I have a good pot roast recipe that I've used for years. I'm pretty sure it came from the Lower Falls Baptist Church cookbook - the one where most of the recipes I've bothered to try were contributed by Beckett relatives, with a few of their good friends thrown in, for good measure. I may have posted an entry about this roast recipe somewhere on the blog though it's so easy, it barely deserves any kind of instructional write-up.
Today, I decided to change things up a bit and go for a different recipe, this one utilizing my crock-pot. Just to make sure I'd remember to get the meat on in time for it's TEN HOUR cooking cycle, I put a note on the kitchen counter the night before. There's nothing worse than going into the kitchen to begin meal prep at say...fourish...and realize that your meal was supposed to have been put on to cook hours before. Those are the times when it's ever so handy to have a Stater Brothers right down the hill from our house!
But this morning I did remember and got my roast on to cook by 8 am. The remembering is probably the hardest part of about any crock-pot recipe.
Sometimes I think that all meats cooked in a crock-pot tend to taste the same so I'll go through stages where I don't use mine as much. But, is there anything more tantalizing than the smell of foods slowly cooking and releasing their yummy aromas throughout the day? Just one whiff of those foodie smells makes me feel ever so domestic and in control of handling my man's appetite.
Except that today I got a call from the hubby saying that because he'd be late working at NASSCO, he planned to just go straight from that job to his deacon meeting at the church. Good thing roast and potatoes and carrots will keep for a day!
(I did, however, do my own taste test. And then I took some more samplings, until I'd basically eaten a meal's worth. Good stuff!)
I found this recipe on Pinterest. If Martin winds up liking it as much as I think he will, I'll feel vindicated after a recent Pinterest failure in the kitchen. My cousin Lisa pinned a recipe for "Tim Tebow's Deep Dish Pizza Pie" and I thought, how could that be wrong, with Lisa's nod of approval and Tim Tebow's name on the recipe? Well it turned out to be a folksy dish that Martin did not care for. It might've been the green peppers, though, heaven knows I tried to chop them up so fine he wouldn't notice. Whatever the reason, I'm now left with a bunch of pizza pie slices that I'll wind up eating for lunches until they go away. I can only hope the roast will not suffer such a fate!
Best Pot Roast Ever
from Marie's Cooking Adventures blog (via Pinterest)
A 2-5 lb roast. (any kind) I use a lean cut, about 3 lbs.
1 envelope ranch dressing (dried) I use Hidden Valley brand, not buttermilk
1 envelope Italian dressing I use Western Family brand.
1 envelope brown gravy mix I use McCormick brand
Potatoes and Carrots (enough to fill a bottom layer on your CrockPot) I use about 7 or 8 baby red potatoes and a half pound of carrots to feed 3-4.
1 to 1-1/2 cup water
What you do:
Put any carrots and potatoes in the bottom of your CrockPot. I usually quarter my potatoes and use baby carrots.
Put Roast on top of vegetables.
Sprinkle all 3 spice envelopes on top.
Add the water.
Cook on LOW for 6-10 hours until tender and veggies cooked through.It is better to cook the roast longer. This will be sooooo tender and yummy!!
Wednesday, September 11, 2013
Monday, September 9, 2013
Chicken Fried Steak
No matter how long I've lived in the west, I think the love of fried foods will always be in my blood...and on my hips...and in my rear end....
Two of the main dishes I most remember my grandmother Simmons making were salisbury steaks and chicken fried steak. Even today I can see her standing in front of the stove on Lewis Avenue, frying up battered cube steaks. My grandfather would chow down on her tasty meals, as would I.
Tonight I even made the gravy for the steaks. Not a big deal, you say? Probably not but in all my growing up years my mom always acted as though making good gravy was something between exact chemistry and hocus-pocus magic. If Edith Beckett made such a big deal out of how difficult it could be to get gravy right, I decided there was no way I'd be able to figure out the formula. Imagine my surprise to find this gravy quite easy to make and get tasty enough to please me and hubby. Win, win.
The best Chicken Fried Steak
Source: Adapted from the Kitchen Life of a Navy Wife
Ingredients:
4 cube steaks, pounded very thin (you can use a rolling pin to do this)
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. black pepper
3/4 tsp. salt
1 1/2 cups buttermilk
1 egg
1 Tbs. hot pepper sauce (like Tabasco)
3 cups vegetable shortening for deep frying
Gravy Ingredients
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
4 cups milk
kosher salt and ground black pepper
Directions:
1. Heat the shortening in a deep skillet
2. Place 2 cups of flour in a shallow bowl. Stir together the baking powder, baking soda, pepper, and salt in a separate shallow bowl; stir in the buttermilk, egg, and Tabasco sauce.
