Wheels by Heather Shouse
7. At My Grandmother's Knee by Faye Porter
8. Storied Dishes by Linda Murray Berzok
9. How to Squeeze a Lemon by Fine Cooking Magazine
10. Clara's Kitchen by Clara Cannucciari
11. Real Food Has Curves by Bruce Weinstein
12. The Thrifty Cook by Lucy Doncster
13. Foodista: best of food blogs by the blog world

How about you, do you have any cookbooks that you need?  I'd love to hear, because I just might "need" to add to my list!!!!

Thursday-13.com 

Tweet

Szechuan Orange Spice Pasta

There is a company called DeCio  in Arizona that is changing the way the world looks at pasta.  Their handmade pasta is flavored; as in the dough is made with flavored oils, spices and herbs.  Their linguine comes in flavors like wild mushroom, spinach basil garlic, saffron, tomato sonoran spice and szechuan orange spice.  They also make fettuccine, orzo, rotini, and penne.   
, 
The incredible thing about these pastas is that they don't need sauce.  Cook them up in boiling water for about five minutes.  Drain, reserving about 2/3 cup of the cooking liquid.  Add the pasta back to the cooking liquid and toss with butter or olive oil.  Add in whatever meat or veggies you want or serve the pasta plain as a side.  Really, they are incredible.


You can visit their site here or if you reside in Arizona, you can find these yummies at big farmers markets, art fairs and Whole Foods and AJ's Fine Foods.


I bought some at a local art fair.  I purchased sweet potato fettuccine, szechuan linguine, tomato spinach garlic (tri-color) linguine and garlic chive fettuccine.  All of them have had me daydreaming about their culinary possibilities.

Because I have five kids and their palettes aren't as well developed as I'd like, I ended up using my tried and true Fried Rice combination of Spam, carrots, celery, onions and garlic cooked up in sesame oil with a splash of soy sauce as a topping.  The aroma of the pasta as it cooked just about knocked my socks off.  The orange oil and ginger smelled wonderful.  The pasta had a bit of a bite to it (it contains some cayenne), but it wasn't overpowering.  My little girl told me it was too spicy for her, though she ate at least half of it.

*Note: I received no remuneration and all opinions are expressly mine.

Tweet

Cream of Tomato Bacon Soup

Remember those tomatoes I said were sitting on my counter?  The ones who were waiting, rather impatiently, to become something...anything, in fact, other than the pile of rotten tomatoes that my procrastination was leading them to?  Well, they became soup.  Quite a luscious soup, I might add.  

I wanted a really hearty soup, thick and creamy, but with chunks of something to make it more of a meal.  I started out using my grandmother's old chinois on the tomatoes, but didn't like how thin the soup was looking, so the last half of the tomatoes I simply peeled and crushed.  In the end, it was a good combination.

Cream of Tomato Bacon Soup: 

4 pounds fresh tomatoes (I suppose you could use 1/2 canned crushed or diced tomatoes and 1/2 tomato juice ~ about 29 ounces each)

1/4 cup minced dried onion (if you use fresh, saute it in some olive oil first)

1 tsp garlic powder

1 tsp oregano

1 tsp thyme

1 tsp salt

1/4 tsp black pepper

3 Tbsp honey

1 tsp Slap Ya Mama White Pepper Blend

1 cup cream (or 1 cup evaporated milk)

slurry of flour & water (about 1/3 cup total)

1 cup bacon cooked, diced before cooking

If starting with fresh tomatoes, blanch them in boiling water and peel.  Add the next 8 ingredients and simmer for 45 minutes uncovered.  Stir periodically to prevent sticking.  (At this point I used an immersion blender to improve the texture). Add the slurry of flour and water, stirring constantly until the soup thickens.  Add the cream and bacon, heat through (but don't boil) and serve immediately.  Sprinkle with mozzarella cheese if desired.

After I made this soup, I realized I could have used a leek instead of the onion...and it would have been a BLT soup.  It's a little corny, but it would taste really good.  If you choose this route, chop it and saute it in some olive oil before adding it to the tomatoes at the beginning of the cooking process.

Tasty Tuesday (1)

Tasty Tuesday (2)

Tuesday Tastes

Tempt Your Tummy Tuesday

Tuesdays at the Table 

Delicious Dishes

Recipe Swap Thursday

Tweet

Project Food Blog Challenge #1: Defining the Harried Homemaker

  The first challenge in the Foodbuzz “Project Food Blog” contest involves defining myself as a food blogger; figuring out why mine might be different from other blogs you may read. It was certainly easy enough to come up with things I am not! I am not a classically trained chef. I don't devote my blog strictly to one cuisine or Real food or beautifully decorated cookies. I don't cook professionally or move in circles of the “big wig" blogs. Well then, who am I?

Let's begin by dissecting the name of my blog: Frugal antics. Although the recession has hit my family with a big black eye, I have always been frugal. I was taught early on that waste was, well, a waste. “Things aren't as important as people,” “Make it do or do without, “ and the like were common mantras of my youth. My parents were both the first generations of their families to attend universities. Regardless of our spending power, frugality was part of every spending decision. That way of thinking translated itself into the kitchen. My mom taught me to bake, to use leftovers, to use what was in the pantry and refrigerator to create tasty meals. When I became the head of my own kitchen, I continued to expand my repertoire; learning to preserve food, to enjoy gardening, to visit local farms, to shop wisely, to continue the frugal patterns of the past.

Harried Homemaker. I have five kids with busy schedules, physical and mental health issues plus all of the other things that children naturally bring to parents' lives. Having a rainbow family built both through adoption and birth, I deal constantly with nosy, well meaning people's questions and judgments. Harried sometimes seems like a tame description of my life.

 To combat the craziness that is my world, I read cookbooks, I plan menus, I bury myself in learning new culinary skills; but I also have to be able to cook on the fly ~ throwing together a meal in a matter of minutes with whatever is within reach.

Added to all of that, is my love for all things past. I feature a story from my family's history every weekend. My Saturday Stories have opened up another facet of cooking for me.  I am in possession of my grandmother's recipe scrapbook and a few of the recipes from yet a generation before her.

 Cooking foods that have been in my family for years, has created an appreciation for old school cooking styles, for the cuisines of my forebears, and surprisingly, for eating less processed foods.  It also inspired my "Make Your Own Monday" series where I have made homemade pop-tarts, pizza rolls, fig newtons, cream cheese and even peanut butter.

So, who am I as a food blogger? I am canned peaches off the tree in my yard. I am dehydrated banana chips from the bananas that turned black too soon. I am the homemade spaghetti sauce and already cooked pasta in my freezer waiting for a busy night's dinner. I am the spaetzle my German grandmother taught my mom to make, who in turn taught me. I am a loaf of homemade bread, dozens of cookies, home corned beef and a few original recipes thrown in, to boot.

Why do I think I should be the Next Food Blogger? Answering this question is the hardest part of this challenge. Already I am being forced out of my safe little comfort zone. I am usually content to hide in the background; make the food and let others enjoy it, teach the skill and let others show off.

But you know what? I am qualified to be the winner. Twenty plus years of cooking and baking, reading and practicing, failing and trying again, combining unusual ingredients and trusting my instincts qualifies me. Winning cooking contests and being hired on the virtue of one cookie qualifies me. Being taught from a child by professional cooks (aka Mom and Grandma) to savor ingredients, to read cookbooks like some people read novels, to be passionate about all things food qualifies me. Being able to admit with a gulp and a sigh that I actually dream about food qualifies me.  I am ready to match my skills against the 1700+ other bloggers.  My fortes and my weaknesses are on the table.

Tweet