A FRIDGE FULL OF FOOD...

Snow Storm Comfort: Paula Deen's Hot Chicken Salad

I first had this recipe about 20 years ago at my cousin, Ann's, table and  everyone in our family loves it as a casserole with a salad for dinner, on Liza Ashley's Angel Biscuits as an appetizer, or with crackers as a snack.  Chilled chicken salad is great but hot baked chicken salad is just a delicious and versatile and very warming on a cold winter's day.

Unbelievably, I couldn't find my handwritten recipe card of Ann's recipe but during a quick search I found this Paula Deen version that had one difference:  cheddar cheese.  Hmmmm.... cheese is always a good thing.  I like both versions, can't even pick a favorite, so I think my next time making this dish will all depend on my mood and if I have the cheese handy in the fridge or not.

The recipe is wonderful served piping hot or room temp, and heats up beautifully in the microwave.

Click for the recipe:

Paula Deen's Hot Chicken Salad

 Nutrition per 3/4 cup serving:  Calories:  381.6;    Protein:  20.2;   Carbs:   2.8;   Fat 32;  Fiber:  2.

 

 

 

 

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Banana Bread Brownies

 

I kept seeing a Banana Bread Brownies recipe on Pinterest and even pinned it myself. What a clever idea, I thought, especially for those of us who don't care for chocolate all that much or often.  Banana bread brownies...something about it just sounds right.

And it is.  So right.

Baked in a large jelly roll pan, the brownies make 35 pieces and come out to be little squares of OMG delciousness. 

I looked at the recipe I had pinned, one that had been adapted from another recipe, and looked at the original as well. Then I changed a bunch of stuff, not because anything was "wrong" with the original recipes, but because I've been trying to eat a little cleaner by add more whole grains to our diet, change out sour cream for Greek yogurt, use honey instead of refined sugar, etc., and I know from experience with banana bread that it's a great vehicle for whole grained flour.  Banana bread made with half whole wheat is actually tastier, in my opinion, than banana bread made with all all-purpose flour (and Gene can't tell the difference). 

These are truly not to be missed!

American Classics: Julia Child's Deluxe Chicken or Turkey Salad

 

Nobody's perfect. We all have the opportunity to learn and grow our skills in everything in life.  Gene has admitted a couple of times over the years that my chicken salad is, well, a little boring.  He likes the way I make potato salad, devilled eggs, and tuna salad, but says my chicken salad is "just okay".  Not that he's a jerk. He's my most enthusiastic supporter and eater, and over 25 years my cooking has put 20 lbs on his once too-skinny frame, so I take no offense.  He loves my cooking but I took this as an opportunity to improve my skills.

I added a rotisserie chicken to his grocery list this weekend while I was working, just for this purpose, and decided to go back to the basics and re-learn how to make a good, basic, no frills, chicken salad.  Who better than Julia Child to teach me? 

After reading over a dozen recipes that were either similar to my way or added more frills (pineapple, grapes, nuts, pasta, etc) than I wanted for a classic dish, I hit upon Julia Child's "Deluxe Chicken or Turkey Salad from her book The Way to Cook.  The ingredients are basic but the preparation is not.  Julia uses a two-step method with a ten minute recess that does, indeed, produce a classic, no frills, but delicious and flavorful chicken salad perfect for the classic all-American "Iron Kids" sandwich.  With Julia's method, she tosses the chopped meat with olive oil, herbs, and seasonings, and lets those ingredients get comfy with each other before coming back and binding it together with the mayo.  The two step method makes a world of difference in how the final dish's flavor resonates. The chicken and herb flavors take the lead and happen to be bound together with mayo rather than mayo flavor dominating.  Adding the fruit, nuts, etc, would also work well with this recipe but for those like my hubs who like it on the "classic" side, this is the recipe and method we'll be using, and he agrees. (Personally, I love the walnuts in it--I love the crunch!)

In four days, August 15th will be the 100th anniversary of Julia Child's birth. We are all better cooks for her enthusiasm and her career. Thank You, Julia!