3. Dredge each steak first in the flour, then in the batter, and the again in the flour. Pat the flour onto the surface of each steak so they are completely coated with dry flour.
4. Fry the steaks until evenly golden brown, 3 - 5 minutes per side. (NOTE: mine took longer.) Place fried steaks on a plate with paper towels to drain.
Gravy Directions:
In a small saucepan, whisk together the flour and milk over medium heat. Add some of the scrap pieces left in the frying pan. Bring the gravy to a slow boil and cook until thick, about 6 to 7 minutes. Season with kosher salt and pepper. Spoon the gravy over the steaks to serve.
Two of the main dishes I most remember my grandmother Simmons making were salisbury steaks and chicken fried steak. Even today I can see her standing in front of the stove on Lewis Avenue, frying up battered cube steaks. My grandfather would chow down on her tasty meals, as would I.
Tonight I even made the gravy for the steaks. Not a big deal, you say? Probably not but in all my growing up years my mom always acted as though making good gravy was something between exact chemistry and hocus-pocus magic. If Edith Beckett made such a big deal out of how difficult it could be to get gravy right, I decided there was no way I'd be able to figure out the formula. Imagine my surprise to find this gravy quite easy to make and get tasty enough to please me and hubby. Win, win.
The best Chicken Fried Steak
Source: Adapted from the Kitchen Life of a Navy Wife
Ingredients:
4 cube steaks, pounded very thin (you can use a rolling pin to do this)
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. black pepper
3/4 tsp. salt
1 1/2 cups buttermilk
1 egg
1 Tbs. hot pepper sauce (like Tabasco)
3 cups vegetable shortening for deep frying
Gravy Ingredients
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
4 cups milk
kosher salt and ground black pepper
Directions:
1. Heat the shortening in a deep skillet
2. Place 2 cups of flour in a shallow bowl. Stir together the baking powder, baking soda, pepper, and salt in a separate shallow bowl; stir in the buttermilk, egg, and Tabasco sauce.
3. Dredge each steak first in the flour, then in the batter, and the again in the flour. Pat the flour onto the surface of each steak so they are completely coated with dry flour.
4. Fry the steaks until evenly golden brown, 3 - 5 minutes per side. (NOTE: mine took longer.) Place fried steaks on a plate with paper towels to drain.
Gravy Directions:
In a small saucepan, whisk together the flour and milk over medium heat. Add some of the scrap pieces left in the frying pan. Bring the gravy to a slow boil and cook until thick, about 6 to 7 minutes. Season with kosher salt and pepper. Spoon the gravy over the steaks to serve.
Sunday, September 1, 2013
Jody's Baked Beans
Church pot-lucks right after service are always a bit tricky if you plan on bringing a hot dish. In my case, it's not like I can run home and heat something up in those few precious moments between the last "amen" and the call to "come and get it!" - but there's also no guarantee of oven space in the church kitchen. Usually when the fellowship begins so quickly after services I prefer to bring an easy dessert or a cold dish I can stick in the refrigerator, but for today's event I was assigned baked beans.
Now I don't know about the rest of the world, but I can dig up plenty of different kinds of baked bean recipes - and that's before even going to the internet and finding a gazillion more. Last night I decided to resurrect a version that I used to make years ago for about every cookout I attended or hosted. I think the only thing that stopped me from continually making this recipe was having a vegetarian daughter. Not that you couldn't leave the beef out of this version...but why not just go on to one of those other fifty thousand non-meat included versions available in my own cookbooks and on the internet?
Since Emily isn't home (yet!), I could cheerfully add meat with nary a trace of guilt. Admittedly, this is pretty much my favorite baked bean recipe and, having now made it for the first time in many, many moons, I'll probably be cooking it more often. At least until when Emily comes home!
And for an interesting variation on how to eat the beans: as I was leaving the church fellowship hall today, carrying the now empty crock pot, Jim Tucker came over to tell me he loved my beans so much he had two giant helpings. When he was eating the first batch, some potato chips fell in so he kind of mixed them up into the beans and then decided that was a mighty tasty addition. For the second helping he deliberately added chips and then happily proclaimed the dish "a great meal in and of itself". I haven't actually tried his interesting experiment but can definitely see where the saltiness of the chips would enhance the tangy sweetness of the beans.
