Breakfast Brunch

7 slices of bread
7 eggs
3/4 c.+ 2 tbsp milk
1/2 tsp dry mustard
1 green onion chopped (it's probably okay without it, or with normal onions or dried onion)
1 1/4 c. grated mild cheese
1/2 c. evaporated milk
1 can cream of mushroom
1 lb. ground sausage or hamburger, browned and drained (we've always used hamburger)
1/4 c. grated mild cheese.

Grease 9x13 pan. De-crust bread and line the bottom of the pan. Mix eggs, milk, mustard and onion, pour over the bread. Sprinkle with 1 1/4 cups grated cheese. Mix milk with cream of mushroom soup and cooked meat, pour over top. Cover with 1/4 c. cheese. Bake at 375 for 40 minutes. Yield: 12 servings.

Cilantro Pesto

These rolls were just a package of cresent rolls I reshaped then sprinkled with garlic salt and parsely.

I've been experimenting a lot with pestos lately and I've found a real keeper.
I used it for our green St. Patricks Day dinner tonight.

2 cups fresh cilantro leaves
1 cup fresh parsley leaves
3 tablespoons lime juice
1/2 cup pine nuts (cashews, walnuts or almonds can be used)
1/4 teaspoon chili powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon black pepper
1/2 cup grated Asiago cheese (or Parmesan)
1/2 cup olive oil (I used garlic EVOO or you could just add a little garlic)

Rinse, dry and roughly chop the cilantro and parsely. Roast the nuts in a pan on the stove over medium. Once they start changing color sprinkle with the chili powder and a little salt. Put the cilantro, parsley, lime juice, nuts, salt, pepper, and grated cheese into the bowl of a food processor then stream olive oil in while pulsing until mixture is smooth, 8 to 10 pulses. If mixture is too thick, add more olive oil; if too thin, add more nuts.  Pour into 4 one-cup freezer containers. Use one container within a few days; freeze the others for later.
 
Ideas for use: I spread it over chicken breasts and baked them in the oven. On the side I made cilantro pesto rice that would be really good on a Cafe Rio type salad. Recipe is as follows...
 
1 can black beans
1 can corn
3/4 c. chicken broth
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp dried cilantro ( I really like cilantro)
2 c. cooked rice
1 c. cilantro pesto sauce
 
Heat through, sprinkle with Asiago & serve.

Anne's Corn Bread

Another favorite!

1/2 c. butter, melted
2/3 c. sugar
    Stir.
    Add:
2 eggs and beat together.
1 c. buttermilk (I keep powdered buttermilk on hand, it works great).
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 c. flour
1 c. cornmeal
1/2 tsp. salt

Pour into an 8x8 pan. Bake at 350 for 30-40 minutes. Ready when knife comes out of center clean.

Homemade Rolls

2 Tbsp. yeast
1/4 c. warm water
1 c. warm water
3 eggs beaten
1/2 c. sugar
4 1/2 c. flour
2 tsp. salt
1/2 c. butter

Soften yeast in 1/4 cup warm water. Add remaining ingredients and 2 cups of flour. Mix until well blended, then add remaining flour 1/4 cup at a time and mix to form soft dough. Place dough in a greased bowl, cover and let rise until doubled (about 1 hour). Punch down, roll out onto floured board. Cut out in circles. Dip circles in melted butter, fold in half and place on cookie sheet. Let rise again until puffy. Bake at 400 for 15 minutes.

I don't cut them in circles, I make little rolls and barely dip them in butter. They taste great!

Delicious Potato Soup

We make this all the time and love it! Here are the measurements, but I really just do as much as I want, because I don't think it would make very much if you follow the vegetable measurements. I will just double or triple the part where you make the broth (broth, milk, butter, flour).

