Pumpkin Fudge

Have I mentioned how much I love everything Autumn? I love the smells of the leaves, the crisp cool air, the apple cider and the pumpkin spice. It is therefore no surprise that when I found this recipe a few weeks ago I was excited to try it. I was unsure of the results, but overall it tastes surprisingly pumpkin-ey and good. It is, however, VERY rich so if you are on a "diet" and can only eat one piece this is perfect as one piece is all anyone will want/need.

I can say that if you want something different but autumnish to take to a potluck or party, this is a fun, adventurous route and anyone that loves pumpkin will love this fudge. I omitted the pecans because I didn't have any in the house, but I am sure it would be simply divine if they were included.



Ingredients:
3 cups sugar
3/4 cup melted butter
2/3 cup evaporated milk
1/2 cup canned pumpkin
2 Tbsp. corn syrup
1 tsp. pumpkin pie spice
1 (12-oz.) package white chocolate morsels
1 (7-oz.) jar marshmallow crème
1 cup chopped pecans, toasted
1 tsp. vanilla extract

Preparation:
Stir together first 6 ingredients in a 3 1/2-qt. saucepan over medium-high heat, and cook, stirring constantly, until mixture comes to a boil. Cook, stirring constantly, until a candy thermometer registers 234° (soft-ball stage) or for about 12 minutes.

Remove pan from heat; stir in remaining ingredients until well blended. Pour into a greased aluminum foil-lined 9-inch square pan. Let stand 2 hours or until completely cool; cut fudge into squares.

Cream of Broccoli Soup

I know, another soup. I just have a weakness for drinking my dinner.

This cream of broccoli soup is perfect for those who don't prefer cheese, (such as my husband) however, for those that do love cheese, the soup can be enhanced by a cup of shredded cheddar.

Another neat thing about this soup is the variety of ways to use the leftovers. We took this soup and mixed it into some cooked egg noodles and added peas and chicken and topped it with bread crumbs for a classic casserole. I also really enjoyed using the soup as a topping for a baked potato.



Ingredients:
2 tbsp butter
1 onion, chopped
1 celery stalk, chopped
8 c. broccoli florets
3 c. chicken broth
3 tbsp butter
3 tbsp flour
2 c. milk
Ground pepper
Bacon bits (optional, but yummy)

Directions:
Saute onion & celery in butter. Add broccoli & broth. Cover & simmer until tender. Mash to rough texture. (If you are seeking a smoother, creamier texture you can puree the broccoli. In separate pan stir flour, butter & milk till boiling. Add to soup. Season with pepper & bacon bits.

Oh, just a side-note: I had a head of cabbage in the fridge and I put a good amount of cabbage into this soup and it was delicious!

Black Bean Dip

I have been the lucky recipient of a lot of party invitations recently and so I decided I needed a new "go-to" treat. I had a few requirements for this treat, the most important being that it needed to be savory, not sweet. I don't eat very many sweets and can really only enjoy a few bites at any given time so I mostly snack on veggies or pretzels, etc. I got the idea for a black bean dip when I rummaged through my pantry and compiled a recipe from things I already had on hand.

When I debuted it a few weeks ago, I was rather nervous as it doesn't look particularly appetizing. However, I didn't need to worry. The bowl was empty within minutes as the dip tastes divine and it is quite filling. I have also found that it is very tasty when made into a burrito. :)



Ingredients:

2 cans black beans
2 tbsp veg oil
½ med onion
1 c. corn kernels
1 can diced tomatoes, half drained
2 tbsp minced garlic
1 tbsp cumin
1 tbsp chili powder
1 tbsp onion powder
1 cube cilantro bouillon
1 cube chipotle bouillon
1 tbsp chipotle pepper seasoning (optional, but adds a good flavor dimension)
1/3 c cheese, shredded
2 tbsp lime juice

Directions:

1. Place black beans in a medium size mixing bowl, partially mash beans -- beans should remain a little chunky.
2. In a medium size frying pan, heat oil over a medium heat. Stir in onion and garlic and saute for 4 min.
3. Mix beans, remaining ingredients into the frying pan; cook for 5 minutes or until thickened.

