Pattypan Squash Bread

Well...

Things have cooled off a bit here, and last night we finally got some rain.

Everything still looks fried but one can hope!

I've been wanting to bake,

anything,

cookies, bread, enchiladas, whatever!


Squash bread and jalapeno cornbread

Brendie over at Bregle Estate has been tempting me

with her baked Maori bread,

which sounds super yummy, and I'm dying to give it a try.

I've only turned my oven on once or twice since about June,

and I'm thinking, it's about time.

I can't do the Maori bread just yet (needs to ferment) but I can do a some quick breads.
I made a squash bread for our breakfast's during the week and
a jalapeno cornbread to go with our ham and beans.

So here goes.

Squash Bread

Ingredients:
Dry
2 cups flour/divided use
1 cup brown sugar
1 tbsp. baking powder
1 tsp. ground cinnamon.
1/4 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg
1/8 tsp. ground ginger or ground cloves

 Wet
1 cup canned pumpkin*
1/2 cup milk
2 eggs
1/3 cup shortening

Goodies
1/2 cup chopped walnuts*
1/2 cup raisins*

Directions:
 Preheat oven to 350° In a large mixing bowl, combine 1 cup of the flour, brown sugar, baking powder, baking soda and spices.

Add pumpkin, milk, eggs and shortening.
Beat with an electric mixer on low speed till blended, then on high speed for 2 minutes.
Add remaining 1 cup flour and beat well.
Stir in nuts and raisins with a spatula.

Pour batter into a greased 9x5x3 inch loaf pan.
(Only grease the bottom and 1/2 inch up the sides,
lets the bread rise straight up, not out and over the edges, trust me).
Bake @ 350°  for about 1 hour.
Cool (in loaf pan) on wire rack for 10 minutes, remove from pan and cool thoroughly.
Wrap and store overnight before slicing.

*I didn't have canned pumpkin, but I did have cooked, frozen patty pan squash that I thawed, drained, then pureed in the food processor. You can use any cooked squash or sweet potato.
*You can use any chopped nuts.
*I used 1/4 cup raisins, 1/4 cup currants.
I have also done this recipe with dried, chopped apricots.

Squash bread

While I was in the freezer I spotted mixed, cooked greens.

I'm thinking,

pureed greens to replace the squash

dried rosemary, thyme, lemon balm or basil to replace the spices

diced, drained, canned pineapple or dried, diced apricots to replace the fruit

and diced ham or chicken to replace the nuts.

What do you think, Yucky or yummy?

Till next time, eat your veggies,
Bonjour

More Canning? More Cooking? Why Yes, I Beleive So!



skins be gone - pizza, pasta, stew starter - turkey roaster waiting station





OK....

Remember those tomatoes from last week?

The ones I had to put in the freezer?
The ones from the farmers market? ($7.00 for about 20 lbs).

 Well yesterday we had  time.

 Let's get them canned up, I said!

We left them whole, more or less, and used the pressure canner.

I was running short on jars so we used a combo of quarts and pints.

Would have preferred to use all wide mouth, but....

We used the hot pack method,

keeping them between warm and hot in the turkey roaster.

Everything went well and we ended up with,

3 quarts, 8 pints and 3 juice.

The juice was the left over liquid in the roaster.

I'd say, we have quite enough tomatoes now!
(Remember, I canned some in January)...

 Anyone needing some of the "said tomatoes"

is welcome to come over and help themselves!

Let me back up!
Before we started on the tomatoes, I put a brisket in the electric roaster,
(about 10 1/2  lbs. for $1.49 a lb.)
and some dry (soaked overnight),  beans in the slow cooker.

OK, moving on....



Brisket waiting to be trimmed - all packaged up - meal size

 The Brisket
Typically, we don't do meat as a main course,
 use it for soups, stews, casseroles, tacos ETC.
I guess I get that trait from my mom, she was
trying to feed 9 people on a limited budget!
She did some wonderful recipes with very little to work with.
(Wish I would have told her, I love you, more often).

So, we packaged the brisket into meal size portions and popped them into the freezer.
(When I say meal size, I mean, big meal, several servings).
I would have rather canned it but I was low on jars, and by this time it was 5pm.

