Daddy's Girl

As I was making supper last night, a new thought (or at least a new perspective on a thought) occurred to me. I have always given my mom the most credit for inspiring my love of cooking (and she deserves it) but I have never really considered my dad’s influence.

My parents have been divorced since I was little and I lived with my mom for the majority of my up-bringing. However, I was still a daddy’s girl. Although I don’t remember, I have been told that my dad would take me out on the tractor when I was a toddler and I would fall fast asleep on his lap while he cut hay. I do remember that as I got older, I always looked forward to “dad’s weekend” and going “bummin’” with him. To clarify, “bummin’” seemed to be driving around without a real plan, stopping at any garage sales that looked promising, visiting anyone you knew that looked like they were home, usually getting a burger somewhere, and just hanging around the family farm. I loved it! I still can’t pin-point why I loved it, but I did!

One of my biggest food memories from being a kid with my dad is that he used to take us through the drive through at the place with the secret sauce. He would order like a dozen hamburgers “plain with ketchup and pickles” for us and whichever of my cousins were around. Getting fries was a real treat and if we did get them, he would ALWAYS say “eat your burger first cause I don’t want to hear ‘Daaaaad, I’m hungrrrrry’”. My cousins and I could (and did) imitate that phrase perfectly!

When we weren’t out bummin or having drive through burgers, my dad did cook. He grew up on the farm and he prefers meat and potatoes. He’s not really big on a lot of seasoning or spices and I don’t think he tries many experiments in the kitchen, even to this day. But what he does cook, turns out pretty good and he inspired last night’s supper.

I am not even sure what we used to call this supper when I was growing up but I’m going to call it goulash now. Dad’s version was a can of tomato soup, a can of Veg-All mixed veggies, ground beef and wagon wheel pasta. I have to admit, I’m thinking the reason why I liked this so much as a kid was the wagon wheels… I loved pasta then, I love pasta now, and there are few pastas that are more fun than wagon wheels! Now, some of you who have read this blog may be thinking (as I am writing this) that this recipe calls for a lot of cans. I didn’t exactly follow dad’s recipe, I was just taking a lovely stroll down memory lane while I was preparing my own version!

I happened to have had some homemade tomato soup in the freezer that I chose for this, along with some frozen tomato puree from the end of the growing season here. I am also not a fan of the consistency of canned veggies in my food-snob adulthood so I opted for frozen peas and carrots as well as frozen corn. Last, but not least, I added a bit of bouillon for that salty, brothy, base and sadly, I did not have any wagon wheels so good ol’ elbow mac had to do. Just to round out the memory for myself, I buttered a slice of bread to eat alongside this, just like dad would have!

My kids gobbled it up, my husband had a hot meal in his thermos today, and I had a very satisfied belly and heart remembering supper with dad as a kid!

Dad’s Goulash

1 lb ground beef

15 oz tomato soup (canned or homemade)

15 oz tomato puree (canned or homemade)

1 cup water

1 cup frozen peas and carrots

1/2 cup frozen corn

2 beef bouillon cubes (start with 1 if you are using canned soup and taste-test for salt before adding 2^nd cube)

Salt and pepper to taste

1/2 lb dry pasta, cooked per package instructions

In a 6-quart pot, brown ground beef over medium heat until cooked through. Add all remaining ingredients except pasta. Bring to a simmer and cook 10-15 minutes until bouillon cubes are dissolved and veggies are tender.

Stir in pasta and serve immediately.

Holiday Hustle

My apologies to any of you who have been waiting on a new post from me. I truly appreciate each of you who read this! This time of year is my absolute favorite but I have a tenancy to bury myself in projects. From decorating to handmade gifts to entertaining to cookies, I love it all! But I am finding that all of that leaves very little time for blogging.

Honestly, it doesn't leave a lot of time for cooking either. I tend to do a lot of quick and easy things or pull things out of the freezer while I run around like a crazy elf. I did try to make braised baby back ribs this past weekend. It is a recipe that I have made before and the first time I did it, the ribs were fall-off-the-bone tender and the flavor was amazing! I have tried the same recipe probably six times since then and still have not achieved the same results. I keep trying to get the best cut ribs, cooking a little longer, different varieties of white wine... I can not figure out why I'm not getting the same results. The flavor is good, my ribs are just not getting even close to as tender!

One recipe that always turns out though is my sugar cookies! This is pretty much the only kind of cookies I make at Christmas time even though I have seen (or tasted) hundreds of other delicious Christmas cookie recipes. I stick to rolling out homemade sugar cookie dough and cutting out all of our favorite shapes. Then I whip up some of my mom's buttercream frosting in a bunch of colors for decorating. Sometimes I add candies on the Christmas trees and chocolate chips on the snowmen but, for the most part, I'm completely good with straight up frosting!

What is your favorite type of Christmas cookie to make? Or eat!

Tradition Addition

What a wonderfully busy weekend! It seems that every weekend from now until New Years is always wonderfully busy. This is my absolute favorite time of the year! My husband works crazy hours during the holidays and then I fill basically every one of his non-working hours with Christmas traditions (new and old)!

Yesterday we upheld an old tradition; we went Christmas tree hunting with some really great friends of ours. This tradition started as “Sunday, Funday” before we had children and was an entire day of mimosas (and other concoctions), Christmas trees, snacks and hot soup when we got home with the tree. The first year, we got home with our tree and added tortellini to the soup we had in the slow cooker. We figured we would play a round of cards while the pasta cooked so we all sat down at the dining room table. The next thing we knew, there was a slow soup waterfall flowing out of the slow cooker, down the cabinet and forming a lovely pond on the floor. Tortellini in the slow cooker must me supervised at all times…

These days we do things almost the same way but with our children and without mimosas. This year, our soup was even the same flavor as that first year. But what I wanted to share with you today was the meatball appetizer we dug into this time.