(I don't have a picture to post because there were no leftovers!)
Jody's Baked Beans (so named because this recipe came from my sister-in-law, Jody)
Ingredients:
1 lb hamburger meat, browned
1 envelope dry onion
1 cup ketchup
1/2 cup water
2 T. mustard
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 t. apple cider vinegar
1/3 cup dark molasses
2 - 1 lb. cans pork and beans
1 - 1 lb can kidney beans
1 - 1 lb can pinto beans
Mix everything together. Bake for one hour at 350 degrees, uncovered.
Now I don't know about the rest of the world, but I can dig up plenty of different kinds of baked bean recipes - and that's before even going to the internet and finding a gazillion more. Last night I decided to resurrect a version that I used to make years ago for about every cookout I attended or hosted. I think the only thing that stopped me from continually making this recipe was having a vegetarian daughter. Not that you couldn't leave the beef out of this version...but why not just go on to one of those other fifty thousand non-meat included versions available in my own cookbooks and on the internet?
Since Emily isn't home (yet!), I could cheerfully add meat with nary a trace of guilt. Admittedly, this is pretty much my favorite baked bean recipe and, having now made it for the first time in many, many moons, I'll probably be cooking it more often. At least until when Emily comes home!
And for an interesting variation on how to eat the beans: as I was leaving the church fellowship hall today, carrying the now empty crock pot, Jim Tucker came over to tell me he loved my beans so much he had two giant helpings. When he was eating the first batch, some potato chips fell in so he kind of mixed them up into the beans and then decided that was a mighty tasty addition. For the second helping he deliberately added chips and then happily proclaimed the dish "a great meal in and of itself". I haven't actually tried his interesting experiment but can definitely see where the saltiness of the chips would enhance the tangy sweetness of the beans.
(I don't have a picture to post because there were no leftovers!)
Jody's Baked Beans (so named because this recipe came from my sister-in-law, Jody)
Ingredients:
1 lb hamburger meat, browned
1 envelope dry onion
1 cup ketchup
1/2 cup water
2 T. mustard
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 t. apple cider vinegar
1/3 cup dark molasses
2 - 1 lb. cans pork and beans
1 - 1 lb can kidney beans
1 - 1 lb can pinto beans
Mix everything together. Bake for one hour at 350 degrees, uncovered.
Thursday, August 29, 2013
Ruth's Chris Potatoes Au Gratin
Martin often chooses Ruth's Chris as our special date destination. As a matter of fact, we're going there tomorrow night in celebration of our 33rd wedding anniversary. I love me some steak from Ruth's Chris, though I may have to modify my dinner this time, after looking at the calorie content for some of those fine steaks. ONE of them equaled out to a whopping 1,500 calories - or, in other words, the complete caloric intake I'm allowed for an entire day. I knew that, beyond the ridiculously hot ovens used, the other secret to those melt-in-your-mouth steaks is BUTTER. Lots of it, apparently, based on that huge amount of calories!
After my careful research, I've come up with what I'm going to order tomorrow night. A meal that will taste divine without breaking the bank on my allowed calorie intake. It'll be asparagus instead of potatoes, a lettuce wedge instead of the (much better) chopped salad, and a petite filet with shrimp as the main attraction. And when I've eaten all those sensible choices, I'll squander some calories on a nice dessert! Hey, your anniversary only comes once a year!
Everything is good at Ruth's Chris. Well...maybe not. I had crab cakes there once and they tasted so awful and fishy that I couldn't even finish them. Do you know how hard it is not to eat all of a entree when it's cost you as much as anything on the Ruth's Chris menu????? One dish I do love, however, is their au gratin potatoes - though to be honest, I love about any kind of potato dish that involves heavy cream and lots of cheese! When I found this copycat recipe on the internet, I had to try it.
Here's the deal. It's an easy dish to make and it tastes great. Is it just like Ruth's Chris'???? I don't know because it's been a very long time since we last had a meal there (like say, maybe, last August 30th????). Hmmmm....does this mean I'm going to have to order some of those potatoes just so I can do a fair comparison test?
Ruth Chris Steakhouse Potatoes Au Gratin
5 medium russet potatoes, peeled
1 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup milk
1 1/2 Tbsp flour
1 large clove garlic, pressed
1/4 tsp salt
1/8 tsp fresh black pepper
1 Tbsp butter softened
1 1/2 cups grated cheddar cheese
Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
Cut the potatoes into 1/4 inch slices, then quarter each of those slices.
