Quiche

My hubby LOVES quiche. If we are out at a restaurant and he spots it on the menu, he will more than likely order it. Sadly, I have never made it for him here at home. Strange, since it is an easy thing to make and I usually have all of the ingredients on hand. I had found this recipe in a Kraft Foods magazine that I used to get and pulled it out this week to try. It's a keeper and very easy! It is called Weeknight 4 Cheese Quiche but only has one type of cheese in it, so I don't quite get that. I'm sure I can remedy that next time, though.

Weeknight 4 Cheese Quiche
1 c. sliced mushrooms
1 c. chopped onion
1 pkg. (10 oz.) frozen chopped spinach, thawed, and drained *
1/3 c. Miracle Whip
1/3 c. milk
4 eggs
1 c. shredded mozzarella cheese
1 prepared pie shell (9 in.) (I made my own.)
1/4 c. real bacon bits or crumbled bacon

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Spray a skillet with cooking spray. Add mushrooms and onion; cook 5 min. or until tender. Stir in spinach; mix well. Mix dressing, milk, and eggs until well blended. Add spinach mixture and cheese. Pour into pie shell; sprinkle with bacon bits. Bake 50 min. or until golden. Makes 6 servings.

* I learned a great trick from Rachael Ray about thawing and draining spinach because who really remembers to let the spinach thaw. Pop it in the microwave and defrost it. Then dump in in a towel, wrap it up and while running cold water over, squeeze the water out. Once it isn't so hot just squeeze until no more water comes out. It works great. I even have a special spinach towel that I use just for this because it has a nice green stain on it.

I am anxious to try this again with the same egg base but different veggies and cheese.

Holiday Recipes

I tried out some new recipes this past Christmas and New Year season that I wanted to share with you here and so I can remember where I found them. They were all winners but things that I probably would only make for a holiday or party. We ate well as you can see from this picture taken on New Year's Eve at my in-law's cabin.

I am a big believer in having a yummy special breakfast on Christmas morning after the opening of presents. I had found a recipe on The Pioneer Woman's cooking blog a few weeks back and knew I had found what would be made for my family. The recipe is called Make Ahead Muffin Melts and you can find it HERE. These were so, so, so, so good and so easy. You make the egg mixture the night before so all you have to do the morning of is scoop the mixture on english muffins and broil. They were superb and got rave reviews!

On Christmas Eve we had snacks to eat while watching Despicable Me. I made homemade French Onion Dip from an Alton Brown recipe on the Food Network site. You can find the recipe HERE. This again was an easy recipe to make and the results were 1,000x's better than the plastic container stuff from the grocery.

On New Year's Eve my mother-in-law and I made an incredible ham from a Neely's recipe. We had watched them make it on their show and knew that this was to be our New Year's Eve masterpiece and that it was! It was a show stopper as you can see from the below picture. The recipe is found HERE.

And now it's a new year and we're all looking for light, low calorie recipes!!!

Brunch Treats

Today was one of my mom's group's Christmas craft workshop. We got to sit around, eat yummy food and make some really fun things all while our children were in the care of some awesome people. BLISS!!!! I had signed up to bring something for the amazing food spread. I wanted to share with you what I made because both items were oh so yummy!

I had put my name under "Egg Casserole" when I signed up and I wanted to make something a little different from the normal breakfast casserole. After scouring Pioneer Woman's breakfast recipes, I came across Eggs Florentine Casserole. It was scrumptious and different from the norm. It makes a 9 x 13" dish of casserole and I came home with two tiny corner pieces left. That's always a good sign.

I used frozen hasbrowns...DO NOT TELL PIONEER WOMAN! It's just so much easier than grating potatoes and it tasted good anyways. I also used a 1 lb. package of breakfast sausage and fried it up while crumbling it.

I absolutely LOVE Martha Stewart's Everyday Food Magazine. It is my favorite recipe magazine. I always learn something and find recipes that I want to make. I treated myself to buying the December issue since I usually just check it out at the library. I found another recipe that I wanted to make to take to my mom's group also.

Sausage-Cheddar Balls

45 sausage balls

1 1/4 cup all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon coarse salt

1/4 teaspoon ground pepper

1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper

1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder

2 cups grated cheddar

1 lb bulk breakfast sausage

1/2 large yellow onion, grated on large holes of a box grater

3 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

2. In a large bowl, whisk together flour, salt, ground pepper, cayenne pepper and baking powder. Add grated cheddar and toss to coat. Add sausage, grated onion and melted butter.