The Beans
My grand-daughter Lauren was over last weekend and
she was watching Nate and I make the crispy breakfast tacos.
(Not that Nathan was really helping, more like,
in and out of the kitchen while playing video games and watching a movie.
I guess he gets his multi tasking from me).

We were tossing around ideas for different fillings and she suggested
using re-fried beans as the binder, chorizo as the meat, and adding scrambled eggs.
Sounded good, might be ugly though, I'm not sure how the eggs will look.

And, as soon as I get my butt away from this laptop,
I'm going to smash some beans and give her idea a try.
I'll let you know how they turn out!

OH, and Sue,
I did at least manage to get the laundry done.
I might even get the dog hair swept up!!!

Yes, my grass is indeed that brown!

What are you guys going to do with your long weekend?

Till next time,
Bonjour

Pancake Zingers

Pancake Zingers

?????

You might be asking,

what are Pancake Zingers?

Well, I'll be glad to tell you!

They're a full meal deal.
 Meat, veggies and sometimes cheese,

all combined to make a yummy disk shaped treat!

No syrup needed!

I'm always searching for food to go.

I have to leave for work early in the AM

so on the road food is my only choice.

I try not to do the fast food places,

not good for my health or my pocketbook.

So here goes.

These are delicious.

Pancake Zingers

Ingridents for the filling:

1 small onion, minced

2 ribs celery plus some leaves, minced

1 small bell pepper, minced (any color)

1 small roma tomato, minced
1 large clove garlic, minced
1/2 cup cooked ham, minced

oil for sautéing

Ingredients for the batter:
1 cup flour
2 tbsp. sugar
2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1 beaten egg
1 cup milk
2 tbsp. cooking oil

Directions for the filling:

Heat oil in a sauté pan, (about two turns of the pan)

add onion, celery, bell pepper and tomato.
Sauté  till limp, then add the garlic clove and ham.
Warm through.
Remove from the heat.

Directions for the batter:
Combine flour, sugar, baking powder and salt in a mixing bowl. Mix well.
In a large measuring cup, measure milk first, then add the egg, then the oil. Blend.

Add the liquid to the dry, lightly mixing. Now add your sautéed veggie/meat mixture.
At this point you can add any grated cheese of your choice, about 1/4 cup.
Use a light hand to incorporate.
Let the mixture sit a few while you're heating your griddle.

When a few drops of water dance on the griddle you're ready to go.
I use a small gravy ladle to spoon out my batter, and I can fit three cakes on my griddle.
(I have a seasoned cast iron griddle so there's really no need to grease the pan).
When bubbles form on the top of the cakes, flip and cook for another a minute or so.
Remove to a platter and continue on.
Makes about fifteen cakes.

You could sub cooked ground pork, diced cooked chicken or any meat of your choice.

I package these up three to a baggie and eat them cold.

Sweet and savory!

If you have any suggestions for one handed, on the road food, let me know.

I'm always looking for something different!

I mean it!!!

Till next time,

Bonjour

No Rain, No Problem! Farmer's Market To The Rescue!!!

So....

Since we had to quit the garden
 due to the  no rain issues/fines for using too much water,

a trip to the farmer's market on Friday was in order.

There was no arm twisting involved, I love to go,

only,
 I would rather not have to buy my produce.

Oh well,

the bright side is,

 I'm helping out a south or East Texas farmer.

(Gotta take the positive notes where you can)!

Anyway...

We scored about 20 lbs of roma tomatoes for $8.00

4 giant, red bell peppers for $1.00

okra @ $3.oo a pint (got 2)

green beans @ $3.00 a pint ( got 2 also)

new potatoes @ $2.00 for 2 pints

and, 2 fairly large cantaloupe for $5.00

Some of the goodies

Not too bad, especially compared to the supermarket!

We canned some of the okra yesterday for Steve's mom

and saved the rest to fry.
We'll do that on Sunday.

My Steve does enjoy his fried okra!

He also enjoys green beans and new potatoes,

Sunday on that one also.

Today I got started on or meals for the week.

First up was spinach/lasagna roll ups from Rachel Ray's kid cookbook.

