Egg Muffins

We have a quick and easy breakfast we eat sometimes around our house - egg muffins.  First, you open some pre-made biscuits, and place one in each (greased) muffin cup.  You can flatten them if you like, but I don't think it makes much difference.  (Also, the egg runs under the biscuit either way.)

Next, add some chopped veggies and meat.  We added green peppers, onions, and ham.

Add some scrambled eggs, mixed with milk, and top with shredded cheese.  It is a good idea not to fill the cups all the way to the top with egg.  You will probably end up with egg on the bottom of your oven.  Like we did.

Cook according to the instructions on the biscuit package, but add a couple minutes to the time they suggest.
Pile them on a plate and enjoy!

Halloween Ideas: Food

Here are some more ideas I've collected on Pintrest for Halloween.  Check out these tasty treats:

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Apple picking

Last week we picked apples at a house owned by the parents of some childhood friends of my husband.  His parents live only about half an hour from where Dan lived when he was a kid.  We went up late one morning, and within an hour had amassed quite a collection of apples.

The picture above is after we had already cored about two bags worth of apples for apple juice.  Once the apples are cored, juicing apples with a steam juicer is easy peasy.  You just have to be patient for the juice to come out of the apples.  Each of the two batches took about two hours to juice.  I canned 6 quarts total.

Check out the color variation in the apple juice.  And it is a pinkish color, not the yellow color you get from stores.  Maybe because I don't filter mine?

I had some juice left over which I used to make mint apple jelly.  Emily helped me pick spearmint leaves from the herb garden.  Tabitha helped by looking pretty and not doing too much fussing.

So pretty. 

Canning

This summer I learned to can.  I canned raspberry freezer jam a couple months ago.  After I was all done, my mother-in-law told me that she didn't think the glass jars I had used should go into the freezer.  So, we ate it all with-in three weeks; three weeks being the life expectancy of freezer jam in the fridge.

Well, it was just over three weeks.  And I gave a couple jars away.  But we were close.

Since getting back from Nebraska, the blackberries that climb all over the pool deck have started to rippen.  Which makes the plethora of vines that spill over the side of the deck, across the entrance, less annoying, and also means we have more than enough to make jam.

So I canned up some regular (cooked) jam.  Seven little jars, and one big jar that went straight into the fridge.  The contents of which have already started to go into our tummies.  Mmm.  A perfect balance of tart and sweet.

I also made some tomato sauce a couple days later.  Lots of onions, garlic, green pepper, basil and oregano went into the sauce.  Hopefully it will be tasty.  One of the jars didn't get quite full, so we will probably eat it soon.  I have also decided that we need more tomatoes the next time we do tomato sauce.  Six pints didn't seem like nearly enough.

Also, check out all the different kinds of jars my mother-in-law had.  There is only one pattern repeated (although the one on the left is just plain, so it might have been a re-used jar of something or other, not a jar that started it's life as a canning jar).  I didn't notice all the patterns until I set the jars out for the picture.  Pretty cool, huh?

Independence Day

This past Monday we had my family over to celebrate Independence Day.  We swam in the pool, ate good food, and had a campfire at the end.

  A great way to celebrate the birth of our nation and the freedom we enjoy.

Oh, and the cake was the tres leche cake from Martha Stewart.  It was a hit.  Just saying.

Celebrating Spring

Spring.  One of my favorite times of year.  And, despite the cold weather and snow, spring has sprung.  Right now, the snow is gone, and it's supposed to be warm again today, and for the rest of the week.

I love the flowers, and the brisk breezes that don't chill you to the bone.  And planting things, and digging around in the dirt.  Emily loves digging around in the dirt, too, which she does frequently in one of Vickie's planters in the kitchen.  But soon we'll help dig up the gardens out by the pool house to plant veggies, and plant herbs by the garage, and flowers underneath our window.  There are already little green things poking out of the soil.  They may be daffodils or tulips.  

I've been welcoming Spring . . .

at my iGoogle page

with my new purse

and some strawberry scones

Hopefully soon we will be welcoming a new little baby as well.  This Thursday will be my 38 weeks, which means the baby will no longer be considered premature.  I've got a doctor appointment today, and hopefully the news is encouraging.  (Like, oh wow, you're at 9 centimeters, the baby'll come any day now).  But Emily was late, so probably this will be just a routine, you're doing fine, hang in there, visit.  Either way, my due date is the 14th, so only a couple more weeks to go.

Perfect Lasagna

When I was little, Mom made the best lasagna.  It was my favorite food.  AND, she let us kids help.  We would mix the bowls of ground beef, tomato sauce, cottage cheese, Italian seasoning and garlic powder together.  Yum.  It smelled so good, and then about an hour later, it would taste so good, too.

