Quiche... aka fancy BFFD (Breakfast for Dinner)

Another with which I like to go overboard with the cheese.

I had a frozen pie crust. I like eggs and cheese. I'm on a spinach kick. I found a recipe and adapted to add a little more substance (original recipe - Budget Bytes.com). This should be just as good at breakfast time as it is for dinner. One of my new goals is to make things I'll enjoy as leftovers (I'm picky) so I spend less money eating out.

Ingredients:

6 oz mushrooms
salt & pepper
4 handfuls fresh spinach
1.5 TBS minced garlic
1/2 lb hot Italian sausage
olive oil
2 - 3 oz crumbled feta cheese
3 eggs
3/4 cup milk
1 tsp garlic powder
1/4 tsp onion powder
1/4 cup grated parm cheese
shredded mozzarella cheese

• Start by browning the sausage. I used 2 pans to save time. In the second pan, heat some olive oil and add 1 TBS of the minced garlic, saute 1-2 minutes, then add the mushrooms. Let them sweat it out, add some salt, about 7 minutes time. Keep stirring so garlic doesn't burn. Remove sausage from heat once browned, drain on paper towels.

 

• Push the mushrooms aside, add a little more olive oil and the half tsp of garlic. Stir in handfuls of spinach to coat, let it sit until it starts to wilt. Once it begins to wilt you can mix in the mushrooms and continue to cook both down. 

• Beat the eggs till frothy, pour in milk, garlic powder, onion powder, additional salt and pepper. Stir it all up and add the parm cheese until combined. 

• In the pie crust (mine was frozen) layer the spinach/mushroom mixture, then the cooked and drained sausage, (here I also added a few slices of tomato), and then the feta. Pour the egg mixture over the layers of goodness. Top with mozzarella cheese, I will leave this up to your taste, but I added enough to cover the top. 

I love feta cheese.

  

I love all cheese.

 

 

And the finished product is just as delicious as I imagined. Pretty sure I wouldn't change a thing. 

 

Italian Style- i.e. I like Parmesean- Chicken

Italian Style Chicken

Minimal effort, few ingredients...my kind of weekday meal.

This is my own personal recipe, adapted from a Campbell's Kitchen Meal Mail Email I received back in 2009. A recipe link so old that when I tried to click and follow from the email, the path could not be found. So that email is, literally, the last evidence I have of this recipe that got me and my roommate through many senior year nights. I have since adapted it even further (back then it was to adjust for ingredients I did/did not have in our dinky apartment kitchen on Buffalo Street; nowadays I adjust recipes because I've a more developed sense of what I like and what things complement each other). So, what you see in the screen shot below is the original. The steps that follow show my adaptation along the way.

Original Campbell's Meal Mail Email 8/10/09

Prep:

I substitute a lot here. For vegetable oil, I subbed Grapeseed Oil. I went to a WildTree party a little while back, was sold on Grapeseed Oil and it's benefits (http://shop.wildtree.com/pages/cfAboutWildtree.cfm) and have been using it here and there when I think it won't mess with the flavor too much in a recipe. Sub #2 is canned diced tomatoes for the chopped plum tomatoes. Sub #3 fresh herbs kicked to the curb, I used Mrs. Dash dried seasoning (Tomato Basil Garlic variety). And finally, since I was making this dish for only 1 person, I eyeballed the quantities of each ingredient, making sure I didn't short myself for the sauce. Another benefit of this recipe is that for the most part, it's a one skillet dish. Just add a side/bread! I boiled rice along side, but you can make whatever side you want (noodles might be good too).

Ingredients:

Grapeseed Oil (veg. oil substitute) 1-2TBS
1 boneless, skinless Chicken Breast
1 can Campbell's Cream of Mushroom (or Chicken for picky non-mushroom eaters)
1/4 cup of water
Shaved or Shredded Parmesan cheese
Mrs. Dash Tomato Basil Garlic Seasoning - to taste
Salt & Pepper - to taste
1 can diced Basil Garlic Tomatoes
1 TBS butter

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Process

Heat oil in skillet. Salt and pepper both sides of chicken. Season to taste with Mrs. Dash. Cook the chicken 4-5 min per side on medium heat, until browned on both sides. Remove chicken from skillet.