I believe I made mention in a previous post that I was popping some leftover sage stuffing in the freezer. If I had to guess (because I didn’t measure of course), I would say I had 3 cups of stuffing or so. As it turns out, that is enough stuffing to mix with 3 pounds of ground beef and 1 pound of pork sausage to make enough meatballs to feed an army… I’m thankful my friend offered to roll meatballs with me or I might still be doing it! Lucky for us, they turned out delicious and almost a dozen of them were eaten before I even got the sauce together!

For the sauce, I wanted to keep playing off of the Thanksgiving flavors of the stuffing. I decided to add cranberries to my store-bought honey barbeque sauce. I can remember my mom adding grape jelly to barbeque sauce when she made cocktail wieners for holidays and parties when I was a kid. They were ALWAYS a hit. My thoughts went like this; cranberry sauce is a little like grape jelly in sweetness and jelly consistency, cranberry sauce is as much of a Thanksgiving staple as stuffing is, cranberry barbeque sauce and sage stuffing meatballs makes complete sense!

I think these meatballs were good enough to be added to the annual tradition roster. The cranberries gave the sauce just the right about of tartness but didn’t over power the tender, savory meatballs! We all ate so many meatballs and cheesy bean dip that we barely had room for the soup in the slow cooker (and tortellini that we cooked separately on the stove top this time).

 Holiday Cocktail Meatballs

For the Meatballs

3 lbs ground beef

1 lb pork sausage

About 3 cups cooked sage stuffing

3 eggs

1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese

2 Tbsp low sodium soy sauce

1 tsp garlic powder

1/2 tsp dried thyme

Salt and pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease 4 baking sheets.

In the largest bowl you can find, combine all ingredients. Scoop roughly 2 Tbsp for each meatball and roll into balls. Place meatballs on baking sheets about 1 inch apart so they have a chance to brown in the oven.

Bake for 30-40 minutes. Allow meatballs to cool on pan at least 10 minutes before transferring to vessel with sauce.

For the Sauce

3 cups honey barbeque sauce

3 cup fresh cranberries

1 1/2 cup apple juice

Place all ingredients in blender and blend until smooth. Pour over cooked meatballs and simmer until sauce thickens slightly (about 5-7 minutes). Serve warm.

*Meatballs freeze well in case you are not trying to feed an army. And sauce can easily be reduce to 1/3 of the amount written.

Rolling Up the Leftovers

Hope everyone had a wonderful holiday last week! And I hope you all got a hold of some great deals between Black Friday and Cyber Monday!

The holiday here was lovely! The only thing that burnt was the French fried onion topping on the green bean casserole. Overall, a lovely success! One of my favorite things about making all of this food for one day is the leftovers! Especially Thanksgiving leftovers! Everything seems to reheat well, making dinner for the next 2 days a breeze! This is good, because I needed those 2 days to put my kitchen back together!

As you may have guessed, I also love turning leftovers into new dishes. I enjoy the real simple ones like turkey noodle soup with turkey stock from the bones and cold turkey salad on sandwiches. Then I also like to come up with something a little bit different or new. This year, I popped my baked beans in the freezer with the intention of making cheesy bean dip for guests this coming weekend. I also threw some leftover stuffing in the freezer. I plan to use that to make meatballs.

The new use for leftovers I am most excited about this year is Cranberry Rolls! Now, in previous years, I have taken leftover cranberry sauce and used it to fill crescent roll dough that you get out of the can. I roll the crescent dough around a teaspoon of cranberry sauce, bake until the rolls are done, and top with simple powdered sugar and milk glaze. This year, I decided to take the same idea and step it up by making cinnamon roll dough instead.

I was also thinking that I wanted to add a little texture and just a little more jazz to these things so in my dough recipe, I substituted about a cup and a half of flour for ground up quick oats. I contemplated a cream cheese frosting for this but I decided to stick with the simple glaze to make sure you could really taste the cranberry sauce. Now, I make a very simple cranberry sauce to start with; just sugar, orange juice and fresh cranberries. So to spruce that up a little bit, I tossed in a bit of cinnamon and butter. There’s got to be some rule somewhere that you can’t make rolls like this unless you use butter.

The way I roll when it comes to cinnamon rolls, or cranberry rolls in this case, is I make one batch and split it in two, one for the morning and one for the freezer. These things are best fresh from the oven. The best method I have found so far is to let the rolls go through their second rise, bake them until they are just set and starting to get just a touch of color, then take them out to cool. At this point, I refrigerate one for the next morning and I pop the other in the freezer. When it is time to serve, I put them back in a 350°F oven for about 15-20 minutes until they heat though and turn beautifully golden brown. For me, this works because I don’t have to get up at a ridiculous time in order to serve these puppies for breakfast but they still come out piping hot and fresh!

As my little girl put it, “my belly likes these cranberry rolls”. I baked a pan of 8 rolls this morning, there are 2 adults and 2 children under the age of 4, and there are no leftovers… ‘Tis the season to indulge right?

Cranberry Rolls

Dough

1 cup warm milk (110°-125°F)

1/3 cup butter, melted

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 cup sugar

1 packet active dry yeast

2 eggs

3 cups flour

2 cups quick oats

Filling

1 cup, or so, leftover cranberry sauce

1/2 heaping tsp cinnamon

4 Tbsp butter, softened

Glaze

1 cup powdered sugar

1-2 Tbsp milk

½ tsp vanilla extract

Add 2 cups of oats to blender. Pulse until the oats have broken up and resemble coarse flour. Set aside.

To stand mixer bowl, add milk, butter, salt, sugar and yeast. Mix on low 30 seconds to allow the yeast to activate.

With the mixer on low, add blended oats. Then add flour 1/2 to 1 cup at a time until soft dough forms and begins to leave the side of the bowl. Turn the mixer up to begin kneading dough. (At this point, I like to remove the dough to a floured surface and knead by hand for 5-8 minutes)

After dough has been kneaded, place in greased bowl, cover loosely and set in warm area of kitchen to rise until double (about an hour).

