Sloppy Joes II Recipe

Transparency Alert: I LOVE sloppy joes. The sloppier, the better. Yes, I did enjoy the school cafeteria. Don't judge me.

But it's time to grow up a bit! Here's an excellent recipe for Sloppy Joes from All Recipes without the canned sloppiness. You could call these gourmet, if you like. I do.

Ingredients:

1 pound lean ground beef 1/4 cup chopped onion 1/4 cup chopped green bell pepper 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder 1 teaspoon prepared yellow mustard 3/4 cup ketchup 3 teaspoons brown sugar salt to taste ground black pepper to taste

Directions:

1. In a medium skillet over medium heat, brown the ground beef, onion, and green pepper; drain off liquids.
2. Stir in the garlic powder, mustard, ketchup, and brown sugar; mix thoroughly. Reduce heat, and simmer for 30 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.

When green peppers go on sale, I buy several, chop them, and then store them in snack size bags in the freezer. It's helpful to have those already on hand when dinner calls and you're in a pinch for some added flavor.

Darn* Delicious's One Pot Pasta Recipe

Photo Courtesy of Damn Delicious

There are a lot of recipes on Pinterest. A. LOT. And most of them that I've tried are pretty disappointing. It should be a rule that if you're going to "pin" a high class food photo to your recipe, that it should TASTE like something at a high class restaurant. But there are no rules on Pinterest, so the false advertising continues.

The photo for this one-pot wonder by Darn* Delicious was decent, so I figured it MIGHT be flavorful.

....and it was! So if you're looking for a FAST, pantry-friendly main course, look no further. This recipe also has the added bonus of less dishes to wash.

Ingredients:

• 1 pound spaghetti
• 1 (12.8-ounce) package smoked andouille sausage, thinly sliced
• 1 large onion, thinly sliced
• 3 cups halved grape tomatoes
• 2 cups fresh basil leaves, loosely packed
• 4 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
• Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
• 1 cup grated Parmesan

Directions:

1. In a large stockpot or Dutch oven over medium high heat, combine spaghetti, sausage, onion, tomatoes, basil, garlic and 4 1/2 cups water; season with salt and pepper, to taste.
2. Bring to a boil; reduce heat and simmer, uncovered, until pasta is cooked through and liquid has reduced, about 8-10 minutes. Stir in Parmesan.
3. Serve immediately.

Ian Knauer's Meatloaf Recipe

Who is Ian Knauer? I haven't the slightest idea, but he's put together a fabulous meatloaf recipe that is truly delicious! Most folks balk at the thought of meatloaf. They shun the jolting memories of a hunk of meat covered in sugary ketchup. No longer, my friends, no longer must you run. This recipe is fit for a crowd, considering it calls for just over two pounds of meat! However, if you end up with leftovers, they won't last long. I made a few adjustments (as noted below by asterisks), but otherwise, this has all the makings of perfection.

Ingredients:

• 1c fine breadcrumbs, seasoned*
• 1/3c milk
• 1 medium onion OR small shallot*
• 3 garlic cloves, minced
• 1 medium celery rib, finely chopped
• 1 medium carrot, finely chopped
• 2Tbs unsalted butter
• 2Tbs Worcestershire sauce
• 1Tbs apple cider vinegar
• 1/4tsp allspice, ground
• 1tsp salt*
• 1/2tsp pepper*
• 1/4lb bacon (about 4 slices), chopped
• 1/2c pitted prunes
• 1 1/2lb ground beef chuck
• 1/2lb ground pork (not lean)
• 2 large eggs
• 1/3c fresh parsley, finely chopped

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350°F with rack set in the middle of oven.
2. Soak bread crumbs in bowl of milk.
3. Meanwhile, cook onion, garlic, celery, and carrot in butter in a large heavy skillet over medium heat, stirring occasionally, 5 minutes. Cover skillet and reduce heat to low, then cook until carrot is tender, about 5 minutes.
4. Remove from heat and stir in Worcestershire sauce, vinegar, allspice, salt, and pepper.
5. Add to bread-crumb mixture.
6. Finely chop bacon and prunes in a food processor, then add to onion mixture.
7. Add beef, pork, eggs, and parsley and mix together with your hands.  
8. Shape mixture into "loaf" (9"x5" oval) onto broiler pan*. (The broiler pan will allow grease to escape from your meatloaf so that you don't end up with the soggy, greasy mess that we think of when making traditional meatloaf.)
9. Bake until an instant-read thermometer inserted into center of meatloaf registers 155°F, 1 to 1 1/4 hours.
10. Let stand 10 minutes before serving.