This tastes best when it has time to sit in the fridge for at least 2 hours. I personally prefer to serve the dip just slightly warm, but it is also good when chilled or hot.

Rustic Potato Stew (sounds gourmet, eh?)

Last night I came down with some kind of sinus infection and after a super rough night, all I wanted today was some warm soup and a cozy blanket. Sadly, my mom is 1100 miles away and her homemade soup is a little out of reach right now. After taking some pills I decided to "mom up" and make a pot of nutrition filled potato soup. Once again, this was a "made my own recipe" soup where I threw in everything I had in the fridge and luckily I had some good stuff in there.


Ingredients:

2 tbsp butter
1 med onion
4 carrots, peeled & chopped
4 celery stalks, chopped
7 red potatoes
2 cups cabbage, chopped
4 cups water
2 cups milk
4-6 tbsp flour
2 tbsp salt
2 tbsp pepper
2 tbsp dill
2 tbsp chicken bouillon

Directions:

I started by warming up the butter in the pot and adding the onion, celery & carrots. Let it cook up for about 10 minutes before adding the water and potatoes. Bring to a boil and let it cook for about 10 minutes. In a separate dish whisk the milk and the flour together before adding it to the pot. Add cabbage, salt, pepper, dill & bouillon. Let simmer for 10 minutes or until vegetables are cooked through.

I think this soup was just what the doctor ordered because I am already feeling quite a bit better. This was the first time I had added cabbage and I really like the inclusion. The soup was chunky and full of veggies and putting the cabbage and potatoes together felt like an homage to my Irish heritage. ;)

Sinful Cinnamon Rolls

The weather outside is quite chilly today and I decided I needed an excuse to use the oven to warm up the kitchen, so when I saw a friend's post on Facebook about cinnamon rolls, well, let's just say I couldn't help myself.



I've never made cinnamon rolls before and the idea had always been very intimidating but honestly, this was much easier than I had anticipated. The batch made 30 rolls, half of which I put in the freezer for this weekend at which time I will defrost them and let them rise before baking.

Ingredients

1 cup milk
1/2 cup butter
1 cup water
1 tablespoon active dry yeast
1 cup white sugar
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
6 cups all-purpose flour

Filling:
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
2 cups dark brown sugar
1 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 cup butter, softened

Directions

Warm the milk in a small saucepan until it bubbles, then remove from heat. Mix in the butter; stir until melted. Add water and let cool until lukewarm.

In a large bowl, combine the milk mixture, yeast, white sugar, salt, eggs and 2 cups flour; stir well to combine. Stir in the remaining flour, 1/2 cup at a time, beating well after each addition. When the dough has pulled together, turn it out onto a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth and elastic, about 8 minutes.

Divide dough into two pieces. Roll each piece into a 12x9 inch rectangle. In a bowl, stir together the cinnamon, nutmeg and brown sugar. Spread each piece with half of the butter, half of the brown sugar and cinnamon mixture. Roll up dough, using a little water to seal the seam.

Cut each roll into 12 slices using a very sharp knife or dental floss. Place rolls onto two 9x13 inch greased baking pans. Cover and let rise until almost doubled, about 1 hour. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Bake in preheated oven for 20 to 25 minutes until golden brown.



I just made my regular white icing but you can always replace that with a cream cheese frosting if you would like. I assure you, either way they are delicious!

Momma's Chili

With the cool weather setting in, I can't help but pull out all my favorite soup recipes and when I want comfort food to warm me up, I can't do much better than my mom's wonderful chili recipe. She usually served it up with fresh cornbread, but I made homemade biscuits instead (find the recipe here), and boy were they tasty! (As a side-note: I also used that biscuit recipe for a biscuits and gravy breakfast and the biscuits were solid enough to handle the thick gravy while still managing to be fluffy.)