Sydney & Kaylee Birthday Party 2012: Pink Rice Krispy Cake with Buttercream Borders

In my family, as much as we love decorated cakes, we're not very big cake eaters.  At least, not me and my siblings. We grew up the children of a cake decorator so while all of our friends were jealous of the presence of cake and buttercream in our house all the time, we got sick of it!  We often laugh about what rotten kids we were to our Mom who would volunteer to make us any kind of outlandish birthday cakes we wanted but because we had so much cake around us every day we all requested things like my banana bread favorite, our brother Kenneth's angel food cake with no frosting, our dad and brother Carl's pie requests, and my sister Suzanne's Rice Krispy treat wish.  What whiners we were! "Pleeeeeease, Mom. Do not make us eat cake!" What kind of sick children were we?

While we were planning Sydney and Kaylee's birthday party last week Suzanne and I were talking about cake, or the lack of it being okay, and told stories to the nieces and nephew about our childhood brattiness and the fact that Suzanne's wedding cake just out of high school (1988) was made of Rice Krispy treats because she emphatically did not want cake at her wedding.  I see Rice Krispy cakes on Pinterest now all the time and people kind of verbally smack themselves in the head and comment "That's so cool! Why didn't I think of that?"  I'm proud that our Mom was 25 years ahead of her time, making my sister's whole wedding cake from Rice Krispy treats and everyone at the wedding loved it.  After that wedding Mom got tons of orders for rice krispy treat wedding cakes, birthday cakes, and anniversary cakes--she was a wedding cake pioneer in our little town in the Ozarks.

Smiling about all the stories we told, and already having planned to make Rice Krispy treats for the party, I decided to revive Mom's idea and go all the way with the girls' birthday and make it an unforgettable cake.

I'm pretty confidant the girls were pleased! 

Kaylee was really nuts about it!

Summer Porridge aka Yogurt Oats

 

When I first saw this recipe, called "summer porridge", "yogurt oats", or "overnight oatmeal", I honestly thought it sounded gross but so many people were enthusiastic on Pinterest and other places on the web that I knew I had to give it a chance. It's not like I'm not an adventurous eater anyway, and with these ingredients I knew that at the very least it would be very good for me. (I just needed to check it out to see if it was "good" in the concept of "good & good for you".)

Guess what? It's my favorite way to make oatmeal now.  Hot oatmeal in the winter is filling and somehow defines cold weather for me, but the summer? Not so much.  Now I have a summer oatmeal to enjoy and start off the day with a nice healthy meal that keeps me going.  And more than just breakfast, it's now included in my lunchbox almost every time I go to work as my go-to healthy mid-night snack that keeps me going until 0700.

This healthy habit plays off another of my new favorite healthy habits:  Sangria Water, where I fill a pitcher with filtered water and fruit of all kinds and let it soak overnight, giving me great fruit-tasting water to drink all day and then the fruit to put on my oatmeal for the next day. So the Sangria Water  I made yesterday, with peaches and blueberries, became the peaches and blueberries that topped my yogurt oats this morning for breakfast. It's a win-win, for sure.

 

Pretty Olive & Cream Cheese Penguins All in a Row

 

Doesn't fun food make holidays and parties feel more celebratory? I think so too. Auntie Miranda made these for a family party and the little guys were the hit of the evening.  They're almost too cute to eat.  Almost.  Delicious!

The best part?  They'd be great for ANY holiday or party so we can make them all the time without having to wait for just one season or holiday!

So without a lot of chitchat, here's how to make the little fellas:

Cheesecake, Ancient Roman-style: Libum or Honey Cakes

 

Here in the Ozarks, we have an excellent local beekeeper:  Matt, who along with his family, own and run the Amish Country Store on Gretna Road in Branson (You can also mail/phone order by checking out their web site Amish Country Store, although, those of us who make the trip can tell you that there are a multitude of additional wonderful foods, ceramics, and furniture, on the shelves that make it worth your time to seek the store out in person the next time you're in Branson.) Next time you go, tell them "Glenna said Hi!"

 

Matt started beekeeping five years ago with one hive and a can-do eagerness. He's now an experienced beekeeper who maintains his hives as naturally and healthily (for the bees and for us) as possibly by eschewing the use of continuous wide spectrum antibiotics and winter feedings of commercial HFC mixes, instead using of a more bee-environmentally harmonious sugar water with lavender and peppermint mixture. His care has paid off in that he now manages fifty hives, which not only produce honey but help local farmers cross-pollinate crops.

