Easy Beef Stroganoff Revisted

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Remember back in the 80′s and 90′s when television was actually good, and had actual seasons? I know some of the TV shows from other decades were or are now good, but for me at least those years were the best! The Cosby Show, M*A*S*H*, The Facts of Life, Little House on the Prairie, The Waltons, ER, Beverly Hills 90210 ( um, maybe not), The Wonder Years….I could go on for a while!!

Back then shows had more structured seasons, normally from September-May with a few reruns around Christmas, mid-season replacements, and then reruns all summer with a few specials thrown in for good measure. What’s my point, you ask?

Last summer I did pretty bad at posting new recipes, and even worse, I kept making excuses when really I didn’t have a good one. The truth is I’m just busy all summer, my birthday is June 1st, my daughter’s July 6th, in between is gardening, and cookouts, and being outside with my daughter. So, this summer, I have decided to do things differently. I have lined up some great blogging friends to guest post so you can look forward to some great new recipes there! I also have a few of my own recipes I want to revisit, take better pictures of and repost, including this one for Easy Beef Stroganoff. I wasn’t able to get a good picture when I first posted the recipe, and to be honest it’s just one of those things that doesn’t photograph well, but at least I got a picture this time. I will still be posting new recipes from time to time throughout the summer, I’m just not sure how often. Kind of like old television seasons.

Easy Beef Stroganoff

1 pound ground sirloin

1/2 cup chopped onion

2 cloves minced garlic

8 ounces sliced baby bella (portabella) mushrooms

2 cups beef broth

2 cups sour cream

3 tablespoons flour

salt and pepper to taste

Brown ground sirloin with the onions. Drain, add garlic, mushrooms, beef broth and salt and pepper. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer 15-20 minutes. Mix flour and sour cream in a bowl.  Stir sour cream into the beef mixture and simmer a few minutes more until thick and bubbly. Serve over egg noodles.

My daughter likes when I make Beef Stroganoff this way, only she DOES NOT like mushrooms, so I have to pick them out for her. Otherwise, I’m sure many kids would love this!

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Skillet Meaty Shells and Cheese

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I love making homemade sauces, and do it often, but sometimes I need something faster but still good. I also really, really love Italian food! The first time I made this was just to use up a box of macaroni that was about to expire. I had the macaroni around for a while after one last futile attempt to get my 3-year-old to eat homemade macaroni and cheese. I’ve given up on that for now. Anyway, this one pot dish came out better than I expected, and then I starting thinking it would be really good with mini shells….

One Pot Meaty Shells and Cheese – Adapted from The Good Home Cookbook Stovetop Macaroni and Beef

1 pound lean ground beef

1 medium onion, chopped

2 cloves garlic, minced

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 carton (33.5 ounce) or equivalent canned tomato sauce, with 3/4 to 1 cup water to rinse the container and add to the pot

2 cups mini shells

1 1/2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley

1/2 tablespoon dried Italian seasoning

salt and pepper to taste

2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese

1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese

Heat oil in a large skillet, and brown the ground beef  with the onion. Drain excess fat, add the minced garlic, tomato sauce, water, parsley, Italian seasoning, and salt and pepper. Stir in the mini shells, cover and simmer over medium-low heat for 15-20 minutes, stirring often, until the shells are tender.

Stir in the shredded mozzarella and Parmesan cheese, and serve immediately.

Perfect for a busy weeknight!

Flatout Flatbread Pizzas and an Amazing Giveaway

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I have a love/hate relationship with pizza. Some pizzas can be very, very good, but some can be very, very bad. I had never had a grilled pizza before, though, so when Flatout asked me to be a brand ambassador and try their new Thin Crust Flatbread as a grilled pizza, plus host an amazing giveaway of a trip for 2 to The Taste of Chicago, one of the country’s premiere food festivals this July, I thought it was a great idea! You can find the link to enter the giveaway at the end of this post, but first a little about Flatout and yummy pizza recipes.

Flatout has put together a Facebook landing page full of great grilled pizza recipes!  They are revealing a new recipe every day for 30 days, and some of the links include coupons, so be sure to check back!

The Thin Crust Flatbreads come in a variety of flavors, and can be found at a Walmart near you, just click on those highlighted words to find the closest store. I used to work at Walmart in the deli department, and was already familiar with Flatout products, so I can tell you they can be found in front of the deli department.  They are so easy to make into a yummy pizza, just a few minutes on the grill!

