back-up plans

I have had this dinner planned for weeks.

I found a new recipe in a magazine and had ripped it out. I do that often.

I have a problem.

There are pages (and pages) of ripped out magazine recipes in my kitchen.

Back to the recipe for tonight's dinner, it's Posole. I think this is some kind of mexican soup. At least if one judges the soup by its ingredients.

Bill and I had a busy day. We went to the eye doctor so Bill could get new glasses. We cleaned the house and the yard. I did a couple loads of laundry. It was just before five o'clock when I started the Posole.

I pulled everything out of the cupboard, started to heat up the oven for some homemade tortilla chips and read through the recipe.

That's when I saw the words "slow cooker" and "six hours".

Whoops!

If I read through it, it was so long ago that I forgot it went into the slow cooker. I may not have read through it though because it was in a category for weeknight meals and I quickly (unfortunately incorrectly) assumed that meant it would be a "quick" meal to prepare.

It is not. Even if I put it in the slow cooker on high, it was still going to take three hours. We do not eat that late.

Instead we had the back-up dinner; mac and cheese with smoked sausage. Thank goodness for the back-up stash of mac and cheese.

It's pronounced "Keen-wa"

I'm going to pre-blog about our dinner. If it turns out, I will try to remember to write more about it after dinner. But I'm going through a sinus bout and don't have all my faculties about me. Instead I have boxes of tissue, bottles of lotion, sinus pills and wadded up balls of tissue. In other words, I may be passed out, snoring loudly on the couch after dinner.

Or a ball of energy. In which case I'll be out shoveling snow.

Maybe not. I'm really over the stuff for this season.

Dinner!

I'm making a sausage, pepper quinoa dish. It all goes in the crock-pot for two hours (on high). It's going to have some sweet (honey), some tanginess (red and orange peppers), and spice (homemade sausage from our local grocery store). I think it will be quite the filling dish with the quinoa.

Wish me luck. I've never cooked anything with quinoa before. Couscous? Yes. Long grain (not instant) rice? Yes. Risotto (Arborio Rice)? Yes. Pasta? Are you kidding me? Of course. Quinoa is a first. I'm confident I can master it.

At least I know where the closest fast food restaurant is.

I'm thankful for creative cooks and all the recipes they have shared.

Editor's note: the dish was delicious. Bill and I each had a serving topped with cheddar cheese and then a serving topped with monterey jack cheese. Each was different and delicious in its own way. I recommend it if you want a quick, weeknight dinner. Just know that quinoa is super, teeny, tiny. When the directions tell you to rinse it, make sure you have a fine mesh strainer. Here's the link to the recipe.

Tonight's Dinner

Rich Beef Stew with Bacon and Plums

It came from Better Homes & Gardens. You can get it here. Which is good because my recipe, which I ripped out of the magazine, is now splattered with bacon grease, oil splatter, splashes of red wine, and drippings.

It's barely readable.

But it was worth every drip. It is amazing. The butternut squash gives it a delicious roasted flavor. The beef was juicy. The wine created a rich juice. The plums round out the flavor topping off the variety of textures created by everything together.

It was the perfect dinner for this cold, last night of February. And for that I am thankful.

it's time for making dinner with the ingredients we have...

...instead of using the ingredients the recipe calls for.

Tonight the recipe was: gnocchi, sweet corn and arugula in a cream sauce.

I made: pierogies, sweet corn and spinach in a cream sauce. 

In addition I added sauteed some onion in olive oil before making the cream sauce.

It was good. And basically still the same dish.

Do you agree that gnocchi and pierogies are the same thing, just from different countries? Okay, gnocchi is supposed to have ricotta; the addition of potato to gnocchi is a "recent innovation". While pierogie are always potato and are typically cooked with onion. (I get points for doing that, even though I didn't know it was the traditional way.) Both are called "dumplings", hence the similarity.

I am getting much better at being creative in the kitchen. I still can't whip up a dish out of nothing, like Bill's infamous Beef Burgundy, but I can figure out what will go with this or that and find things to try.

The trouble is remembering it for next time if we really liked it.

 
 

that was some cake

I made the Oatmeal Cake with Cinnamon frosting for Bill for his birthday. I had also made it for Emil and Gary as part of their desserts for a year. Gary raved about how good it was. 

Yup, I made it for them before I ever tried it. I do that a lot. Make recipes for the first time for other people. 

I trusted this recipe. 

Before Bill and I got married, we had a couple of showers, like engaged couples do. One was thrown by the Schrumpf family friend, Suzanne. It was a "couples" shower and had a kitchen theme. Ask my parents and they'll tell you (somewhat proudly I'm ashamed to say) that the only thing I used to be able to cook was macaroni and cheese (from the box) and hot dogs. I could cook scrambled eggs and grilled cheese too.

Anyway, Bill was the cook. And we were going to need things for the kitchen. One of the things Suzanne did for the shower was ask the guests to provide their favorite recipes for us. Another family friend, Karen, told us at the shower that we would get the recipes later. She didn't write just one, she wrote dozens.

It's definitely because of this gift that I have a love of baking. Her recipes were clear and easy. She added tips and hints. Those made it easy for someone like me to bake delicious goodies. I know I have told her in person how much those recipes mean to me and how grateful I am that she shared so many.

