for Carla

Butternut Squash Bisque

2 Tbsp butter
2 small onions, chopped
1 pound butternut squash, peeled, seeded and cubed
5 cups chicken stock
8 oz. potatoes, peeled and cubed
1 tsp paprika
1/2 cup whipping cream (optional)
1 1/2 Tbsp chopped fresh chives + some to garnish (optional)
Salt & pepper
Red pepper flakes

In a large pot, saute onions in butter for 5 minutes. Add squash, stock, potatoes and paprika. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low, simmer for 35 minutes or until veggies are tender.

Blend in batches until smooth. Stir in cream, season with salt & pepper, reheat gently. Stir in chopped chives or red pepper flakes just before serving. Garnish with chives or cream.

This soup is very forgiving. I have never weighed the potatoes or squash. I just cut up one whole squash & put in about half that much of potatoes. Then add plenty of chicken broth - you can always add more as you're blending it if it's too thick.

It's Fall Ya'll!

I have a great post about picture day coming up, but my camera needs a new battery & that post needs pictures. (It involves a black eye.) So, in the meantime, here is a recipe for one of my favorite soups. I think I found it in a magazine & modified it a little because I can't seem to follow a recipe to save my life. I made it for dinner last night and served it with brown rice pilaf, roasted broccoli & wheat rolls. I felt totally healthy, especially since I'd been eating candy corn all day long. I think that soup is my favorite thing about fall. This is also good to serve with Halloween coming up - all that garlic will keep away the vampires!

Creamy Carrot Potato Soup
1 head of garlic (That's right, 1 HEAD, not one clove. Peel each & every clove from an entire head of garlic & throw 'em in the pot. Don't be afraid, it's so good. Unless you don't like garlic, then perhaps you shouldn't even bother with this soup.)
6-8 cups chicken broth
3 large potatoes, peeled and chopped into large chunks
6+ carrots, peeled and chopped into large chunks
1/3 cup heavy cream (or half 'n' half or milk, but cream is best)
salt & pepper

Bring broth, garlic, potatoes and carrots to a boil. Simmer, covered, 25 minutes, until vegetables are tender.

Blend soup in batches until smooth. Return to pot. Stir in cream, season with salt and pepper. Heat through. Ladle into soup bowls, garnish with a few drops of heavy cream and serve.

My girls really like it when I whip up the rest of the heavy cream & top their soup with a dollop of that.

Pork Tenderloin with Cranberry Pan Sauce

I think I got this recipe from a Weight Watchers cookbook. (Don't you love how WW recipes are always titled with an ingredient list? Hm, pork tenderloin with cranberry pan sauce, I wonder what's in that?) It is delish. It also contains oranges, so it is not for my mother-in-law! Glancing at the few recipes I've shared on this blog, it's apparent that I really like cranberries.


Pork Tenderloin with Cranberry Pan Sauce & ORANGES

1 1/4 lbs pork tenderloin, trimmed & cut into 8 slices (4 servings) (I think the one I bought was about a pound and a half & it fed my little family of 5)

Salt & pepper the pork, brown 2 minutes on each side (in a little canola oil), transfer to a plate & keep warm.

Deglaze the pan with 1/2 cup of chicken broth. maybe a little more

Add: 1/4 cup whole-berry cranberry sauce, a little more of this too, actually like twice as much
1 Tbsp orange zest I didn't measure, just zested one whole orange
1/2 teaspoon thyme Mmmmm!
& pork.

Reduce heat and simmer covered, until pork is cooked through, about 8 minutes. I sliced up the orange I zested & simmered it along with everything else. I really like sweet meat. I discarded the cooked orange slices before serving. Then I sliced up another orange & garnished our plates with orange slices. Fancy! Yummy! Easy!

Cranberry-Pear Chicken

I made one of my favorite chicken dishes last night, one I like so much that I am confident enough to share with you. I even took pictures while I made it. (I'm a wanna-be.) And I looked up the word fond (the browned and caramelized bits of meat stuck to the bottom of a skillet after cooking a piece of meat) so I could use it correctly. What is it they say about the best-laid plans? Mine went a little awry, but dinner still made it to the table.

Cranberry-Pear Chicken
2 tsp canola oil
¾ lb. chicken breast, boneless, skinless - cut in
1-inch cubes
1 ½ tsp all-purpose flour
¼ tsp freshly ground black pepper
½ tsp salt

3 green onions, chopped
1 pear, peeled, cored, and chopped
¼ cup dried cranberries
¾ cup pear nectar
2 tsp coarse multi-grain mustard I'm not a huge mustard fan - I just used 1 tsp

Season chicken pieces with salt and pepper. Toss with flour and sauté in 1 tsp oil for five minutes, turning once to brown all sides. Remove from pan.