While dough is rising, mix cranberry sauce, cinnamon and softened butter. If your cranberries are in large chunks, consider doing this step in the blender or with a potato masher to create a relatively smooth filling. Set aside.

When dough has doubled, turn out on a floured surface. Use rolling pin to roll dough into a rectangle, about 1/4 inch thick. Spread filling evenly across rolled out dough.

Begin rolling the dough the long way to make a long log. You will have to roll some-what loosely to avoid squishing out all of your filling. When dough is rolled into a log, use a serrated blade to slice into 16 rolls. Place rolls in greased baking dish, cover loosely, and allow to rise for about another hour.

Bake rolls at 375°F for about 20 minutes. If you plan to refrigerate or freeze rolls, remove from oven when rolls are just set and barely starting to show color*. If you are serving immediately, continue baking until rolls are golden brown.

While rolls are cooling, mix together powdered sugar, milk and vanilla. Poor over rolls and serve warm.

*To finish rolls that have been refrigerated or frozen – thaw frozen rolls over night in the fridge. Preheat oven to 350°F and bake rolls for about 15-20 minutes until golden brown. Mix glaze and poor over rolls as usual.

Turkey Talk

I tried that theory of going to my favorite wholesaler last week to avoid the rush before the holiday this coming week… Turns out that even last Thursday at 2:30 in the afternoon, the place was packed!

Despite the crowd, it was a necessary trip and turned out to be well worth it. They had fresh turkeys on sale for almost half the price of my local grocery store! Unfortunately, because of the crowd, the turkey sizes went directly from 13 pounds to 22 pounds. I plan to brine my turkey so I need a bird small enough to fit in my brining vessel, which happens to be my pressure canning pot. That means I have a very adorably sized 13-pound turkey chillin’ in my freezer. Still more than enough to feed the 4 adults and 2 small children gathering at my house this year.

After making our rounds through the store, my kids and I picked a checkout line and began our wait. An older gentleman got in line behind us and started chatting; talking about how busy they are for a week day and so on. He listened to my three-year-old as she shared random information and made small talk, seemed friendly and nothing odd. Then I started unloading my cart onto the belt and when I got to the turkey and this guy goes, “That’s not a very big turkey, lady”. Now how exactly do you respond to such a comment? Was I just judged on the size of my turkey? I think I might develop a turkey complex.

Nah, the size of the bird doesn’t matter as long as it is juicy and delicious! I have my plan all set to help me accomplish said juicy and delicious bird. Although, I already pushed my Sunday plans back to Monday… not really the best way to start the to-do list. Oh well, game on tomorrow!

It Pays to Have a Plan

The count-down is on! Thanksgiving is next week! Arguably the biggest food day of the year, I spare no expense when setting out our Thanksgiving feast!

My husband works in an industry that gets stupid busy for the holidays. And yes, I meant stupid. We also live far enough from family that it takes us longer to get there than it does to have dinner. The result, new tradition!

I have been preparing Thanksgiving dinner every year since we bought our first house. That particular year, I thought it would be an awesome idea to grill a whole turkey breast. Yeah, not an awesome idea in Wisconsin in November. It took FOREVER for that little turkey breast to cook through. I had invited my mom and younger siblings to dinner that year and to spend the night… They have not been back for Thanksgiving since. Sorry mom…

No picking on my handwriting, scribbles or miss spellings!

The following year, I discovered turkey brining (thank you Good Eats!) and also decided I needed a plan. Every year since, I make a plan and I start as much prep as I can on the Sunday before Thanksgiving. I also grocery shop in two parts so I don’t spend an entire day at the store. Tonight’s project was menu plan (which is basically the same every year) and the grocery list. Tomorrow I can head to my local grocery store and stock up on dry and canned goods, lightening the load for early next week. I can also head to my favorite wholesaler at the end of this week instead of trying to fight the crowds there next week.

Still to be done this week, list all the tasks and give them time slots for next week. Thanksgiving is a labor of love! Plan and prep and then I spend the entire day in my pj’s, going in and out of the kitchen. So much to be thankful for!

Piping Hot Freezer Pie

I love freezer cooking! It is a life saver! I have found everything people say about how it saves time and money while being far healthier than fast food to be true! It’s like having a safety net if the day gets away from me or if the weather is terrible and I don’t have any groceries or if someone is sick, etc. I can still serve a yummy meal without dishing out extra cash for delivery.

Before we moved, I was able to be a part of a freezer cooking event at the church my family belonged to. In the days leading up to cooking day, the congregation signed up to bring the ingredients needed and then dropped them off to the church kitchen. The morning of cooking day, a group of a dozen or so women came together in the church kitchen and turned out a couple dozen meals. All the meals were stored in the church freezer and when someone was ill or had a new baby or some other immediate need, the pastoral team would take them a meal. I love this ministry. It is so simple but such a powerful way to help another person and I was blessed to be a part of it.

I have given away freezer meals to friends of mine who could use a little dinner time relief and I have also given them as gifts! People love food! And if you can feed them something delicious that they don’t have to fuss over, what a fabulous gift!

I have done the one day freezer cooking marathon before and it was good. I made the meals I had planned and ended up with three additional meals from the leftover ingredients. The result was something like 22 meals; lasting roughly three months at my house. That is just about perfect as you don’t typically want to keep meals frozen longer than three months. However, my favorite way to do freezer cooking is just to double something I’m already making and pop one in the freezer. This gives me a wide variety in the freezer and I don’t have to dedicate hours to the cause; just the amount of time I was already going to spend on dinner.

