Dinner in 20: Bratwurst with corn and onions

Made this for dinner tonight. It has been a tough couple of weeks and I just needed to get dinner on the table quick. So I rooted around the freezer and came up with this:

Bratwurst with corn and onions

Cut up 5 bratwurst sausages (or remove them from their skins if you like, other sausages can be substituted if you want.)

Add sausages and a cup or so of chopped onions (frozen ones are fine) and brown over medium high heat.

When it is all browned up, add about 8 ounces of frozen corn kernels and heat through.

Good served with your favorite frozen potatoes (pop them in the oven just before you start the sausage), apple sauce and/or cole slaw.

The brats go really well with the slight sweetness of the corn and onions. The kids really liked it.

Tip of the Day: Onions

Every now and again you find a little tip that is just worth sharing.

I love onions, but chopping them is such a royal pain! One way to get around this is to do the chopping in bulk.

Get out the food processor and either a very coarse chredding blade or the regular chopping blade. Peel your onions and cut them in quarters. Put them in the food processor to coarsely chop them.

Then toss them in a freezer wieght zip lock and toss them in the freezer.

Add them to recipes like you would regular chopped onions. I wouldn't use these for onion rings, but anything else works just fine.

Sidelines: Parlseyed Potatoes

My husband and kids love these. They are easy to make and are great comfort food.

Parsleyed Potatoes

2 1/2 Lbs red potatoes
Butter
Parsley
Salt
Onion Powder, optional

Cut the potatoes into fourths. Put in pot and cover with water. Boil about 20 minutes, until potatoes are tender. Drain.

Add butter, lots of parsley, salt, pepper, and onion powder (if desired) to taste.

Stir well.

Finger foods

When ever I make these up for the freezer they are the first things we run out of. There is just something about finger foods that make them easy to pull out and serve. They have the added bonus that go on the road well if needed.

Use a variety of dipping sauces, BBQ, sweet-n-sour, ketchup, ranch, buffalo, salsa, cheese sauce, ect to add to the fun.


Chicken Fingers, Beef Fingers, Pork Fingers

This is kind of an assembly line process. Cut the meat, chicken breasts, tenderized round steak and pork chips trimmed of fat, into finger-strips.

Take some mayo, dijonaise, or miracle whip and place into a bowl. Don’t over do it as you have to throw away anything that is left over. Do not put what is left in the bowl back in the jar, that can add up to food poisoning!

Brush the fingers with mayo and toss with bread crumbs. Line fingers on a baking sheet.

Bake at 350F, about 10-15 minutes, depending on thickness of meat. Do not over or under cook.

Cool and store in zip lock bags.

Reheat in microwave (1 minute if thawed, adding time if needed) or oven, 350F 10-15 minutes.


Oven Fried Chicken Legs

Brush chicken legs with Ranch salad dressing (one of the flavored Ranch Dressings like the Three Cheese variety is good too). Toss to coat in a mixture of 1/2bread crumbs, 1/2parmasean cheese.

Line on a baking sheet, bake 350F, 20 minutes or so.

Cool, store in zip lock bags.

Reheat in microwave (1 1/2minute if thawed, adding time if needed) or oven, 350F 10-15 minutes.


Meat Balls on a stick

Take your favorite ground meat, about 1 lb. Add 1/2C crumbs, 1 egg, a generous squirt of ranch salad dressing and 1/4C parmesan cheese. Mix well.

Make ping pong ball sized meat balls. Thread two or three meat balls on a bamboo skewer (look in the grilling department or Asian food section). Line skewers on a baking dish (with a lip to catch any juices). Bake 350F 15-20 minutes, until cooked through.

Cool, store in zip lock bags.

Reheat in microwave (1 1/2minute if thawed, adding time if needed) or oven, 350F 10-15 minutes

Little Leagues: Strawberry Banna Pie

Once again I was left with a few extra, too-brown bananas in the fruit bowl. So, here's what we came up with, it's easy, it's different, it tastes good and the kiddos can help too!

My guys loved helping me make it and fought over the one left over piece!



Banana Strawberry Pie

3 very ripe bananas
1 1/2C sugar
1/4C lemon juice
1/4 C hot water
1 envelope unflavored gelatin

Graham cracker crust

Strawberries

Mash the bananas with sugar and lemon juice. Heat water, add gelatin and mix until it is completely dissolved. Add to bananas.

Pour it all into the crust and chill until it is set, a couple of hours.

