Pork Chops!

I found a pork chop recipe in my latest Better Homes & Gardens magazine and decided to try it. It was pretty easy!


You dip the chops in egg and bread crumbs, then fry them quick and hot. Remove them from the heat and add honey, cider vinegar and dark brown mustard to the drippings. Also throw in some sliced apples. Stir fry them until tender and serve on top of the chops! You can also toss in some spinach leaves, but we didn't have any. 


They went over well so I guess I'll have to try them again!


Tomorrow I bake! Cookies and snacks for school lunches and muffins for my son's class. They're doing testing at school this week and asked for snacks. 


Now back to my Schweddy Balls ice cream!

Warming up the house

It's another rainy, cool day here in NH, so what better way to warm up the house than to bake!

I've been craving apple crisp for a while now. Due to the weather, we haven't been able to go apple picking. Sad. But while grocery shopping the other day, I picked up five different kinds of apples, perfect for crisp. My daughter had her BFF over after school today, so I had two little sous chefs in the kitchen with me. They liked the corer/peeler and took turns doing the apples. Then they got their little hands in the butter, sugar and oats and had a grand old time mixing it up. They had even more fun eating it when it came out of the oven! I guess this one is a winner!!


As to the pumpkin pie I made the other day, it came out OK. It wasn't horrible, but it wasn't spectacular either. I never thought to puree the pumpkin in the blender, so it wasn't as smooth as it could be. Also, next time I need to add more sugar. But all in all, it wasn't bad. Makes a great breakfast.


Boring night tonight, spaghetti!

Garden bounty

Hello!! I've neglected this, yes, I know, but not the cooking!


We had a wonderful garden this year. All sorts of veggies to harvest. Lettuce, herbs, tomatoes, peppers, hot peppers, artichoke, squash, eggplant....yum!!


My little daughter raised and eggplant on her own this year. She entered it into the local veggie contest and won Second prize! She was so proud. Later that week, we ate said eggplant. I've given the children the chance to make dinner once a week. They plan the menu and cook it themselves or with help if needed. M loves it! She decided to take her prize winning eggplant and have Eggplant Parmesan. 


To start, I made fresh marinara sauce with everything from my garden. The tomatoes, the basil, rosemary, thyme, oregano, the only thing I didn't grow personally was the garlic, which was freshly bought from the Farmer's Market. M and I sliced the eggplant and dipped it in egg batter (the eggs were from our very own chickens!) then fresh bread crumbs. We put the slices in my stone baker, topped it with the sauce and baked. Right before taking it out of the oven, I topped it with mozzarella and provolone cheese. I made a loaf of bread and voila! We had a yummy, completely home-made dinner!!!! Everyone enjoyed it.


I've also made salsa and jalapeno poppers with the veggies from my garden. Picked some green peppers from my folks and made stuffed peppers with beef, too! So though I've been slacking here, I have been cooking!


At the moment, I have a pumpkin pie in the oven. No canned stuff here, I baked a sugar pumpkin with spices and cream, scooped out the flesh, then pureed it. It's currently baking in a pie crust, making the whole house smell yummy. Can't wait until it's done.


On another note, I have recently become a Pampered Chef consultant. I figured since I'm enjoying this cooking adventure so much, I'd love to share it, too! If anyone is interested, please let me know!


Off to check the pie!!!

Vacation food!

Whew! It's been a while since I posted here. Been a while since I cooked, too!


We're just getting back from a fabulous vacation at Disney World in Florida. We did rides, saw princesses, more rides, shows, more rides...and the FOOD! It's a good thing you walk so much at the park or I would have gained pounds instead of lost them. One of the most memorable dinners was at Cinderella's Royal Table, inside the Castle itself. We got to meet Her Royal Highness, then were escorted upstairs to a beautiful table. The cutlery was real silver, and our drinks were served in cobalt blue goblets. Our private waiter put napkins on our laps, and brought the first course. It was a gorgeous mixed greens salad, complete with mozzarella balls and home made vinaigrette dressing. On the side were small round French bread toasts with a yummy dipping sauce. For entrees, I had cobia with wild rice and veggies. Cobia is a salt water fish found along the coast of Fiji. Now I'm not a seafood fan, but wanted to try something different. It was fantastic. Not a heavy fish taste at all. It went nicely atop the rice, squash, beans and carrots. Hubby had boneless marinated ribs, with potato, also delicious. The kids had chicken and pizza. For dessert, son and I had an amazing chocolate mousse, drizzled with chocolate sauce and white chocolate shavings. S had cheesecake that was to die for, and M had a Princess Cupcake, complete with edible glitter! 