One of my favorite kinds of pizza is chicken wing pizza, so I knew immediately I would make a Grilled Chicken Wing Pizza, but I wanted to try something more healthy also. At first I thought of a veggie pizza, but my husband ( who ironically never had a healthy recipe thought before in his life) suggested I make a Spinach and Feta Grilled Pizza. Sounds good, right? I though so!

Grilled Flatout Thin Crust Flatbread Chicken Wing Pizza’s

For 2 Pizza’s you will need:

2 Flatout Thin Crust Flatbreads, Rustic White or flavor of your choice

1/2 cup cooked and shredded chicken for each pizza, 1 cup total

1/8 cup wing sauce for each pizza

1/4 cup Parmesan cheese for each pizza

1/4 cup crumbled bleu cheese for each pizza

Preheat grill to 350*F. Grill flatbreads for 1-2 minutes, with the lid closed. Remove from grill, brush with wing sauce, and top evenly with chicken, Parmesan and bleu cheeses. Return to grill and close lid, grill for 4-5 minutes more. Cut into pieces and enjoy!

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Grilled Flatout Thin Crust Flatbread Spinach and Feta Pizza’s

For 2 Pizza’s you will need

2 Flatout Thin Crust Flatbreads, Spicy Italian or flavor of your choice

1 cup washed and throughly dried spinach for each pizza

2 ounces crumbled feta cheese for each pizza

1 teaspoon minced garlic for each pizza

1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil for each pizza, plus a little extra drizzled over the top

Preheat grill to 350*F. Grill flatbreads for 1-2 minutes with the lid closed. Remove from grill and brush with olive oil. Top evenly with spinach, crumbled feta and minced garlic. Drizzle a little more extra virgin olive oil over the top of each pizza. Return to grill, close lid and grill for 4-5 minutes more. Cut into pieces and enjoy!

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Both of these pizza’s came out very good, the Thin Crust Flatbreads were nice and crispy and they hold together remarkably well considering how thin they are.  Now that you know you have to try these, head right to your local Walmart and pick up your ingredients!

Now, onto this great giveaway that Flatout has put together! Just click the link below that says a Rafflecopter giveaway to enter to win a two night trip for 2 to Taste of Chicago 2013! You can enter up to 6 times, so go ahead!

I am a paid blog ambassador for Flatout Thin Crust Flatbreads via MtoM Consulting. All opinions and recipe creation are my own. I am endorsing this giveaway, which is being handled by Flatout, and am in no way responsible for the outcome.

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Good For You Turkey Melt

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Arnold/Brownberry/Oroweat Breads provided me with coupons for product for this review. All opinions are my own.

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I don’t think I’ve mentioned it before here, but when I was pregnant with my daughter I was diagnosed with gestational diabetes. I failed the first and second stupid test by one point each time. I was NOT thrilled! I had none of the normal indicators that I would have it, I’m underweight, no family history that I know of, etc. But, I did and I was to control it by diet alone. This made my carb-loving self very sad! At least I didn’t have to do injections, I really don’t think I could ever do that to myself, and I hope I never have to!! I really did mostly hate the diet, though. My husband used it to his advantage to make steak ALL THE TIME, and I couldn’t eat potatoes like I used to. And I could forget pizza. Luckily, as soon as our daughter was born it was gone!

One of the few things I did enjoy eating during this time was  Arnold® Sandwich Thins® Rolls. They come in several different varieties, and my favorites were always the Multi-Grain and the Whole Grain White. For this sandwich I used the Multi-Grain, which has 100 calories per roll, no high fructose corn syrup, 11 grams of whole grain, and only 2 grams of sugar and 23 grams total carbohydrate. The best thing about them, they are quite delicious!

When making this sandwich I wanted it to be healthy, yet tasty. I thought about baking the turkey breast cutlets, but I thought that would make it too dry, and I was looking for a moist turkey breast. Honestly, I was hoping to be able to shred it, but I ran out of time to be able to cook it long enough to get to that point. I think next time I’ll put the turkey breast cutlets in the crock pot. This time I simmered them in water with a herb mixture to give it a Thanksgiving turkey kind of taste.

Good For You Turkey Melt

4 turkey breast cutlets ( 1 1/4 lb. I ended up using a little less than this, with each cutlet cut in half on the sandwiches, but I cooked all 4)

4 sprigs thyme

5 sprigs parsley

1/4 teaspoon poultry seasoning

4 Arnold® Sandwich Thins® Rolls, Multi-Grain or whichever you like!

baby spinach

sliced tomato

sliced avocado

1/3 pound lacey swiss cheese

Put the turkey breast cutlets in a medium saucepan with the thyme, parsley, and poultry seasoning, and cover with water. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, and simmer until cutlets are cooked through, reaching 180*F with a meat thermometer. Remove from the pot, and cut the turkey to fit the rolls. Preheat oven to 350*F. Place pieces of turkey on bottom of rolls, placed on a baking sheet. Put the tops upside down on the baking sheet. Top the turkey with folded pieces of swiss, and bake in the preheated oven for 4 minutes, or until cheese is melted. Top with baby spinach, sliced tomato, and sliced avocado. Serve immediately.