Today’s doubled-up recipe is Shepherd’s Pie. Yet again, I am not claiming authenticity… it just tastes good! I have had shepherd’s pie at an Irish pub but I found it a bit bland. I’ve been playing with my recipe for a little while and this is my family likes it best! My method for making this might be a bit odd. I like to make my meat base and divide it into two pans and freeze it. Then I make my mashed potatoes, cool them, and spread them over the frozen base. Two reasons I do this, 1) It’s really easy to spread the potatoes over the frozen base, 2) It allows me to break up the process on the days I have less time in the kitchen.

Shepherd’s Pie comes out of the oven piping hot and full of comfort! The meat and veggies are coated in savory gravy and the potatoes are just barely starting to crisp. It’s not fancy but it just feels like home.

Shepherd’s Pie

(makes 2 casseroles)

2 lbs ground beef

1 large onion, chopped

3 Tbsp butter

1/4 cup flour

1 tsp garlic powder

1 tsp onion powder

1 tsp thyme

1/2 tsp black pepper

2 Tbsp Worcestershire Sauce

1 bag frozen mixed vegetables (1 lb), thawed

4 lbs potatoes

1/3 cup whole milk

1/2 cup butter

Salt & Pepper to taste

Over medium-high heat, brown ground beef and onions. When beef is cooked through, add 3 Tbsp butter and 1/4 cup flour. Stir and allow flour to cook 1-2 minutes. Gradually add beef broth and stir to avoid lumps. Season with garlic powder, onion powder, thyme, black pepper and Worcestershire sauce.

Add mixed vegetable and allow to simmer about 10 minutes.

Transfer meat mixture to two greased baking dishes (8”x10” or similar). Allow to cool and then freeze until solid.

For mashed potatoes:

Peal and boil potatoes. When potatoes are fork-tender, drain and set aside. Melt butter in pan potatoes were boiled in over medium heat. Add milk and let it warm for 2-3 minutes. Add potatoes back into butter and milk mix and mash. Season with salt and pepper.

When potatoes are cooled, remove meat mixture from freezer and top with potatoes. Smooth potatoes with spoon or spatula so entire meat base is covered and potatoes reach edges of pan.

Immediately return pan to freezer if you are not eating it on the same day. To serve on the same day, place in the refrigerator to thaw meat base.

To heat Shepherd’s pie for serving, preheat oven to 350°. Cover and bake approximately 30 minutes. Remove cover and bake additional 15-20 or until heated through and potatoes are just starting to brown.

Dinner Slump

I keep seeing this thing pop up in my news feed that says something like "I hate when I'm waiting for mom to make dinner and then I realize that I am mom". I can relate to this!

Just yesterday dinner time was here before I knew it and all of a sudden I was going through the fridge like "it's too late to start that" and "the kids won't eat that" and "maybe we should just have cereal..." We did not have cereal, at least not this time :)

Having freezer meals come in especially handy for days like this! Even though I stay home with my kids, time still gets away from me and having a dinner back up plan is a life saver! Last night, I pulled out a bag of burrito "filling", shredded some cheese, chopped a tomato, pulled out tortillas and ta da!!! Supper is ready! Saved by the freezer!

My Roots are Roasting

Buckle up friends, we have a three for one tonight!

So now that everyone in my house is pretty much over this last round of colds, I have some time to connect with all of you fine people again! Tonight’s adventure took place over a span of three days. The growing season here is just about over and I have received my last box of veggies from my CSA. From the last two boxes, I formed a small collection of root vegetables; beets, turnips and celeriac. I know, what the heck is celeriac? It is also known as celery root and does have a celery flavor but not as distinctive as actually celery stalks.

As I was reading about each of these bulbous roots, I noticed that they are all commonly roasted and they are all commonly seasoned with thyme. Seemed to me like they were made to be served together somehow. I decided my best bet was to roast them all individually, according to the best recipes I could find for each, and then bring them back together in my final dishes.

My first idea was inspired by pizza night at the farm where we get our CSA from. On Friday evenings, during growing season, the farm hosts pizza night where they serve homemade pizza with farm-fresh ingredients baked in their outdoor brick ovens. It is and awesome community event and my family just loved it! One of the pizzas on the menu at the end of the season was Roasted Root Vegetable. We tried the October Special over the Roasted Root Vegetable at the farm so I don’t know exactly which root vegetables are on it but the idea sounded like a perfect use for my trio.

Like I mentioned, I had a small collection of veggies so I knew that I wasn’t going to be able to use them all on pizza. When I’m working with ingredients that I don’t use often, I like to try to fit them into something I already know that I like. For example, I know I like skillet breakfasts with fried potatoes and ham, served with a fried egg on top (I have no idea what is with this fried egg on top kick that I have going here). I know that potatoes and beets taste nothing alike but I have substituted rutabaga for potatoes in this kind of breakfast so I thought maybe I could sneak my roasted root veggie combo in there too! The morning that I made Root Veggie Breakfast Skillet, I threw in a couple baby red potatoes to make sure I had enough food in case I was totally wrong about this idea.

The third roasted root vegetable experiment was risotto. Now, risotto is up there with the Italian Wedding Soup; I have never had it anywhere but my own kitchen. I have no idea if what I’m dishing up is what risotto is “supposed” to be like. Doesn’t matter. We love it! My favorite way to make risotto is with a combination of mushrooms but I have read and heard that there are about a million ways to spin risotto and I got the most confidence from butternut squash risotto. Again, butternut squash does not taste like a beet but both veggies are on the sweet side and I could see no reason why creamy rice wouldn’t make a delicious home for my rooty mix.

After eating all three meals, my husband and I ranked them as such:

1^st place: Pizza. This one turned out great! I had drizzled it with a balsamic glaze when it came out of the oven and the vinegar just took the veggies to a new level! Paired with homemade crust, this one is worth making again!

2^nd place: Risotto. This was also very tasty. I added the roasted veggies in when the risotto was almost done to give the whole dish time to melt together. Finished with a pad of butter and some salty Parmesan, it made a delicious side to baked chicken.