3. With your hands, mix until well blended and roll mixture into 1-inch balls. Place balls, 1/2 inch apart, on baking sheet. Bake until balls are golden and cooked through about 25 minutes. Serve warm.

***I chopped my onion finely instead of grating it but next time might grate it to get even smaller pieces. I would also use just a little bit less of the cayenne. They had a good kick to them but were still so very yummy!

The Yumminess of Fall

Fall has been so majestic this year. It is simply divine. We had some rain move through earlier and I am hoping beyond hope those drops that quenched our dry earth did not take down the beauty on the tree tops.

I took my girls to an apple orchard last week to pick apples (only to discover that there were no more apples to pick) and discovered a new favorite fall treat, the apple cider slushy! It was so good that when I saw a sign for another orchard two days ago on a quick trip to the zoo, we stopped so Mama could get a slushy!

I also needed another half gallon of fresh apple cider. My favorite thing to do this time of year is warm a mug of cider at the end of the day. It's fall in a cup!

I have also been stocking my pantry with canned pumpkin. I am afraid of another shortage so every time we hit the grocery, I grab a couple more cans. The other night for supper my daughter voted for pancakes so I found a great recipe for Pumpkin Pancakes HERE on allrecipes. It was scrumptious. I loved that they weren't too sweet since you add just a bit of brown sugar. That way when you add the syrup you aren't getting a sugar overload. I also loved how they became light and cakey. This is a keeper recipe for me!

Tonight as the weather cooled during the rain, I made a new soup recipe, Roasted Vegetable Minestrone found HERE from the one and only Pioneer Woman! It was really easy and very good. I did add a few cloves of garlic to the onion, celery, and carrot sauté. This recipe made a huge pot of soup, so we have left-overs for tomorrow plus a big container freezing for later use. Next time I think I would add a can of tomato sauce as I like my minestrone more tomatoey. (I know that isn't actually a word.)

What are you cooking this fall?

Banana Bites

I stumbled on the coolest website a few weeks ago. A friend of mine became a fan of the site on Facebook so I checked it out. It is a fabulous site filled with recipes for kids of all ages. The creator focuses on healthy foods and all types of them. If you have a school aged child and need some creative, healthy ideas for lunches to pack she has TONS!

The website is Weelicious. I am so excited to dig through her posts and try some of the things for my family especially snacks. Snacks are a hard thing. It's so easy to pop open a bag of goldfish crackers and call it a snack. I desperately want to give my kids a foundation of healthy eating habits and Weelicious offers some excellent ideas for these.

My girls LOVE pancakes so yesterday I tried making Banana Bites. I have to admit that I only made them for Pumpkin, the toddler. The reason being was the toddler having a fit at my feet and Daddy was on the couch suffering from a bad case of Gout so I had to HURRY. I made a banana's worth of Banana Bites and then just plain pancakes.

I will definitely be making these again. They were warm and gooey and YUMMY! Pumpkin scarfed them down and begged for more. Ha! Make sure you slice the bananas thinly or the pancake batter won't cook on the edges.

Be sure to stop by and check out the Weelicious site. I know you will find some great, healthy ideas!

The Griddle

Tonight it was the just the girls and I again for supper. I googled pancake recipes and found an Applesauce pancake that I decided to make. Pancakes are such an easy supper and cheap. You just can't go wrong, at least I don't think you can. They are also easy for the baby to eat so that helps quite a bit. I'm always thinking ahead in my meal planning, "What can the baby eat? Is there anything soft for her?" I think I am wearing her out on bananas, peas and cheese.

Back to the pancakes...I have to say that my first impression was that they were bland but once we added the butter and syrup they were really good. I might add a bit of salt to the recipe next time. The batter is pretty thick so don't be worried about that if you make them. They cooked up really nice on my electric griddle. Have I ever shared with you the story of how I became the owner of my current griddle? No, you say, I have not. Well, let me share, because it is priceless.