Slice the strawberries, toss with some sugar. Refridgerate.

When pie is set, top with berries and whipped topping to serve.

Dinner in 20: Sausage with cabbage and potatoes

This quick meal has lots of flavor and some green veggies to boot. My kids loved it, in fact there were no-leftovers! If you like, you can use fresh white potatoes instead of canned, it will add a couple of extra minutes to the cooking time though.

Sausage with cabbage and potatoes

2-3 Cans sliced/diced potatoes or 4-5 diced white potatoes
1 package smoked sausage, diced
1-1 lb bag cole slaw mix
shredded cheddar cheese

Heat large skillet over medium high heat, add 2 T oil and potatoes. While potatoes begin to brown, dice the sausage.

After the potatoes start browning, add the meat and continue to cook until potatoes are well browned. When potatoes are done, add cole slaw, turn down heat to medium low and cover skillet for a couple of minutes.

When cabbage is wilted,toss the mixture, top with cheese, remove from heat and cover again, until the cheese melts.

If you want to double to recipe, use a large (4qt) pot.

This is good with apple sauce and rye bread.

It would also be a good filling for flat bread wraps.

Spring in East Texas

The wild flowers can be really amazing this time of year. We've had so little rain this year that they haven't been as good as other years. But still there were some pretty spectacular fields. Here are a few shots of our neck of the woods.





These are actually about an hours drive from home for us, be well worth it!




Most people head out to see the bluebonnets, but there are other wild flowers out as well.

Snack Attack: Taffy Apple Dip

This one is great for the kids, they absolutely love it. In addition to apples, you can use it for carrots, to stuff celery, on graham crackers, even in place of peanut butter on a sandwich. Good stuff!

Cream together:
8 oz cream cheese (low fat is fine)
3/4 C brown sugar
1T vanilla

Serve with sliced apples.

That’s it! Enjoy!

Company’s Coming: Boneless Pork Ribs

Everyone needs a few recipes that are good enough for company, but easy and stress free to prepare. The nice thing about this recipe is all the work is done hours before they arrive! We had company last weekend and here’s what we had

Slow Cooked Boneless Pork Ribs

Slice up a couple of onions and put them in your crock pot.

Brown 3 lbs of boneless pork ribs in a hot skillet. Just get a nice brown color on the outside, don’t cook them all the way through. Should take about 15 minutes.

Put meat in slow cooker. Cook on low 6-8 hours or high 4-6 hours.

During last hour of cook add a 1 lb bag of cole slaw to the slow cooker.

To serve, remove meat to an extra dish. Mix cabbage and onions and meat juice. Cover serving platter with cabbage and arrange meat attractively on top.

Good with: baked potatoes and apple sauce

Pantry Picks: Chicken and Dumplings

Ah, spring is in the air! So naturally, I’m thinking about….hurricane season! Yep, that’s right, as soon as it starts getting warm, the coastal waters start warming up and that means storm season is on its way!

Seriously, this year they are predicting a worse season that was predicted last year. Between Katrina and Rita, that doesn’t bode well for the Gulf Coast Region. Rita missed us by a hare’s breath, but we were without power for a while nonetheless.

So, I’ll start posting some recipes that can be made with shelf stable ingredients (no refrigeration) and cooked on a grill or camp stove. Nothing fancy for sure, but something other than spaghetti-out-of-a-can that will make the storm effected time a little more bearable.

These recipes are also good for camping and for “I haven’t been to the grocery but need to make dinner” times at home.

My nieces actually ask me to make this one for them when they come over!

Chicken and Dumplings

2 cans mixed vegetables, drained
1 can sliced mushroom
1 large can chicken
2 cans cream of chicken soup
1 2/3 cups bisquick® baking mix
2/3 cup milk (use powered milk)

Pour all the cans into a large, lidded skillet. Keep the liquid from the mushrooms and chicken. Mix gently.

Heat the mixture over medium-high heat. Mix Bisquick and milk to make dumpling batter. Drop small dumplings over the top of the soup-veggie mix.

When the soup starts bubbling, turn down the heat to medium low (about 3), cover and simmer about 10 minutes. Dumplings are done when you insert a toothpick and it comes out clean.

Bluebonnet portraits

This is a spring tradition for us. Every year I try to haul the boys out to the bluebonnet fields for some spring portraits. They were good sports about it this time around.

I'll post some flower shots later.

Spring has sprung!

