Brussels Sprouts and Eggs

Sometimes, simple is just the best. Sauteed brussels sprouts. Fried eggs. Toast. Perfect weeknight dinner.

Thank you to Perry's Plate for the recipe. And to Bill for making it for us!
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3 T olive oil
1 pound brussels sprouts
1 T honey mustard dressing
3 T sliced almonds
2 eggs
salt and pepper, to taste

Prep the brussels sprouts by cutting off the tough stem ends, removing outer leaves, then slicing them in half.

In a large nonstick skillet heat olive oil over medium-high heat. Place brussels sprouts halves cut-side down in the pan and let them cook for 4-5 minutes, without stirring, until the bottoms are medium brown and caramelized. Give them a stir, then add the remaining 1 T oil, honey mustard, and almonds. Stir to coat the sprouts in the mustard and cook for another 3-4 minutes until they're tender. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Meanwhile, fry eggs in a separate skillet over medium heat to your liking. Serve eggs and sprouts together with toast.

Blackberry-Pear Cobbler

When they announced that the Ward Trunk or Treat was to be preceded by a Chili and Cobbler cookoff--I knew I needed to make cobbler!! I spent all week looking at different recipes, trying to decide what kind of cobbler I should make--and they all sounded so good. But, Mom and Dad had another bumper crop of pears this year, and kept trying to send us home with them. So, I decided to make good use of their fruit and went with this recipe for Pear-Blackberry cobbler from Epicurious.com.

Delicious! I was so nervous about the batter rising up around the fruit like it should. But it baked up beautifully and smelled amazing when I pulled it out of the oven. It got a lot of hits at the cook-off and I even overheard several compliments. (I kept coming back to the cobbler table to try juuust one more..)

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Preheat oven to 350°F. Butter 9x13" baking dish.

4 cups frozen blackberries, NOT thawed
4 cups pears, peeled and chunked
1 1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup Cran-Grape juice
3 tsp finely grated orange peel
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground ginger

Gently toss berries, pears, 2/3 cup sugar, juice, orange peel, cinnamon in large bowl. Set aside.

1 cup all purpose flour
1 cup sugar
4 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cup whole milk
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, melted
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

Combine flour, baking powder, salt, and remaining sugar in medium bowl. Add milk, melted butter, and cinnamon; whisk until blended.

Spread batter in prepared dish. Place berry-pear mixture atop batter. DO NOT STIR, batter will bake up around fruit.

Bake cobbler until crust is set in center and brown at edges, about 1 hour.

Butternut Mac & Cheese

I was so intrigued when I saw this recipe on the cover of Cooking Light magazine. I even bought the magazine.

I made a few changes to the recipe, mostly just being lazy. But it was easier to put together than I had expected. I think I'd like to try different combinations of cheeses. The original recipe called for Gruyere instead of Cheddar buuuuuut, its kind of expensive and I already had a lot of Cheddar on hand. I think it was a bit too heavy on the Pecorino. Anyway, maybe there's room for improvement there. Still came out creamy and rich.

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3 cups cubed peeled butternut squash (about 1-pound squash)
1 1/4 cups fat-free, lower-sodium chicken broth
1 1/2 cups fat-free milk
2 garlic cloves
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
2 tablespoons yogurt
1 1/4 cups (5 ounces) shredded cheddar cheese
1 cup (4 ounces) grated pecorino Romano cheese
1/4 cup (1 ounce) finely grated fresh Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese, divided
1 pound uncooked cavatappi
Cooking spray
1 teaspoon olive oil
1/2 cup panko

Preheat oven to 375°.

Combine squash, broth, milk, and garlic in a medium saucepan; bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Reduce heat to medium, and simmer until squash is tender when pierced with a fork, about 25 minutes. Remove from heat.

Cook pasta according to package directions, omitting salt and fat; drain well. Set aside.

Place the hot squash mixture in a blender. Add salt, pepper, and Greek yogurt. Remove the center piece of blender lid (to allow steam to escape); secure blender lid on blender. Place a clean towel over opening in blender lid (to avoid splatters). Blend until smooth. Add Cheddar, Pecorino Romano, and 2 tablespoons of the Parmigiano-Reggiano. Blend until combined.