3^rd place: Breakfast Skillet. I’m still thinking this could be really tasty. For some reason, the turnips in this application tasted a bit bitter. Now, they did not taste bitter in either of the other two recipes but they had more time to cook in both of those. So maybe the turnips needed more roasting time to start with or more time in the pan while I cooked the potatoes. The beets and celeriac both paired well with the ham and fried egg!

I’m a big fan of preparing one thing and turning it into a bunch of other things. I’m good with leftovers too but if you can turn it into something new, it is so much more exciting! I had a lot of fun checking out new ways to use these root vegetables and no leftovers suggests that the results were not half bad!

Roasting the Vegetables:

(I did all of the roasting the day before and stored them in containers in the fridge. I also lined my pan with tin foil to help with clean up)

Peal the beets and celeriac, scrub the turnips. Cut all veggies into 1/2 inch cubes.

For the Beets: Toss with 1 Tbsp olive oil. Season with 1/2 tsp dried thyme, salt and pepper. Roast at 400°F for 45 minutes or until tender.

For the Celeriac: Toss with 1 Tbsp olive oil. Season with 1/2 tsp dried thyme, 1/2 tsp paprika, salt and pepper. Place celeriac on a piece of heavy duty foil and close foil

to form a packet. Place packet on a cookie sheet and roast at 425°F
for 25 minutes. Open and spread the foil out on the cookie sheet and roast 15-20 minutes more, until tender.

For the Turnips: Toss with 1 Tbsp olive oil. Season with 1/2 tsp dried thyme, salt and pepper. Roast at 425°F for 30 to 40 minutes, until tender.

Roasted Root Veggie Pizza

1 pizza crust (preferably homemade!)

1/3 of the roasted root veggie mix

1/2 cup shredded mozzarella

Balsamic Glaze (recipe below)

Preheat oven to 425°F. Stretch raw pizza dough to fit pan. Poke a few holes with a fork to prevent large air bubbles. Bake until crust just starts to brown; about 5-7 minutes.

Remove crust from oven and carefully flip it over. Return to pan upside down and top with veggie mix and then cheese. Return to oven for another 8 to 10 minutes or until cheese is completely melted and just starting to brown.

Drizzle with Balsamic Glaze, cut and serve.

Balsamic Glaze

1/2 cup balsamic vinegar

1/4 cup brown sugar

Combine vinegar and sugar in small sauce pan over medium heat. Bring to a simmer and allow to reduce by half. Cool slightly before using.

Root Veggie Breakfast Skillet

2 -3 baby red potatoes, cubed

1/3 of the roasted root veggie mix

2 ham steaks, cubed

1 Tbsp oil

1/4 tsp garlic powder

Salt and pepper

1 -2 eggs per person

Heat oil in skillet over medium heat. Add potatoes, season with garlic powder, salt and pepper. Cover for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. When potatoes are just tender, add root veggie mix and ham. Cook uncovered to heat veggies and ham through.

While veggies and ham heat through, fry 1-2 eggs per person. Plate the veggie mix and top with over easy eggs. Serve immediately.

Root Veggie Risotto

4 cups chicken broth

1 Tbsp olive oil

1 small onion, finely chopped

1 cup Arborio Rice

1/4 cup white wine

1/3 of the roasted root veggie mix

2 Tbsp butter

1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese

Sliced green onions for garnish

In large skillet, heat oil over medium heat. Add onions and cook until translucent. Add rice and toast for 1-2 minutes.

Add wine. Stir and cook until wine has been absorbed.

Add 1/2 cup broth. Stir and cook until broth has been absorbed. Continue to add broth 1/2 cup at a time and allow to absorb until you have 1/2 cup of broth left. Add root veggie mix then the last 1/2 cup of broth. Allow the broth to be absorbed.

Remove from heat. Add butter and grated Parmesan. Garnish with green onion. Serve immediately.

Soup, Soup, Soup and More Soup

Soup has been the theme of the week here. It was like the perfect soup storm; it was cloudy and cool outside, I had a drawer full of random veggies and greens to use up and everyone in my house has a cold. So three times this week, I made soup for dinner.

Of this week’s versions of chicken noodle, minestrone and Italian wedding soup, the Italian wedding was my favorite! Now, I can’t claim authenticity on this one because I have only ever had Italian wedding soup that I have cooked and I have never been to Italy. BUT, I’m in love with my version! I may never try Italian wedding soup anywhere else for fear it will ruin my relationship with my version…

This soup is right up there with chicken noodle as far as being comforting and soothing for a cold. It is broth based with carrots and greens, plus meatballs! I also serve mine with small pasta such as orzo or rings. I can’t even pick a favorite part. Of course I love pasta, always but the meatballs! They are so savory and soaked in broth. They just make such a perfect bite! The carrots are shredded so you get some in each spoonful. This is the first time I have used collard greens in this soup but they turned out awesome! I liked them better in this soup than when I braised them with bacon and garlic.

I grabbed my trusty bouillon cubes for this one. I have made this soup with bouillon, stock from a box and homemade stock. Homemade is always the best but this soup has never not turned out! It takes more time to make the meatballs than to put all of the rest of the soup together (unless you are making homemade stock!). I like to mix and bake my own meatballs in large batches and toss them in the freezer. Having those on hand helps this soup come together in minutes. Of course I didn’t have any in the freezer but I do now!

Meatballs, broth, veggies and tiny pasta make this soup a meal in a bowl. Served nice and warm to take the chill right out of your cold and make you feel comfy cozy! It is definitely in my top five soups to make at home!