2 c. water
1 1/2 c. potatoes
1 c. carrots
1 c. celery
1/4 c. onion
Salt and Pepper

1/4 c. butter
1/4 c. flour
1 c. milk
1/2 c. chicken broth
1 c. cheddar cheese
1/4 tsp. dill weed (I don't have this, so I just throw in whatever spices I want, like parsley, garlic powder, etc)
Crisp bacon

Boil water in large pot. Chop veggies, then add to boiling water. Return to boil, cover and simmer for 10 minutes. Do not drain. In a seperate pan, melt butter and whisk in flour. Cook until smooth, stirring constantly. Remove from heat and gradually stir in milk and chicken broth. Bring to boil over medium heat. Boil 1 minute. Add cheese and stir until melted. Add to veggies. Add spices. I let it simmer for quite a while before we eat, and definitely let it cook on low heat for a while if the veggies are still really crunchy. Add salt and pepper  and broken up pieces of bacon to taste, if desired.

This recipe is really yummy with homemade bread or rolls on the side.

A Gourmet Sack Lunch Meal

Last week we had our RS Birthday dinner and had these yummy gourmet sack lunches. They sent out the recipes, they were really good! Here they all are.

Pesto Mayonnaise

¼ cup mayo

2 Tbsp. Parmesan Cheese

1 dash of garlic powder

1 Tbsp. Gourmet Garden Basil Herb Blend  (I’m sure you could also just use fresh basil.  I just went for the easy route.  This is found in the produce section by the fresh herbs and it is in a little squeeze bottle.)

Cranberry Dijon

½ cup whole cranberry sauce (homemade or canned)

2 tsp. Dijon mustard (or more to taste)

The recipe I found calls for 1 tsp. horseradish but I forgot to buy it at the store, so I didn’t put it in.  It would probably give it more of a kick though and might be good.

Whole Wheat Bread 

(makes 4 large loaves)

***This recipe was made for a bosch mixture, for me, I think bosch is the greatest and best way to go with bread. But I'm sure other mixer machines would work as well.***

5 c. warm water

2 T. instant yeast

1/4 c. oil

1/4 c. honey

3 T. dough enhancer (this is used in lots of dough recipes, it makes super fluffy, moist, bread. I found mine at a kitchen store in Utah and bought several cans. I'm sure you can find it here in Cleveland, although I've never looked for it)

1/2 c. gluten (I also bought a bag of this at the same kitchen store in Utah, but I'm pretty sure I've seen it in the store here)

6 c. wheat flour (freshly ground is always yummier, but store bought works great too!)

Instructions (these are really important, it can make all the difference when it comes to making bread!)

Knead above ingredients for 2-3 minutes. (I set my timer and make sure it gets a full 2 minutes). Then sprinkle 2 more cups of flour on top, then 2 T. on top of the flour. (Supposedly the salt can mess with the yeast, so it works better to put it on top of the flour and mix it in that way.... this is just what the kitchen store told us when they gave us the recipe!). Mix in that 2 cups of flour. Then add more flour until it reaches a good consistency, about 3-4 more cups of flour. About 12-14 cups in total recipe. I know when my dough is a good consistency because it starts to pull away from the sides, and the bowl is practically clean when it's done mixing, there is no dough on the sides of the bowl. Once it reaches this consistency, knead 8-10 minutes (set your timer!). Shape into loaves in greased bread pans. Let rise until double in size (about an hour). Then bake at 350 degrees for 25-30 minutes, until golden on top.

Note* They had this sliced and we ate it as cold sandwiches with ham and white cheese, then we had the options of the two sauces above. I loved it with the Pesto Mayonnaise. The bread worked great for cold sandwiches.


Thai Peanut Noodle Salad

1 cup Asian sesame dressing

2 TBS soy sauce

2 TBS crunchy peanut butter (i add more... maybe 3)

2 TBS honey 

1 pkg thin spaghetti (i use whole grain)

4 green onions

1 cup chopped cilantro

spinach (approx 2 cups) and matchstick sliced carrots, or shred your own (approx 1 cup)

cook spaghetti, drain, and toss with 1/4c of the asian dressing. 

mix remaining 3/4c asian dressing with PB, honey, and soy sauce in a bowl.

add spinach, carrots, green onions, cilantro to noodles. 

pour dressing mixture over. mix lightly. this is good cold or warm.

i also usually add chicken (2 cooked breast, or i'll buy a rotisserie chicken and pull meat from it~ VERY GOOD) and serve as main dish.