Pour squash mixture over cooked pasta, and stir until combined. Spread mixture evenly into a 13 x 9-inch glass or ceramic baking dish coated with cooking spray.

Sprinkle panko and remaining parmesan evenly over the hot pasta mixture.
Bake at 375° for 25 minutes or until bubbly. Serve immediately.

See? The cut up squash even LOOKS like Cheddar, doesn't it?

Baby Girl Strawberry Frosting

I really wanted to do strawberry frosting from scratch for cupcakes I made for Angela's baby shower. (Girl. Duh.) I ended up using a mash-up of two recipes; one was the Sprinkles recipe from Martha Stewart's website and the other from a blog called Recipe Shoebox. I made the cupcakes from scratch also, but they came out pretty dry, so I don't think I'll post the recipe I used.
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4-6 whole frozen strawberries, thawed
3/4 cup butter, slightly cold
1/4 cup shortening
3 cups powdered sugar
1 tsp vanilla
3 tsp lemon juice
pinch of coarse salt

In a small bowl, mash strawberries.

In a medium bowl, beat together butter, shortening and salt until fluffy. Reduce mixer speed and slowly add powdered sugar until it is the consistency of ice cream.

Add 3 Tbsp of the mashed strawberries, the lemon juice and vanilla. Mix until just blended.

Root Beer Float Ice Cream Cake!

Best Idea Ever. I saw this recipe on foodbuzz.com and HAD to try it out. And since my father-in-law is pretty much the Root Beer Float King, and his birthday was last week...it was perfect.

I was surprised at how much the root beer really flavors the cake. AND probably my favorite thing was the way my kitchen smelled as it was baking. Heavenly!

Be Warned: This makes for a sticky, sticky cake. Light, moist, delicious, but sticky! Refrigerate the cakes before you try to take them out of the cake pan. Don't try to plop the cake out onto a cooling rack like I did with the first one; the cake stuck to the cake pan AND stuck to the cooling rack AND stuck to the plate I tried to invert it onto and ended up a big mess. (I squished it into the ice cream layer before re-freezing the ice cream layer and that saved it.) The second cake was much easier to get out of the pan after having been refrigerated and much easer to transfer around with the use of a sheet of wax paper.

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1 box white cake mix
1 12 oz can/bottle root beer (diet or regular)
abt 4 cups vanilla ice cream
16 oz Cool Whip (2 small containers or 1 big one)

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Spray two 9-inch round cake pans with cooking spray; set aside.

In a large bowl, whisk together cake mix and soda until almost all the lumps are gone. Divide cake batter evenly between cake pans and bake for 16 to 20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Refrigerate to cool (you can even cool the cake layers in the freezer.)

While cake is cooling, prepare ice cream layer: Line an 9-inch cake pan with wax paper and press ice cream down into pan. Put this layer in the freezer until firm, about 1 hour.

Once ice cream has hardened and cakes have cooled, you can begin to build your cake.

Place first layer down on a cake plate. Top cake with ice cream layer by turning wax papered ice cream upside down over cake and then peeling wax paper. Top ice cream with second layer of cake and press down lightly. Re-freeze cake until ice cream is well frozen again, about 20 minutes.

Ice entire cake with cool whip and refreeze until cool whip is set. Slice and serve.

Store leftovers in the freezer covered tightly with saran wrap for two weeks.


(Apologies for no pictures, I was too stressed about getting to Bill's parent's on time with a frozen rather than a melted ice cream cake!)

Pasta alla Philadelphia

I've had this recipe in my mission collection for years, but never tried to recreate it. Until I just couldn't pass up a good-looking batch of sweet Vidalia onions at Whole Foods and needed a good recipe for their flavor to shine. Ohhhh it must have been inspiration. This recipe was made for sweet Vidalia onions and sweet summer zucchini. Unfortunately, cooking with an entire block of Philadelphia cream cheese makes this dish a "sometimes food". Or probably it should.

I had Bill write out the instructions, since he's the master of this dish now.

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2-3 Vidalia onions, peeled and sliced
3-4 small zucchini, sliced
1-2 small yellow squash, sliced
1 pkg Philadelphia cream cheese, cut into cubes
season to taste
1/2-3/4 box penne pasta


Cook onions on high until they start to carmelize, with a sweet brown tint. Include a tablespoon of brown sugar if you don't have sweet Vidalia oinions or they aren't browning.