Rachel Ray's cookbook

Naturally, I put my own spin on the recipe using ingredients I already had on hand.

Here's my take!!

Mince, mince, chop!

Ingredients:

1 small onion, minced

3 ribs celery, with some leaves, minced

1 red bell pepper, minced
1 roma tomato, seeded and minced

1 package spinach, drained and chopped (about one lb.)

(I had a package of blanched mixed greens in the freezer, swiss chard, spinach and beet greens)

about a 3/4  lb. of queso fresco, divided use (fetta or ricotta would work)

medium thick rue, about 1 and 1/2 cups  divided use (made with turkey broth)

1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg

6 lasagna noodles, cooked, rinsed and drained

olive oil for sautéing

Directions:

Sautee first 3 ingredients in heated olive oil about 7 minutes.

Add spinach/greens, 1/4 lb. queso fresco, 1/2 cup rue and nutmeg.

Stay with the skillet at this point.

Cook, stirring until queso fresco starts to melt.

Remove from heat.

Lay out your cooked lasagna noodles on a cutting board.

With a rubber spatula coat the noodles with your spinach/queso fresco mixture.
I added extra, crumbled, queso fresco at this stage, a little for each roll up.

Fill and roll up all noodles and place seam side down in a casserole dish.

Time To Roll!!!

Spoon extra rue over the rolled noodles, sprinkle with extra queso fresco or parmesan cheese.

Bake in a 350 degree oven till cheese melts and noodles heat through. About 15 minutes.

When I make these in the summer I stop at the baking step. I just cover the casserole dish with plastic wrap and pop in the fridge. When ready to eat just spoon out a noodle or two and microwave.

Great for gourmet, lunch box treats !!!

Yummo!!!

I'm curious...

Have you been restricted on your water usage,

fined for using too much?

Do you  recycle your water when possible?

Tomorrow we'll be canning the tomatoes,

frying okra and making the green beans and new potatoes.

Till next time,

Bonjour

Crispy Breakfast Tacos To Go

Have some leftovers?

Need a good breakfast meal?

Good, because I have one!

I was watching PBS a few weeks ago

and they were featuring Pati's Mexican Table.

If it's Mexican, I'm in!!!

This is the original recipe,

POTATO, SCALLION, & CHORIZO CRISPY TACOS

Naturally, I only had a few of the ingredients,

 but hey, I can improvise!

OK, here goes...

Filling Ingredients:

3 medium potatoes, boiled. Cool, and cut into cubes (skins on or off, your choice)

about 1/2 pound cooked pork roast, minced

1 small onion, minced

3 or 4 ribs of celery, minced (use some leaves too)

2  roma tomatoes, seeds removed and minced

(after mincing I put them into a strainer to drain off the liquid)

oil for sautéing  (3 turns of the pan)

oil for frying ( about 1")

about 12 corn tortillas

Seasonings, I used salt, lemon pepper, mexican oregano and cumin

Directions:

Sautee onions, celery  and tomatoes in oil about 5 minutes.

Add pork roast.

Heat roast/veggie mixture about 4 minutes.

Add potatoes.

Mash everything together with your potato masher or a large spoon.

You now have something that resembles hash.

Remove from heat.

Fan your tortillas on a plate, dome with another plate and warm in microwave for about 4 minutes.

Now we're ready to roll!!!

Spread a few tablespoons of the potato, veggie, meat mixture on the tortilla and roll up cigar style.

Secure end with a toothpick.

Securing, safety pin style

Patti suggested picking 2 together. I tried that the first time.

Second time I ran a tooth pick through them each individually.

This time I used the toothpick like a safety pin, worked much better!

Frying, cast iron style



Fry them up in about 1' of hot oil, (about 350 degrees), turning once, until they're lightly browned.

Use tongs to remove from pan.

When you're removing them from the pan, tilt slightly to drain off  the excess oil.

Place on a paper towel lined platter.

Draining on vintage platter

You can also bake these.
Temps here are still in the 100's plus, so baking is not an option right now.

These are yummy hot or cold.

I package them up 3 to a zip baggie, makes 4 breakfast meals.

If you are eating these at home, try dipping in some sour cream and salsa, even better!