Beat together the cream, milk, flour, garlic, salt, and pepper by hand just till well combined.
Coat the inside of a large baking dish with the softened butter. Arrange the potatoes in the dish and pour the cream mixture over the potatoes.
Cover and bake for 20 minutes. Uncover and bake another 20 or so minutes or until the potatoes are starting to brown on the top.
Note: Watch the time as every oven is different. The recipe called for a total of 60 minutes but my potatoes were overcooked. The second time around, at 40 minutes total, they were perfect.
Sprinkle grated cheese over the top and continue to bake for another 5-10 minutes or until the cheese is melted and slightly browned and the potatoes are tender.
After my careful research, I've come up with what I'm going to order tomorrow night. A meal that will taste divine without breaking the bank on my allowed calorie intake. It'll be asparagus instead of potatoes, a lettuce wedge instead of the (much better) chopped salad, and a petite filet with shrimp as the main attraction. And when I've eaten all those sensible choices, I'll squander some calories on a nice dessert! Hey, your anniversary only comes once a year!
Everything is good at Ruth's Chris. Well...maybe not. I had crab cakes there once and they tasted so awful and fishy that I couldn't even finish them. Do you know how hard it is not to eat all of a entree when it's cost you as much as anything on the Ruth's Chris menu????? One dish I do love, however, is their au gratin potatoes - though to be honest, I love about any kind of potato dish that involves heavy cream and lots of cheese! When I found this copycat recipe on the internet, I had to try it.
Here's the deal. It's an easy dish to make and it tastes great. Is it just like Ruth's Chris'???? I don't know because it's been a very long time since we last had a meal there (like say, maybe, last August 30th????). Hmmmm....does this mean I'm going to have to order some of those potatoes just so I can do a fair comparison test?
Ruth Chris Steakhouse Potatoes Au Gratin
5 medium russet potatoes, peeled
1 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup milk
1 1/2 Tbsp flour
1 large clove garlic, pressed
1/4 tsp salt
1/8 tsp fresh black pepper
1 Tbsp butter softened
1 1/2 cups grated cheddar cheese
Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
Cut the potatoes into 1/4 inch slices, then quarter each of those slices.
Beat together the cream, milk, flour, garlic, salt, and pepper by hand just till well combined.
Coat the inside of a large baking dish with the softened butter. Arrange the potatoes in the dish and pour the cream mixture over the potatoes.
Cover and bake for 20 minutes. Uncover and bake another 20 or so minutes or until the potatoes are starting to brown on the top.
Note: Watch the time as every oven is different. The recipe called for a total of 60 minutes but my potatoes were overcooked. The second time around, at 40 minutes total, they were perfect.
Sprinkle grated cheese over the top and continue to bake for another 5-10 minutes or until the cheese is melted and slightly browned and the potatoes are tender.
Wednesday, August 14, 2013
Chicken Pot Pie
I recently had surgery. Everything went well and I'm healing nicely, after a few days of being completely unable to move and having to rely on Martin to do everything from help me get up from the toilet to cooking.
The first few days home it didn't much matter what was in the house to eat because I had no appetite whatsoever. In those first three days post-surgery, I think I had one small bowl of canned soup to eat. That's about when Dr. Emily got involved and decided I needed more nutrients than I was getting. When her father messed up the order for Odwalla drinks, Emily decided to bypass him completely by having Vons deliver all kinds of good healthy foods to keep me going. That girl of mine earned some MAJOR points for managing to stock my kitchen with healing foods, even from three thousand miles away.
Friends also brought food and that was greatly appreciated. When I felt well enough to brave the kitchen I realized how much I'd been craving a good solid pot pie so I decided to make one. I'm not a fabulous cook but I do know my way around a kitchen and can, like my mom, whip up something to eat in a fairly short amount of time. Making this pie was different, however. With little strength and a still very achey stomach, going through the paces of putting together the components of my pot pie began to feel like I'd signed up to dig a trench. A really deep and long trench. In hard, unyielding soil.
Yea. I wasn't quite myself and everything felt hard and very, very tiring. That said, the pie turned out great. Maybe it was just sickey me feeling enveloped with healing with every wholesome bite - whatever the magic, I know I ate a piece of that pie every day for almost a week, eagerly anticipating the smell and taste of the next best thing to Mom's chicken soup.