 

Here I take the skillet off direct heat completely, just while I pour in the water so it doesn't burn off too fast. Pour in about 1/4 cup of water, then I use about 2/3 of the full can of Cream of Mushroom soup. If you've removed from heat, put skillet back over the eye. As you stir the soup and water together, make sure to scrape along the bottom getting the juicy crispy chickeny bits up because that's where the flavor is! 

Then, plop about 4 spoonfuls of diced tomatoes into the saucy mixture and stir it up. It turns a sort of orange-pinkish color at this point like a vodka sauce. This is also where I add the beloved Parmesan cheese. I don't care what form (except grated I hate grated), it never disappoints. I drop in 2 handfuls of shaved Parmesan that you can find in Kroger. Heat until cheese is melted through.

Spoon the sauce over your cooked chicken, add your side to your plate, and enjoy!

My Kind of Finger Lickin' Chicken

Sweet & Tangy Chicken

I'm a huge fan of chicken. Not only is it generally easy to prepare, but also I believe it can be changed to suit any mood you're in; asian (sweet and spicy), italian (garlic, herbs, parm cheese), cajun (chili powders, peppers), french (cordon bleu, mushrooms, wine), etc. etc. you get my drift. This recipe, however, defies any sort of label or boundaries I've ever encountered in my limited cooking experience and that got my attention. With each ingredient on the list, your expression might grow bewildered but the product, the most delicious finger licking good sauce with the tender cut of chicken thigh (my new obsession for some reason), was BEYOND any of my expectations and I will continue to make this routinely from now on in order to satisfy the constant craving for this dish that now exists in the back of my brain, taunting me with sweet sweet memories of the last time we met. The best part... it's REALLY EASY. No lie. There are barely enough photos for me to put up in order to warrant a whole post, there are that few of steps, but it's that good. So read on and enjoy. 

The ingredients: 

4 chicken thighs, bone in (I like, no love, the skin...but that's personal preference)

1 package of dry onion soup mix

8oz of Russian dressing

1 small jar or 8-10oz of apricot preserves (sub. orange marmalade or peach preserves)

That's it... all the ingredients fit easily in this one pic

First, salt and pepper the chicken thighs in a baking dish/pan. Mix the Russian dressing, onion soup mix, and apricot preserves together. Pour over chicken so that all is covered with the sauce.

Prepare to smother....

Ready for the oven!

In the oven, at 400° for 1 hr and 15 min (depending on your oven, best bet is a meat thermomter. Internal temp should be 165°)

One good thing to remember: baste the chicken a few times during cooking by spooning the sauce over the chicken. The way the sauce cooks with the fattiness of the thigh skin/meat creates a sticky yet pourable sauce. So it comes out like a glaze...yum!

....annnnd this is where the "finger-lickin'" comes in.

That's it! Enjoy!

I served it over just plain rice, with steamed veggies as a side. It's the perfect easy and quick weekday meal. I hope that you get to utilize it, because once you do you'll have it as a staple forever!

Getting in the Mood for Fall

Crock Pot Apple Butter

Apparently the process of making apple butter was once a tedious and boring act. But since I found this crock pot recipe, I'll never have to go through what my mother remembers with an adverse shudder, something about stoking fires and cast iron pots...who knows. But to say this apple butter was easy would be an understatement. To say it was "good" would also be an understatement. Enjoy!

Step 1. Peel, slice, toss into crock pot. One of the recipes I adapted from suggested using Gala and Granny Smith, which is what I used for this run. Apparently, the more tart the better the flavor of the butter. My downfall here already: I don't have an apple corer. Next time I pass a Pampered Chef booth at a craft show or someone has a book party, I must snag an apple corer. It would make the first step of peeling/coring/slicing the apples go a LOT quicker.

