Green Bean Casserole

This is the only way to have green beans for Thanksgiving or Christmas Eve!!

1 T.  flour
1 t. butter
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. sugar
1/8 tsp. pepper
1/2 tsp. onion powder
1/2 c. sour cream or plain yogurt
2 cans french-style green beans
1/3 c. crushed cornflakes, or bread crumbs
1 T. flour
1 1/2 c. swiss cheese

Mix together the flour, salt, sugar, pepper, onion powder. Melt 1 T. butter, and then add the dry ingredients. Whisk in milk.  Remove from heat and add sour cream. Add cheese and beans. Melt 1 T. butter and mix with cornflakes. Spread beans in 9x13 pan and top with cornflakes. Bake at 400 deg. for about 20 min, or until bubbly.

Creamy Mexican Turkey Soup

Here is a leftover turkey recipe- we love it!!
1 tbsp. oil
1 large carrot, chopped
1 stalk celery, chopped
1 c. chopped onion ( I usually do 1/2 c.)
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 c. chicken or turkey broth
1 can diced green chilies, drained
2 c. milk
1/4 c. flour
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. chili powder
1/2 tsp. cumin
2 c. shredded/chopped turkey
3/4 c. corn
3 tbsp. chopped fresh cilantro ( I never have this, so have never tried it)
1 c. grated cheddar or monterey jack cheese

In large stockpot, heat oil over med-hi heat and saute veggies and garlic for 5 min. Add broth and bring to boil. Reduce heat to med-lo and simmer, covered, for about 10 min. Add chilies.

In a bowl, whisk together milk, flour, salt, chili powder, cumin. Increase heat to hi and whisk milk mixture into soup. Stir until thick and bubbly, about 5 min. Add turkey, corn, cilantro and cheese, stir until cheese is melted and soup is hot, about 5-10 min.

Makes 5-6 servings.

Kool-Aid Playdoh

So this is really easy, fun and smells a lot better than the original homemade playdoh. I am not sure how long it lasts though, we just made it today. Good for winter days and sundays when you need something for sunbeams to do!

1 c. flour
1/2 c. salt
3 tsp. cream of tartar
1 pkg kool-aid in the color you want

Mix in pan. Add:
1 c. water
1 Tbsp. oil

Mix over med. heat until smooth and thick, 6-7 minutes. Stir constantly so it doesn't burn.

Makes enough for good size portions for 4 kids. It is edible, but not very tasty. Andrew prefers eating the name brand store bought playdoh to the warm, homemade berry blue playdoh!! Go figure...

Cranberry Chicken

This is in the oven cooking for dinner. It is SUPER easy and delicious. Curt's mom gave me the recipe.

2-3 large chicken breasts
1 can whole berry cranberry sauce
1 onion soup mix package
1 cup Russian or French dressing


Defrost chicken and cut into chunks. Mix other ingredients together and pour over chicken. Cook at 350 degrees for 45 minutes, or until chicken is done and sauce is bubbly. Serve over rice.

Vegetarian Fajitas

This is my favorite meal lately. I like that I can just make the seasoning for this myself because I never remember to buy those fajita seasoning packets. The mushrooms in this are delicious! I got this recipe from my friend's blog: www.thevegetablecollaboration.blogspot.com. We eat it with refried beans and fresh salsa on corn tortillas.

Ingredients
2-3 bell peppers
1 large onion
1 carton mushrooms

Mushroom Marinade
1 Tbsp. water
1 Tbsp. red wine vinegar
1 lime, juice
3 Tbsp. olive oil
2 cloves minced garlic
1/2 tsp. cumin
3/4 to 1 tsp. chili powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. pepper
1/4 tsp. paprika

Stir marinade ingredients together. Cut mushrooms into slices and pour marinade over, tossing to coat. Let marinade for 20-30 minutes.
Cut up onions and bell peppers. Saute onions 4-5 minutes, then add mushrooms and bell peppers at same time and let cook until they are as soft as you want them.

Have you ever tried corn tortillas? We never had them until we moved here and they seem to be the tortilla of choice. I like them better than flour. You just have to make sure you heat them up or they break apart really easily when you try and fold them up.