Chicken Pot Pie
Recipe Courtesy of The Girl Who Ate Everything
Ingredients:
1 pound skinless, boneless chicken breast halves - cubed
1 (16 ounce) bag frozen carrots and peas
1/2 cup sliced celery
1/3 cup butter
1/3 cup chopped onion
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1/4 teaspoon celery seed
32 oz. carton chicken broth for boiling(reserve 1 3/4 cups chicken broth for sauce)
2/3 cup milk
2 (9 inch) unbaked pie crusts
(Next time I make this I'll add potatoes.)
Directions:
Preheat oven to 425 degrees F (220 degrees C.)
Place one of the crusts in the bottom of a pie pan and prick with a fork. I like to slightly bake the bottom crust before filling the pie so it isn't soggy. Just bake for 5-6 minutes at 425 degrees.
In a pot, combine the raw chicken, carrots, peas, celery. Add the carton of chicken broth to cover and boil for 15 minutes. Remove from heat, drain (reserving 1 3/4 cups chicken broth for filling) and set aside.
In the saucepan over medium heat, cook onions in butter until soft and translucent. Stir in flour, salt, pepper, and celery seed. Slowly stir in chicken broth and milk. Simmer over medium-low heat until thick. (NOTE: One thing I loved about this recipe is the way the sauce thickened up so nicely. You know how you have those recipes that tell you to stir until thickened and you just keep stirring and wondering if the sauce is ever going to thicken and, then when it does, you can't really figure out if it's thickened ENOUGH or are you just imagining the thickening because your arm is about to fall off from all that stirring. I hate that. And on a day when remaining standing for any length of time was a bit of an accomplishment, I appreciated a sauce that had the good sense to thicken right up in a quick and very noticeable way.)
Remove from heat and combine with the chicken, carrots, peas, and celery mixture. Here you can add more chicken broth if you like depending how runny you want your filling.
Place the chicken filling in bottom crust. Cover with top crust, seal edges, and cut away excess dough. Make several small slits in the top to allow steam to escape.
Bake in the preheated oven for 25 to 30 minutes, or until pastry is golden brown and filling is bubbly. Cool for 10 minutes before serving.
The first few days home it didn't much matter what was in the house to eat because I had no appetite whatsoever. In those first three days post-surgery, I think I had one small bowl of canned soup to eat. That's about when Dr. Emily got involved and decided I needed more nutrients than I was getting. When her father messed up the order for Odwalla drinks, Emily decided to bypass him completely by having Vons deliver all kinds of good healthy foods to keep me going. That girl of mine earned some MAJOR points for managing to stock my kitchen with healing foods, even from three thousand miles away.
Friends also brought food and that was greatly appreciated. When I felt well enough to brave the kitchen I realized how much I'd been craving a good solid pot pie so I decided to make one. I'm not a fabulous cook but I do know my way around a kitchen and can, like my mom, whip up something to eat in a fairly short amount of time. Making this pie was different, however. With little strength and a still very achey stomach, going through the paces of putting together the components of my pot pie began to feel like I'd signed up to dig a trench. A really deep and long trench. In hard, unyielding soil.
Yea. I wasn't quite myself and everything felt hard and very, very tiring. That said, the pie turned out great. Maybe it was just sickey me feeling enveloped with healing with every wholesome bite - whatever the magic, I know I ate a piece of that pie every day for almost a week, eagerly anticipating the smell and taste of the next best thing to Mom's chicken soup.
Chicken Pot Pie
Recipe Courtesy of The Girl Who Ate Everything
Ingredients:
1 pound skinless, boneless chicken breast halves - cubed
1 (16 ounce) bag frozen carrots and peas
1/2 cup sliced celery
1/3 cup butter
1/3 cup chopped onion
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1/4 teaspoon celery seed
32 oz. carton chicken broth for boiling(reserve 1 3/4 cups chicken broth for sauce)
2/3 cup milk
2 (9 inch) unbaked pie crusts
(Next time I make this I'll add potatoes.)
Directions:
Preheat oven to 425 degrees F (220 degrees C.)
Place one of the crusts in the bottom of a pie pan and prick with a fork. I like to slightly bake the bottom crust before filling the pie so it isn't soggy. Just bake for 5-6 minutes at 425 degrees.
In a pot, combine the raw chicken, carrots, peas, celery. Add the carton of chicken broth to cover and boil for 15 minutes. Remove from heat, drain (reserving 1 3/4 cups chicken broth for filling) and set aside.