It was late winter/early spring of 1998. I was engaged to Hubby. We were at Wal-Mart one night getting some things. I was in a bad mood, feeling pretty stressed out about our upcoming wedding. Hubby said, "I'm going to buy you a present to cheer you up." So off he went looking for something to cheer me up. Awhile later we met up with each other, he was beaming with pride and I was eager to be cheered up. Now it was Wal-Mart but I can think of alot of things that would have cheered me up at that moment...well let's just say his idea and mine didn't quite connect. Standing before me he revealed....A GRIDDLE. It was a griddle, people!!! I.DID.NOT.SEE.THE.CHEERING.UP.FACTOR.IN.THAT. Seeing the look on my face which was not utter joy and bliss, he said, "My mom always made pancakes for us on a griddle. Now you can make pancakes for us." THIS.DID.NOT.HELP! I think maybe in that moment of my already bad mood now enhanced by said griddle, there may have been tears shed.

He was willing to put it back and get something else, but the damage had been done! Get the griddle and let's get out of here. Oh, did you get a box of pancake mix? :) He did make pancakes for us when we got back to his house and the griddle lived with him until we got married since I was still living at home.

Now looking back, I know he was trying to be thoughtful. He knew what joy pancakes cooked on a griddle had brought to his family and he wanted to bring the same joy to his new family. It took awhile but I think I get it now, only 12 years later. I have pulled that griddle out numerous times to make pancakes for my little family. Hopefully someday our girls will have fond griddle memories just as their daddy did.

Now for the recipe...oh, the suspense! I found tonight's recipe on AllRecipes. It is called Oatmeal and Applesauce Pancakes.

Oatmeal and Applesauce Pancakes

• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/3 cup quick cooking oats
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 3/4 cup unsweetened applesauce
• 1/2 cup fat free sour cream
• 1 egg, lightly beaten
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/3 cup milk

1. Heat a lightly oiled griddle over medium-low heat.
2. In a bowl, mix the flour, oats, baking powder, baking soda, and cinnamon. In a separate bowl, mix applesauce, sour cream, egg, and vanilla. Stir applesauce mixture and milk into the flour mixture until evenly moist and thick.
3. Scoop about 1/4 cup batter for each pancake onto the prepared griddle, and cook, turning once, until golden brown on both sides.

(I did not have fat free sour cream so I just used the regular, yummier kind.)

Warm Fuzzies

My hubby has to be out the door by 8:45 a.m. each morning to get to class on time. This means that he doesn't usually get a warm, hearty breakfast. I'm stumbling around trying to pack his lunch and supper for the day, feed the kids, and remember where I put my cup of coffee. I know, I know...it's not that early, but I stay up late so I can actually spend time with my hubby these days and have an early morning wake up call that comes in a super cute, little, chunky body.
SO.I. STUMBLE!

But this morning hubby's first class was canceled so I set about to make something yummy to give him an extra bounce in his step.

I like oatmeal ok but wouldn't pick it over regular cereal unless I'm pregnant and craving it. NOOOOO, I am not pregnant but I did crave it with my first pregnancy along with spinach and V-8! Anywho...many years ago at a conference I had baked oatmeal and it was so delicious. I found a recipe online and made that for hubby this morning. It was so easy, the ingredients are cheap and it was YUMMY. Win, Win, Win! It is trifecta!

Again this recipe came from All Recipes. I liked that it had dried cranberries. I would pick a dried cranberry over a raisin anyday. I love to add substitute cranberries for raisins in many of my baking recipes.

Baked Oatmeal

• 3 cups rolled oats
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup milk
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 cup melted butter
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 3/4 cup dried cranberries

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
2. In a large bowl, mix together oats, brown sugar, cinnamon, baking powder, and salt. Beat in milk, eggs, melted butter, and vanilla extract. Stir in dried cranberries. Spread into a 9x13 inch baking dish.
3. Bake in preheated oven for 40 minutes.

We just put it in a bowl and poured milk over the top. I think that next time I may add some pecans.

To close have you ever stumbled upon the Cake Wrecks blog? I laughed my hiney off today. I do have to say that she can be a bit crude in her humor and language, so beware if you are faint of heart. The cakes, oh the cakes. They are priceless. It's like that People of Wal-Mart site. You don't want to look but you just can't help yourself. Cake Wrecks got me throught this long, hard day at home alone with two children, one of which was GRUMPY!

Buttermilk Pancakes

We like pancakes here in our house and it is such a cheap last minute meal. It's also fun to have breakfast for supper every once in a while. Last night it was just my girls and I. I have a hard time cooking a full blown out meal when it is just us. We usually eat left-overs and such but we decided on pancakes. I got online and searched for a new pancake recipe and found Cakey Buttermilk Pancakes on The Food Network site. They were really yummy! I didn't have any buttermilk on hand so I used the buttermilk substitute that I always use and it always works.