Easy Italian Wedding Soup

1/2 batch meatballs (recipe follows)

6 cups chicken broth (homemade, stock in a box or bouillon and water)

2 carrots, grated

3-4 large collard green leaves, spines removed, cut into 1 inch squares

1 tablespoon butter

Small pasta, cooked per package instructions

Melt butter in soup pot over medium high heat. Add collard greens and sauté until they begin to wilt. Add chicken broth and bring to simmer.

Simmer collard greens until tender, about 15 minutes. Then add carrots and simmer 2-3 minutes longer. Add meatballs and small pasta* and warm through. Serve immediately.

*I like to dish my pasta into each bowl and then pour the soup over it rather than adding all of the pasta into the soup. This way I can store the pasta separately if there are leftovers without it bloating in the broth.

Meatballs

1 lb ground beef

1 lb bulk Italian sausage

1 cup bread crumbs

1/4 grated Parmesan

1 egg

1 tsp Worcestershire sauce

1 Tbsp basil

1 tsp garlic powder

1 tsp onion powder

Salt & pepper

Preheat oven to 350.

Add all ingredients to a bowl. Use hands to combine thoroughly.

Use roughly 1/2 tablespoon of the mixture per meatball so they fit on your soup spoon. Roll into balls and place on un-greased cookie sheet. Bake for 25 minutes.

It came with an egg, it must be breakfast

About a week ago, our family had a little weekend getaway with some good friends at an indoor waterpark resort. Of course, an important part of any getaway for me is having some good food! When we went out for dinner, my meal was good but my husband ordered something I just had to try to recreate at home!

 I believe what he ordered was called "Carnivore Tots". I’m pretty sure it was like the equivalent of a full bag of frozen tater tots covered in some sort of gravy with shredded pork, shredded cheddar cheese, a fried egg and sprinkled with green onions. Now, I didn’t dive in until there was just tots and gravy left but that was enough. I wanted more!

When we got back home and I made my meal plan for the week, tots and gravy were on my brain! Even though the original dish had pork on it, my husband was not overly impressed with that part. He said it was a tad dry. Instead of pork, I was thinking pot roast with a nice, rich gravy. Most of the time, I just pop my beef roast in the slow cooker and cover with 1 packet onion soup mix, 1 can cream of mushroom soup and 1 can water. The roast always comes out super tender and the drippings are already like gravy! Perfect set up for recreating the tater tot dish; shredded meat and gravy – check! At some point, I had to ask my husband if the egg really added anything to this. After all, I was digging just tater tots and gravy. He assured me it did and that’s when I decided I was serving it for breakfast. I mean why not? Potatoes, meat, eggs… Sounds like breakfast ingredients.

The morning of “carnivore tots” was really quick and easy. I used half a bag of frozen tots (next time I’ll probably go for the whole bag!) that I just had to spread on a pan and put in the oven. My left over pot roast was already shredded and covered in its own gravy so I just warmed it on the stove in a sauce pan. All that was left was to shred a bit of cheese, dice a couple green onions, and fry a few eggs. About as challenging as bacon and eggs. Once all the pieces were ready, I just had to pile them up! I was so excited to dig in, I forgot to even put the green onions on before I snapped a picture!

Tots are just delicious and tots for breakfast are just plain fun! This is a savory, satisfying breakfast. I suppose it could easily be done over hash browns or American fries to be more breakfast-like. Any which way you pile it up though, crunchy potatoes topped with tender meat and a little velvety egg yolk is a spectacular way to start the day!

Carnivore Tots

1 bag frozen tater tots

2 cups shredded left over pot roast in gravy

1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese

1-2 eggs per person

Green onions to garnish

Prepare tater tots per package instructions.

While tater tots bake, warm pot roast on the stove in sauce pan. Shred cheese and chop green onions; set aside.

When tater tots are almost ready, fry 1-2 two eggs per person.

To assemble, spread tater tots in single layer, spoon pot roast and gravy over them to cover. Sprinkle with shredded cheese and top with egg(s). Garnish with chopped green onion and serve immediately.

Pasta! It’s What’s for Breakfast!

People, I crossed a line. And there is no turning back. I made pasta for breakfast! Pasta has been my favorite food group for as long as I can remember. I can’t get enough of the stuff! All shapes, sizes, sauced, buttered, cold in salad or piping hot in soup… I have met very few pasta dishes I didn’t like. It would appear that I have passed this pasta gene on to my daughter. It was totally her idea to have noodles for breakfast! Mom was more than happy to accommodate such an innocent request!

Not long ago, I saw a post in my news feed for breakfast lasagna that sounded delicious to me. The only problem with breakfast lasagna is that my daughter has days when her food cannot be mixed together. She doesn’t go as far as the different foods can’t touch but it’s almost like she doesn’t believe they are the same foods if they are all mixed in one dish. Also, she’s hit or miss on if she will eat cheese. Cheese is more important in lasagna at our house than lasagna noodles so I decided breakfast lasagna will have to wait.

Two things that are always a hit here are bacon and sausage. Either one or both, I never have any left over when I make them for breakfast. Eggs go over pretty well too and I thought that egg yolk over pasta sounded like an excellent idea! As I was trying to put a plan together in my head, it became obvious that this was going to have an adult version and a kid’s version. Both have about the same ingredients but assembly was altered to accommodate our different tastes.

This is the kid's version; notice the lone noodle basking itself in the sun...

Oh, there was one other minor snag in my plan; I didn’t have any breakfast sausage, only plain pork sausage. So I had to whip up a little seasoning mix from a couple of recipes I read online. My whole family loved it! Possibly better than store bought! It had a subtler flavor than what I buy at the store and I liked that I knew exactly what went into it. Today, I just browned my sausage and left it as crumbles but I will definitely be seasoning my own again for patties.

Admittedly, this took longer to make that I typically like to spend on breakfast. My little man was withering away by the time breakfast was on the table and then he was shoveling it in his mouth with both hands. For next time, the sausage and bacon could easily be browned the day before and refrigerated, freeing up a ton of time in the morning. Other than that, you just need enough time to boil some spaghetti and fry a few eggs.

