Caramel Apple Dip

At the last minute, I decided to bring apples and dip to my youngest daughter's Shakespeare class this afternoon.  We always have lots of cut-up apples in the fridge, so they're easy to grab and go.  But all alone, they'd be boring.  Peanut butter is good with apples, but doesn't shout 'special'.

Back in the dark recesses of my brain lurked a recipe that my family used to make quite often when I was a young adult.  They may still make it, I don't live near them anymore and somehow this was lost from my immediate memory during one of our many moves.  I started thinking about it a couple of weeks ago.  Probably because I'm getting tired of apples with peanut butter!

As you can see from the container, my memory served me well!

Best of all?  It took me less than five minutes to make.  Really.

Apple Dip

1 - 8 oz brick of cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup brown sugar, packed
1 Tbs vanilla

Using a hand mixer, combine all ingredients and whip until smooth.

Cream Cheese Dip (the original)

2 - 8 oz bricks of cream cheese, softened
1 cup brown sugar, packed
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup shelled peanuts (salted or unsalted)

Using a hand mixer, combine cream cheese, brown sugar, and vanilla.  Whip until smooth.   Stir peanuts into the dip by hand.

Serve dip with your favorite apple - my kids love Granny Smith, but I'm more partial to the Gala - or other hard fruit, like pears.  Apples are best, though.


In my haste, I did a quick Allrecipes search to come up with the first recipe (click on the recipe name to go to the Allrecipes version).  After we got back home, I had time to search my recipe box and I found the original recipe my family used.  Can't believe I forgot about the peanuts!

The handwritten recipe card says "Cream Cheese Dip" for the name, but I remember distinctly that we called it "Caramel Apple Dip" when it was mentioned by name.  The peanuts improve this dip from 'good with apples' to 'oh-my-gosh this tastes like a caramel apple".

~ ENJOY!

Merissa at Little House on the Prairie Living hosts an Old Fashioned Recipe Exchange every Tuesday.  If you have a recipe to share you can link your blog post or you can post in the comments.  CLICK HERE to go to this week's exchange!

 

Go ahead, you know you want to look!

Escallped Corn

I love discovering new recipes and I was excited to see that Merissa at Little House on the Prairie Living is hosting a weekly Old Fashioned Recipe Exchange every Tuesday.  If you have a recipe to share you can link your blog post or you can post in the comments.  CLICK HERE to go to this week's exchange!

 

Comfort food doesn't get much better than this!

Escalloped Corn

2 cans creamed corn
1 can sweet corn
1/2 stick butter, melted
2/3 row saltines, crushed
2 eggs

Mix together and pour into greased casserole dish.  (I used a 7 x 11 glass pan.)

1/2 row saltines, crushed
1/2 stick butter

Mix together and spread evenly over the top of the casserole.  Sprinkle with paprika, to taste.

Bake at 350F for 40 minutes.


~ ENJOY!

Operation Clean Out the Freezer - Day #11

Awesome quick lunch for the grown-ups!

Shrimp and Avocado Salad

Ingredients

• 1 cup cooked salad shrimp (or larger shrimp, chopped)
• 2 tablespoons chopped chives
• 1/3 cup mayonnaise
• 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
• 2 tablespoons cocktail sauce
• salt to taste
• 2 avocados, halved lengthwise and pitted
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• Bibb lettuce leaves
• 1 teaspoon paprika

Directions
In a bowl, mix the chives, mayonnaise, Worcestershire sauce, and cocktail sauce. Stir in shrimp and season with salt to taste (I don't usually add any salt). Mound the shrimp mixture into avocado halves, and sprinkle with lemon juice. Place avocado halves on Bibb (or Boston) lettuce leaves that have been dusted with paprika.

I didn't have any lettuce leaves on hand yesterday, so I sprinkled the filled avocados with paprika. WAY better this way!

I have one kid who doesn't like shrimp and one kid who doesn't like avocado. So, I cooked two servings of spaghetti and the shrimp hater had hers with butter and avocado (?!) and the other tossed hers with shrimp heated with Ghee.

This is a nice snack, side dish, or light lunch.

Enjoy!

Operation Clean Out the Freezer - Day #10

 Nachos with Beef and Beans.