Cakey Buttermilk Pancakes

• 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 1/4 cups well-shaken buttermilk
• 1/2 cup melted unsalted butter plus 2 tablespoons for cooking
• 2 large eggs
• 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
  
• 1 teaspoon salt
  
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon baking powder

In a medium bowl, whisk together all ingredients except 2 tablespoons butter until evenly combined and moistened thoroughly (some small lumps will remain). Set mixture aside to rest while griddle heats or cover and store in the refrigerator to rest up to 12 hours before using. (If batter rests, stir briefly before using.)

Heat a large seasoned cast iron skillet, frying pan, or griddle over medium heat. To check that the pan's properly heated, sprinkle a few drops of water on pan or griddle and water will "dance" around before evaporating.

Melt 1 tablespoon butter in pan. When it foams, ladle 1/4 cup batter for each pancake and cook until bubbles cover the top, about 3 minutes. Flip and cook until golden brown, another 1 minute. Repeat with remaining batter.

Brunch Food

Yesterday I had the pleasure of enjoying making some fun crafts and treats with a very cool group of moms at a Mothers Group that I have joined. I was asked to bring a holiday brunch item to share. I remembered a recipe that a friend of mine had made for a brunch she held for a group of ladies awhile back. It certainly was brunch food and could certainly fit the holiday requirement. If you need a quick and yummy breakfast or brunch dish this season, this is perfect. Who can resist cinnamon rolls? These are out of a can, but with the mixture you pour over the top, they'll never know.

The one downside....do you know how much a jar of Maple syrup costs? I was dumbfounded as I only ever buy generic pancake syrup! It was worth it though. Yum!

Cinnamon French Toast Bake

INGREDIENTS

French Toast Bake
1/4	cup butter, melted
2	cans (12.4 oz each) refrigerated cinnamon rolls with icing
6	eggs
1/2	cup heavy whipping cream
2	teaspoons ground cinnamon
2	teaspoons vanilla
1	cup Chopped Pecans
1	cup maple syrup
Garnish
	Icing from cinnamon rolls
	Powdered sugar
1/2	cup maple syrup, if desired

DIRECTIONS

	Heat oven to 375°F. Pour melted butter into ungreased 13x9-inch (3-quart) glass baking dish. Separate both cans of dough into 16 rolls; set icing aside. Cut each roll into 8 pieces; place pieces over butter in dish.
	In medium bowl, beat eggs. Beat in cream, cinnamon and vanilla until well blended; gently pour over roll pieces. Sprinkle with pecans; drizzle with 1 cup syrup.
	Bake 20 to 28 minutes or until golden brown. Cool 15 minutes. Meanwhile, remove covers from icing; microwave on Medium (50%) 10 to 15 seconds or until thin enough to drizzle.
	Drizzle icing over top; sprinkle with powdered sugar. If desired, spoon syrup from dish over individual servings. Serve with the additional 1/2 cup maple syrup.

Cinnamon Oat Pancakes

Hubby usually has to head out for classes and work before lunch so I try to make a late breakfast for us that is filling. That way he isn't starving during his class. Today I made a batch of Cinnamon Oat Pancakes for us. I found the recipe in Everyday Food. This little magazine is one of my favorite recipe magazines. I check them out of the library and scour them for new recipes. This is a keeper! I will be writing this one on a recipe card and filing it.

Cinnamon Oat Pancakes

2 c. flour
1/4 c. brown sugar, packed
1 T. baking powder
1 t. salt
1/2 t. cinnamon
2 c. old fashioned rolled oats
2 c. milk
2 large eggs
1/4 c. vegetable oil

Grind 1 cup of the oats in a food processor. Combine ground oats with flour, brown sugar, baking powder, salt, and cinnamon. In another large bowl whisk milk, eggs, and oil. Add dry ingredients to the liquid ingredients and 1 cup oats.

I do not have a food processor but a mini food chopper. It worked fine to grind the 1 cup of oats in that. I also used quick oats, which is all I had on hand. These were so yummy! I made all of the pancakes and froze the leftovers. You just layer on a cookie sheet, freeze 30 minutes, then put into freezer bags. When you want to use them, warm them in a toaster over or in 350 degree oven for 10 minutes.