Since this is a pretty labor intensive recipe, I found it helpful to chop and cook the onion mixture (later adding the Worcestershire mixture to it) and chopping up the prunes and bacon the NIGHT BEFORE. The day of, I combined all of the ingredients, including my milk-soaked breadcrumbs, by hand. (....also, in an effort of full disclosure, I did not use my food processor because I didn't want to clean it up afterwards......I used kitchen scissors instead.)

I would caution you to add the salt and pepper to TASTE rather than simply going by the ingredient amounts above. Mr. Knauer originally called for 2tsp salt and 1 1/2tsp pepper. That seemed a bit extreme for me personally, so I halved it. In the end, our meatloaf was still a bit too peppery, so I recorded it as a third of the original recipe above. One way to "test" your "to taste" with raw mixtures, is to take a 1" ball of the mixture, flatten it, and pop it in the microwave for thirty seconds to one minute. It won't be EXACTLY like your oven, but it will give you a decent approximation of taste.

Chocolate Chip Cookies {Cake} Recipe

 

This is the second time I've used Sally's recipe and honestly, the results are so perfect and consistent that I can't help but blast it from the rooftops,

BEST. CHOCOLATE. CHIP. COOKIE. EVER.

No really. Seriously, why aren't you getting out the ingredients right now?! The first time I used her recipe, I made two 9" round cookie cakes in pie pans. They were dense and delicious. I baked them about 10 minutes more than the suggested time, but every oven is different. I gave it the old jiggle test to see if it was done. (If it looks like jello, it's not done.)

This time, I used the SAME recipe to make just over 3 dozen drop cookies. The recipe probably would have made 4 dozen if I hadn't grazed sampled the dough. (Don't worry, I removed my sampling from the big bowl --- no germs shared, promise!)

These cookies were perfect at 350F for 9 minutes. I used my silpat (honestly, you should put that on your Christmas list because those are a life/pan saver) and then cooled on my stackable cooling racks (collapse nicely for efficient storage). At 9 minutes, the cookies looked puffy, but after cooling, they resembled the most perfect chocolate chip cookies. And after 2 days, they were still just as soft. Yep, soft. SOFT! I hate hard cookies.

So if you're looking for a tried and true cookie recipe to make for your kids' teachers (because they REALLY deserve cookies...every day), this is the one you should make. I will warn you, this recipe will totally NOT WORK if you do not measure your flour correctly. This is THE most crucial ingredient. You have been warned. If you use too much flour, you're going to need to add more of the other ingredients and just make more cookies. That's the only solution.

Happy Baking!

Chicken Parmesan Recipe

Found this recipe on AllRecipes.com! It's rare that a dish gets a solid five stars after so many reviews, so I figured I'd give it a shot. I think the author measures out a bit more ingredients than are required, so I changed it a bit to avoid waste.

Despite being labor intensive, this recipe is a keeper. I made everything during nap time and then refrigerated the dish until dinner. Even though the dish and its contents were cold, I think it was a little overcooked at 15 minutes. All ovens are different, so keep an eye on your chicken parm!

Ingredients

• 2lb Boneless, skinless chicken breasts
• 2Tbs Flour
• 2 Eggs
• 2c Panko, seasoned
• 1/2c Parmesan Cheese, grated
• 2Tbs Olive Oil (for frying)
• 1/2c Tomato Sauce
• 1/4c Mozarella, cubed
• 1/4c Fresh Basil, chopped
• 1/2c Provolone, grated (OR 6 thin slices from deli)
• 1/4c Parmesan Cheese, grated or shredded (I like it shredded for topping)
• 1Tbs Olive Oil (for drizzling)

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 450F.
2. Pound chicken to 1/2" thickness. I like to toss my chicken breasts into a gallon ziplock bag, and pound with the back side of a cooking ladle. Unconventional, but the Calphalon ladle doesn't slice my bag and the bag keeps all of those funky chicken juices contained.
3. Get out 3 shallow salad bowls. Place flour in the first bowl; beaten eggs in the second; combined panko and parmesan cheese in the third.
4. Dip each breast into the three bowls: coat with flour, dunk in egg, toss into panko/parm. I personally like to go back and dunk in the egg and panko/parm a second time. I really like carbs.
5. Lightly fry breasts until golden brown.
6. Place breasts in 9x13" baking dish. 
7. Top breasts with tomato sauce, mozzarella, fresh basil, provolone, and parmesan (in that order).
8. Finally, drizzle some olive oil over the top and pop it in the oven for 15-20min.
9. Make sure your chicken reaches 165F. We use a digital meat thermometer that keeps track of what kind meat you're cooking and what the suggested internal temp should be. If you don't have one of these, put it on your Christmas list!

