Corn Chowder with Potatoes and Sausage

Dreary February is a  soup kind of month. I've had a rather perfect day today that has included being in pajamas all day (though I suppose I'll need to put on some kind of clothes before the Reading and Rambling Ladies show up tonight) and cooking up this recipe. As if that doesn't scream cozy, I decided on pot pie for dinner this evening. One pot simmered with soup goodness while another held pot pie guts. By lunchtime, I was able to ladle up a big bowl of the chowder and now, as dinner hour approaches, I'll pop my little pies into the oven for a quick winter meal.

The soup went together easily. Having had my first serving, I'm giving it a thumbs up though I might try a future variation without the meat. What I kept finding myself savoring in every bite of today's portion was the taste of corn and potatoes in that smooth, creamy base. Is it possible to feel like something as fundamental as the sausage might be expendable?

And one last note: You have to be a professional photographer or darned close to get a really good picture of soup. Otherwise, the world gets treated to an image of something very unappetizing. Like snot. Or worse...

Corn Chowder with Sausage and Potatoes

Ingredients:
1 lb. bulk Italian sausage or country style sausage
1 cup chopped onion
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
2  1/2 cups chicken broth
2 cups diced gold or red skinned potatoes
2 cups frozen corn kernels
1 small can (8 oz) cream style corn (I just used the 15 oz size)
1/4 tsp. freshly ground black pepper
dash hot sauce
2 cups half and half or whole milk
1 Tablespoon butter
1/2 tsp. salt, or to taste

Directions:
In a large Dutch oven or sauce pan over medium heat, brown the sausage with the onion until sausage is no longer pink and onion is slightly browned and tender.

Stir in the flour until blended into the mixture. Add the chicken broth and stir to blend. Add the diced potatoes, corn, and cream style corn, pepper, and hot sauce.  Bring to a simmer and continue cooking for five minutes, stirring frequently.

Cover and continue cooking, stirring occasionally, until potatoes are tender.

Add the half and half (or milk) and stir in butter

Taste and add salt as needed.

Man In The Moon Cookies

When your kids are little they eat pretty much anything you put in front of them. Mine all had their own picky peculiarities in terms of what they loved and what they didn't but, overall, they accepted whatever was put on their plate.

One of the first kid requested recipes I ever made for Brian was Man In The Moon cookies. Who knows how they got their name? I actually tried researching this online but couldn't come up with any kind of answer. Maybe the chocolate chips look like craters?

Brian's first tasted these in his preschool class at Penasquitos Lutheran. Once introduced, my preschooler couldn't wait to make his Mom crank out a batch or twenty. You know what I still remember about making those cookies for Brian? How surprised he was that his Mom could create something he'd experienced at school and loved. I got to be the maker of magic just by shaping balls of cookie dough into Men in The Moon.

This is another of those recipes that eventually wound up at the back of my recipe box.. until this week. I couldn't even remember what the cookies looked or tasted like until I whipped up a batch to share with Awana kids.

The dough is shiny and greasy. With the liberal amount of oil called for in the recipe, I almost wondered if my slick little dough blobs would keep their shape during the baking process. They did. For very little effort, I was rewarded with rich, chocolatey cookies that taste great dipped in milk. A cookie Brian would probably still approve of.

Man In The Moon Cookies

Ingredients:
1 chocolate cake mix
2 eggs
2/3 cup oil
1 tsp. vanilla
2 cups chocolate chips
1 cup chopped nuts (optional)

Directions:
Mix all ingredients. Drop by small spoonfuls onto cookie sheet. Bake at 375 for 10 minutes.

Pumpkin Pudding Dip

A lot of pies I can take or leave: even the typical fruit varieties don't do much for me, unless they have a big scoop of ice-cream on the side. I do, however, truly love pumpkin pies though I only make them for the holidays. Thanksgiving dessert becomes my favorite breakfast treat, with a piece of pumpkin pie every morning until there is no more.

After telling me about this recipe for a few weeks, Millie brought her take on pumpkin pies for our meeting Monday night. One bite was all it took for me to fall in love! No need to wait for Thanksgiving to roll around again - I can have these little mini pies any time I want. 

I suppose you could assemble the "pies" ahead of time but Millie brought hers as a dip, with graham crackers and pumpkin snaps placed nearby. Homemade whipped cream would be lovely but there was something kind of fun about making a pretty little squirt dollop of the canned kind of whipped cream to cover the pumpkin dip. Cookie, dip, and dollop together create a twee little pie that in addition to being adorable tastes just like a perfect bite of pumpkin pie. 

