Blueberry and Raspberry Croissant Puff

Don't you love it when you find a recipe that's easy to make and tastes good enough to serve to company? I first tasted this dish as the company while visiting my friend Millie in Colorado.  Since then, Ive gone on to make it for my own guests.  Being with  Millie and seeing her life was such a treat. I love the area she lives in and I love her new home but, truthfully, I don't think I could live that far off the beaten path. I could, however, eat her breakfast puff every day.

This dish comes out sort of like a cross between bread pudding and a clafoutis.  I've made it with just blueberries and like it that way too. It warms up pretty well for next day eating - assuming you have any left over!

Blueberry and Raspberry Croissant Puff
recipe courtesy of Millie Picker

Ingredients

4 large croissants, cut up into pieces.
1/2 cup fresh or frozen blueberries
1/2 cup fresh or frozen raspberries
8 oz. cream cheese softened
2/3 cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
3/4 cup whole milk

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly coat a 9 inch square pan with cooking spray.
Place croissant pieces in the pan. Scatter the blueberries and raspberries over the top.
In a medium bowl with an electric mixer, beat cream cheese and sugar until combined and smooth. Add in the eggs and vanilla and beat well until blended. Gradually add milk, beating well after each addition.
Pour the mixture evenly over the croissant pieces. Gently pat down with a wooden spoon so all the pieces are coated. Let rest 10-15 minutes
Bake for 35-40 minutes or until set in the center and golden brown. (If the top starts to get too brown toward the end, cover with foil.)
Serve warm with powdered sugar sprinkled on top.

Corn Casserole

When Brian was in preschool, we attended the obligatory Thanksgiving Pilgrims and Indians feast. Every school seems to have some variation of this re-enactment, from full on turkey and all the trimmings meal to popcorn and pie.  In addition to all the staples, Brian's PQ Preschool served up a corn casserole dish that had the sweet taste and texture of the corn cakes some Mexican restaurants like to dollop onto a combo platter. I'm not gonna lie - I absolutely loved that little addition to plates at Chevy's and other restaurants where we would eat Mexican food. The ever so addictive queso blanco that I eat by the bowlful when I'm at Miguel's hadn't been invented yet, but those little corn cakes were equally anticipated and quickly devoured.

When I came across this Pioneer Woman recipe the name had me fooled into thinking I'd be making something with a texture more like the corn cakes. Turns out Ree's version of "casserole" actually winds up being creamed corn that is slightly less heavy (creamy?) than other cream corns I've eaten. My sister-in-law Jody used to always make creamed corn for our holiday meals and I loved hers...but, as I've gotten older, I think I prefer things that are a little less heavy on the sauce side. Like this corn casserole.

Also, I admit that I love scraping corn cobs right down to the hard cob itself. There's something satisfying about watching those kernels peel off and then going pack for a second pass to get as much of the juice out as possible. Our family recently watched an episode of Shark Tank where some nut job was pitching this super icky gag toy that simulated picking and popping pimples. I won't go into more detail because it makes me sick to even think about it. My advice is to NEVER buy one of those absolutely awful contraptions but, rather, stick with denuding cobs of the last bit of corn juice. Way less gross and far more tasty. Ewwww....

Corn Casserole
From Pioneer Woman

Ingredients:
8 ears Corn, Still In The Husk
2/3 cups Heavy Cream
3 Tablespoons Butter (salted)
1/2 teaspoon Salt To Taste
 Ground Pepper To Taste

INSTRUCTIONS
Remove the corn from the husks. In a large, deep bowl, slice off the kernels of corn. With the dull side of the knife (or a regular dinner knife), press and scrape the cob all the way down to remove all the bits of kernel and creamy milk inside.

Add heavy cream, salt to taste, a generous amount of ground pepper and butter; mix well. Pour mixture into a baking dish. Bake at 350Fº for 30 to 45 minutes or until thoroughly warmed through.

BAKED FONTINA PASTA

Before Emily and Andrew visited in November, I asked her to give me a few hints of what to cook for her and she complied by sending this recipe. Our first attempt had to be aborted when we noticed that the Brussel sprouts were wormy. Ewwwww.

I think I have some kind of complex about cooking in front of Andrew because it seems like everything I make for him turns out less than what I'd hoped it would be. Emily was helping in the kitchen the day we made this dish, but I still managed to screw up a few components. Not that anything about making a simple pasta casserole is that complicated, just that I was feeling hurried and not reading ahead on the recipe. For instance, AFTER the pasta had been cooked and drained, I realized I should've kept the water it was boiled in. Whoops! This omission made it harder to get the béchamel sauce to set correctly...and so it went. Aren't you just dying to try this recipe now, after this raving review?

While I was exasperated by all the stupid errors that made putting this pasta casserole together a lot more tedious, I did very much like the end result. I'm not a macaroni and cheese lover but with the different cheese and the addition of non-wormy Brussel sprouts, the flavor profile was changed enough to make me want to eat a big helping.