In the saucepan over medium heat, cook onions in butter until soft and translucent. Stir in flour, salt, pepper, and celery seed. Slowly stir in chicken broth and milk. Simmer over medium-low heat until thick. (NOTE: One thing I loved about this recipe is the way the sauce thickened up so nicely. You know how you have those recipes that tell you to stir until thickened and you just keep stirring and wondering if the sauce is ever going to thicken and, then when it does, you can't really figure out if it's thickened ENOUGH or are you just imagining the thickening because your arm is about to fall off from all that stirring. I hate that. And on a day when remaining standing for any length of time was a bit of an accomplishment, I appreciated a sauce that had the good sense to thicken right up in a quick and very noticeable way.)
Remove from heat and combine with the chicken, carrots, peas, and celery mixture. Here you can add more chicken broth if you like depending how runny you want your filling.
Place the chicken filling in bottom crust. Cover with top crust, seal edges, and cut away excess dough. Make several small slits in the top to allow steam to escape.
Bake in the preheated oven for 25 to 30 minutes, or until pastry is golden brown and filling is bubbly. Cool for 10 minutes before serving.
Monday, July 1, 2013
Summer Pasta Broccoli Salad
I don't make a lot of pasta salads since Martin prefers anything not pasta. Well, technically, he likes pasta but only in it's cooked, hot form. Macaroni and cheese, check. Spaghetti, check. Lasagna, definitely! Summer Pasta Broccoli Salad...not on your life.
As for me, I love pasta salads in the summertime though I prefer them homemade in my own kitchen so I can regulate how much dressing is used. Store bought pasta salads seem to go way overboard on using sauces such that the resulting dish is too wet and, often times, bitter for my taste. Give me a sweetish tang but give it to me with great moderation. The dressing is very nice and creamy without overwhelming the pasta. This is definitely the kind of salad you could easily add all kinds of whatever else is in your refrigerator - grape tomatoes, red or yellow peppers, cauliflower...the possibilities are endless.
I made this for our church Fourth of July celebration this weekend. You know what's totally awesome about bringing a dish to church picnics? If no one likes what you've brought you can just keep quiet and let them wonder who made such a sub-par dish. No harm done, dignity intact. But, what a sweet moment it is when one of your fellow church members walks around asking who made the "delicious whatever" and it turns out to be you! "What that old pasta salad? It's really nothing!"
Summer Pasta Broccoli Salad
1 box Rotini
1 cup mayonnaise (light or regular)
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1/4 cup sugar
3 cups chopped, raw broccoli (about 1 inch pieces)
1 cup shredded Cheddar cheese
1/2 cup roasted, unsalted sunflower seeds
1/2 cup crumbled, cooked bacon
1/4 cup diced red onion or sliced green onion
1. Cook pasta according to package directions; drain. Rinse with cold water until completely cooled; drain again. Place in a large bowl.
2. Meanwhile, for dressing, in a small bowl, whisk together mayonnaise, vinegar and sugar; set aside.
3. Add broccoli, cheese, sunflower seeds, bacon and onion to pasta. Toss to combine. Add dressing: toss until coated. Refrigerate, covered until chilled, at least one hour. Let stand at room temperature 15 minutes before serving.
Easy Eclairs
This appears to be the summer of baking messy things. Or...maybe I'm just messy, no matter what I'm preparing.
I've always loved me some chocolate eclairs but figured they had to be something only the most seasoned and expert of cooks could attempt. Based on some of the recipes I checked out, there might be truth to that statement but lucky for the rest of us, the internet is also filled with easier versions of this favorite treat.
The choux pastry isn't all that sweet and has a texture similar to popovers. There are certain kinds of instructions bound to fill me with cooking angst, and reading that I have to immediately pierce the eclairs as they come out of the oven is one such recipe detail. I mean, here you sit with a dozen hot pastries and only one set of hands to carefully prick a hole into the end of each one. Sure the instructions said I could make things easier by simply cutting each eclair in half to add the cream mixture but how fun would that have been to miss out on channeling Julia Childs by expertly piercing the pastries. In my ignorance, I imagined I'd have to scrape and move dough in order to empty out an inner chamber but instead found a very satisfying airy emptiness just waiting to be stuffed with cream.
Trying to find the best method for piping in the vanilla cream is where things start getting very messy. I wanted to use my Pampered Chef tool for piping the cream in but, after I'd already loaded the pudding/cream mixture into the chamber, it turned out even the smallest tip was too big and produced a giant mess of cream squirting out from the eclair. Now I had to transfer that ooey-gooey substance into a regular pastry bag, thereby creating more mess all over the counter.