Pumpkin Pudding Dip

Ingredients:

1/2 cup plus 2 Tbs. water

1 pkg. sugar free vanilla pudding

1 can (15 oz) pumpkin

1/2 tsp. cinnamon

1/2 tsp pumpkin spice

1/2 tsp. finely grated orange peel (optional)

Directions:

In a medium bowl, blend water and pudding mix until smooth.

Add remaining ingredients. Mix on low speed until smooth.

Serve with whipped cream and graham crackers or ginger or pumpkin snaps (available at Sprouts)

Saltine Toffee

I seem to be on a kick of digging out recipes I haven't made in decades and cooking them up. Monday night, I wanted a quick finger food for the Reading and Rambling group. Usually I'll check Pinterest for inspiration but, this time, something made me go through my own Longaberger recipe box. That's when I noticed the Saltine Toffee card former neighbor Trish Arthur gave me way back in the mid 80's. After tasting hers at some neighborhood gathering back when all our kids were little, I remember making my own batches for a period of time. You know how that is - you find a recipe, you keep making it, and then the phase passes and you move on to some other go-to favorite.

Obviously, making this toffee is quick and easy. While it takes little effort, the results do taste like a poor man's version of toffee. Like eating a heath bar with a cracker base.

Gianne liked this tasty recipe so much that I ended up giving her what we didn't eat Monday night. Young, sweet thing that she is, she'd never heard of saltine toffee. Maybe now it'll be her chosen recipe to make over and over... until she doesn't.

Saltine Toffee

Ingredients:
Approximately 40 saltine crackers
2 sticks (1 cup) butter
1 cup light brown sugar
8 oz semisweet chocolate chips
Finely chopped nuts (optional)

Directions:
Preheat oven to 425 degrees.
Line a jelly roll pan with aluminum foil. Spray lightly with nonstick spray (I didn't do this) and arrange the saltines salt side down in a single layer.
In a medium saucepan, melt the butter and brown sugar and boil til it turns a caramel color, a few minutes. (It will begin to pull away from the sides a bit) Remove from heat and pour over the crackers, covering them evenly.
Put the jelly roll pan into the oven and bake for 3-5 minutes, or until just bubbly, watching carefully. Remove from oven and pour chocolate chips over the crackers. (I used an entire bag of the chocolate chips). As the chips melt, spread them over the crackers with a knife.
Transfer the pan to the freezer for about 15 - 20 minutes, or until completely cold. Break the toffee into pieces. Store in an airtight container.

Butternut Squash and Caramelized Onion Galette

When Martin leaves town, I’m faced with an existential crisis. Do I use my time alone as a reprieve from all cooking duties, glibly enjoying cereal for dinner every night...or do I indulge in my own tastes and cook up foods I like, without having to feel guilty that they’re not what my husband would want to eat? I’ve gone both ways in the past but, for this last consulting trip, I went the cooking route. A big butternut squash purchased at the local farmer’s market was calling my name, begging me to cook up something good to eat. 

As with the scones, this recipe comes via Emily. Not that she made it up (why does anyone ever need to create recipes as long as Deb and Smitten Kitchen are around?) but just that it’s something she made in the past and I liked enough to remember and want to recreate. Martin was barely up in the air and flying over our house (literally. we are on a pretty direct flight line to to the local airport) before I started preparing a butternut squash and caramelized onion galette. 

Before I start ranting, let me stress that the galette turned out great. Or to put it another way, the end result was more than worth whatever hassle went into the preparation. Hassle? What could possibly be so difficult about cutting up some veggies, slapping them on dough, and cooking up autumn yummyness? 

For all that Deb forgets to mention this on her Smitten Kitchen site, I’m here to proclaim that peeling and slicing a butternut squash isn’t any quick and easy job! Somewhere in the midst of a massive squash mess and sore arm, I began wondering if it was really worth my time to make this dish. And yes, as a matter of fact, I WAS carrying on an imaginary conversation with Deb wherein I proceeded to chide her for not clearly warning cooks about what they were getting into when they applied peeler and knife to a very large, unyielding, and hard as a rock object. My hands hurt and it felt like I’d never get to the end of scraping that squash into submission. A quick very compliant bowl of cereal was suddenly looking good. 