Mom gave me a recipe for the chili, but nowadays I tend to just throw it all in the pot and guess at quantities. I think it tastes better that way. With that in mind, I will tell you my guesstimate on the ingredients:

2 large cans of tomato juice
Red/kidney beans (mom's recipe used dried beans that were soaked, but I always cheat with 3 rinsed cans of beans instead)
About equal quantities ( 2-4 tbsp, to taste) of the following spices: cumin, curry powder, garlic powder (or fresh garlic), sugar, chili powder (although I tend to add a lot more of this), salt to taste
1 lb ground beef, cooked with 1 chopped onion

Add it all together on the stove and cook for about an hour, give or take. If you use the canned beans I recommend waiting to add them until halfway through.

Southwestern White Chicken Chili

My husband and I just got back from a soirée in Arizona where the weather was hot and my craving for Mexican food was a bit overwhelming. Now that we are back in Kansas City, the air feels chilly and today seemed like the perfect day for soup. Like all my soups, it was created based on what was in my cupboard at the time. I decided to create a white chicken chili since I had never done it before and I happened to have white beans on hand. Halfway through cooking, I decided to give it a more pronounced southwestern taste to answer my tex-mex craving and added black beans as well.



As I never measure anything I create, the rough estimate of my soup recipe is below. The good thing with soup is that it is easy to fix if it doesn't taste quite right.

1 1/2 lbs of chicken, chopped and cooked in 1 tbsp of veg. oil
2 Tbsp of southwestern chipotle pepper seasoning mix
2 Tbsp olive oil
1 medium yellow onion, chopped
2 Tbsp minced garlic
2 stalks of celery, chopped
5 cups of chicken broth, or water with chicken bouillon
1 can of cream of chicken soup
1 can of great northern white beans (rinsed)
1 can black beans (rinsed)
1 can of chopped green chilis
1 Tbsp white pepper
2 cubes of cilantro bouillon (seriously, this stuff is amazing and can be found in a little box in the hispanic food section of the grocery store)
1 Tbsp cumin
Other ideas I had that would be good but I didn't have on-hand: red or green pepper, sour cream, fresh cilantro

Mandatory add-ins: (these REALLY made the soup terrific!)
Shredded Mexican Cheese (mine is a mix of cheddar & monterey jack)
White Rice (we had this leftover from our chinese dinner last night)
Tortilla Chips, broken on-top of soup

Chop the chicken and cook it in the veg oil, seasoning with salt & pepper. Halfway through the cooking add the southwestern chipotle seasoning.

In a rice cooker or separate pan, cook rice according to your usual methods, set aside.

Meanwhile, in a soup pot add olive oil, onion, garlic & celery. Cook until soft. Add water or broth. Mix in cream of chicken soup (to thicken the soup) & green chilis. Bring to a boil. Once at a boil, reduce to simmer and add beans, cooked chicken, cilantro bouillon, white pepper & cumin.

When serving, put about a 1/2 cup rice in the bottom of bowl, pour soup over top. Top with cheese and chips. Enjoy!


Beverage Tip: Ginger ale is a great pairing with this dish as the ginger is a compliment to the spicy flavors in the soup.

Quick Sweet & Sour Chicken

Stir-frys have become my "go-to" dish when I don't have a lot of time but I want something delicious and my stir-fry did not disappoint tonight. I was inspired by the very ripe pineapple that I needed to use and the red and green peppers in my fridge.

I forgot to take a picture before we ate, so here is a picture of the leftovers I packed into the fridge:


I cooked my chicken in my usual and favorite way, as mentioned in the chicken soup post below. I then added in the chopped peppers and pineapple and let them soften up a bit.
I had a secret weapon that I was able to pull out of my freezer, the leftover orange sauce from the orange chicken I had made a few weeks ago.