Spaghetti for breakfast will most definitely happen again at our house! Making little girl’s pasta dreams come true is an awesome part of my mom job!

Spaghetti Breakfast Bowl

(yields 4 breakfast bowls)

1/2 lb spaghetti, cooked per package directions and buttered

1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese

4 slices thick cut bacon, crisped and chopped

1/2 lb breakfast sausage, cooked (seasoning mix recipe follows)

4-8 eggs (depending on your appetite!)

Green onions, chopped

Preheat oven to 350°F. Place 4, oven safe, ramekins or bowls on a cookie sheet. In each bowl, layer spaghetti, shredded cheese, bacon and sausage. Bake for roughly 10 minutes to melt cheese and warm through.

While bowls are warming, fry 1 to 2 eggs per bowl. When eggs are cooked over easy or over medium, place on top of warmed spaghetti. Sprinkle with chopped green onions and serve immediately.

Breakfast Sausage Seasoning

(for one pound pork sausage)

1/4 tsp kosher salt

1/4 tsp black pepper

1/2 Tbsp brown sugar

1 tsp fresh sage, minced

1/4 tsp dried thyme

Dash ground red pepper

Dash ground nutmeg

Mix into raw pork sausage. Form patties or crumble and brown.

Life is Better with Bacon

Just a few days ago, Bacon Jam popped up in my news feed. I’m not sure if I should be thankful or just creeped out by the fact that my social media “knows” me… But either way, I had to make it! And it was worth it!

The recipe I used is from Chef John on allrecipes.com. It’s not hard but it takes a little time, like he says. I don’t really mind though because the first step is to render the bacon fat and crisp the bacon. That means bacon potpourri! Once you add onions to bacon grease… ahh that smells just promises that magic is happening in the kitchen! The only minor change I might make next time is that I will skip the salt that the recipe calls for to help sweat the onions. It just doesn’t need the additional salt and the onions have sufficient cooking time to caramelize, in my opinion.

Why have I not heard of this before? It is sweet, smoky, salty bacon spread! With caramelized onions! I already had a thing for caramelized onions and the bacon just sends it way over the top. It is addictive! I have been “testing” it on crackers and I may have to buy more crackers when I’m ready to serve it. Actually, I really want to whip up some burgers and but a big ol’ heaping scoop of this stuff right on top!

If you know any bacon lovers, make them a batch for Christmas. Seriously, it’s good!

Soup's On

Grilled cheese and tomato soup. I always have cheese and bread for grilled cheese but I never make myself a grilled cheese unless I also have tomato soup. Oh, and after trying condensed tomato soup with water once, I won’t make condensed tomato soup unless I also have milk! I’m a food snob, I know.

Grilled cheese and tomato soup takes me back to being a kid. I can remember one occasion when my mom had some tomato basil bagels from a local bagel shop. She cut them open, put slices of Swiss cheese on them and toasted them under the broiler. Then we dipped them in tomato soup… And now I wish I lived anywhere near a bagel shop that made tomato basil bagels!

I’m pretty sure I could go on for days on this topic… Tomato soup is the perfect pairing for gooey, melted cheese held together by glorious toasted slices of carbs! It’s a simple meal, kids love it and it will warm you right up on a blustery fall day.

I’ve been wanting to try to make my own tomato soup for a while now. I still have love for the “Mmm… Mmm… Good” stuff but I have always thought there was probably a way to make it at home with less sodium and no preservatives. And what better time to find out than when you have a CSA box full of season’s end tomatoes.

When I started tossing ingredients in my roasting pan for this, it occurred to me that I was really making a roasted vegetable soup. I promise, tomatoes are still the star! There’s like a 50:50 ratio of tomatoes to all other vegetables! I wanted some sweetness from the carrots and bell pepper to balance the acidic tomatoes and things like garlic, onion and celery to add some flavor. Otherwise, this would be a tomato sauce recipe!

As often happens when I cook; there was way more soup than my family was going to eat in a reasonable amount of time so I froze three quarters of it for later. This way I have soup ready when I need a quick, hot lunch or a good goulash base!

Roasted Tomato Soup

4 pounds garden tomatoes, cored and chunked

2 carrots, chunked

2 stalks celery, chunked

1 small red bell pepper, chunked

1 medium onion, chunked

3 cloves garlic, pealed

2 Tbsp olive oil

1 Tbsp dried basil

1 Tbsp kosher salt, plus more to taste

½ tsp black pepper

½ cup cream (optional)

Preheat oven to 425°F

Fill bottom of non-reactive roasting pan with tomato chunks. Layer remaining vegetable chunks and garlic on top of tomatoes. Drizzle vegetables with olive oil and sprinkle with basil, salt and pepper.

Roast at 425° for 1 hour. Allow to cool slightly then blend in batches until all soup is smooth. Taste and adjust salt as necessary.

To serve, heat on stove until hot then remove from heat and add cream if using.

Note: If you plan to freeze soup, I suggest freezing without the cream and adding it after reheating.

Saucy Apples

Since making mud pies last weekend, my little girl has been asking if we can make real pies; “like blueberry,” she says while jumping up and down. So today, I asked her if we could make apple pie with some of the apples we picked.

Me: “Do you think we should make an apple pie today?”

Her: “Yeah. Hey mom, can we make apple sauce this day too?!”

Me: “Sure. Did you know that sometimes we eat ice cream on apple pie?”

Her: *Wide eyed* “Mom, can we make apple sauce first and eat it at the same time as pie?”

I interpreted that last bit to, “Mom, can we eat ice cream on our apple sauce?” I’m pretty sure that’s the picture in her head.