This recipe for Libum or "honey cakes", dating back to 160 B.C. and written by Cato the Elder, Roman Statesman, is found in his book De Agri Cultura (translated: "On Farming"). Libum is the Roman version of cheesecake, used both as celebratory food and as sacrifices to the houseold spirits or gods.  It's a fun and appropriate choice to focus on honey, one of the oldest foods known to man. Revered for its antibacterial properties, it makes an excellent wound dressing and its composition from local pollens boost the immune systems of the honey-vores consuming it.

I have a couple of notes about the recipe. First: bay leaf.   I know it may sound like a funny choice since it's not usually associated with desserts in our present day culture, but don't leave it out. I was pleasantly surprised at how wonderful the bay smell while baking and what a subtle influence it was on the final taste. Not traditional to us, but a flavor I can only describe as "homey" or "cozy", and one that I think will become almost addictive to me with more use. I'll definitely be baking bread/dinner rolls on bay leaves in the future.

While these are called "cakes" the final texture is a cross between bread and cake. Not as light and fluffy as butter/sponge cake but not as chewy as bread. The ricotta gives a unique texture that is both soft and light while still warm but also denser when cooled. Not a texture we use a lot but a great experience for kids and adults alike.

Overall, this was a very fun recipe to make, eat, and think about culture and cooking from centuries ago. This would be a great Sunday School or Home School recipe to play with, easy for the kids to put together themselves and easy on the wallet, bringing kids closer to a tangible understanding of the reference to "honey cakes" in history, literature, and scripture. It will also definitely give them a better appreciation for  all the varieties of sweets we have available to us in our era!

More links to honey recipes

 Honey Curry Roasted Chicken-- OMG good! One of Gene's FAVORITE chicken recipes.

Honey, Cardamom, and Almond Rugelach -- One of my favorite cookies

Home-made Granola with Dried Fruit & Honey --Breakfast done right

Blood Orange & Lavender Muffins -- Summery goodness

Orange Olive Oil Cake with Honey -  Love this recipe! Whole food at its best.

 

Appetizers with Style: Christmas Tree Veggie Plate

My friend, Jennifer, sent me a pic of the appetizer plate she made for a Christmas work party. I LOVE this!  What a great way to turn a simple veggie tray into a festive wrok of art!

It's as straight-forward as it looks: She halved one broccoli spear, leaving about 3 inches of "trunk" and then laid in bite-sized floret bites to form the tree itself.  Next she decorated with yellow pepper slices for garland and then added cherry tomato ornaments. The final touch is a treetop star cut out of yellow pepper using a small cookie/hors d'oeuvre cutter.

Thanks for sharing, Jenn!

 

 

 

Snack Time: Seasoned Oyster Crackers

 

Having a couple of bags of oyster crackers leftover from Halloween chili, I decided to play a little. I've tried hot, sweet, salty.... but my all time favorite has turned out to be this recipe.  Not only are the great as a handful straight out of the bag, we've now topped more chili with them, potato soup, and stew--all delicious.  I also crushed 2 cups of them and topped a ham/potato casserole one night for the crunch--yummy!  They're yummy, cheap to make, and versatile. They've also stayed fresh in a gallon zip baggie with as much air removed as possible each time we get into them.  This is a keeper.

Halloween Food: Eyeball Rice Cereal Treats, Devil's Eye Eggs, Blood Clot Cranberry Dip, and I See You Meatballs

Bwahahahaha! Halloween--my very favorite holiday!  And a family favorite as well. No matter how old "our" kids get, this will always be our tradition: get together at Aunt Gonnie and Uncle Gene's house, eat great creepy food, dress up or dress down, take any little ones trick-or-treating the neighborhood and just hang out..

This year our creepy food was all eyeball in theme. We didn't really plan it that way but as the eyeballs piled up we just kept running with them it:  Gummy Eyeball Rice Cereal Treats,  Devil's Eye Eggs,  Blood Clot Cranberry Dip, I See You Meatballs, and just for fun, the un-eye-ball Mexican Villa Cheese Dip and Chips. There was also two crockpots full of chili and a few others goodies on the table like spinach dip, witch's pretzel/candy fingers, etc.    

 

 And now for recipes....