You know what else is a good point about making your own baked fontina pasta? When you slice the Brussel sprouts so thin and cook them up, the color is just so beautiful and vibrant that you want to keep stirring forever. Sure, everything may have gone wrong up to that point, but when you're stirring those beautiful shiny green sprouts, you can't help but feel that something so beautiful is bound to make up into a great tasting dinner.

BAKED FONTINA PASTA
(from Blueapron.com)

Ingredients:
8 oz. campanelle pasta
2 oz fontina cheese
6 oz. Brussel sprouts
1 bunch sage
3 Tbs. all purpose flour
2 Tbs. butter
2 Tbs. heavy cream
1 shallot
1/2 cup panko breadcrumbs

Directions:
Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Wash and dry the fresh produce
Heat a large pot of salted water to boiling. Cut off and discard the rind of the Fontina cheese, grate the cheese.
Cut off and discard the stem ends of the Brussel sprouts. Cut the Brussel sprouts in half lengthwise: thinly slice the halves.
Pick the sage leaves off the stems. Discard the stems and finely chop the leaves.
Peel and thinly slice the shallot
Cook the Pasta:
Add the pasta to the pot of boiling water. Cook 9-11 minutes, or until just shy of al dente.
RESERVING 2 CUPS OF THE PASTA WATER, drain the cooked pasta thoroughly and set aside in a warm place. Rinse and dry the pot.
Making the Sage Breadcrumbs
While the pasta cooks, in a medium nonstick pan, heat 2 tsp. of olive oil on medium until hot.
Add the sage and breadcrumbs. Season with salt and pepper.  Cook stirring frequently, 3 to 4 minutes, or until fragrant and browned.
Transfer to a bowl and set aside. Wipe out the pan
Cooking The Brussel Sprouts
In the same pan used to amok the sage breadcrumbs, heat 2 teaspoons of olive oil on medium high until hot.
Add the shallot. Cook stirring occasionally, 1-2 minutes, or until softened.
Add the Brussel sprouts, season with salt and pepper. Cook stirring occasionally, 2-4 minutes or until softened and bright green. Remove from heat
Making the Fontina Béchamel Sauce
In the same pot used to cook the pasta, melt the butter on medium high. Once melted, add the flour, cook, whisking frequently, 30 seconds to 1 minute or until toasted and fragrant.
Slowly whisk in the heavy cream and reserved pasta cooking water. Cook, whisking frequently, 2-4 minutes or until thickened. Add the fontina cheese, stir until melted and combined. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Remove from heat.
Finishing and Baking the Pasta
Add the cooked pasta and cooked Brussel Sprouts to the pot of Fontina béchamel sauce. Stir until thoroughly combined. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Transfer the mixture to a baking dish. Place the baking dish on a sheet pan. Bake in the oven 7-8 minutes, or until bubbly. Remove from the oven. Top the baked pasta with the sage breadcrumbs. Let stand for at least 2 minutes before serving.

Light As Air Popovers

My favorite popover recipe is the Jordan Pond version I've previously written about. This one is a little bit easier and a little bit less wonderful than the JPs. But sometimes you just wanna go with what's fastest and easiest, and for those days this recipe is definitely spot on. Martin likes to eat these with jam slathered inside. I actually like mine plain though I certainly won't cry foul if a dollop or two of butter somehow falls into those lovely, craggy, eggy insides of my popover.


Light As Air Popovers
Recipe courtesy of InspiringKitchen.com

Ingredients
2 Tbs. melted butter
3 eggs, lightly beaten
1 cup milk
1 cup flour
1/2 tsp. salt

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees
2. Spray popover or muffin pan with cooking spray. Add 1/4 teaspoon of butter in the bottom of each cup
3. Mix beaten eggs and milk together
4. Whisk in remaining melted butter
5. Add flour and salt
6. Mix to smooth (This is important! You need to get all lumps out and get the mixture to a smooth texture)
7. Pour mix into popover cups, each about 1/2 full
8. Bake for 20 minutes at 450 degrees
9. Reduce heat to 325 degrees and bake for 15 minutes more.
10. Let cool on wire rack.

Slow- Cooked Pork Chops

In addition to being "the other white meat", pork seems to be the completely forgotten meat in our home - unless you're talking good ole' Kansas City bbq. It's not that I don't ever make pork chops but the end product sometimes turns out drier and less tasty than I like. When that happens, I kind of swear off pork, until the next time I'm tired of chicken and beef alternating every night.

This dish couldn't be easier and Martin absolutely loved it. It'd be nice if I could say we sat down together to enjoy our good dinner but, much as it was supposed to be that way, who knew the Symphony Lady would call. We're season ticket holders which means she doesn't exactly have to talk us into buying the new season...yet, that's exactly what she did. While Martin chowed down on the dinner I'd so lovingly prepared, I got to listen over and over again about how much money I was going to save and how much I was going to love the concerts she felt a need to talk me into, though I'd already said we were purchasing them. When we got to the part about would we like this seat or that seat, I finally started eating while she talked. Not exactly the best way to enjoy a meal but, even standing up and gulping bites between debating the merits of Row G versus H, I agreed that these pork chops are a winner for a filling and great tasting evening meal.