 ****other things we've added- bean sprouts, water chestnuts, mandarin oranges (was ok), baby corn (the little ones on the cob), sugar snap peas.... you can dressing it up or down. just make slt more dressing if you add much more to it, like 1 1/2 of the recipe. very versatile.***

White Cake

1 french vanilla cake mix

1 6oz plain Yogurt (I can never find plain so I use vanilla)

3 egg whites

3/4 c milk

1/3 c vegetable oil

Mix on low until blended then beat on high for 3 minutes

9x13 cake pan

Bake 335 degrees for 40 minutes

After its baked make a lemon glaze

1/8 c water, 1/8 c sugar.  Heat until dissolved and squeeze 1 whole lemon or 2TB lemon juice. Mix, fork the cake a few times and brush the glaze over top of cake with pastry brush.  Before eating sprinkle top with powder sugar. 

Refrigerate the cake, I use this for a yummy strawberry shortcake so thats why the lemon glaze and powder sugar are good however you can also frost it.

 Note* The cake was frosted with a buttercream frosting. They were SO good.

Here are a few pictures I stole off a girl in my ward's blog of the dinner. The center pieces were so cute too. All she did was make suckers on skewers and filled the pots with rock salt and stuck them in. How cute & easy!

Coconut Cupcakes

Ok girls are you ready for the yummiest day of your life :) I made these for Addi's 1st B-Day and we have made them almost every weekend since. (I wonder where those extra 5 lbs. came from :)

3 eggs

1 cup Sour Cream

1/2 cup water

8 oz. cream of coconut (can sub. with coc. milk)

1 tsp. vanilla

1 tsp. coconut extract

1 white cake mix

1 small box instant coconut pudding

1- 7 oz. pkg coconut flakes (use for sprinkling on top)

Frosting:

2 cubes butter

4 cups powder sugar

2 tsp. coconut extract

1 tsp. vanilla extract

3 Tbsp. cream of coconut or coc. milk

Beat until smooth. Frost the cupcakes when they have cooled. (I used a ziploc bag and cut a little whole in the corner.)

Preheat oven to *350. Place 24 liners in the cupcake pan. Beat first 5 ingredients together. Add the rest (except for the coconut flakes) one at a time beating on low. Fill batter in liners about 3/4 full. (they seem kind of full but they don't cook up too big.) Cook 18 - 21 minutes. Check with a toothpick. (Mine were still a little moist but I didn't want to burn the tops, and they still turned out fine.) When cooled frost and sprinkle with coconut. These are soo good even without the coconut on top if you are not a fan. (The cream of coconut can be found by the mixed drink stuff in the grocery isle. The coconut milk is found down the Asian isle. I haven't tried that but my friend has and said it is just as good.)

Red Beans and Rice

Matt had this on his mission a lot and waited three years to make it for me. When he made it I thought for sure I wouldn't like it...and I ate three bowls at dinner (don't forget, I am pregnant). It's simple and cheap! We figured it costs less than $7 dollars to make and makes something like 12 servings.

1 pkg of family size Zatarans Red Beans and Rice mix
2 cans of red beans (not kidney)
1 polska kielbasa sausage...I'm not sure what that means. Really all you need is one of those slabs of sausage (any kind) that are kind of in the shape of a horse shoe. I hope that makes sense.

We've also added a half cup of normal rice (cooked separately) just to add to the mix if you want.

Mix the box, according to directions. After, add the extra beans (and rice, if you want) and cut up sausage and add that. Let it warm for 5 minutes or so.

Eat up! It's so yummy, seriously. And, it's not very spicy from coming from the south!