It was messier and harder than I’d hoped but for every day that I took out a piece of that galette and warmed it for lunch and/or dinner, I knew my efforts were being well rewarded. I love the mixture of butternut squash and onions. But you know what I especially couldn’t wait to get another taste of throughout the week? That incredibly flaky crust. It may look rustic in pictures, but truth is the pastry itself tastes light, buttery, and just plain delicious. I’ll make this dish again and, next time, I might not even have to rant at the imaginary Deb watching me wrestle with a vegetable. 

Butternut Squash and Caramelized Onion Galette

For the pastry:

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

1/4 teaspoon salt

8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, cut into

pieces

1/4 cup sour cream

2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice

1/4 cup ice water

For the filling:

1 small butternut squash (about one pound)

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 to 2 tablespoons butter (if you have only non-stick, the smaller amount will do)

1 large onion, halved and thinly sliced in half-moons

1 teaspoon salt

Pinch of sugar

1/4 teaspoon cayenne, or to taste

3/4 cup fontina cheese (about 2 1/2 ounces), grated or cut into small bits

1 1/2 teaspoons chopped fresh sage leaves

1.Make pastry: In a bowl, combine the flour and salt. Place the butter in another bowl. Place both bowls in the freezer for 1 hour. Remove the bowls from the freezer and make a well in the center of the flour. Add the butter to the well and, using a pastry blender, cut it in until the mixture resembles coarse meal. Make another well in the center. In a small bowl, whisk together the sour cream, lemon juice and water and add half of this mixture to the well. With your fingertips, mix in the liquid until large lumps form. Remove the large lumps and repeat with the remaining liquid and flour-butter mixture. Pat the lumps into a ball; do not overwork the dough. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 1 hour.

2.Prepare squash: Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Peel squash, then halve and scoop out seeds. Cut into a 1/2-inch dice. Toss pieces with olive oil and a half-teaspoon of the salt and roast on foil lined (for neatness sake) sheet for 30 minutes or until pieces are tender, turning it midway if your oven bakes unevenly. Set aside to cool slightly.

3.Caramelize onions: While squash is roasting, melt butter in a heavy skillet and cook onion over low heat with the remaining half-teaspoon of salt and pinch of sugar, stirring occasionally, until soft and lightly golden brown, about 20 minutes. Stir in cayenne.

4.Raise the oven temperature to 400 degrees. Mix squash, caramelized onions, cheese and herbs together in a bowl.

5.Assemble galette: On a floured work surface, roll the dough out into a 12-inch round. Transfer to an ungreased baking sheet. Spread squash, onions, cheese and herb mixture over the dough, leaving a 1 1/2-inch border. Fold the border over the squash, onion and cheese mixture, pleating the edge to make it fit. The center will be open.

6.Bake until golden brown, 30 to 40 minutes. Remove from the oven, let stand for 5 minutes, then slide the galette onto a serving plate. Cut into wedges and serve hot, warm or at room temperature. Serves 6.

Apple Cheddar Scones

You know how you can sometimes lust after a food for days before finally getting to the point where you have to meet that desire, no matter the cost? It seems that I’ve been craving cheddar apple scones for the past WAY more than a week. And now that the weather has turned very fall-like it suddenly seemed imperative that I have one of the scones I remember as being absolutely delicious.

Years ago, I went to New Haven in the dead of winter. As much as a San Diegan can think they’ve packed for cold weather, more than a few minutes out into the biting, stinging freeze that marks a New England winter will painfully point out how lacking our coats and wraps really are. I loved seeing all the snow during the visit but, oh! that cold. Even with scarves, mittens, wool socks, and long underwear, I still shivered my way through the vacation. Sometime during those frigid days, Emily offered up a batch of Smitten Kitchen apple cheddar scones and, with that first warm and moist bite of those scones, I fell in love. Have I been craving another batch since that time so long ago? Pretty much.

I made these scones a week ago and froze most of them. Today,  when I woke up to fog and enough fall foliage to delight my senses, it seemed like a perfect time to take out one of the frozen scones and eat it, along with pumpkin spiced coffee. Yes, the coffee was in a fall themed mug. And, yes, I was wearing socks with pumpkins on them. And wrapped in a blanket printed with autumn leaves. (I'm more than a little bit into this whole fall that's really fall phenomenon.)