 Beef and Beans

• 1 lb ground beef
• 4 cloves garlic, crushed
• 1 medium onion, chopped
• 1 j, chopped (seedless for less spice)
• 1 can black beans, drained
• 1 bunch cilantro, chopped (don't forget the stems!)

Brown all ingredients except the black beans in a skillet over medium high heat.  After all pink is gone from the ground beef, add the can of beans and simmer about five minutes.  Add cilantro and continue to cook until all vegetables are soft.

Serve over nachos with cheese, salsa, olives, lettuce, sour cream...  whatever you like to put on your nachos.

I got this recipe from a show Rachael Ray did at least seven years ago about take-home at home.  She made fresh pico de gallo and cheese sauce based on a white sauce,  but that's too much work for us most days.  The show made me SO hungry that I ran out and bought cilantro and jalapeños, the two ingredients I was missing.  From that day forward, for the rest of the summer, I made the full nachos with the cheese sauce for my kids and their friends in our apartment complex every week.  It's easy to make for a crowd.

The beef and beans is also good inside tacos and burritos.

ENJOY!

P.S.  In case you were wondering...  I couldn't get the actual recipe because my cookbooks are being held hostage by a disassembled bunk bed. :p

Operation Clean Out the Freezer - Day #5

Noodles with Broccoli and Meat (Cambodia)

I substituted a bag of Asian mixed vegetables for the broccoli and used imitation crab and chicken for the meat.  As always, it did not disappoint!

Cucumber Salad (Indonesia)

2 small cucumbers (I used one large English cucumber)
1/2 medium onion, thinly sliced
1/2 cup cider vinegar
1 T olive oil
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/2 Tbs sugar
slices of hot chili pepper to taste (optional)

Whisk together all ingredients except the cucumbers and onions in a largish bowl.  Add cucumbers and onions, toss with dressing.  Marinate at least 30 minutes before serving.

I skipped the pepper because my family just isn't all that fond of pepper.  Then I increased the garlic powder because I knew I wasn't going to be using the hot chili peppers but I still wanted some kick.  Lastly, I used about 2 tsps of chili powder in place of the hot chili peppers.  This was a perfect side with the stir fry!


Both of these recipes are from Extending the Table: A World Community Cookbook by Joetta Handrich Schlabach, 1991, Herald Press. (It's also available from Amazon.)  My number one, absolute favorite cookbook. Ever. I can't recommend it highly enough to my ethnic food loving friends.

Operation Clean Out the Freezer - DAY #2

Nothing exciting today.

I made broth from the chicken parts (that were hanging out in the freezer just for this purpose), the lone chicken tenderloin, and a pack of chicken thighs. Everything tossed into the slow cooker along with the other half of the onion (leftover from the red sauce and meatballs), onion peels, about 12 cloves of garlic, and a Tbs of sea salt.  Cooked on low, overnight.

Today, I cooked Amish noodles (bought at Kroger) in the broth and added some of the chicken pieces from the above broth making. Totally simple and painless, yet my youngest loves this stuff as much as love chocolate. What an easy way to get brownie points!

Holiday Apricot Kugel

I came to kugel relatively late in life, introduced to it by my cousin's mother-in-law. It was love at first bite! It seems a stretch to call it a comfort food since it isn't a product of my childhood, but there is something about this lightly sweet, rich dish that wraps me up like a warm blanket, straight from the dryer. This version caught my eye because the creator adds apricot preserves to the mix. It didn't disappoint! My husband, father-in-law, 13yo, and her friend all give it two thumbs up!

HOLIDAY APRICOT KUGEL

Ingredients
1 (16 ounce) package wide egg noodles
1 (18 ounce) jar apricot preserves
6 eggs, beaten
1 cup melted butter
1/2 cup white sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 pinch salt
1 (16 ounce) container cottage cheese
2 cups shredded Cheddar cheese

Directions
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Grease a 9x13 inch baking dish.
Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Add egg noodles and cook for 8 to 10 minutes or until al dente; drain.
In a large bowl, stir together the apricot preserves, eggs, butter, sugar, vanilla extract, and salt, and mix to thoroughly combine. Fold in the cottage cheese and noodles, and spoon the mixture into the prepared baking dish.
Bake in the preheated oven until the center of the kugel is cooked and set, about 50 minutes. Remove the kugel and top with Cheddar cheese, return to the oven, and bake until the cheese is browned and bubbling, about 10 minutes. Let the kugel rest for 10 minutes before serving.