Tomorrow I'm off to get this hair cut.

17" of ponytail is more than enough for Locks of Love!

New do in the works!!!

 

Nathan says "hi" to everyone, he's missing our cooking together!

 

The next Iron Chef?

Till next time,
Bonjour

Time For Me?

Oh My, Busy, Busy Bee....

Soap shows are over till fall, no more late night product making....

I'm out of, or near out of several soaps but that can be rectified in a day or two!

(Like Tomorrow and Sunday).

Time to concentrate my energies on other endeavors!!!

Cooking, painting, redoing?

Let's start with cooking.



Nathan holding his cookbook



As I've had time Nathan and I have been working our way

through the cookbook 

Rachel Ray 30- Minute Meals For Kids.

A gift from his Aunt Heather.

We've done several recipes in the book but Nate keeps going back

 to the Shrimp Scampi recipe.

Nathan, shrimp is $6.99 a pound, let's try it with chicken!

OK then!

Today we tried altering the recipe to use chicken.

The original recipe goes like this.

RECIPE

1 pound angel hair pasta/ we used thin, whole wheat spaghetti

4 cloves garlic, chopped

2 tbsps EVOO

3 tbsps butter/ we just used more EVOO

1 lb. shrimp/ we used 1 lb. cubed chicken breast 

1 cup chicken stock/ we had canned turkey stock

4-5 blades fresh chives, snipped/ we used dried, ground rosemary, dill, lemon balm and chocolate mint

A hand full of fresh parsley/ we used fresh lemon balm

tablespoon or two of flour, (not in the original recipe)

Salt and pepper to taste

DIRECTIONS

Bring a pot of water to boil, add pasta.

Cook pasta aldente. Drain.

Heat oil in saucepan and add dried herbs.

Sautee herbs about 2 minutes then add cubed chicken.

Cook chicken until almost done then add chopped garlic. 

Sautee about 2 minutes.

Add flour and cook for another 2 or so minutes.

Add the stock and  raise heat up to a boil.

( May need to add some water to mixture depending on how thick or thin you want your sauce to be).

Remove the pan from the heat and add the drained pasta.

Stir/toss to incorporate.

Garnish with fresh snipped/chopped lemon balm.

Serve with toasted, buttered herb bread.

YUMMO!!!!!

Chicken was $1.97 lb., boneless, skinless.

Pasta was $1.00 lb.

Surprisingly inexpensive for several gourmet lunch box treats.

What do you think, would you make this recipe?

Would you change anything?

I think we'll make chicken toes next!

Till next time...

Bonjour

Mock Fried Meat Pies

Let me tell you....

Texas is starting to warm right on up, which means no turning on the oven.

My husband Steve AKA  the fruit tree guy, has been selling fruit trees like crazy.

Not just your normal ones either,

customers are looking for things like Quince, Mulberry, Persimmon, Pomogranate....

He's been doing a lot of Goggling and phone calling to find these unusual

(at least around here) types of trees.

He's a very busy guy in the spring.

Did I forget to mention he works at a nursery?

What does this have to do with ovens and meat pies you might ask?

There's no time for him to eat....

I'm not kidding, no sitting down with a plate or fork.

He needs portable food, something he can eat on the go.

So on my days off I've been making him big batches of meat pies, fruit pies and fajita rolls.

I package them up into meal size portions and freeze them.

They need to be done now because in a few weeks there will be no turning the oven on.

I can do the fajitas on the grill but not the meat or fruit pies.

Anyway, that's what I've been doing instead of blogging, (oh yeah, I've been making soap too).



FRESH BAKED PIES



 I call them mock fried pies because I bake them instead of frying them.

I lightly oil the cookie sheet, lay down the pies,

brush the tops with oil, bake for 10 minutes,

flip and bake for another 10 minutes.

They come out nicely browned on both sides.

All they consist of is meat mixed with veggies and gravy in a pie crust round.



CUTTING ROUNDS WITH A CEREAL BOWL

 I do a double pie crust recipe times 4, roll it out, cut it into rounds,

then fill, fold in half, seal. and bake.

Basically I'm doing  hand held pot pies.