In addition to sharing this recipe with me, Emily also taught me the careful art of freezing foods for future consumption. I know - you’re wondering how an old lady such as myself missed out on the basic skill of freezing foods. It’s not that I’ve never wrapped all manner of foods in foil and thrown them into my freezer to be forgotten until the mystery packages wound up being too freezer-burned to use. In watching Emily’s very deliberate preparation of foods for freezing, I finally realized the correct way to preserve tasty foods for another time. This is a most important skill in my world as careful freezing allows me to make things Martin doesn’t like but I do, without ending up wasting what I can’t eat before the delicacy goes bad. Happy hubby, happy me.

When I took my scones out of the oven, I wondered if they were overdone.  Too many recent visits to tea rooms made visions of perfect pale scones come to mind. It’s doubtful that I have any pictorial records of Emily’s scones but, mercifully, a quick look at Smitten Kitchen’s site, showed the same amount of rustic darker color I was seeing with my batch of scones.

Even if they’d been completely off in appearance, one bite into the apple cheddar goodness of one of these scones is enough to warm the soul and bring the taste of fall. I’m enjoying slathering mine with some homemade apple butter I recently bought at a farmer’s market type venue. Something about the sharpness of cheddar mixed with a cinnamony sweetness in the apple butter spread works perfectly together.

Apple and Cheddar Scones
Recipe Courtesy of Smitten Kitchen

Makes 6 generous scones

2 firm tart apples (1 pound or 2 454 grams)
1 1/2 cups (6.75 ounces or 195 grams) all-purpose flour
1/4 cup sugar plus 1 1/2 tablespoons for sprinkling (total of 2.2 ounces or 63 grams)
1/2 tablespoon (7 grams) baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt (3 grams) plus additional for egg wash
6 tablespoons (3 ounces or 85 grams)unsalted butter, chilled and cut into 1/2-inch cubes plus additional for baking sheet if not lining it with parchment
1/2 cup (2.25 ounces or 65 grams) sharp cheddar, shredded (white is recommended, I assume for aesthetics)
1/4 cup (2 ounces) heavy cream
2 large eggs

Position a rack at the center of oven and preheat oven to 375 °F. Line baking sheet with parchment paper.

Peel and core apples, then cut them into one-sixteenths. (I assumed this meant chunks, not slivers.) Placed them in a single layer on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and bake them until they take on a little color and feel dry to the touch, about 20 minutes. They will be about half-baked. Let them cool completely. (You can speed this up in the fridge, as I did.) Leave oven on.

Sift or whisk flour, sugar, baking powder and salt together. Set aside. Place butter in the bowl of an electric mixer with a paddle attachment, along with cooled apple chunks, cheese, cream and one egg. Sprinkle flour mixture over the top and mix on low speed until the dough just comes together. Do not overmix.

[Don’t have a stand or hand mixer? I’d rub the cold butter into the flour mixture with my fingertips or with a pastry blender, hand-chop the apples coarsely and mix the rest together with a wooden spoon until combined. It might feel awkward, but it should all come together. Again, don’t overmix it though it will be harder to do this by hand.]

Generously flour your counter top and place the scone dough on top of it. Sprinkle with flour. Use a rolling pin to gently roll (or use your hands to pat) the dough into a 1 1/4-inch thick, 6-inch circle. Cut circle into 6 wedges. Transfer them to a baking sheet that has either been buttered or lined with a fresh sheet of parchment paper. Leave at least 2 inches between each scone.

Beat remaining egg in a small bowl with a pinch of salt. Brush the scones with egg wash and sprinkle them with remaining tablespoon of sugar. Bake until firm and golden, about 30 minutes. With a spatula, lift them to a wire rack to cool for 10 minutes. Before you eat one, make sure you realize how addictive they might be. Once you’ve got that down, go for it anyway.

Do ahead: Scones are best the day they are baked. However, they can be made ahead of time and stored unbaked in the freezer until you need them. Simply brush them with the egg wash and sprinkle them with sugar, and bake them still frozen for just a couple extra minutes. This way they are always freshly baked when you want them.

Sweet and Sour Chicken

If this was the kind of blog that people actually followed I suppose I’d be in trouble for all these months of not writing up any new recipes. It’s certainly not that I haven’t been cooking during this time frame and not even that I’ve not made anything new. For the most part, however, my meals have tended to be the tried and true recipes that I know Martin will eat. Perhaps my life has had so many new challenges since we moved to the midwest that I’ve just not been as anxious to get creative in the kitchen. I absolutely love my kitchen in Parkville and look forward to making lots of new and old seasonal favorites as we move into autumn and winter, so maybe the coming months bring the promise of a whole slew of new recipes. 