Well, spring has sprung in our neck of the wood! I didn't cook today--spring fever! Instead I got out the camera for a little creative spree.

We had a doozy of a spring storm this morning, thunder, pouring rain, hail, the works. When it all blew over, I couldn't resist taking some pictures of the flowers that survived the storm.



My husband's favorite flower.



Azaleas are the flower du jour right now. They really are a spectacular sight in their full glory.





I loved the water dripping off the leaves of our sago palm.



Our silver leaf bushes that screen my bedroom window.





A fern on the front porch.



Our loquat tree isn't producing as much as last year, but we're stil getting some nice fruit.

Dinner in 20: Spinach-Alfredo Fettucini

At our local pizza buffet place, my kids absolute favorite pizza is, believe it or not, the Spinach-Alfredo pizza. The pizza is green--white sauce, spinach and cheese. And somehow it manages to cover up the strong taste of the spinach and the kids wolf it down.

So, I experimented at home and discovered I could make a very similar sauce for pasta at home. It is a simple fix and a nice change from spaghetti and tomato sauce.

Spinach Alfredo Sauce

Put your water for the pasta on to boil.

[I do this in a 4 C pyrex measuring cup, but you can use a 1 quart microwave safe dish. ] Measure in a liquid measuring cup, 2 C of frozen spinach. Add milk on top of spinach to make the liquid level up to 2 cups. Pour into dish if not using 4 measuring cup. Add 2 envelopes of powdered alfredo sauce, the margarine called for by the mix and garlic acccording to your tastes.** Mix.

Pop in the microwave and heat 1 minute at a time. Mix after each minute. Stop when the sauce is hot and thick. How lon it will take overall depends on the power of your microwave. Don't try to heat all at once because it will boil over and make an awful mess in the microwave. Guess how I KNOW that...

Cook your pasta while all this is happening.

Serve your sauce over your pasta of choice. We like fetuccini, but anthing you like will work. It looks like a whole lot more work than it actually is.

**If you use an alfredo mix that requires 1 1/2C of milk, increase everything above to 3 C.

Out of the Frying Pan....

This week oone of the local grocery stores had a really really good sale on boneless chicken breast tenders. Usually I don't buy these puppies because they are way to expensive, but they were a great buy, so I had 5 lbs of them sitting in the kitchen! And we weren't about to eat 5 lbs in one week either. So here's what I did with them: (You can use childen breast tender, boneless breasts sliced into tenders or boneless thighs sliced into tenders. You could also use slivers of turkey breast or thighs if you like.)

First, divide the meat into one lb. increments. Then pull out two skillets (with lids if possible) and put them on the stove. (Doing more than 2 at a time is more than I can keep up with! But you can do three or four skillets at once if they'll fit on your stove.) Add a little oil to the skillet and turn the heat up to medium high.

When the pan is hot, add in a pound of chicken. Stir frequently and cook the meat until it begins to brown. Then turn off the heat(if using electric heat, turn it to low if using gas heat) and add one of the following to the pan:

• BBQ sauce
• Sweet and Sour Sauce
• Cream of Mushroom soup, condensed
• Cream of Chicken Soup, condensed
• Sesame-Ginger marinade/sauce
• Honey Dijon salad dressing
• Raspberry Vinegrette Salad dressing
• Lime-garlic marinade/sauce
• Enchillada sauce
• Tomatillo (green enchillada) sauce
• Spaghetti Sauce
• Your favorite sauce, avoid alfredo sauces though, they don't freeze very well
  

Cover the pan and let set 3-5 minutes, the sauce should come to a simmer.

Then, transfer the cooked chicken into a freezer container or a dish for further cooling. Give the skillet a quick rinse and wipe down and put it back on the stove for another round.

I got all five meals done in about half an hour.

When you reheat the chicken, you can add some frozen veggies that fit the sauce if you want. You could also add the veggies into the freezer bag before you put it in the freezer. If you do that though, make sure the chicken is cooled before you add the veggies. Otherwise, the veggies will thaw completely before you freeze the meal and , well, it just makes them yucky on reheating.

These are all good served over your favorite carbs--rice, noodles, tortillas, biscuits, potatoes, what ever you like.

Snack Atttack: Creamy Spinach Garlic Dip

I was 'making it up as I went' in the kitchen the other day. My kids absolute quiver with excitement when I tell them that. They hover around and insist on helping out in the creative process. This was no exception.