As an added bonus, the Princesses all stopped by our table to greet us in person. Besides Cinderella, we met Princess Aurora (Sleeping Beauty), Ariel (The Little Mermaid--I cried), Belle (Beauty and the Beast) and Snow White. B was given a toy sword and referred to as the Young Prince, S and I were Your Majesties, and M was Princess and given a magic wand. Both children were given wishing stars and we all closed our eyes and made a special magical wish. It was incredible. The atmosphere, food, decor, pure Disney magic.
We also stayed at the Animal Kingdom Lodge and tried African food. I found it too spicy for my taste, but hubby loved his stew. We then moved on to Italy in Epcot. We met up with friends and dined at Via Napoli which specializes in wood oven pizza. My God! I had a five cheese one (no cholesterol there), the kids had two giant pepperoni, and B had a pizza Margarita . We also tried Italian beer which was pretty good!


We all stepped out to the Polynesian Resort for breakfast one morning. I had pineapple and macadamia nut pancakes with pure maple and pineapple syrup. S had Tonga toast. I have to describe this. Tonga toast is a 4-6 inch thick slice of sourdough bread. It is stuffed with cooked bananas, then dipped in egg and deep fried. It is then rolled in cinnamon sugar and served with fresh strawberries. It was to die for. It is one of those things I need to find a recipe for to try here at home. We also had French pressed Kona coffee. Yum...


I didn't even mention the little pastry and ice cream restaurants that were also delicious. Needless to say, we didn't go hungry!!!


Now it's back to the real world. I need to go through my cookbooks and try and find some yummy recipes for that back on vacation feel!

Pizza casserole...bake...thing....

Tried a new recipe last night. While it wasn't a disaster, it wasn't actually a success either.


I subscribe to a couple of recipe sites. I recently got one from Betty Crocker. One I received last week sounded intriguing so I decided to give it a try. It was called Four Ingredient Pizza Bake. You can view it here:  http://www.bettycrocker.com/recipes/4-ingredient-pizza-bake/f4af756e-8a2a-41c8-b36a-f950fbed9fa6


Basically, you use Bisquick as your base, layer the sauce, pepperoni and cheese, then repeat. Since no one in my house likes pepperoni, I skipped it. I used our favorite blend of pizza cheese, mozzarella and provolone, and a jar of premade pizza sauce.


The actual cooking part came out fine! (We'll forget about discovering the Boy ate all the pizza cheese with his chips and salsa so dinner was delayed while Dad ran to the store) Anywho, it looked and smelled great but taste-wise...blah. Very dry and bland. The kids weren't impressed at all, even the Girl who eats anything that's not nailed down and most things that are!


This is however, something I will try again. Only this time I'll use my signature pizza dough, and add some olive oil, garlic and spices. Maybe even add the spices to the dough itself. I'll bet my homemade tomato sauce would be good too. Hmmm....

Pea Soup!

I took the bone from the Easter ham and made pea soup! Gross, I know, but my husband loves it. Took and old tried and true recipe, but added a few extra spices to it. I didn't try it, but I was told it came out great. Hooray!!


Now, what to tackle next? Any suggestions??

Happy Easter!!

It's Easter Eve!!!


I'm baking for dinner at my folks tomorrow. I'm going with my old favorite, my Famous Sweet Potatoes! Also bringing a nice Spring salad and some great home-made dinner rolls. The roll recipe is from some good friends. They make the dough in the bread machine, but since I don't have one, I make the dough by hand. It's very therapeutic to knead and beat the dough, watch it rise, then beat it again! I'm down an arm this week, so I'm cheating a bit and letting my Kitchen Aid do the kneading. After that's done, you form them into rolls, drench them in garlic butter, and bake! Delicious!


Depending on how much time (and energy!) I have, I may make some Rolo Brownies to bring, too. Yum!


Off to finish cooking! Happy Easter!!!

Dinner at Hogwarts!

Well, I've been bad and neglected this blog, but not anymore!!


I received a Harry Potter Cookbook for my birthday! It features recipes from both the books and the movies. Very traditional British meals, but also beverages, snacks and sweets! Fun stuff!! Tonight I selected some recipes to tackle.


I decided to try Herb Roast Chicken with Onion Garlic Mashed Potatoes. (I did omit the onion since no one but Steve likes them.) I bought a little roaster chicken, and some fresh herbs while grocery shopping today and got to work. 


First I took the skin off the garlic using my handy-dandy little garlic stripper from Pampered Chef. Placed 6-7 cloves at the bottom of my stone roaster pan. I chopped up fresh parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme (sounds like a song, doesn't it??) and mixed it into some softened butter. Then I slit the skin on the chicken and rubbed the butter underneath, along the meat. I placed the chicken in the roaster, put the cover on and for 2 hours!


While this was cooking, I peeled and boiled the potatoes. Sauté-ed some garlic in oil, which I added to them after they had drained. Mashed them up with some sautéd garlic and some chicken broth. I could have used more potato, it was a little soft, but still yummy. They'll make a great breakfast tomorrow, fried up in a pan like a pancake.


Made some steamed corn and some dinner rolls and served. M loved the chicken. She had four or five helpings. She's not a big potato fan-doesn't even really like French fries. B is my picky one. He ate everything though, just not much of it. Really enjoyed having a big dinner even though it wasn't a special occasion. I told him he can plan one meal a week. Something new, not something we have on a regular basis. He is excited about this. He wants to use it towards a merit badge for Scouts. He's a good little cook. In fact, he made my birthday cake over the weekend!