Slow-Cooked Pork Chops
from mydailymoment.com

Ingredients:
6 lean pork chops
1/2 cup flour
1 Tbs. salt
1  10 oz. can chicken and rice soup (I'm usually not a big advocate of soups in the crock pot but this one makes up a nice rice and "gravy" that goes well with the meat.)
1 1/2 tsp. dry mustard
1/2 tsp. garlic powder
2 Tbs. oil

Directions:
Coat pork chops in mixture of flour, salt, dry mustard, and garlic powder and brown in oil in skillet. Place browned pork chops in crockpot. Add can of soup. Cover an cook on low for 6-8 hours or on high for 3 1/2 hours.

Watermelon Feta Blueberry Salad

This salad is so simple that you can pretty much just read the title and know what you need to do to put it together.  It's very light and absolutely reeks of warm summer days. With the red watermelon, blue blueberries, and white feta you could definitely whip this salad up for a patriotic get-together such as 4th of July, Memorial Day, or Labor Day. And that's just what I did for our Stoops family Labor Day gathering.

Watermelon Feta Blueberry Salad
Recipe from Runninginaskirt.com

Ingredients
1/2 seedless watermelon, cubed (about 8-10 cups)
1 cup blueberries
1/4 cup crumbled feta
2 Tablespoons mint leaves, chopped

Dressing Ingredients
I lime juiced
2 teaspoons olive oil
2 teaspoons honey
1/4 teaspoon sea salt

Directions:
Combine the fruits, mint, and cheese in a bowl. (See what I mean - how easy is this?)

Dressing Instructions:
Combine lime juice, olive oil, honey and sea salt. (Seeing a pattern here?). Pour over the salad ingredients.

SNICKERDOODLES

This has been a summer of very little cooking. Sure, I make dinner most nights but I've stuck to the easiest, most familiar recipes, in light of a houseful of men and their construction mess going on here. 

For weeks the place was so torn up that I had little desire to do anything in the kitchen and, up until this weekend, we certainly weren't inviting people over in the midst of the constant mess. Since Monday was Labor Day and since the summer is rapidly coming to an end, we invited Mike and Jody and family to spend the day with us. Only we couldn't plan the day for Saturday or Monday, as we had workmen here both those days...so that left Sunday for family game night. Let's not imagine I went crazy in the kitchen as we wound up eating delivered pizza for our main course. I did, however, make a few desserts and a side salad. These snickerdoodles were one of the desserts because I've noticed the Yorba Linda Stoops like grazing type foods that can be picked up easily and eaten. Cookies have to be about the easiest form of getting something sweet and yummy into your tummy.

I've made plenty of snickerdoodles in my day but this time I decided to try the Smitten Kitchen version. Given that Deb's recipes often seem rather complicated, these went together easily. But, really, how can you make a simple cookie like the much loved snickerdoodle be too complex??? Even with the ease of the recipe, I did have one aggravating failure. Most of my cookie pans are in Parkville so I could only find one of the kind I love and always use. That one got used, along with another larger but somehow flimsier feeling sheet. The cookies from my favorite baking sheet turned out pretty close to perfection while the ones from the Brand X sheet were too dark on the bottom and not as pretty on top. So, let this be a lesson...the quality of the cookie sheets matters. 

Snickerdoodles

Recipe from Smitten Kitchen 

Ingredients

  

2  3/4 cups  all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons cream of tarter

1 tsp. baking soda

1/4 tsp. salt

16 T (2 sticks or 8 ounces) unsalted butter, at room temperature

1 3/4 cups sugar, divided, plus more if needed

2 T ground cinnamon, plus more if needed

2 large eggs

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 400, with one rack in the top third and one rack in the bottom third of the oven. Line baking sheets with silicone baking mats or parchment paper. Set aside. 

Sift together flour, cream of tarter, baking soda, and salt. Set aside. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, combine butter and 1 1/2 cups of sugar. Beat on medium speed until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Scrape down the sides of the bowl. Add eggs and beat to combine.  Add dry ingredients and beat to combine. At this point,  Deb chilled her dough for an hour and I chilled mine overnight, before scooping, as it makes it easier to form balls to roll in the cinnamon sugar. Other recipes I've used don't call for any chilling and that always worked, too, though it might have been a bit messier. 

Once the dough has chilled, in a small bowl, combine the remaining 1/4 cup sugar and the ground cinnamon. Use a small ice-cream scoop to form balls of the dough and roll these in cinnamon sugar. (I didn't have a small scoop so just eye balled mine) Place the sugared up balls about two inches apart on the prepared baking sheets. Bake until the cookies are set in the center and begin to crack, (they will not brown), about 10 minutes, rotating the baking sheets after 5 minutes. 

Transfer the sheets to a wire rack to cool about five minutes before transferring the cookies to the rack. In theory, they can be stored in an airtight container up to one week.