These sandwiches take some time to make, so you could always cook the turkey the day before, then reheat before placing on the rolls.

Note:  Arnold® Sandwich Thins® Rolls are sold in the East under the Arnold name, Brownberry in the Mid-West, and Oroweat in the West.

Asparagus Soup with Dill Oil

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I’ve collected many cookbooks over the years, but one of my favorite’s remains Eating Royally by Darren McGrady. Mr. McGrady was a private chef to Princess Diana after starting out as a junior chef at Buckingham Palace. I love his cookbook because it is much more than just recipes, it tells stories of life at the palaces of the royal family, including both the lives of the palace cooks and the royal family themselves. I can tell you the Queen’s favorite foods, and what Prince William and Prince Harry liked to eat as children because of this cookbook. I have a love of history, but more so when it’s on a personal story level.

One of my favorite Spring vegetables is asparagus. I’ve been making this soup ever since I found it in Eating Royally, and I love it! I never really do much with asparagus besides steam it, otherwise, so this immediately caught my attention. I have made it many times since, and think it’s great for rainy Spring days.

Asparagus Soup with Dill Oil - Adapted from Eating Royally

For the soup:

2 pounds asparagus

1 stick unsalted butter

1 yellow onion, finely chopped

2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

4 cups chicken broth

salt and freshly ground pepper

For the Dill Oil:

1/2 cups chopped fresh dill

1/4 cup olive oil

1 teaspoon lemon juice

salt and pepper

Cut the flowered tops off of the asparagus, about an inch long and set aside. Chop the remaining asparagus into 1/2-to 1 inch pieces, discarding the bottom two inches.

Melt the butter over medium heat in a 4 quart pot. Add the onions and asparagus and saute until the onion is translucent and the asparagus begins to soften. Add the flour and cook for 1 minute, stirring constantly. Pour in the chicken broth and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat, and simmer for about 20 minutes, or until the asparagus is soft.

Meanwhile, in a small saucepan bring 3 cups of water to a boil. Blanch the asparagus tips for 1 minute, drain and run under cold water. The tips will be bright green and still crunchy, giving a great texture to the finished soup.

Once the asparagus is fully cooked, puree the soup well using a hand blender or traditional blender. Pass the soup through a mesh strainer into a clean saucepan, pressing down with a large spoon to achieve a perfectly smooth texture. At this point you can refrigerate the soup until the next day or continue.

For the dill oil, put the dill, olive oil, lemon juice, salt and pepper in a blender and blend until smooth and bright green in color. Taste and adjust the seasonings if the flavor is too bland.

Reheat the soup over low heat, don’t allow it to come to a boil. Ladle the soup into bowls and garnish with the asparagus tips, drizzling the dill oil over the top. Enjoy while pretending you are royalty!

Mozzarella and Prosciutto Salad

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The Laughing Cow® provided me with product for this review

This week Spring finally sprung around here! I’m in NE Pennsylvania, were it is winter 9 months out of the year! Ok, I might be exaggerating  just a little, but it feels like it for someone like me who loves it warm. 70 degrees is barely warm to me.

I was thinking of making prosciutto wrapped mozzarella with Mini Babybel© Mozzarella but when it reached almost 80 degrees on Tuesday I decided on hot dogs on the grill and a salad for dinner. Confession, I had never made a salad with meat in it before! So, I asked a few friends for some ideas on what to add besides the Mini Babybel© Mozzarella and prosciutto. You can find these great friends after this yummy recipe!

Before I get to the recipe first let me tell you a little about this yummy cheese. Great for a snack, in a salad like this, or in any recipe you like, Mini Babybel Mozzarella has only 50 calories per wheel and 20% of a days worth of calcium! I hardly ever drink milk, so I need all the calcium I can get from cheese. Being low in calories, this makes a great snack if your watching your weight.

Mozzarella and Prosciutto Salad

8 Mini Babybel© Mozzarella, sliced in half or in fours

1/4 pound thinly sliced prosciutto, chopped

1 tomato diced

1-2 ounces baby spinach

Olive Oil and Balsamic Dressing

1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil

1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar

fine sea salt and fresh ground pepper, to taste

Combine salad ingredients in a bowl and toss lightly to mix. In a small bowl combine dressing and use a hand mixer to mix well. Pour the dressing over the salad, cover and refrigerate up to an hour. Enjoy!