Back to this oatmeal cake. I knew I could bake it and it would turn out for Gary and Emil because it was one of Karen's recipes.

So I finally made it for us.

Now, because I have gotten much more comfortable around the kitchen I'm not afraid to changes things up a bit. In this case (or cake, I should say), the frosting has coconut and is actually finished under the broiler.

I am not afraid of the broiler anymore either. But I did decide that because I had to give this cake to two people, and I only had one 9 x 13 pan, I could bake it in two 9" round pans (sorry for all of you who read this and aren't bakers, hopefully I haven't lost you completely). That meant I needed a different frosting. 

I pulled out the "Cake Dr." cookbook and looked at the Buttercream Frosting recipe. One of the suggestions on that page is for other types of Buttercream frostings. One of those suggestions was Cinnamon.

Now I know cinnamon and oatmeal go together like peanut butter and chocolate. So that's what I did.

We shared it with our friends Friday night. It was good.

Then Bill and I each had a piece last night, it was even better.

And tonight, we each had another piece.

That is some good cake.

thoughts on cookbooks

Oh, if I could have my dream kitchen; the cookbooks that would fill my shelves...

Huh?

Yup. You read that right.

While I have dreams of a beautiful glass tile back splash, cupboards set at the right height, cupboards that don't leave behind a trail of termite-looking dust as wood drags on wood, cupboards with cool features that don't require climbing onto the counter to reach into the far depths (a trait that few appreciate, hey it's a good upper body workout!) or literally crawling into to reach into the back corner, a dishwasher and maybe even a garbage disposal (that one is still up in the air, I may prefer composting; but you can put anything down the disposal so maybe it would come in handy for what can't get composted), I dream more about the cookbooks.

I do more research for the cookbooks. The rest is stuff I know I want. Period. The cookbooks are like the cherry on top. Having new cookbooks and new recipes are always fun to try whether in a new kitchen or the old.

The iPad has helped reduced my printing off of recipes, lowering the paper usage (I've gone green!) and generating a whole new world of hoarding, er collecting recipes. But I still love books. And there are still cookbooks out there that I want.

I think to convince Bill that I need more cookbooks I have to read and cook out of the ones I have now.

My list as it stands???

I'm glad you asked:

One Dish Dinners by Pam Anderson
Joy the Baker Cookbook
Better Homes and Gardens (in the three-ring binder version)
all of PW's cookbooks
all of Giada's cookbooks
possibly an Emeril cookbook
possibly any other tv host cookbook (I'm not picky)

I am on my way to utilizing the ones I have. I have blogged a couple of times about recipes from my "Back Home Again" cookbook and I often use my BH&G and Betty Crocker for basic recipes (and pecan pie). I also have a couple from my grandma, both Italian cooking. By now you should know how much I love Italian food. And I have Ben & Jerry's ice cream cookbook, along with several others.

They're getting used. Slowly but surely. What happens when I've cooked and baked through all of them?

I'm not sure, but maybe I'll still be blogging and I'll let you know!

new recipes

I made the most delicious chicken enchiladas the other night. The recipe basically consisted of nacho cheese, shredded cheese, cream cheese, sour cream and chicken, wrapped in a tortilla and baked. It's covered with nacho cheese. I tried to make it healthier (really, is that possible?) by adding a red onion.

Whether or not it was good for us, it was delicious.

Today I made a Hoosier Cream Pie. It's for our pastor for his dessert of the month.

I remember the first time I had ever seen one. I was with my friend Robin and her family, I think we were celebrating her grandma's birthday (it could have been a family reunion or her grandparents anniversary). At any rate, Robin picked out that piece of pie. I'm pretty sure I picked a piece of pecan pie.

At any rate, I remember Robin eating her piece of pie and at some point I must have asked her what it was. I remember that she commented it was her favorite. I don't know if I had a bite of hers or if I went and got my own (really at this point I could be mashing several different memories together). I know that I had never had it before. Then, I started seeing them at our own church's potlucks. I wouldn't say it was my favorite (pecan holds that title), but I didn't realize that it isn't as well-known as the pecan or apple pie.

I didn't even know it was known as a Hoosier Cream Pie. I think we just called it a Sugar Cream Pie. There are differences.

The recipe I used came from an issue of Midwest Living.

I like trying new recipes.

basic risotto

Basic Risotto:

• 2 cups low-sodium chicken broth
• 3 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 1/2 small onion, chopped
• 3/4 cup Arborio rice
• 1/4 cup dry white wine
• 1/4 cup finely grated Parmesan
• 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

In a medium saucepan, bring the broth to a simmer over high heat. Reduce the heat to low and keep the broth hot.

In a large, heavy saucepan, melt 2 tablespoons of the butter over medium heat. Add the onion and cook, stirring frequently until tender, about 3 minutes. Add the rice and stir to coat with the butter. Add the wine and simmer until most of the liquid has evaporated, about 1 minute. Add 1/2 cup hot broth and stir until almost completely absorbed, about 2 minutes. Continue cooking the rice, adding the broth, 1/2 cup at a time, stirring constantly and allowing each addition of broth to absorb before adding the next. Cook the rice until tender but still firm to the bite and the mixture is creamy, about 15-20 minutes (when liquid is almost all absorbed). Remove the pan from the heat and stir in the remaining butter, Parmesan cheese, salt, and pepper.

Yield: 2 cups