Add sliced veggies with a 1/4 cup water. Bring to a boil and reduce heat, continuing to cook/steam until desired softness, adding a little water if needed.

Season with garlic powder, oregeno, pepper and salt. A touch of chili powder and paprika if you're feeling spicey, which I allways do!

Stir in the cream cheese a chunk at a time untill all smooth. Buon appetito!

Pies for the win

Bill's office decided to have a little bake-off this week. And if there's one thing we cannot walk away from, it's a cooking competition! So, Bill was hell-bent on a classic apple pie. And I threw together something involving Pillsbury crusts, canned Oregon fruit and a few handfuls of Bill's carefully peeled and sliced apples.

Here is the recipe we found on Allrecipes.com. And the one we found on OurBestBites.com.

And this is what Bill did with them:

Recipe for double pastry crust

2 Tbsp butter

5 Tbsp flour

1/2 cup water

3/4 cup sugar

3/4 cup brown sugar

8 apples

1 1/2 Tbsp lemon juice

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp nutmeg

Preheat oven to 350F.

Melt butter in saucepan. Stir in flour. Add water, sugar and brown sugar. Bring to a boil. Reduce temperature and let simmer.

Spoon over apples, coating them well.

Place bottom crust in 10" deep dish pie pan. Fill with apples, slightly mounded. Top with second crust.

Seal edges of top and bottom crusts. Cut vents in top crust.

Bake 45 min.

4th of July Jell-o

My friend Jenn posted this recipe on her blog a very long time ago, and although I haven't made it in years, I remembered it being a big hit at potlucks. And we were unpacking the kitchen all morning so it wasn't such a pain to keep up with all of the layers! So, I thought it was time to revive this one:

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1 box (6 oz.) berry-blue flavored Jell-o
1 box (6 oz.) raspberry flavored Jell-o
2 packets Knox plain gelatin
1 (6 oz.) container Yoplait mountain blueberry yogurt
1 (6 oz.) container Yoplait red raspberry yogurt
1 (6 oz.) container Yoplait vanilla yogurt
water
½ cup sugar

1. In medium bowl, stir 2 cups boiling water into blue jell-o until jell-o is dissolved. In another medium bowl, slowly stir 1 cup of the blue jell-o into blueberry yogurt. Pour yogurt mixture into 13x9-inch (3-quart) glass baking dish. Refrigerate about 1 hour or until set. Meanwhile, stir 2/3 cup cold water into remaining plain blue jell-o; let stand at room temperature.
2. When blue yogurt layer is set, carefully pour plain blue jell-o over yogurt layer. Refrigerate about 30 minutes or until set.
3. Pour ½ cup cold water into a bowl. Sprinkle with two packets of Knox plain gelatin; let stand one minute. Add 1 ½ cups boiling water and stir until gelatin completely dissolves. Stir in ½ cup sugar. In another medium bowl, slowly stir 1 cup of the gelatin mixture into vanilla yogurt. Pour mixture over blue layers. Refrigerate about 30 minutes or until set. Stir 2/3 cup cold water into remaining plain gelatin; let stand at room temperature.
4. When white yogurt layer is set, carefully pour plain gelatin over yogurt layer. Refrigerate about 30 minutes or until set.
5. In medium bowl, stir 2 cups boiling water into raspberry jell-o until jell-o is dissolved. In another medium bowl, slowly stir 1 cup of the raspberry jell-o into raspberry yogurt. Pour yogurt mixture over layer of clear gelatin. Refrigerate about 30 minutes or until set. Stir 2/3 cup cold water into remaining plain raspberry jell-o; let stand at room temperature.
6. When raspberry yogurt layer is set, carefully pour plain raspberry jell-o over yogurt layer. Refrigerate at least 2 hours until set.

Macaroni Salad

We were invited to a Memorial Day barbeque and I knew that all I wanted to bring was macaroni salad. I'd never made one before, but I found this recipe at Allrecipes.com It turned out very well. I accidentally forgot to buy a green pepper, so I replaced that with peas. And next time I might cut back on the sugar just a tad.