Amazingly, I didn't make any changes to this recipe. Of course, how do you mess with kugel, I ask? I used preserves that had no added sweeteners, but regular apricot preserves would work just as well. I imagine it would be a tad sweeter than my version.

ENJOY!


note: click on the recipe name to link directly to the original recipe

Shrimp and Avocado Salad

I stumbled upon this recipe playing with my Dinner Spinner Pro app on my iPhone. It *sounded* incredibly tasty and with the teens out of the house today it was the perfect opportunity to give a try. Oh. My. Word. This EXCEEDED all of my expectations! The husband was looking for seconds. :)



SHRIMP and AVOCADO SALAD

Ingredients
1 1/2 cups cooked & coarsely chopped shrimp
2 tablespoons chopped fresh chives
1/3 cup mayonnaise
1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
2 Tbs cocktail sauce
salt to taste
2 avocados, halved lengthwise, pitted, and scooped out of the skin
1/2 lemon
Boston lettuce leaves
paprika

Directions
In a bowl, mix the shrimp, chives, mayonnaise, Worcestershire sauce, and cocktail sauce. Season with salt.
Line individual serving plates with one leaf of Boston lettuce and sprinkle with paprika to taste.
Place 1/2 an avocado on each lettuce leaf.
Mound the shrimp mixture into the avocado hollow and sprinkle with fresh squeezed lemon juice.

This recipe is modified from a recipe by the same name I found on AllRecipes. The changes are pretty significant, so I'm not going to list them separately.

Although, I will note that the original recipe seems to serve the avocado IN its skin on top of the lettuce. That seemed a waste of a perfectly yummy looking piece of lettuce, so I scooped the avocado out of the skin in one piece and spooned the shrimp mixture into the hollow. One of the reviewers on AllRecipes suggested lining a rectangular plate with the lettuce leaves sprinkled with paprika, placing the wedges in a line, and spooning the shrimp between the avocado slices.

Also, the original recipe uses bibb lettuce. I substituted Boston lettuce only because it was the better looking of the two at my grocery store.

ENJOY!

Tomatoes! Tomatoes! Tomatoes!

Does this picture make you drool?

It makes me drool. I dream about tomatoes fresh-from-the-garden all year long and I tolerate the less-than-perfect hot house tomatoes the rest of the year.

I'm going to make something with tomatoes for dinner tonight - not sure what yet, maybe we'll just have sliced tomatoes - and I stumbled across all these incredibly yummy sounding tomato dishes out on the web. Haven't tried any of them. YET!

Savory Tomato Crumble
Onion Tart with Gruyere and Tomato
Easy Tomato Galette
Gina's Summer Tomato Pie
Summer Tomato Salad with Creamy Garlic Vinaigrette
Scalloped tomatoes with croutons
Tomato, Onion and Potato Gratin

Penne Franco

I could eat at this place every day! UNFORTUNATELY, there isn't one within an hour of my house.

This weekend the craving hit with a vengeance. I had to have Carrabba's Penne Franco!

Picture from Between Blue & Yellow blog, link below

Okay, maybe it was just the kalamata olives and pasta I was craving, but why stop there, right? Thankfully, a quick google search of 'Carrabba's Penne Franco' gives me 9,690 sites to peruse. Complete with recipes and pictures.

I started with the recipe for Penne Franco at Between Blue & Yellow, but as usual I didn't have all the ingredients on hand (a sad reality of living in the boonies) and I had to improvise.

PENNE FRANCO (Veggie Version)

Ingredients~
1 box penne pasta
1 can diced tomatoes
1 can artichoke hearts, quartered
3 tbsp olive oil
1 pack of mushrooms, sliced
kalamata olives (as many or as little as you want)
5 garlic cloves, chopped
Grated Parmesan cheese (optional)
Salt & pepper to taste


Preparation~

• Cook pasta according to package directions.
• Pour olive oil into large pan, and saute garlic for 1-2 minutes over med-high heat. Add in mushrooms, tomatoes, artichokes, and olives. Saute for several minutes, stirring frequently.
• Toss with the cooked pasta. Stir until heated through, sprinkle with salt and pepper. Top with grated parmesan.