As I get used to life here in the San Diego condo, I’m actually cooking more than I thought I would. Before beginning this stint of second home living, I pictured lots of evenings out and/or simple Trader Joe prepared meals. Neither of those predictions have been borne out. While my kitchen here isn’t as big or well laid out as in Missouri, it’s certainly functional enough to cook in. The two kitchens present an interesting contrast. Whereas the Missouri kitchen is made up of dark granite counter tops and deep wood cabinetry, this kitchen is a white-on-cream kind of light and airy. I love the way the sun comes into the room on bright mornings. Other than the back patio, this might be my favorite place to sit and look out over the houses and hills outside my window.  

What do I cook here? Tacos, hamburgers, BBQ ribs, lasagna, spaghetti, paninis, breakfast for dinner, and chicken are the staples. I’ve made many of the tried and true recipes Martin likes, from chicken pot pie to steak, and what we haven’t eaten in one meal has been carefully wrapped and frozen for future consumption.  Last night, however, I did break away from the usual menus to try Cindy’s recipe (or maybe it is actually Cali’s via Cindy?) for sweet and sour chicken. When we go to Chinese restaurants Martin will often order orange chicken so I figured this was a dish he might eat. 

I thought of Cindy while I was preparing the chicken. Specifically, I remembered that she’d made this same recipe for her family. I found myself making a huge mess while I was dipping the chicken pieces in egg and corn starch and, as I watched gloppy messes forming on my hands and the counters, I wondered if Master Chef Cindy had encountered the same problem. I had memories of being in my kitchen on Riverhead once when Virginia was watching the two of us make some kind of recipe. I was probably my usual sloppy self while Cindy tidily cleaned as she went, leaving no trail of cooking clutter behind. Virginia was dutifully impressed. 

Back to this recipe...after getting the coating on each piece, I put all the chicken bites in the skillet together and then had a bit of trouble separating them for turning when they began sticking together via that same gloppy batter messing up my counters. In some cases, the chicken would separate from it’s coating as I tried to turn the pieces. I began to wonder if the final result of my cooking efforts was going to be a big disappointing batch of cooked but naked chicken pieces. 

The directions also mentioned turning the chicken every fifteen minutes during the baking time, in order to ensure full coating of the sweet and sour sauce. I tried this technique at the first fifteen minute interval but found that it took too long to turn all those pieces. My baster went to the Parkville kitchen but, if it had been here in San Diego, I think that might’ve been an easier method of drawing up the sauce and basting it over the chicken pieces. 

Even with all my worries during the prep period, this recipe turned out great. It's a funny thing about making something you normally only order in a restaurant. The point of home cooking is that it should NOT taste like what you go out and eat, right? Instead, each bite should sing out the superiority of home-made goodness, cooked with love over your own kitchen stove. And yet, sometimes the very mark of excellence seems to be in how much you can make your efforts taste like what you'd get if you weren't indulging in all that home-baked goodness. That's how it is with this recipe. Instead of boasting how much better this version turned out, I proudly proclaim that my sweet and sour chicken tasted just like what you'd get in a restaurant! Martin loved  the recipe enough that I’ll definitely go through the mess of making this sweet and sour chicken again. And I’ll add a baster to the never-ending list of things I need to complete my condo kitchen. 

Baked Sweet and Sour Chicken

Ingredients:

3-4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts

salt and pepper to taste

1 1/2 cups cornstarch

3 eggs, beaten

1/4 cup canola oil

1 cup granulated sugar

4 tablespoons ketchup

1/4 cup white vinegar

1/4 cup cider vinegar

1 tablespoon low sodium soy sauce

1 tablespoon garlic salt

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Cut chicken breasts into bite-sized pieces and season with salt and pepper. 

2. In separate bowls, place cornstarch and slightly beaten eggs. Dip chicken into cornstarch then coat in egg mixture

3. Heat canola oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat and cook chicken until browned. Place the chicken in a 9x13 greased baking dish. 

4. In a medium sized mixing bowl, combine sugar, ketchup, apple cider vinegar, white vinegar, soy sauce and garlic salt. Pour over the chicken and bake for 1 hour. 

5. I stirred the chicken every 15 minutes so that it coated the pieces in the sauce. (This is the part where I'd use a baster instead.)