And what is it with me and those pastry bags? Why do I always get just as much of the pastry cream squirting out the top of the bag as through the tip???? The good thing about this recipe is that it makes enough of the cream to fill 12 pastries and still have copious amounts to spend time cleaning off your counters for the rest of the afternoon.
The cream filling is good in a very light Cool-Whippy way but, when I make this recipe in the future I'll probably try a different recipe that has more density. If I were someone like Deb or Annie, I'd have made batch after batch of the eclairs until I got everything just perfect but, since I'm not, I'll include a possible substitution for you to try and tell me about. And, remember this is a personal preference thing. The cream as it's written for the recipe is wonderful and tastes great but I'm the kind of gal who likes thicker rather than lighter.
For as much as I might switch out the filling, I was very satisfied with the chocolate icing drizzle. It took me awhile to figure out that this chocolate mixture turns out tasting a lot like fudge. I might or might not have formed that impression after eating a few spoonfuls to make sure it was just right for the eclairs.
Easy Eclairs
Recipe Courtesy of Hidden Ponies
Ingredients
CHOUX PASTRY:
½ cup butter
1 cup water
1 cup all-purpose flour
¼ tsp salt
4 large eggs
CUSTARD FILLING:
1 (4 serving size) package instant vanilla pudding mix
2 cups milk (or as called for on pudding package)
1 cup heavy cream
¼ cup icing sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
¼ tsp salt
CHOCOLATE ICING:
2 oz semisweet chocolate (or ⅓ cup semisweet chocolate chips)
2 Tbsp butter
1 cup icing sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
3 Tbsp hot water
Instructions
Preheat oven to 450 degrees. LIghtly grease a large cookie sheet and set aside.
In medium saucepan, combine ½ cup butter and water. Bring to a boil, stirring to melt butter.
Reduce heat to low and stir in flour and salt with a wooden spoon until the mixture begins to form a stiff ball of dough.
Remove from heat and add eggs, one at a time, stirring vigorously after each addition to ensure they are incorporated. Work quickly, especially with the first one, to prevent it from cooking into scrambled eggs on the bottom of your warm pan :)
With a spoon or pastry bag fitted with a large tip, spread/pipe the thick dough onto prepared cookie sheet into 10 strips approximately 1½ x 4″ each. (My note: I started out spreading the dough but it looked messy so I changed over to piping it out with my Pampered Chef handy gadget. The piped dough looked much better in it's baked form.)
Bake for 15 minutes, then reduce heat to 325 and bake another 20 minutes, until puffed and golden and hollow sounding when lightly tapped on the bottom. When removed from oven, IMMEDIATELY pierce the ends almost through to the other side to let steam escape and prevent any sogginess in the middle. This hole is also where you will be piping your filling into. Let cool completely before filling and icing (this will only take about half an hour).
For CUSTARD FILLING: combine pudding and milk in a bowl and mix according to package directions. In a separate bowl, beat the heavy cream with an electric mixer until soft peaks form. Beat in ¼ cup icing sugar, 1 tsp vanilla, and ¼ tsp salt. Fold whipped cream into pudding.
Scoop mixture into pastry bag fitted with a smallish tip (I enlarged my steam holes a bit to make my tip fit, so do whatever works) and pipe mixture into centers of eclairs until full. This is a bit of a messy business, but worth it for ease of eating and pretty appearance. You could certainly also just slice the eclairs in half horizontally, fill the bottoms with cream, and replace the tops. Either way, you will probably have some custard leftover.
For ICING: Melt the chocolate and 2 Tbsp butter over low heat in a saucepan (or in the microwave, stirring after 30 seconds and giving additional 10 second increments as needed until fully melted). Stir in 1 cup icing sugar and 1 tsp vanilla. Stir in hot water, 1 Tbsp at a time, until icing is smooth and reaches desired consistency. Drizzle, pipe or spread over filled eclairs.
Store in the fridge.
Alternate Pastry Filling, As Promised
Pastry Cream:
2 lb (907 grams) milk
4 oz (113 grams) sugar
3 oz (85 grams) egg yolks
4 oz (113 grams) whole eggs
2.5 oz (71 grams) cornstarch
4 oz (113 grams) sugar (this is an additional 4 oz of sugar, to be used separately from the other 4 oz)
2 oz (57 grams) butter
.5 oz (14 grams) vanilla extract
1. In a heavy saucepan, bring 4 oz sugar and the milk just to a boil. Meanwhile, in a separate bowl, whisk together the yolks, whole eggs, cornstarch, and the rest of the sugar until completely smooth. Temper the hot milk into the egg mixture, then return the mixture to the pan over medium high heat. Bring the mixture to a boil, and immediately remove from heat. Stir in the butter and the vanilla and mix until completely incorporated.