And then (about when I was in high school) I was introduced to store bought lasagna.  You know, the kind that comes in a red box.  The yummy layers of cheese and meat and lots of noodles.  Mmm-mm.  I was sold at first, but after awhile I started to miss Mom's lasagna.  Because it was Mom's, and home-cooked tastes better than over processed factory food.

So, in college, I started making lasagna Mom's way.  Mixing all the layers together, just like mom.  But being out in the big wide world, I also noticed that mom's recipe wasn't the way most people made lasagna.  So I started trying different recipes.  Cookbook recipes didn't taste right--too much filling, not enough yummy noodles, and they usually only had a couple layers, instead of 3, like my mom's, and trying to add another layer didn't work out as well as I hoped.

And then it hit me.  Why not put layers of noodles between the cheesy filling and the meat filling?  Then you get the yummy noodle taste & you don't have to add lots more ingredients.  Two birds, one stone.

Last night I made lasagna.  And it turned out divine.

Here's how to do it:

1. Cook 15 lasagna noodles
2. Brown breakfast sausage, add just over half a jar of 6 cheese spaghetti sauce
3. Mix one tub of cottage cheese, about 1 cup mozarella, 1 1/2 to 2 tablespoons Italian seasoning, and 1/2 to 1 tablespoon garlic powder
4. Spray your lasagna pan with pam, and then coat the bottom with some of the left over spaghetti sauce
5. Lay down 3 noodles, and then cover with half your meat sauce mixture
6. Lay down 3 noodles, and then cover with half your cheese mixture
7. Repeat steps 5 & 6
8. Lay down 3 noodles, cover with the remaining sauce, and then cover with mozzarella cheese. 
9. Cook for 30 minutes (I cooked it about 25, since my noodles were hot).  Let it cool for a bit before eating.

Dan and I both had seconds (I had thirds, small thirds, but still) but the real test was Emily, who doesn't always like cheese.  She had seconds.

Cookbook

So, Dan and I gave his sister and her husband a cookbook for Christmas, with a compilation of recipes from family. I will post it if I can ever figure out how. Until then, let me know if you want a copy (the cover page is a separate file, let me know if you want that as well).

Pumpkin and Sage Sausage Soup

So, I will admit to usually watching a certain amount of TV each day. Alright, I spend most of my time in front of the TV, but in my defense, I do knitting or other things while I'm watching it. And sometimes I have it on more so I know what time it is, and so I have some noise in the apartment.

Anyway, one of the shows I like to watch is Rachael Ray. Since we no longer get the food network (one of my favorite TV channels), the Rachael Ray Show is one of my only ties to it, even though the show is not actually from the food network. But Rachael Ray is. Anyway, there was this recipe, using pumpkin and sage, and Rachael mentioned her husband likes to have sausage as well when she does pumpkin and sage together. Dan and I had had pumpkin soup earlier this fall, which tasted good, even though I hadn't cooked that batch of pumpkin correctly. Now I have a whole new batch of pumpkin, which I've baked and pureed, and tastes good. So, I put together a pumpkin soup and sage sausage recipe (we had sage sausage already), using as reference a recipe from Emeril Lagasse for pumpkin, sage, and sausage (note the subtle difference) and another general pumpkin soup recipe that let me specify the number of servings I wanted, and which used pureed pumpkin instead of not yet cooked pumpkin, like Emeril's did.

So, after that long introduction, here is the recipe:

Pumpkin and Sage Sausage Soup
1/4 pound sage sausage
1 Tbsp butter
1/2 cup onion, diced
1 3/4 cup chicken broth, or one 14 oz. can
1 1/2 cup pureed pumpkin*
1 tsp brown sugar
1/2 tsp dried parsley**
Salt and pepper to taste

Cook the sage sausage in a skillet, breaking into small pieces. Drain if necessary (I didn't).

Meanwhile, cook the onions in the butter until soft and tender. Add the rest of the ingredients. Add the sausage when it is finish, and bring to a boil. Reduce and simmer. I let it simmer for about half an hour because I was also baking bread to go with the soup. You probably don't have to wait that long, but it does meld the flavors.

Serves 2

*I'm not sure exactly how much pumpkin I used, but this should be about right. You can try putting in a little less first, and tasting it. The soup should taste like pumpkin, and if it is too weak, you should add a little more.
**I think I used dried parsley. My mother-in-law gave me some dried basil from her garden, but I thought that maybe some of it was actually parsley (she also grew parsley).