Once they were peeled and sliced, I cut them up a little more into smaller chunks, just to help along the cooking process. 

Step 2. Mix the sugar and spices. 1 cup white sugar, 1 cup brown sugar, 1 T cinnamon, 1/2 tsp ground cloves

Step 3. Sprinkle. Combine the apples in the crock pot with the sugar and spice mixture.

Step 4. Cooking Phase 1. Turn crock pot on HIGH, cover and cook apples for 1 hour, stirring occasionally. After an hour, they'll start to get mushy all on their own, and some people leave them to their own devices to cook fully down, but I wanted to make sure my apple butter wasn't lumpy so I went ahead and mashed them up right there in the pot.  

Phase 1 (cont.) After they were good and mashed, this is when I added vanilla. 1 tablespoon's worth. I figured it would bring out the flavor more if the vanilla simmered with the apples all night instead of being burned off on the high setting during that first hour. 

Step 5. Cooking Phase 2. Having turned down the heat to LOW setting, cover the apples and let cook 8-10 hrs. I let mine go overnight, stirring every hour until I went to bed. I will admit, I got up once during the night to stir it but that's just because I'm a bit of a paranoid OCD freak so I had to check to make sure I wasn't messing anything up....

...and to my delight, it turned out perfectly! I woke up to an inundation of Fall smells and now have an abundance of apple butter to get me through the season. See the final product and full recipe below!

Full Recipe

12-15 apples, different kinds

1 cup white sugar

1 cup brown sugar

1 T cinnamon

1/2 tsp ground cloves

1 T vanilla

Peel, core, and slice apples into smaller size chunks. Toss in crock pot.

In med size mixing bowl, combine sugars, cinnamon, and cloves. Add to apples in crock pot.

Cook covered on HIGH for 1 hour, stirring occasionally. 

After 1 hr, remove lid and mash the cooked apples if you desire. Add 1 T of vanilla.

Cover and cook on LOW overnight, or 8-10 hrs, stirring occasionally. 

Can/store finished apple butter product!

Fitting: My First Pot Roast for My First Post!

The idea of starting a food blog has always danced in the back of my brain, but my lack of blog/html savvy has kept me from it...until now! I mean why not, considering I almost always end up taking pictures of the dishes I cook (and sending them to a certain boyfriend to make him jealous, since he's on the starving grad student diet)?  :) I think my decision to finally get this thing going stemmed from having received my first CROCK POT for my 25th birthday. I've already used it a number times to make a variety of dishes but today I wanted to start accounting for them all...

Starting with my very first attempt at cooking a pot roast! This recipe was adapted from another blogger who calls it a Mississippi Roast and is possibly the easiest thing ever to prepare. Also, judging by the seasonings added, I can tell that my house is going to smell glorious when I get home.

Preparation

Buy a chuck roast (the one pictured is a little over 4.2 lbs), place it in a good size crock pot

Sprinkle 1 packet Hidden Valley Ranch Dressing mix

Sprinkle 1 packet McCormick Au Jus gravy mix

Place 1 stick of butter (in an attempt to be at least somewhat healthy, I used margarine) on top of the sprinkled roast

Arrange (at least--more if you love them like we do) 5 pepperoncini's on/around the roast as well

Cover and cook on LOW for 8 hrs.


Before picture: This is what mine looked like when I put it in this morning...

After pictures: and this is how it turned out... 





Moist beyond words and literally falling apart with tenderness. Plenty of drippings to make a gravy but just as good as a plain Au jus over the meat. I was afraid the peppers would over power the meat and wouldn't appeal to everyone but it was sopped up in a heart beat! The peppers were a light light after taste, I definitely would not add more than what the recipe calls for. Overall this was an awesome success and I'm so glad I took the opportunity for these 2 firsts! 

More to come, don't you worry! Sunday Funday isn't too far away ;)