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4 cups uncooked elbow macaroni
1 cup mayonnaise
1/4 cup distilled white vinegar
2/3 cup white sugar
2 1/2 tablespoons prepared yellow mustard
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 sweet onion, chopped
2 stalks celery, chopped
1 green bell pepper, seeded and chopped
1/4 cup grated carrot

Place the chopped onion in a bowl of ice and let set in the refrigerator about 30 min.

Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Add the macaroni, and cook until tender. Rinse under cold water and drain.

In a large bowl, mix together the mayonnaise, vinegar, sugar, mustard, salt and pepper. Drain excess water from chopped onion. Stir onion, celery, green pepper, carrot, and macaroni into mayonnaise mixture. Refrigerate for at least 4 hours before serving, but preferably overnight.

Sicilian Blood Orange Salad

It's blood orange season! Yum! I got so excited to see these beautiful things in the store that I bought quite a lot. And for dinner I tried this recipe from The Splendid Table for a Sicilian Blood Orange Salad..something I only vaguely remembered from my mission days. It was delicious and beautiful.

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ice
water
1/2 red onion, thinly sliced
2 blood oranges, thinly sliced
1 navel orange, thinly sliced
1/2 cup kalamata olives, roughly chopped
1/4 cup orange juice
2 tbsp olive oil
very smalll quantities:
black pepper
salt
paprika
cinnamon

Place the sliced red onion in a bowl of ice and water, leave in the refrigerator at least 20 minutes to take away their "sting".

In a shallow bowl, mix the different colored orange slices. Drain and pat dry the onion slices and mix with oranges. Add juice and drizzle with olive oil. Add olives. Season to taste.

Texan Chicken Fried Chicken

Bill has been really great about taking on dinner lately--which is awesome. I love to watch him in the kitchen.

On Saturday he was very excited about a food convention that was in town; Zest Fest--sponsored by Chile Pepper Magazine. (who knew?) It was a convention of the spiciest food products out there. Of course Bill and his friend participated in the Atomic Hot Wings eating contest

and stepped up to sample the outrageously hot Jolokia pepper hot sauce

but he also brought home some locally made dry seasonings for barbecue dry rubs, etc. and decided to test it out in some down home fried chicken. It came out great, very moist and juicy and the seasoning was really yummy.

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4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts

3 cups flour

3 Tbsp Angelo's Poultry Seasoning

(we're gussing a little paprika, salt, pepper, cumin, garlic powder would do just as well)

2 eggs

1 tsp vinegar

4 Tbsp shortening

1/2 cup oil

Between two sheets of wax paper, pound chicken to flatten and tenderize.

In a shallow bowl, combine flour and seasonings.

In a smaller bowl, beat eggs and vinegar together.

In a deep skillet, heat shortening and supplement with oil until 1/2" deep, covering the bottom of the skillet, on medium-high heat.

Alternate dipping chicken breasts first in egg then in flour mixture, so that they are dipped in each mixture twice and well coated in the dry mixture.

Toss chicken into the oil--if oil is not immediately bubbling and sizzling around the chicken, turn up the heat!

Cook until deep golden and flip chicken breasts to cook the other side. When both sides are golden and crispy, check chicken to see that it is cooked through. Serve with veggies!

Pumpkin Spinach Lasagna

I was so intrigued when I came across this recipe, I was excited to try it! I was pretty conservative trying to make it for the first time--next time I would probably go heavier on the seasonings and cheese. I might make more of the spinach filling and add an extra layer of noodles, because I had a lot of noodles left over. But, it turned out to be pretty easy for a lasagna.
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Serves 6

olive oil
1 onion, chopped 
2 cloves of garlic, minced
400 grams frozen chopped spinach
salt, pepper
1 tsp ground sage
1/2 tsp grated nutmeg, divided
3  pumpkin, divided
1 1/2 cups heavy cream, divided

1 1/2 cups grated Parmesan, divided

1 box whole wheat lasagna noodles

Preheat the oven to 400°F.

In a frying pan on medium heat, sauté the onion and garlic until the onions are cooked and translucent.

Add the chopped spinach, 1/2 tsp sage, 1/4 tsp nutmeg, salt, and pepper. Cook the mixture until the spinach is wilted and there is no more water left in the pan (this takes several minutes). Set the pan aside.

Cook the lasagna noodles according to the package. When they are al dente, drain them and run cold water over them to cool them. Strain them once they've cooled.