2. Pour into a shallow pan, and cover with plastic wrap, making sure the plastic wrap is touching the entire surface of the pastry cream to prevent a skin from forming. Chill for a few hours or overnight. Whip until smooth again before using.
Easy Eclairs
Recipe Courtesy of Hidden Ponies
Ingredients
CHOUX PASTRY:
½ cup butter
1 cup water
1 cup all-purpose flour
¼ tsp salt
4 large eggs
CUSTARD FILLING:
1 (4 serving size) package instant vanilla pudding mix
2 cups milk (or as called for on pudding package)
1 cup heavy cream
¼ cup icing sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
¼ tsp salt
CHOCOLATE ICING:
2 oz semisweet chocolate (or ⅓ cup semisweet chocolate chips)
2 Tbsp butter
1 cup icing sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
3 Tbsp hot water
Instructions
Preheat oven to 450 degrees. LIghtly grease a large cookie sheet and set aside.
In medium saucepan, combine ½ cup butter and water. Bring to a boil, stirring to melt butter.
Reduce heat to low and stir in flour and salt with a wooden spoon until the mixture begins to form a stiff ball of dough.
Remove from heat and add eggs, one at a time, stirring vigorously after each addition to ensure they are incorporated. Work quickly, especially with the first one, to prevent it from cooking into scrambled eggs on the bottom of your warm pan :)
With a spoon or pastry bag fitted with a large tip, spread/pipe the thick dough onto prepared cookie sheet into 10 strips approximately 1½ x 4″ each. (My note: I started out spreading the dough but it looked messy so I changed over to piping it out with my Pampered Chef handy gadget. The piped dough looked much better in it's baked form.)
Bake for 15 minutes, then reduce heat to 325 and bake another 20 minutes, until puffed and golden and hollow sounding when lightly tapped on the bottom. When removed from oven, IMMEDIATELY pierce the ends almost through to the other side to let steam escape and prevent any sogginess in the middle. This hole is also where you will be piping your filling into. Let cool completely before filling and icing (this will only take about half an hour).
For CUSTARD FILLING: combine pudding and milk in a bowl and mix according to package directions. In a separate bowl, beat the heavy cream with an electric mixer until soft peaks form. Beat in ¼ cup icing sugar, 1 tsp vanilla, and ¼ tsp salt. Fold whipped cream into pudding.
Scoop mixture into pastry bag fitted with a smallish tip (I enlarged my steam holes a bit to make my tip fit, so do whatever works) and pipe mixture into centers of eclairs until full. This is a bit of a messy business, but worth it for ease of eating and pretty appearance. You could certainly also just slice the eclairs in half horizontally, fill the bottoms with cream, and replace the tops. Either way, you will probably have some custard leftover.
For ICING: Melt the chocolate and 2 Tbsp butter over low heat in a saucepan (or in the microwave, stirring after 30 seconds and giving additional 10 second increments as needed until fully melted). Stir in 1 cup icing sugar and 1 tsp vanilla. Stir in hot water, 1 Tbsp at a time, until icing is smooth and reaches desired consistency. Drizzle, pipe or spread over filled eclairs.
Store in the fridge.
Alternate Pastry Filling, As Promised
Pastry Cream:
2 lb (907 grams) milk
4 oz (113 grams) sugar
3 oz (85 grams) egg yolks
4 oz (113 grams) whole eggs
2.5 oz (71 grams) cornstarch
4 oz (113 grams) sugar (this is an additional 4 oz of sugar, to be used separately from the other 4 oz)
2 oz (57 grams) butter
.5 oz (14 grams) vanilla extract
1. In a heavy saucepan, bring 4 oz sugar and the milk just to a boil. Meanwhile, in a separate bowl, whisk together the yolks, whole eggs, cornstarch, and the rest of the sugar until completely smooth. Temper the hot milk into the egg mixture, then return the mixture to the pan over medium high heat. Bring the mixture to a boil, and immediately remove from heat. Stir in the butter and the vanilla and mix until completely incorporated.
2. Pour into a shallow pan, and cover with plastic wrap, making sure the plastic wrap is touching the entire surface of the pastry cream to prevent a skin from forming. Chill for a few hours or overnight. Whip until smooth again before using.
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