For the benefit of all of us, I will record my recipe for the orange sauce here. If I don't put it here I know I will lose the recipe and regret it forever.

1 1/2 cups pineapple juice
2 tablespoons
1/4 cup lemon juice
1/3 cup rice vinegar
2 1/2 tablespoons soy sauce
1 tablespoon grated orange zest
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon ginger
1/2 teaspoon minced garlic
2 tablespoons chopped green onion
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
To thicken: mix 2 tablespoons cornstarch with 2 tablespoons water and add in to sauce

Add everything together and bring to a boil. Let cool for 10 minutes

I mixed in the sauce and let the flavors combine for about 5 minutes and served it over a bed of basmati rice. On the side I served garlic green beans which were a perfect accent and also tasted great with the orange sauce.

The end result accidentally tasted EXACTLY like the sweet and sour chicken bowl from Teriyaki Stix, without the gross chicken fat that I always seemed to get. ;)

Jägerschnitzel - Schnitzel with Noodles

These are a few of my favorite things...

I cooked up an awesome German dinner for my hungry German husband this week that was really tasty! I turned boring old pork chops into schnitzel and served it up with noodles and an amazing bacon mushroom sauce.

For those of you who don't know what schnitzel is, it's just German for cutlet (and no, it has absolutely nothing to do with sausages). It can be made of veal, pork, chicken, or really whatever you want. The version I made is called Jägerschnitzel (pronounced Yay-grr-shnitz-el) which means "Hunter Cutlet" and is so named because of the mushroom gravy. Other types of schnitzel include the famous Wienerschnitzel (Vee-ner) or "Viennese Schnitzel" that is breaded and served plain with a slice of lemon, and Zigeunerschnitzel (Tzi-goy-ner) or "Gypsy Schnitzel" that is served with a spicy paprika and red bell pepper sauce, (which I am going to have to make next, because it sounds delicious!).

I've decided to share the love and post my improved directions below. You are welcome! :)



Ingredients:

6 pork chops
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon salt
1 teaspoon black pepper
2 teaspoons garlic powder
2 teaspoons paprika
1 egg
1/2 cup milk
2 teaspoons mustard
2 cups seasoned bread crumbs
1/2 pound bacon, diced
1/2 diced yellow onion, approximately 1/2 cup
1 pkg mushroom soup mix (I used a German variation featuring chanterelle mushrooms)
2 teaspoons Maggi or Worcestershire sauce (I recommend Maggi for all gravies)
Vegetable oil, for frying
2 cups half and half
2 tablespoons chopped fresh Italian parsley leaves

Directions:

Pound pork chops between sheets of plastic wrap or wax paper to 1/4-inch thickness. In a shallow medium bowl, mix together 3/4 cup flour with salt, pepper, garlic and paprika. In another shallow medium bowl, combine egg, milk and mustard. Put the bread crumbs in a third medium shallow bowl. Dredge pork slices first in flour, then in egg wash, and finally in crumbs. This works best if you do it like Alton Brown and have a dry hand and a wet hand. Let set on a baking sheet fitted with a cooling rack for 5 minutes.

In a medium saute pan over medium heat cook the bacon and onions until crispy. Pour half and half into a small saute pan and mix the soup mix into it. Add maggi, bacon & onions, and season with a couple of shakes of salt, parsley and pepper. Depending on your desired thickness, you may want to add more/less half and half. Keep warm.

Heat 1/4-inch oil in thick saute pan. Once heated, add pork and cook evenly on both sides, about 3-5 minutes for the first side, 3-4 minutes for the second. Remove to platter when done. To serve, cover pork with sauce. Either egg noodles or mashed potatoes would be an excellent addition to this dinner.