In a separate bowl, combine 1 1/2 cans of pumpkin with 3/4 cups heavy cream, and 1/2 cup parmesan. Add  1/2 tsp sage and 1/4 tsp nutmeg, along with salt and pepper.

Butter an 8x12 Pyrex. Place 1 layer of lasagna noodles. Top with half the pumpkin filling, and half the spinach filling. Place another layer of lasagna noodles. Top with the other half of the fillings. Place the final layer of lasagna noodles on top.

In a bowl, mix 1 cup pumpkin and 3/4 cups cream. Pour this over the top of the lasagna. Sprinkle with 1 cup parmesan.

Heat the lasagna in the oven for about 30 minutes.

Place the lasagna on a cooling rack to set for 10 minutes before cutting into it.

Zuppa Toscana

Bill and I both like the "Zuppa Toscana" at Olive Garden. My mom used to make something similar, sans greenery. So I found this Copykat recipe online, and decided to give it a try. I substituted the kale in favor of spinach. I've never cared for the kale in that soup.

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4 spicy Italian sausage links
3 red potatoes, chunked
1/2 onion, diced
1 tsp. minced garlic
2 c. frozen chopped spinach
6 c. chicken broth
1/2 c. whipping cream

Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Place sausage links onto a sheet pan and bake for 25 minutes, or until done. Use a paper towel to soak up extra grease. Cut in half length-wise, then cut at an angle into 1/2 inch slices.

Place onions in a large saucepan and cook over medium heat until onions are almost clear. Add garlic to the onions and cook an additional 1-minute. Add chicken broth, spinach, and potatoes, simmer 15 minutes.

Add sausage and cream. Simmer 4 minutes and serve with crusty french bread.

Christmas Cookie Favorites

Mom would make tons of cookies every year, and make up plates for all of our neighbors. So, I'm trying to carry on the tradition! I started with my two favorites of the ones Mom makes every year. Except I don't know what they're supposed to be called. The first are known by so many different names. And the second, I've never seen anyone else make them! So, here they are:

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The ones rolled in powdered sugar
1 cup butter (salted)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
6 tablespoons confectioners' sugar
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup chopped pecans
1/3 cup confectioners' sugar for decoration


Preheat oven to 325 degrees F

In a medium bowl, cream butter and vanilla until smooth. Combine the 6 tablespoons confectioners' sugar and flour; stir into the butter mixture until just blended. Mix in the chopped walnuts.

Roll dough into 1 inch balls, and place them 2 inches apart on an ungreased cookie sheet.

Bake for 12 minutes in the preheated oven. When cool enough to handle, roll in remaining confectioners' sugar.

* Honestly, I found a pretty close recipe on allrecipes.com under "Russian Tea Cakes." But there were also "Mexican Wedding Cakes," "Italian Wedding Cookies," "Austrian Tea Biscuits"...

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The mint chocolate chip ones
Makes about 5 dozen
3 egg whites
1 teaspoon vinegar
1 cup sugar
3 drops food coloring
1 12 oz pkg mini chocolate chips (semi-sweet)
a few drops of peppermint extract


Preheat oven to 350 degrees F

Line a large baking sheet with a double thickness of waxed paper and set aside.

In a large mixing bowl, beat the egg whites and vinegar on high speed until they are all foamy. Add the sugar 1 Tablespoon at a time until all used.  Should be white and firm when you lift out the beaters.

Add 2-3 drops peppermint extract. Careful with the extract, a little goes a long way. Blend in a few drops of food coloring (with the beaters) to whatever shade you like.

Fold in the mini chips gently with a spatula.

Drop by teaspoonfuls onto the prepared baking sheet.

Turn off the oven and put in the baking sheet(s) letting the meringues dry out in the oven overnight.  Or for several hours until they are dry and delicate.

Store them in a dry place or they will absorb moisture and lose their crispness. An airight container is best.

Plum Pie

So, Laura Flowers, of TheCookingPhotographer.com, has written several blogs extolling the wonders of Oregon brand canned fruit. I'd never bought it before, and wasn't even sure if grocery stores carried it down here in Texas. So I looked on their website to see which grocery stores sold their brand. Super Target was listed, so I made a special trip to the nearest Super Target to look for these Oregon Whole Purple Plums that are apparently THAT GOOD. But they didn't seem to have any Oregon products at all. A few days later guess what I spotted at the Albertsons just a block over from our apartments. That's right. I bought four cans, and I was sooo excited to make this plum pie.