At this point your pan has a beautiful fond. This is the best part. It makes the dish. Don't burn it.

Add additional teaspoon of oil; sauté chopped green onion and pear for three minutes to brown the pears.

It smells so good right now!

Add the cranberries, pear nectar, and mustard; simmer, uncovered for 3 minutes.

This is the part where you deglaze that wonderful fond from the pan with the pear nectar. I used a little chicken broth too, because I like it saucy. Imagine my horror when I turned from getting the mustard out of the cupboard and saw/smelled my precious fond blackened and burnt. I guess I took too long hunting for the mustard. I guess I had the heat a little too high. I guess I am not the cook I wish I was. I know it was not the end of the world, but it upset me. I had to transfer the pears and onions minus the fond to a nonstick skillet. I added a little more chicken broth and pear nectar and hoped for the best.

Add the reserved chicken and simmer for one minute to glaze the chicken.

Maybe all is not lost.

Garnish with green onions and... 

Serve immediately.

with brown rice, Mmmm!

So, it turned out OK. It was delicious actually. The real question is, did the girls eat it? They asked for 2nds - of broccoli. They did eat the chicken after picking off all those pesky green & red things. They must think I'm insane for messing up perfectly good plain chicken with fruit and vegetables and sauce. That won't stop me from making it again though. I hope you like it too. Good luck with the fond!

Recipes

I made chowder last night with a leftover ham that's been in the deep-freeze since Christmas. I got the recipe from Jena & Dedo. It was delish. Each one of my daughters' liked it which was a pleasant suprise because soup is not the little Lowe girls' favorite food. There are too many ingredients to worry about, too many spices, everything's all mixed together & there's no way to divide the vegetables from each other & leave off the sauce. 

Plus also, this wasn't just soup, it was chowder, so not only is everything all mixed together, but you can't even see everything that you're about to eat! They ate it though. The biggest suprise was Gwen. Gwen loved it. That is huge. She is our pickiest eater and will go days without food before tasting something she doesn't think she'll like. We've tried everything (bribes, shame, physical force) and now we're back to this is what we're having, if you're hungry, you'll eat it. The girls set the table while Matthew raved about how good the soup smelled and how much everyone was going to like it. I was trying to be optimistic, but suspected that Gwen would go to bed hungry, preferring to wait until she could have a bowl of Shredded Wheat for breakfast. I told her that this soup only had things she liked in it: potatoes, ham, corn, carrots, onions - wait, I didn't tell her about the onions, we don't talk about the onions, everyone knows they're there, but there's no need to bring them up in front of the children. I sat down determined to enjoy my bowl no matter what faces the girls made about the hot dinner sitting before them that I had slaved for hours in the kitchen to make. The faces never came. The comment about this not being their favorite never came (after hurting my & their grandparents' feelings one too many times, they are not allowed to say they don't like something at the table). The I'm not hungry statement never came. They ate it all up, thick broth, spices, onions, and all! Gwen actually finished her bowl. You only have to glance at her little bird-legs to tell that that is a rare occurence.

I have been on a high ever since, feeling like a success as a mother & all that. I'm enjoying it now, because it will only last a few more hours, then I'll have to make dinner again & start all over.

After lunch today, I made the girls peanut-butter balls. I'm not sure why I'm admitting making such a thing on a semi-public forum, but maybe I have a niece or nephew out there that will appreciate the things. (Not a Fowler niece or nephew, your mom will feel nauseas just reading this.) Peanut-butter balls (& the next person to make them, please help me come up something else to call them) are a mixture of powdered sugar & peanut butter. That's it. Roll them into balls, roll them in a little powdered sugar and feel good about giving your kids a healthy snack. Except that they're not all that healthy. It's a great way to get them to eat peanut butter though! As if it's hard to get kids to eat peanut butter in the first place. Basically, they're something sweet when you don't have the time or energy to make cookies and you've already raided your marshmallow & chocolate chip stash.

That reminds me of a recipe Matthew & I discovered years ago... 

Have a hard time getting your kids to eat hot dogs and Ramen noodles? Try this!

Although I have not yet and never will make the Octopus and Seaweed Special, I've been on a roll in the kitchen and can't wait to try a recipe Jamie gave me for dinner tonight. I'll let you know how it goes. In the meantime, here's last night's success story:

Cheesy Vegetable & Ham Chowder

2 c. water

2 c. chopped potato

1/2 c. chopped carrot

1/2 c. chopped celery

1/4 c. butter

1/4 c. flour

2 c. milk

2 1/2 c. shredded cheese

15 oz. can cream style corn

1/4 t. black pepper

2 c. cubed/cooked ham 

In a large saucepan combine water, potato, and carrot. Bring to boil. Reduce heat. Simmer covered for ten minutes. DO NOT DRAIN. Meanwhile, in a medium saucepan, melt butter. Stir in flour and 1/4 t. black pepper. Add milk all at once. Cook and stir over medium heat until thickened and bubbly. Add cheese to milk mixture cook and stir until cheese melts. Add cheese mixture to potato mixture. Stir in corn and ham. Heat through but do not boil. If desired, season with additional pepper.