Crock Pot Cobbler

A few weeks ago, I had purchased a bunch of frozen raspberries for a dessert I was making for a family party. Unfortunately, the turnout at the party was not nearly what I had planned, and I was left with two bags of thawed raspberries that I could not re-freeze. In an effort to avoid wastefulness, I began scouring the internet for an easy recipe that I could use these raspberries in. Lucky for me, I came across this AMAZING crock pot berry cobbler recipe!

Ingredients

Filling:

• 1 (10-ounce) bag frozen strawberries
• 1 (10-ounce) bag frozen blackberries
• 1 (10-ounce) bag frozen raspberries
• 1/3 to 2/3 cup sugar, depending on your level of preferred sweetness
• 1/2 cup baking mix

Topping:

• 2 1/4 cups baking mix
• 1/4 cup sugar, plus 1/4 cup
• 4 tablespoons butter, melted
• 1/2 cup milk
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

Directions

Spray the insert of a slow cooker with nonstick cooking spray

In a large mixing bowl, toss together all the frozen fruit, sugar and 1/2 cup baking mix. Transfer the fruit to the slow cooker. In another large mixing bowl, stir together 2 1/4 cups baking mix, 1/4 cup sugar, melted butter and milk with a wooden spoon. With your hands, drop bits of dough on top of the fruit in the slow cooker. In a small mixing bowl, stir together the remaining 1/4 cup sugar and ground cinnamon. Sprinkle the cinnamon sugar on top of the dough and place the lid on the slow cooker. Turn the power onto high and slow cook for 3 to 4 hours until the topping has puffed and the fruit is bubbling.

Serve warm with whipped cream or ice cream.

My assumption is that you can use any type of berry in this recipe, but I just included my favorites. I love this recipe because it's fast and amazingly delicious! The prep only took me about ten minutes, and then I just left it for 4 hours. With 4 kids at home, my time is precious, so I really love the simplicity. It's a perfect dessert recipe!

What's For Dinner: Korroke Potatoes

On tonight's menu is Korroke Potatoes, which are Japanese potato croquettes. This is one of Zuke's favorite meals that his mom used to make while growing up. The recipe is really easy, but kind of time-consuming, so make sure that you give yourself plenty of time for prep. You can link to the original recipe here, but I've typed up the recipe below with our own little changes that we've made over time.

INGREDIENTS

• 2 lb potatoes
• 1 lb ground beef
• 1/2 medium onion, finely chopped
• 1-2 tsp curry powder, to taste
• Salt & pepper
• 4 eggs, beaten
• 1 cup flour
• 2 cups Panko or unseasoned breadcrumbs
• 3 cups peanut or vegetable oil (for deep frying)

DIRECTIONS

1. Boil the diced potatoes in salted water, until tender.

2 Meanwhile, crumble the ground beef into a heavy skillet and cook, stirring, until browning.

3 Add the chopped onion to the beef, and saute until tender.

4 Combine salt, pepper, and curry powder and add to the meat/onion mixture.

5 Cook for a few minutes, then remove from heat.

6 Drain cooked potatoes and mash until smooth.

7 Combine the meat mixture with the mashed potatoes.

8 Add a quarter of the beaten egg to the meat and potato mixture and blend together thoroughly.

9 Divide the mashed combination into 16 equal portions.

10 Form each portion into a small sausage shape.

11 Dredge each portion in flour, then dip each into the remainder of the beaten egg.

12 Coat each croquette with panko or unseasoned breadcrumbs.

13 Arrange the breaded croquettes on a waxed paper-covered tray or cookie sheet.

14 Refrigerate for at least 2 hours- this ensures a crunchier result when deep-fried.

15 Heat peanut oil in a wok on high, or until just smoking.

16 Deep-fry the croquettes a couple at time until lightly browned.

17 Drain on paper towels and keep warm.

18 Repeat with remaining croquettes until finished.

In Japanese tradition, these are usually served with Tonkatsu Sauce (or Bulldog Sauce), which you can either make at home or purchase at any oriental market. My kids and I prefer them with ketchup, so you have many options on how to serve them. Enjoy!