Of course it was Thanksgiving morning, and I had other things already going in the kitchen. So rather than look up the recipe again, I made it from memory. Meaning, the recipe isn't EXACTLY the same as the one posted on the website. But it felt great to be baking a pie sans recipe while we watched the Macys Parade on an overcast and chilly Thanksgiving morning. So homemaker-y.

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2 (15 ounce) cans Oregon Whole Purple Plums in Heavy Syrup
1 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup flour
Pinch of salt
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
Butter for dotting pie
1 box Pillsbury Pie Crusts
Place the oven rack in the lower third of the oven and preheat to 350 degrees. Set out a 9 inch pie plate.

Strain the juice from the plums into a large saucepan. Cut the plums in half, then half again pitting as you go. Set plums aside.

Pour the sugar into the saucepan with the plum juice. Cook the mixture over medium heat stirring often at first, and constantly as the mixture heats. Cook and stir scraping the bottom of the pan with a wooden spoons until the mixture thickens and sugar is completely dissolved. Turn off the heat from under the sauce pan. Add the ground ginger.

Mix the sliced plums with flour and salt until coated.

Place the dough into the pie dish. Place the plums onto the dough. Next, pour the hot filling into the pie dish arranging the plums around if needed. *Don't overfill the pie. Leave out a little of the juice if it gets too full.* Dot with butter and top with the top crust. Flute and cut vents into the dough.

Place a pie shield over the crust and bake pie for 30 minutes. Then remove the pie shield and bake for about 10 more minutes, or until golden brown and done on the bottom. Cool for several hours or overnight.

Broccoli Cheese Soup

From Let Me Plan Dinner! This turned out sooo good. Of course Bill added more cheese when I asked him to dish it out. We ate it with toasty garlic bread. Yum! We thought it would also taste good with cubed ham or even...bacon! But it was surprisingly good on its own.

1 large potato, diced small
1 c cauliflower florets
2 c broccoli florets
3 T butter
1/4 c flour
1 can chicken broth
2 c milk
1/2 t salt
1 1/2 t pepper
2 t minced onion
4-8 oz grated cheddar cheese

In a small saucepan, steam potato, cauliflower, and broccoli (with potato on the bottom and broccoli on the top) until tender.

Meanwhile, in a large pot, melt the butter on low heat. Stir in the flour.

Turn the heat up to high and whisk in the chicken broth, milk, salt, pepper, and minced onion. Bring to a rolling boil for a minute, stirring constantly, or until mixture begins to thicken enough to coat the back of a spoon. Turn the heat to medium-low. Cook, stirring occasionally, until vegetables are tender.

Stir in the cooked potato, broccoli, and cauliflower. Remove from heat and stir in 4 oz cheese until melted.

Serve with fresh cracked pepper and additional grated cheese.

Shepherd's Pie

The last time I attempted Shepherd's Pie, it was a dismal failure lost in a sea of Campbells cream of mushroom soup. Bland. Colorless. Awful.

So I found a recipe on Allrecipes.com that didn't use cream of anything at all.

Problem: I didn't print it out. I just wrote down the ingredients to pick up at the grocery store. Then when I came home, I couldn't remember which recipe I'd been looking at. (If you look at the original, you'll see it's "Shepherds Pie VI.") So, I kinda did it from memory. I did alright, but I was skimpy with the beef broth and it came out a tad too dry for my husband's taste. But I liked it. I love that there's a whole layer of bright orange carrots!

Also, I used potato flakes instead of real potatoes! We bought a big ol' box of them at Costco and...I use them when I can, because I'm not huge fan of potatoes. Unless they're sweet potatoes. Or french fries.

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1 lb carrots, chopped

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 onion, chopped

1 pound lean ground beef

1 cup frozen peas

2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

1 tablespoon ketchup

3/4 cup beef broth

1 packet Idaho potato flakes

1/4 cup shredded Cheddar cheese

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C.)

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add carrots and cook until tender but still firm, about 15 minutes. Drain, mash and set aside.