Have you ever tried to duplicate something you ate at a restaurant? I do it all the time with varying degrees of success. There was a diner near where we used to live that served homemade apple sauce as a side. Really, it was like apple pie filling but it was sooooo good! Tender chunks of apples bathing in warm, caramel-like cinnamon sauce… Mmmmm

So that’s the apple sauce I was dreaming about while my little girl was dreaming about ice cream in hers and honestly, combining the two would probably make a fabulous dessert!

The variety of apples we picked last weekend is called “Sweet 16” and they are indeed very sweet. They have been great for sweetening vegetable juice and the kids have been dipping them in peanut butter to snack on all week. I think they are the perfect amount of sweet for apple sauce too!

Cinnamon Apple Sauce

4 medium sweet apples, peeled and cubed

¼ cup water

1 Tbsp pure maple syrup

½ tsp (heaping) ground cinnamon

Combine ingredients in medium pan. Cook, covered, over medium heat for 5-7 minutes then remove cover. Continue to cook until apples are fork tender, about 20 minutes. Leave apple sauce chunky or use a potato masher for apple sauce consistency.

Why is the Rum Gone?

Did I mention I was a Disney fan? Anyone picturing a ruggedly handsome, wildly entertaining pirate?

Anyway… This past weekend was simply gorgeous! Beautiful sunshine; mid 70’s with a breeze; just perfect. The best part was that my family spent the whole weekend enjoying it together. Everything from mud pies in the back yard, chalk drawings on the driveway, swinging on the swing set, a walk through the neighborhood and even apple picking for the first time. Gorgeous weather, amazing family, I am truly blessed.

Such perfect weather lends itself so well to blended beverages! Something about such a relaxing day enjoying the outdoors and cold drink, match made in heaven! While shopping our favorite wholesaler last week, I let my daughter pick out a type of fruit. This resulted in two 2-pound containers of watermelon chunks, one gallon bag of watermelon slices and two gallon bags of frozen watermelon chunks… Watermelon for days! Watermelon punch seemed like a tasty solution!

Watermelon Punch

Roughly 4 cups frozen watermelon chunks

2 -3 limes, pealed

1 cup juice cocktail (I had apple blueberry on hand, I think most anything but a cranberry blend would work. Cranberry may be too tart with the limes)

Lemon lime soda

1 cup-ish (I didn’t measure, just used up what I had) coconut rum (optional)

Blend frozen watermelon, limes, juice cocktail and rum (if using) until smooth. Fill glass about half full with soda and top with blended mix. Stir and garnish with lime slice if desired. You may want a deck chair and sun glasses ready for enjoying this beverage.

100% Juice

I’m not sure what I’m going to do when my CSA is done for the season and I have to go back to grocery store produce. Don’t get me wrong, we live near a really nice grocery store but when there are 12 inches of snow on the ground, you know those tomatoes were not grown locally. Maybe we will just relocate to a place where it is always growing season. My best friend is reading this like “I know a place! I know a place!”

Oh well, winter is coming. But it’s not here yet so I better just keep enjoying the fresh stuff! Today I juiced some farm fresh spinach. I have been juicing for my family for roughly 2 ½ years and although I wish I did, I don’t do it every day because it does take some time. Maybe if I were one of those super organized moms that brings home the groceries and immediately scrubs and preps all produce and stores it all in a gorgeous array of labeled, stack-able containers so all I had to do is feed it into the juicer… But I’m not. We probably have fresh juice about 4 times a week.

Spinach is a pretty common juice ingredient here and I normally buy it at my favorite wholesaler along with our apples and carrots that are also common ingredients for us. When you get it in the bag, triple washed and sealed for freshness, or something like that, it’s ok but there are always broken leaves or leaves that didn’t get enough drying time so they are wet and wilting, etc. Honestly, it never really mattered to me because I was about to pulverize the juice out of it but now I know, there’s better spinach. Once again, the spinach in my CSA box was like food art. The color was perfect, beautifully sized, unbruised leaves of spinach. I almost didn’t want to juice them, like it was a waste of pretty food or something! I’m glad I did though! Even after juicing as long as I have, I still prefer a sweeter juice. Apples add a ton of sweetness and the veggies I used today also have a sweet side. My 1-year old drank his whole cup in like 2 minutes. There are few things more satisfying to consume than something that is fresh, honestly healthy, and truly delicious!

It’s Easy Being Green Juice

2 large crisp apples (crisp is kind of important, soft apples go through the juicer and yield more of an apple sauce than apple juice)

3 small carrots

3 stalks celery

3 handfuls fresh spinach

Clean all produce and cut to fit your style juicer. Process juice and serve immediately.

Nothing to Write Home About

My apologies to any of you who have been waiting on a new post; I know I have been slacking for a couple days now. Honestly, you haven’t missed much. I have only really “cooked” dinner once in the past four days… One night, I asked my daughter what she wanted for dinner and her response was bacon. I think I am creating a bit of a monster here though. When I asked what she wanted with the bacon, “eggs! But just the white eggs.” Yep, my 3-year old has a specific egg order, egg whites only.

We also had pizza delivered one night and tonight I served the kids frozen peas right out of the bag with deli salami and buttered noodles. Frozen peas out of the bag is actually pretty common here. My kids love peas and it must be more fun if they are frozen. But I just haven’t had a lot of creativity to share with the world these past few days.

A contributing factor to my lack of kitchen spunk may be that our refrigerator is still not working. We currently have an old standard refrigerator in our garage to prevent me from having to grocery shop every day while we sort out a little drama with our home warranty company and the repair service. The up side to not having a refrigerator in the house, you just don’t eat as much! I have to go down a half flight of stairs and across the garage to get to the fridge which is just enough of an inconvenience to make me evaluate if I really want a snack, or cream in my coffee, or jelly on my toast, or if I’m just going to skip it this time.

Seriously though, I’m so spoiled. I really just want a glass of filtered ice water! It has been years since I have not had ice and water in the refrigerator door and I so want it back! What is that saying? “First world problems”