(I add chopped herbs to my pie dough for added zing)

The fruit ones are made from canned fruit preserves that are heated

and thickened with corn starch.

This last batch of fruit pies was made with papaya/cantaloupe preserves.

The fajita rolls are cheese, sautéed meat and veggies rolled up

in a flour tortilla and packaged the same as the meat pies.

(Forgot to photo those).

About 45 sec. in the microwave and he's good to go.

A lot of work but worth it.

Nathan helped me make these,

he's learning how to stay away from the fast food places.

After we finished our baking,

Nathan and I took a walk down to the creek for a little R&R.

The scenery was nice as was the quiet.

 (As much quiet you can  get with a 12 year old anyway)!





NEIGHBOURS COW





CHECK OUT THE BARBED WIRE REFLECTION ON THIS COW



NATHAN CLEANING HIS FOUND SHELLS



NATHAN EXPLORING

We found shells and some cool rocks at the creek.

Nathan and I are big rock collectors.

We stayed for about an hour or so at the creek then it was back to the Casa

to fry up some fish and hush puppies.

I'm telling you, we are some food cooking fools here.

It was a lovely day spent working and playing with my grandson.

Hopefully he will know something other than fast food and video games!!!

WELL,

It's way past my bed time, so......

Till next time,

Bonjour

G Is For Good Food

Well....

 I'm not poisoning anyone just yet.

Friday was market day, my local AD  featured

boneless, skinless chicken breast for $1.99 per lb.

and whole pork loin for $2.50 per lb.

Where is the chicken breast I ask the meat guy?

OH, we don't have "that here" he says.

Well, I got the "AD here" I say...

Humm, he says.

Humm I say.

Now he's lost!

What do you have that's comparable I ask?

(I'm not afraid to ask the tough questions.)

After a little hide and seek we worked it out!!!

Came home with  2 1/2 lbs of chicken breast

 and about 7 lbs. of center cut pork loin.

They also advertised a 5 lb. bag of flour for $1.79,

the shelf was empty but....

the 25 lb. bag was $7.42,

$1.49 per lb. not a bad price, but not great either.

Also bought a whole chicken for $.89 per lb.

Cut  the pork loin into roast size pieces and wrapped for the freezer,

cut and wrapped a few less thick pieces for steaks on the grill.  

The chicken breasts were sautéed for fajitas,

the whole chicken, one of the pork roasts 

along with potatoes and carrots, were baked in my electric roaster.

Most of it was packaged (in meal size portions) for freezing.

 The rest  was to be filling for fried meat pies for Steve's lunches.

And since it's almost 9:30

on a school work night, I'll tell you about the

fake, fried meat pies later.

No poison involved!



Till next time,

Bonjour

Painting chairs & grilling

SO........

Where to start????

Ok, the paint project.

I found these chairs at my local thrifty shop about 5 years ago. (Only $5.00 each) Threw some white paint at them, covered the cushions in some black & white toile & called it good.

Well today it's going to get better.

So, off to the paint closet we went. What color should we use Nate?

blue, green, purple, red, orange, yellow? OOPS no yellow, we made that orange for the bee hive!!!

Red it is!!

New & improved chairs.

I found this fabric at Wally world for
$1.50 a yard. I still have some left so

it might turn up later in another project.

These chairs are for extra seating, so

I have one in the bedroom area & one in the dining area. I use the term area because we have an

open plan house so there are no rooms per se.

 Well painting wasn't the only thing we did today. We also grilled some shrimp kabobs, a rack of ribs & some chicken leg quarters. I say we grilled,  what I really mean is...

Steve grilled & we watched, although we did put the kabobs together.

        Yummy shrimp, pineapple chunks (from the canning day post)

& fresh jalapeños.

 (No Trisha, the pineapples are not in the mail yet.)
We cut some fresh rosemary & basil to lay on the fire, mixed up some olive oil & dried herbs to brush on the meat & viola lunch box gourmet for next week!!! Probably need to make some potato salad or something to go with the meat. Maybe tomorrow.

Earlier in the week I needed a sewing fix.

SO.

Darn out of time.

Nate wants me to go watch My Name Is Earl.

Till next time...

Bonjour