Heat oil in a large frying pan. Add onion and cook until clear. Add ground beef and cook until well browned. Pour off excess fat, then stir in flour and cook 1 minute. Add ketchup, beef broth and frozen peas. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer for 5 minutes.

Spread the ground beef in an even layer on the bottom of a 2 quart casserole dish. Next, spread a layer of mashed carrots. Top with the mashed potato mixture and sprinkle with shredded cheese.

Bake in the preheated oven for 20 minutes, or until golden brown.

Apple Dumplings

A recipe that I've carried around for years, given to me by my pre-mission roommate, Jenn, at BYU. It will always remind me of her because the syrup turns a fabulous shade of PINK.

Pie Crust:
2 cups flour
1 tsp salt
2/3 cup Crisco
1/4 cup water

Mix flour and salt. Mix 1/4 cup of mixture with the 1/4 cup water. Cut Crisco into the rest of the flour mixture, then mix in the water mixture.

Roll out dough and cut into 6 squares.

Filling:
4 sm. apples, peeled and chunked
1/3 cup sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
butter
Red Hots

Place filling in each square with a dollop of butter and one or two Red Hots. Fold up corners, and seal into "dumplings." Place in 9x13 baking dish, sealed-side down.

Syrup:
1 cup sugar
1 cup water
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 cup Red Hots
1/4 cup butter

In saucepan, combine sugar, water, spices and Red Hots. Boil 5 min. Remove from heat and stir in butter. Pour syrup over dumplings in the baking dish.

Bake at 375 for 45 min.

Chicken Piccata

This is another find from Allrecipes.com. It tastes just like the Chicken Piccata that you order in your local strip-mall Italian restaurant. Maybe even better. Especially since I added the capers. Yum!

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4 skinless, boneless chicken breasts
1 egg
1 (small) lemon, halved and ready to juice
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/8 teaspoon garlic powder
1/8 teaspoon paprika
1/4 cup butter
2 teaspoons chicken bouillon powder
1/2 cup boiling water
2 tbsp capers

In a small bowl, beat the egg together with about 1 tablespoon of the lemon juice. Set aside.

In a shallow bowl or dish mix together the flour, garlic powder and paprika.

Dip the chicken in the egg/lemon mixture, then in the seasoned flour. In a large skillet, melt butter/margarine and brown the coated chicken pieces.

Dissolve the bouillon in the boiling water, then add the remaining lemon juice.

Pour liquid into skillet. Sprinkle with capers. Cover and let simmer for 20 minutes, turning chicken pieces after 10 minutes, until chicken is tender.

4 servings.

Taco Soup by any other name..

I first got this recipe my freshman year at BYU from Virginia Whiting..or rather, her mother. It became a staple in my life. Especially after screwing with it a few times.

The original recipe:
Taco Soup
1 lb ground beef
2 cans stewed tomatoes
2 cans corn
2 cans dark kidney beans
1/3 cup salsa
1 tbsp chili powder

Brown ground beef in large pot. Drain excess oil. Without draining, add canned tomatoes, corn and beans. Bring to a low boil. Add salsa and chili powder. Simmer. Top with shredded cheddar cheese and/or Frito corn chips.

But after a few batches made with spaghetti sauce for salsa, black beans for kidney beans, and other substitutions through the years...I made one very bold substitution: a dash of cinnamon and crushed red pepper for chili powder. It's become my signature recipe. I still add spices without much of a formula other than what smells good--so, I'll just tell you how I made it tonight. But it hardly seems appropriate to call it "Taco Soup." And I've even entered it into church chili cook-offs which forced me to rename it,

Black Bean Chili
1 lb ground beef
salt, pepper
garlic pepper
crushed red pepper
2 cans stewed tomatoes, Italian style
2 cans corn
2 cans black beans
oregano
cumin
paprika
cinnamon

Brown the ground beef in large pot, and season with salt and garlic pepper. Drain excess grease. Without draining anything, add tomatoes. Season with crushed red pepper. Drain one can of corn, but not the other as you add the corn. Season with black pepper. Add black beans. Bring to a low boil. Simmer and add a big dash of oregano, a medium dash of paprika, a small dash of cumin and cinnamon. Top with cheddar cheese and/or tortilla strips.