Crock Pot Hibachi Chicken & White Sauce Recipes

This isn't a common recipe on the web. Sure, there are lots of recipes for Hibachi, but VERY FEW for crockpots. So I wasn't really sure what I was going to get when I dumped all the ingredients into a gallon ziplock the night before. Here's the original recipe from Designed by Dawn Nicole. Here's my version.

Ingredients

• 2 pounds boneless skinless chicken thighs (breasts work too), trimmed of fat and cut into bite size pieces
• 1/2 cup soy sauce
• 1/3 cup packed brown sugar
• 2 tbsp sesame oil
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/2 cup thinly sliced scallions (optional)
• 1 tbsp toasted sesame seeds (optional)
• 4-6 cups white rice (can be made ahead of time and frozen)
• 1 onion, medium and sliced
• 1 zucchini, large and sliced
• 1 cup mushrooms
• 1 cup cabbage or baby bok choy
• 2 tbsp oil for frying

Directions

1. Combine chicken, soy sauce, brown sugar, sesame oil, and garlic in gallon bag. (Can be made ahead of time and frozen.)
2. Toss contents of bag into crockpot on HIGH for 2 hours. Your chicken may need to cook longer, but CHECK IT at 2 hours. It should definitely not need more than 3 hours.
3. Meanwhile, steam the onion, zucchini, mushrooms, and cabbage. (I don't really care for cabbage, so I just stuck with the other 3 for steaming.) When finished, toss into the crockpot to soak up some of that sweet sauce!
4. Fry your white rice in a bit of soy sauce for flavor and color.
5. Plate your crockpot creation over fried rice.

Clearly, you're missing the best part of the meal if you stop here. Please read on! Drizzle (or POUR if you're me) the coveted white sauce over the plate. Here's the recipe I used for mine. It makes just over a cup of sauce. You MIGHT have some left over after the meal depending on how much you love white sauce.

Ingredients

• 1-1/4 cup Hellman's mayo (HAS to be Hellman's)
• 1/4 cup water
• 1 tbsp butter, melted
• 1 tsp tomato paste (HAS to be paste)
• 1 tsp white sugar
• 1/2 tsp garlic powder
• 1/4 tsp paprika
• dash cayenne pepper (you can get away with skipping this, but it won't be perfect)

Directions

1. Combine all ingredients and wisk together.
2. Refrigerate overnight. (But in a pinch, you can make it an hour before.)
3. Serve room temp.

Crock Pot Pork Tenderloin Recipe

This recipe from AllRecipes.com was nothing short of AH-Mazing! We used the 2-pack of tenderloins from Costco and planned to have a good amount of leftovers....but that didn't happen. It went well with some mashed potatoes and broccoli (with cheese, because we are cheese lovers).

Ingredients:

• 2lb pork tenderloin
• 1 envelope dry onion soup mix
• 1c water
• 3/4c red wine (or 1 mini bottle)
• 3Tbs minced garlic
• 3Tbs soy sauce, reduced sodium
• freshly ground black pepper to taste

Directions:

• Place all ingredients in crock pot
• Cook on High for 3.5hr

One special change you'll want to make is to cook this on HIGH for 3.5 hours, not LOW for 4. I think the original poster must have made a mistake. For the red wine, we used a cabernet sauvignon. Since we don't typically keep alcohol in the house, we usually buy the mini-bar bottles that come in 4-packs when a recipe calls for it. We've tried the "cooking wines" in the past, and those are full of salt (as a preservative). It's better to just get the real stuff in smaller quantities, albeit less cost effective. This recipe is a great freezer meal. Simply combine all ingredients in a gallon ziplock bag and freeze until you're ready. Thaw overnight. You can also freeze the marinade part separately if you want to make up a few bags using a full size bottle of wine. The marinade portions fit nicely into quart ziplock bags. If you've got leftovers, try pulling the pork and saving for later to use on sandwiches with your favorite BBQ sauce.

As a side note, let's take a moment to talk about fresh minced garlic. There. Is. No. Substitute. Do not use one of those bottles of minced garlic. Don't grab the dehydrated flakes. Fresh garlic is amazing and will change your life. When you go to the grocery store, buy a head of garlic (looks like a white ball with some roots coming out of the bottom). When ready to use, pull off a few small cloves (look like oval pieces). Next, peel them. You can easily peel the skin off of the individual cloves by pinching the clove or rolling it around on the countertop. Finally, place your skinless cloves into your press. I love my Pampered Chef garlic press, specifically because it comes with a cleaning brush that clips into the handle when not in use. If you don't have one of these, get one. ...And while you're at it, buy one for a friend too!

Chicken Broccoli Rice Casserole Recipe

Chicken Broccoli Rice Casserole by Money Saving Mom has a few more steps than I like in preparing a freezer meal, but I LOVE that Crystal's recipe makes 4 batches. That's right, I said FOUR! One for you and three to give away!