I had a hankering for that warm creamy spinach garlic dip you can get as an appetizer at some resturants, but no desire to go out and find some.

So, I hit the fridge and come up with something remarkably like the resturant stuff for a small fraction of the price!

Creamy Spinach Garlic Dip

Start with a 10 oz. bag of fresh, washed spinach. Stuff it into the food processor, a about 1/3 at a time. Pulse the processor to mince the spinach. Add more as what is in the processor gets minced.

When all the spinach is minced add 2 blocks of cream cheese (low fat is fine, but not fat free), as much minced garlic as you like (we like A LOT!, like 1/4C!), 2T of red wine vineagar, onion powder and a generous does of parmesean cheese.

Whirl it all around in the processor until it is all well blended. You may need to scrape down the sides a couple of times. This makes a very generous portion of dip.

You can gently warm this on the stove, over very low heat, stirring frequently, in the microwave or in the oven.

I actually spread this on ciabatta bread, topped it with pepperoni and toasted it all in the oven. The kids fought over the last piece!

Sidelines: Quick Tomato Salad

This is a quick and easy side dish to pull together when you need another veggie on the plate. The kiddos love it and even my hubby who doesn't love tomatoes likes this one!

Quick Tomato Salad
Dice 4 or 5 Roma (plum) tomatoes.
Dice or crumble 4-8 oz of your favorite white cheese (we like queso fresco, a very mild mexican white cheese). Add to tomatoes
Add a generous squirt of your favorite vineagrette salad dressing. (We like raspberry-vineagrette best).

Toss it all well and serve. Or chill then serve. It is pretty and colorful on the plate and mades a refreshing change from green salads.

You can add a couple of slices of finely chopped onions as well if you like. Or some fresh basil, but you don't have to. Toasted almonds would be good too come to think of it.

The Daily Grind

My kids love meatloaf, end of statement. Running out of meatloaf in the freezer is a sort of national emergency around here. The nice things about it is that meatloaf is really easy to make in large quantities and pop into the freezer to stave off such emergencies!

So here’s a set of a variety of meatloaf recipes. None are glazed, that doesn’t freeze well. If you want to glaze them, pour the glaze after they are thawed and you are heating them up for dinner.

Start with 9 lbs of ground beef. I have found that the leaner beef does better in the freezer. Place meat in 1 1/2 lbs increments into mixing bowls. To each bowl add 3/4C of your favoring binder (bread crumbs, cracker crumbs, rolled oats…) and 2 eggs

Then add:

Traditional Meat Loaf
1/4C milk
dollop ketchup
1 can drained mushrooms (4 oz.)
1 envelope onion soup mix

Taco Meat Loaf
1 envelope of taco seasoning
1 can (1 C) corn kernels, drained
1 can diced tomatoes, drained

Ranch Meat Loaf
1 envelope ranch dressing mix
Handful shredded parmesan cheese
Handful dry minced onions

Asian Meat Loaf
Handful of dry minced onions
And either:
• 3 tablespoons soy sauce
• 1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger
• 2 tablespoons hoisin sauce
Or 1/2C sesame ginger salad dressing or marinade

Italian Meat Loaf
1/4 cup ketchup
1 table spoon Italian-style seasoning
1 (14.5 ounce) can diced tomatoes, drained
1 1/2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese

BBQ Flavor Meat Loaf

1/2C BBQ sauce of your choice
Handful of dry minced onions
A couple of handfuls of shredded cheddar cheese

Mix well. Turn each into a baking dish and bake 30-40 minutes at 350. Do not over load the oven, but usually 4-6 of these will fit comfortably at a time. If you are short on baking dishes, get disposible foil loaf pans while you are at the store. They are worth the investment for the time savings alone. You can wash them out and reuse them a couple of times if you want to boot.

Let the loaves cool, bag or wrap, label and freeze.

Dinner in 20:Honey Dijon Pork Chops

Ever have one of those weeks when you feel like you've just hit a wall? This was one of those for me. I got to a point where the thought of cooking one more meal was more than I could tolerate! So KISS (keep it simple stupid!) has been the ordder of the week.

Tonight for dinner we had: Honey Dijon Pork Chops, Parsleyed Pasta, corn (frozen) and apple sauce. And it came togeher in just 20 minutes.

The corn and applesauce are obvious. The pasta and chops cook at the same time.