I like to make fresh salsa with this too:

Cut up 2-3 tomatoes. Add a 1/4 of a bell pepper and either 1 green onion (with all the green part too) or some really finely diced regular onions. Add minced garlic, lemon/lime juice and salt and pepper to taste. If you have some cilantro, add some of it too.

Survival recipes?

Hey my amazing cooking sisters, and mother, out there!! I want to know what your survival recipes are? What do you cook when you don't know what to cook? What will your kids always eat, or your spouse always eat?

I was trying to think what my survival recipes would be and this is what I came up with:

Brushetta Sandwiches

slices of tomato
slices of moz
a plate of sauce mixture: olive oil and balsalmic vinegar, minced garlic and sald and pepper
fresh basil if you happen to have it, which we never do
french bread

dip one side of the bread in the sauce and pile on the tomato and cheese
eat...use lots of napkins cuz it's messy but it's easy and yummy. No cooking!! Easier than making regular brushetta cuz there is less cutting involved.

Pesto noodles

lots of the same ingrdients, but still good and easy
cook some noodles
add pesto sauce while still hot
eat with diced tomatoes, moz and or frozen/fresh spinach.
Even Elsa will eat this and Leah loves it...and Casey now loves it too.

Easy Honey Garlic Stir Fry Sauce

Recipe from kimskitchenconcoctions.blogspot.com

I've been looking for an easy stir fry recipe and this is very easy and pretty tasty.

Honey Garlic Stir Fry Sauce

2-4 cloves minced garlic
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup water
1 Tbsp oil
1 Tbsp cornstarch
1/4 tsp black pepper

To make sauce alone: put all ingredients in sauce pan and simmer until thickened. Stir fry vegetables of choice and pour sauce over them.
To make marinade: mix sauce, pour over cut up meat in resealable container. Refrigerate for a few hours. Scoop out meat, and cook in pan until almost cooked through. Then add rest of sauce and let finish cooking. Add stir fried veggies and eat.

New favorite coleslaw recipe

Here is an easy yummy salad!!

1 bag coleslaw mix
slivered almonds
craisins
poppyseed dressing

Toss together and serve!!!

Picnic Cake

This cake is really yummy. I found the recipe on a blog somewhere. Try it out:

1 3/4 cups boiling water
1 cup oatmeal
1/2 cup butter
3/4 cup brown sugar
3/4 cup white sugar
2 eggs
1 3/4 cups flour
1 tsp soda
1 tsp cinnamon
2 Tbsp cocoa
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla
1 bag chocolate chips, divided
1/2 cup brown sugar

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Pour boiling water over butter and oatmeal. Let sit for 10 minutes. Add sugars and mix with a spoon. Add eggs and mix. Add dry ingredients and half of chocolate chips and mix. Pour into greased 9x13 pan. Sprinkle remaining chocolate chips on top and the 1/2 cup of brown sugar. Bake for 30 minutes.

P.S. Anyone have a good idea to organize recipe cards? Mine are all over the place.

Mexican Super Rice!

Well, I threw together this casserole kind of meal for the past two Thursdays and we love it. Anne and I decided to make Thursday nights our Fiesta nights and eat mexican food. Anne and I dubbed it "Mexican Super Rice!!"

Open one can refried beans and smooth out on the bottom of a casserole dish

Layer salsa, cheese, rice, salsa and more cheese.

Warm it up in the oven or microwave.

Then we had lots of lettuce and tomato and sour cream in separate bowls to put on top, so if we did not eat it all we could just save it and add the fresh stuff the next time we at it.

Leah loved this meal and it was quite a hit with me and Anne too. Still working on Elsa, but she never eats anything these days. (sigh!!!)

Homemade Chinese Take-out

I found some great Chinese recipes this weekend! We love getting Potstickers and I never thought that making them would be so easy, although it is a little time consuming. Worth it though!  And here is an easy Orange Chicken Sauce recipe too!