Her recipe calls for cooked amounts of food, which wasn't very helpful to someone like me who doesn't know a whole lot about how much raw is required to make cooked portions. Thank goodness for Google....and my own mistakes :)

For reference, 10c cooked rice is made from 7.5c of uncooked rice, and 4c cooked chicken is made from 3 breasts. I really like the way she bakes her chicken. She chops it then bakes it on a cookie sheet! Genious! I rubbed poultry seasoning on my chicken before baking. It took about 10 minutes to bake, turning about halfway through. I also baked my chicken on a Silpat so that I didn't have to worry about the chicken sticking. Love my Silpats!

In the future, I would cook the rice in chicken stock rather than water for more flavor. Additionally, I found the defost time of 8 hours to be too short if you're pulling this out of a chest freezer. I also increased the cook time to 60 minutes instead of 30 to get my casserole nice and bubbly.

Crock Pot Mongolian Beef Recipe

This recipe by Who Needs a Cape was SO simple to assemble and did not require any prep beyond opening containers. In short, this is my kind of recipe! I made two bags since you'll use a full jar of hoisin sauce with a double recipe. For this meal, I only defrosted and cooked one of the bags.

I followed the recipe with only one substitution (shallots in place of onions), and the crockpot was smelling like a tasty Asian restaurant after about 3hr on low in my crockpot. I continued to cook on low until we hit 6hr. In my opinion, we should have eaten this dish at 3-4hr. By six, the meat was chewy and the smell wasn't as appetizing. It was just overdone. I added 1/4c of water around 4 hours because I thought it looked a bit dry, but that didn't prevent the resulting dry meat.

Before serving, I heated up a steamer bag of broccoli and tossed it (drained, of course) into the crockpot so the broccoli could soak up some of that delicious sauce. Then I plated the beef and broccoli over white rice.

This meal froze, defrosted, and cooked beautifully (despite the suggested cook time being too long). Definitely an EASY freezer/crock-pot meal to file away for the future!

Pioneer Woman's Hamburger Soup Recipe

This recipe was GREAT. Despite the time it took to chop everything, it was easy to throw together for the actual cooking part. It helped that I could chop throughout the day as time permitted. It made a ton! The wonderful thing about cooked soup is that it is perfect for freezing. I was able to make two gallon freezer bags (with 4 cups each) in addition to what we ate for dinner that night. Those two bags went into the freezer!

Before I tossed them in to freeze, I wrote the date and directions for reheating on the bags. I also wrote down suggested sides. My goal with these freezer portions is two-fold:

• Make dinners for myself a snap!
• Have meals on hand to deliver to others, that don't require being eaten the same day.

In the last 7 days, Brian and I have heard of 4 families that could use a meal. Two families just got more foster kiddos, one welcomed a new baby this past weekend, and the fourth family just needs a break. Looking forward to this new ministry of freezer meals thanks to the inspiration of Roshena over at Grey House Green Door who has blessed us REPEATEDLY with freezer/fridge meals and desserts!

Pioneer Woman's Bowtie Chicken Alfredo Recipe

Source: Pioneer Woman

I've heard about this pioneer gal for some time. Seems like she's got some fabulous recipes out there, so I thought I'd click over to her site and take a look. I really enjoy her writing style and her attitude toward food prep. She appears confident but not obsessive, which I would love to become!....both parts....confident in cooking and no longer obsessive about getting my ingredients just right :)

The Bowtie Chicken Alfredo was my first attempt at one of Pioneer Woman's recipes. The recipe was easy. I enjoyed ALL of the pictures. I did not use my cast iron because I couldn't count on being able to stand next to my stove with two kids under the age of two needing my attention, so I changed up the chicken portion. I cubed 3 breasts and covered them in olive oil and poultry seasoning, then tossed them on a cookie sheet in the oven for about 20 minutes. They came out extra moist and delicious, but I admit that this change probably had some overall effect on the flavor of the dish. I also didn't have any fancy white, dry wine....I just had a small bottle of white and since I'm wine illiterate, who knows if it was dry. This was probably a bad idea. I should have googled the name on the bottle to see if I could use it with the recipe......but again, the two kids under two thing was a bit of a priority.

The end result was simply ok. Not fantastic. It was easy and quick, but I probably wouldn't use this recipe again. I've got another recipe from E-Meals that adds baby bella mushrooms, and boy is that recipe ever amazing! Also, the serving size listed by Pioneer Woman is 6. She must have 6 adults in that household! It made a ton! Brian and I ate healthy portions the night of, had some for lunch the next day, and still had at least 4 more servings left. I would definitely cut this recipe in half or thirds next time.......