Start the water boiling and set out a large skillet for the chops. When the water starts to boil, put the chops in the skillet on medium high heat. Add the pasta to the water. While it cooks, brown both sides of the chops and heat up the corn on the stove or in the microwave.

When the pasta is done, drain it. While it drains, top the chops with a good dollop of Honey-Dijon salad dressing. Turn down the heat to medium low and put a lid on the skillet.

Return the pasta to the pot. Add the butter, parsley and salt to the pasta and toss well. By the time you get everything else to the table, the chops will be done. Give the pan juices and dressing a little stir and you're done.

Start serving and you should have a minute left from your 20!

The nice thing about this meal is that my kids really really like it. My youngest actually had 5 servings of pasta and they all but fought over the extra pork chop. That all makes it a little easier to face dinner again tomorrow night.

Mad Scientist Recipes

My middle son has a start of the school year birthday, so this year, we didn't get to have a party. So instead, we did a half-birthday party for him. With the help of his teacher, we had it on science fair day at school, for the last two hours, since our theme was 'Mad Scientists'.

The kids had a ball. We ran out of time before we ran out of things to do.

So I thought I'd share some of our fun here for you guys:


Super Bubble Juice
Dawn Ultra or Joy Ultra 1 Part
Water 15 Parts
(Distilled Water Works Best)
Glycerine or White Karo Syrup .25 Parts

Click on the second bibble link below to get directions for making a super bubble blowing cone to use with the solution.


Super Bubble Ooze
-this is like the stuff you buy in a tube at the store.

1. In a small bowl pour 3 T glue gel and 1 drop food coloring, mix well.
2. Add 3 T liquid starch and mix well.
3. Let sit for 5 minutes. Remove from dish and knead well.
4. When it is firm, roll into a ball and bounce it or take off a piece, put it on the end of a straw and blow it up like a balloon.

Crystal Paint
1. In a small dish, mix up ? C warm water and 3 t. salt. Keep stirred very well thoughout play.
2. Use a paintbrush to paint a picture on black paper.
3. Watch for crystals as the paint dries, you can use a hair drier to speed up the process

Magic Colors
-make sure you use water soluable markers for this one.

1. Cut along the sealed edges of the coffee filter. Open up the filter so it is a single layer.

2. With the black marker, draw a line across the bottom of the filter on one side, about 1 inch up from the bottom. Do the same with your colored marker on the other half.
3. Put some water in the cup-enough to cover the bottom. Curl the paper circle so it fits inside the cup. Make sure the bottom of the circle is in the water.

4. Watch as the water flows up the paper. When it touches the black line, you'll start to see some different colors.

5. Leave the paper in the water until the colors go all the way to the top edge. How many colors can you see?


Outrageous Ooze
-this was the biggest hit of the day!

1. Put the cornstarch into the bowl. Add a drop or two of food coloring. (Use whatever colors you like.) Add water slowly, mixing the cornstarch and water with your fingers until all the powder is wet.
2. Keep adding water until the Ooze feels like a liquid when you're mixing it slowly. Then try tapping on the surface with your finger or a spoon. When Ooze is just right, it won't splash--it will feel solid. If you Ooze is too powdery, add a little more water. If it's too wet, add more cornstarch.
3. Pick up a handful and squeeze it. Stop squeezing and it will drip through your fingers.
-->Rest your fingers on the surface of the Ooze. Let them sink down to the bottom of the bowl. Then try to pull them out fast. What happens?
--> Take a blob and roll it between your hands to make a ball. Then stop rolling. The Ooze will trickle away between your fingers.



References:
Bubble solutions
Bubble solutions 2
Science for kids
Exploratorium
Kid concoctions

Little League: Marshmallow Banana Bake

I don’t know about you, but we tend to have banana problems around here. We like the bananas rather green and as they tend toward ripe, they are less and less likely to get eaten. So we have a banana pile up. Over the years, I’ve come up with a few things to do to use them up. Here’s one that the kids love to eat and can help out making as well:



Marshmallow Banana Bake
3-4 bananas
Baking chips (chocolate, cinnamon, peanut butter, whatever you like)
Marshmallows

Spray a round pie plate or other baking dish with non-stick spray. Slice the bananas lengthwise and lay them in the dish. Sprinkle the chips over the fruit, about 1/2C of chips, more if you like. Lay marshmallows over the top of everything. Spray marshmallows with nonstick spray.

Bake 350F about 10-15 minutes, until the marshmallows are brown and puffy.