Potstickers
1 lb. ground pork or turkey
1/2 bunch green onion, sliced
1/4-1/2 white or red onion, minced
1/2 head green cabbage sliced thinly
salt, pepper, ginger powder (abt 1/2 tsp. each)
1 pkg. won ton skins

Dipping sauce
1 t. sesame oil
3 T. brown sugar
3 T. soy sauce
1 T. water
1/2 tsp. ginger powder

Finely chop green onion, cabbage and onion. Fold veggies in a clean dish towel and squeeze out extra liquid. Combine raw pork, veggies and seasonings. Place spoonful in the middle of the potsticker skin and fold in half. Seal sides with water. Heat 2-3 T. oil in saute pan and saute potstickers until golden brown on both sides. Turn heat to low and add 2-3 T. water and steam covered until potstickers are cooked through, like 5 min.  (NOTE: I used turkey and the orig. recipe called for 1 head cabbage, but I think that would be way too much. So use your judgement)

This recipe made about 50 little potstickers, I froze most of them and will let you know how cooking the frozen ones turns out. I think maybe with frozen ones I will steam them first and then saute.

Mix sauce, and dip and enjoy! These are awesome!


Orange Chicken sauce
3-4 cloves garlic minced
4-5 green onions sliced
Saute in oil til tender.
Add:
3 T. soy sauce
1/2 c. sugar
1/4 c. orange juice CONCENTRATE
1/3 c. vinegar
Heat till bubbly and then add 1-2 tsp. cornstarch to thicken. I use popcorn or other breaded chicken that I have baked in the oven and have rice on the side! Talk about yummy!

Sorry I don't have pics, you'll have to use your imagination!

Chocolate Fondant Cake

So the name of this cake is really lame, but it is pretty much like chocolate fondant/chocolate cheesecake-tasting mix of chocolatey yumminess. I was not able to get it to flip out of the pan onto a plate (it broke in half so no picture for you) but I think it is really good and I ran out of cocoa to dust the pan with so maybe next time it will work out better.

Flourless Chocolate Cake II (allrecipes.com)

• 4 (1 ounce) squares semisweet chocolate, chopped
• 1/2 cup butter
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 1/2 cup cocoa powder
• 3 eggs, beaten
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 300 degrees F (150 degrees C). Grease an 8 inch round cake pan, and dust with cocoa powder.
2. In the top of a double boiler over lightly simmering water, melt chocolate and butter. Remove from heat, and stir in sugar, cocoa powder, eggs, and vanilla. Pour into prepared pan.
3. Bake in preheated oven for 30-40 minutes. Let cool in pan for 10 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack and cool completely. Slices can also be reheated for 20 to 30 seconds in the microwave before serving.

SOMETHING CHOCOLATLY FOR CHOCOLATE DAY!

TRIPLE CHOCOLATE BLISS CAKE!
WARNING: KINDA HARD TO MAKE BUT VERY YUMMY!
Pic is just from internet but you get the picture :)







Ingredients-
1 package chocolate cake miz
1 cup Sour Cream
1 pkg. Jell-o chocolate flavor instant pudding and pie filling
4 eggs
1/2 cup oil
1/2 cup water
3 cups cool whil
1 package semi sweet baking chocolate
1 1/2 cups raspberries

1. Preheat oven to 350F. Lightly grease bunt pan. Beat all ingridients except whipped cream, chocolate and raspberries in large bowl with electric mixer on low speed untill moistened. Beat on medium speed 2 min. Pour into pan.
2.Bake 50 min. to i hr. Cool 10 min. Loosen cake from side of pan with something and remove cake, cool it completly. place on serving plate.
3.Put aside 2 tbsp of whipped cream. microwave remaing with chocolate on hight 1-2 min. Drizzle over cake. Immediatly drop reserved whipped cream ,with teaspoon, around top of the cake, you can make cool star shape by drawing with a wooden toothpick.:) Spoon raspberries into center of cake.

NATIONAL CHOCOLATE CAKE DAY

January 27th- national chocolate cake day. Need I say more? What a great holiday that is definitely marked on my calendar! So, here is the challenge- lets all put up a couple of favorite chocolate recipes to share! Then we can all make something chocolatey, decadent, rich,  and scrumptious on January 27th!

Here is my first one, I love this frosting recipe! It turns out great every time!

Hershey's "Perfectly Chocolate" Chocolate Frosting

1/2 c. melted butter or margarine
2/3 c. cocoa
3 c. powdered sugar
1/3 c. milk
1 tsp. vanilla

Mix melted butter and cocoa. Alternately add powdered sugar and milk, beating  on med. speed til spreading consistency. Stir in vanilla, more milk if needed ( I have never needed more). Makes 2 c. frosting. This frosts a bundt cake nicely with a little bit to spare- i.e. a snack for the next few days!!