(I simmered the ham bone in water, strained it out, & then boiled potatoes & carrots in the ham-water. Oh, & I added onions of course! I sauteed them with the butter before adding the flour & milk.)

White Chili with Salsa Verde

What to do with your leftover turkey:

This is a recipe that Emily came home with from Relief Society that calls for ground turkey. Tonight she made it with chopped-up leftover turkey and it was much better than the original.

White Chili with Salsa Verde

Chopped onions (the recipe calls for 1/2 cup, we diced about 5 small ones.)
1 Cup diced turkey leftovers (or 12 oz. ground turkey)
1 garlic clove, minced

3 cups water
2 cans great northern beans
1 can diced chilies
2 teaspoons chicken bullion granules
Pepper
1/4 Cup water
2 Tbs. Flour

Cheese
Salsa Verde

In a soup pan, saute the onions until caramelized, add turkey and garlic. Stir in water, beans, chilies, bullion, and pepper. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, and simmer 30 minutes. Stir together flour and water and add to thicken.

Serve with Salsa Verde and grated cheese on top.

Now check this out. Sarah Palin after pardoning a turkey in Alaska:

The Staff of Life

I had never made bread in my life, not real bread, until just a few weeks ago. Banana bread, zucchini bread, pizza dough and Nestle Toll House cookies were the extent of my baking capabilities. Carla and I went to a bread-making class last month and I learned the easiest recipe for bread ever. Actually, I don’t know that, because I’ve never tried any other recipes. But this is really easy. I added the swirl after getting Fancy Lessons from my daughters. Bev, the bread lady, recommended SAF Instant Gold Yeast, so that’s exactly what I use.

Fancy Swirl Bread

1 ¼ cups warm water
2 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon yeast
2 teaspoons salt
2 tablespoons oil

½ cup oatmeal

3+/- cups flour

Mix the first 5 ingredients together in your KitchenAid with the dough hook. Add the oatmeal, just to make yourself feel good about the extra fiber. Add the flour about a cup at a time. Add the last cup slowly. The dough is ready when it cleans the sides and bottom of the bowl, but is still slightly sticky. I usually let the KitchenAid knead it for about 5 minutes after all the flour’s in.

Let the dough rise until doubled. I use a large plastic bowl with a lid because that’s what Bev used.

Roll out the dough into a rectangle as wide as your bread pan. Sprinkle cinnamon all over it. Roll it up, pinch the ends closed and put it in your bread pan (sprayed with Pam) to let it rise again. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. When the loaf is almost the size it should be when it’s done, stick it in the oven. Bake for 25-35 minutes, depending on the size of your loaf. Let the crust get nice and brown. Take it out, let it cool a minute, slice it and amaze everyone with your fanciness. Feed the hordes of people that come running to your kitchen when they smell bread baking. Feel like the best homemaker in the world because you just made bread. If there’s any left the next morning, it makes really good French toast, which is already fancy because it's French, so the swirl bread makes it out-of-this-world fancy. According to my experts, this bread even makes peanut butter and honey sandwiches fancy!

Cranberry-Ginger Chicken

This is really good:

8 small skinned chicken thighs (bone-in, do they even come boneless? I don't know!)
1/2 cup sliced scallions (I used green onions, that's what scallions are right? I can never remember.)
1/2 cup dried cranberries
1/2 cup orange juice
2 Tbsp soy sauce
2 Tbsp orange or apricot marmalade (I used apricot preserves)
1 Tbsp cider vinegar
1 Tbsp grated fresh ginger (Please use fresh ginger, it is so good. Peel a section of it & then run it over the zester part of your cheese grater until you have 1 tablespoon.)
1 Tbsp Dijon mustard

Mix ingredients in a slow-cooker. Cover & cook on low 7-9 hours. EAT!

I served it with rice. I also served it to my mother-in-law. How sweet of me right? How thoughtful. Except that my mother-in-law is allergic to oranges. Anaphylactic shock allergic. Closing up of the throat, can't breath, deadly allergic. After dinner, being the sweet woman she is, she complemented my cooking and asked what was in the sauce. "Oh, it's so easy!" I began, "there's orange juice..." Her face froze, then she asked if we had any Benadryl. Oops. Sorry Mom. I wasn't trying to kill you, I promise. She took some Benadryl & lived through the evening. She has even spoken to me since which just shows how big her heart is.

So, make this soon, tonight, you won't regret it. Just don't invite Carla, she won't fall for this recipe again.