I'll be completely honest. I would have much preferred sun-dried tomatoes (packed in oil) and GRATED, fresh parmesan, but those would be the two ingredients I didn't have on hand. To make up for the lack of sun-dried tomatoes, I doubled the amount of mushrooms. Actually, I'd double the mushrooms anyway... we're a mushroom lovin' family. :) I also added more garlic and a tad bit less olive oil than the original recipe.

Also, you can add cooked chicken or shrimp into the pasta to make this a main dish. I love, love, love to order it at Carrabba's with SHRIMP! Alas, I'd already promised the hubby beer can chicken, so we had the pasta as a side/vegetable dish.

ENJOY!

Noodle Kugel

I was in my teens the first time I ate this dish and I've been in love since the first bite.  Noodle kugel says COMFORT FOOD in a big way.  I've been in a somewhat melancholy mood lately and find myself craving comfort foods.  Today at the computer noodle kugel came to mind, so I googled a recipe.  (LOL!  Google 'kugel'!)

While some recipes include cinnamon and other toppings, I chose to try this simple sweet kugel from Smitten Kitchen because I had all the ingredients on hand.  I did cut it in half since I only had one pound of cottage cheese.

Noodle Kugel

1/2 pound wide egg noodles
5 eggs
3/4 cup sugar
1 pound full-fat cottage cheese, creamed or large curd
1 stick melted butter margarine
2 teaspoons vanilla
Dash of salt

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Parboil the noodles (five to seven minutes).

In a very large bowl beat eggs until fluffy. Add the sugar gradually, then the cottage cheese, margarine or butter and vanilla. Stir in the drained noodles.

Pour into a 9×13-inch pan. Bake for 1 hour, or until kugel is set.


It's still in the oven. Verdict later. Right now I'm praying for extra compassion so I will not stress over sharing with the family. :)

Roasted Pork with Black-Eyed-Pea Salad

Roasted Pork with Black-Eyed-Pea Salad
Everyday Food: Great Food Fast by Martha Stewart Living Magazine p. 137

I actually followed these recipes exactly. Amazing, I know. :p Both the pork and the salad were AWESOME! I didn't think the teens would like the black-eyed pea salad, but both girls loved it. Flower Child even had it for lunch today.

I tossed the asparagus in olive oil and sprinkled it with parmesan cheese, then roasted it under the broiler for about 12 minutes.  This is also from the Martha Stewart cookbook, but I don't know the page number.  We've been roasting our asparagus for years, but the parmesan made it oh-so-much more yummy!

This one is definitely a keeper!

Simple Au Gratin Potatoes

I'm not going to give specific ingredient amounts for this recipe, because it's very easily adapted to however many people you want to serve.

Basic Ingredients:

Potatoes
Shredded Sharp Cheddar Cheese
Flour
Salt
Pepper
Nutmeg
Paprika

Directions:

• Choose an oven-safe casserole dish that will accommodate the number of people you'll be serving


• Thinly slice potatoes in a single layer in the bottom of the dish


• Sprinkle lightly with flour, salt, pepper, and nutmeg - remember, the seasoning will be in each layer, so don't be too heavy-handed


• Sprinkle a layer of shredded cheddar cheese


• Repeat layers until casserole is filled

• For every 1 1/2 quarts of casserole, make a mixture of 1/4 cup melted butter in 1 1/4 cups milk and pour it over the layers


• Garnish with a sprinkle of paprika

Bake covered at 325F for 1 1/2 hours, or until a nice golden-brown crust forms on top and potatoes are tender.

The more you make, the longer it will take to cook. For Christmas Dinner I made enough casserole to fill a 3 quart dish and I baked it for 2 hours at 350F. I had other dishes in the oven, so 350 was my only choice. :p

This recipe is adapted from Marcia Adam' Old-Fashioned Escalloped Potatoes in Cooking from Quilt Country: Hearty Recipes from Amish and Mennonite Kitchens.