But I digress...S also enjoyed dinner. Of course he eats anything. Seriously though, he was very impressed. Though he did inform me that I put the chicken in the pan upside down. Instead of being breast up, it was breast down. But it was so tender and juicy from cooking that way, that it worked! I consider it a mistake on purpose. ;)


So all in all, a raving success! Makes me eager to try something else!


P.S. I'm behind here...made tie-dyed cupcakes for the kids birthdays in February. Made cake from scratch, separated the batter into six sections and dyed them each a different neon color. Spooned them color by color into the baking cups. The batter is so thick that they didn't blend together. For M's party, I frosted them with white frosting, then sprinkled different colored jimmies them. I cut Peace signs out of tie-dyed fruit roll ups and then arranged them in the shape of another Peace sign on my round serving tray. Perfect for a little 7-year old hippie party!


For B's party, I dyed the batter red, white and blue, and red and yellow. Frosted the r,w, & b white and used red icing to make stitches and a B for the Red Sox. Used chocolate frosting and white icing for the red and yellow ones to make San Francisco 49er cupcakes. 


Both parties were a success!! 

 

Sick again! But managing!

So, the kids have infected me again. Good thing they're so cute...Steve had a potluck dinner at work that I was supposed to cook for. Feeling that cooking for the masses wouldn't be a good idea, I let him handle it. I do get brownie points though. It was my super famous Sweet Potato Recipe! Never heard of it? Well, here it is! Enjoy!

Lauren’s Sweet Potatoes

3 cups sweet potatoes

½ cup of sugar

½ cup of butter

2 eggs, beaten

1 teaspoon of vanilla

1/3 cup of milk

Topping

1/3 cup of butter, melted

1 cup dark or light brown sugar

½ cup of flour

Boil and mash sweet potatoes. Mix in sugar, butter, eggs, vanilla and milk. Beat until smooth. Pour into a baking dish.

Combine topping ingredients and mix well. Sprinkle on top of potatoes. Bake for about 30 minutes or until topping is browned.

Added note! Submitted this to the Granite State Dairy Promotion today, and won a prize! :)

Not off to a good start.

Well, things aren't going as I hoped. I came down with a nasty flu Monday night and been sick ever since. But, I'm feeling much better today and planning on making homestyle mack and cheese for dinner. I've made it before but it's kind of bland so I think I'll experiment and add a little garlic and some spices. We'll see if the kids eat it!

And so it begins...

I've never done this blogging thing before but have sort of wanted to. I just never had any idea of what I wanted to write about! Then I had an epiphany. 

The kids were at school, hubby at work so I had the TV to myself for a change. Surfing through the channel I found a girly, chick-flick movie. It was called “Julie and Julia”. It was about a young woman who was at a crossroads with her life. She had aspirations of being a writer but was stuck at an entry level, dead end job. She was however, a pretty decent cook. So, being a fan of Julia Child, she decided to cook every dish in Julia’s “Mastering the Art of French Cooking” in one year, at the same time, blogging her progress.

In between these scenes, the movie showed us little vignettes of Julia’s life, starting with her beginner classes at Cordon Bleu through the publishing of her book. There were so many things I had never known about her! All in all, a pretty great movie. Not one my hubby would watch, but I enjoyed it all the same.

Anywho, it inspired me.

As most of you who know me, I am NOT a cook. I can bake well enough, but anything that resembles a meal usually resembles the trash when I make it. I laugh at those recipes that say “Total time: one hour” because I always wonder which hour they’re talking about! 

I can bake fairly well. I rock at yeast breads. Cookies and other desserts are never a problem and I've created and decorated some pretty incredible birthday cakes. Cooking however, is another story. I've tried to make lasagna at least three times. The dog wouldn't even eat it so I've been forbidden to ever try it again.

But I digress…I decided that I would like to learn to cook. I want to find a cook-book (or cook-books), search out some recipes online, suggestions by friends-anything, and teach myself. I’m going to try a different recipe every day if I can, desserts don’t count (except as a bonus). I figure this will do a couple of things.

1. I’ll learn to cook.
2. We’ll eat healthier (in theory).
3. We’ll have to plan our meals therefore saving money at the grocery store.
4. We’ll eat together at the table more often.
5. It could be fun!!

Also, like the Julie in the movie, I’m going to blog it. I’ll put down what I cooked, how difficult it was, if we and/or the kids liked it, all that good stuff. If I can figure it out, I'll even post pictures. At times, I may even write about some of the chaotic things that seem to happen at our house on a daily basis. Comments and suggestions will be most welcome! Wish me luck!


P.S. The name "Ratatouille" was a suggestion from my daughter based on the Disney movie of the same name. In her infinite wisdom, she thought that if a rat could learn to cook, so could Mom!