One note: My husband plated the dish in the picture, which I then ate. He put a good amount of prosciutto on it and I feel it was too much, it made the salad too salty. Try to split the prosciutto evenly between plates.

Thanks to Lysska from Cooking from a SAHM  and Monica from Sweet Heat Chefs for helping me come up with this recipe! I would thank Crumbs in my Mustachio also, but really all she did was argue the validity of croutons and tell us to eat more bread!  <3<3<3

Ranch Red Skinned Mashed Potatoes

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This is one of those recipes that I just came up with one night and had no clue it would be so good! I mean, I know how to make basic, extra creamy, garlic, whipped….so many different kinds of mashed potatoes, and they are good but this time I just rocked my mashed potatoes, if I do say so myself :) Until recently my daughter wouldn’t touch any kind of potatoes except French fries. Since she started preschool this past fall, she has eaten mashed potatoes at school, and maybe once or twice at home, but she still doesn’t love them. She LOVES ranch dressing though, so I thought she might eat these. I was wrong. No matter how much I tried to convince her they tasted like ranch dressing, she wouldn’t try them. Oh, well, maybe next time!

Since I just made these for my husband and myself basically, what I’m giving you here doesn’t make a lot, but it’s easy to change to how many people you want to serve. I figure about two potatoes per person, that way you MIGHT have some left over, but I have to warn you I liked these better than the main dish that day so between the three of us there wasn’t any left!

Ranch Red Skinned Mashed Potatoes

6 medium red potatoes, scrubbed well and unpeeled with any bad spots cut off

1/2 cup heavy cream

2 tablespoons powdered ranch dressing mix

2 tablespoons butter

salted water

Put enough water to cover the potatoes into a pot large enough to hold them. Slice the scrubbed potatoes thin, add to the pot, add salt and bring to a boil. Reduce heat slightly and cook for 15-20 minutes or until potatoes are soft. Drain the potatoes and return to the turned off burner ( the heat helps absorb the extra cream, while the larger amount of cream makes the potatoes easy to mash) and pour in the cream, ranch dressing mix and butter. Mashed with a potato masher until desired consistency. I like mine pretty smooth, but not completely! Enjoy!!

Linked to: Sunflower Supper Club Weekend Potluck

Lemon Bars – A Recipe Swap

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One year ago today I started this blog. This has been an awesome year! 50 recipes, two restaurant reviews, a product review and some posts with me just rambling later, and I’ve learned a lot. Mainly I’ve learned that my photography skills need a lot of work, but I’ve also learned that some people really do like my recipes, and I love that! I even had two of my recipes from here put into a cookbook! That is why I started this in the first place, I wanted to share my love of cooking with the people who read this. Along the way I’ve “met” other bloggers, and today a few of them are just like my friend’s in “real” life. Most of them are food bloggers, but some aren’t. Ironically, the blogger that wrote the cookbook that I’m featured in isn’t a food blogger! All my love to Jodi Ambrose <3

A few days before Easter I was looking for either a lemon bar or lemon pie recipe to make for Easter dessert. Instead of looking through my cookbooks or searching online I asked a few of my foodie friend’s if they had one, and my friend Cindy from Hun, What’s For Dinner? came to my lack of dessert planning rescue! Cindy is awesome! She’s married to a chef but she does most of the cooking at home, and has had her blog for almost 5 years! I wonder if I’ll make it that long..

Lemon Bars (Original recipe here)

For the crust:

2 cups flour

1/2 cup powdered sugar

1 cup butter or margarine ( I used butter, the original recipe calls for margarine. Either works, so use what makes you happy :) )

For the filling:

4 eggs

2 cups sugar

1/3 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice

1 teaspoon lemon zest

1/4 cup flour

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

Prepare the crust: Preheat oven to 350* F. Combine two cups flour with the powdered sugar. Cut in butter or margarine and stir until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Press into an 8×13 baking dish and bake for 20-25 minutes, or until edges being to brown slightly.

While the crust is baking, prepare the filling. Beat the eggs together with the sugar, lemon juice and zest, flour and baking powder until well combined.

Once the crust is baked pour the filling over the crust and return to the oven for 25 minutes or until the filling is set. Sprinkle with additional powdered sugar and allow pan to cool completely before cutting into squares.

My mother, sister and I loved them! My daughter only liked the powdered sugar, ha! Then she wanted to eat a whole lemon!

Roasted Chicken Broth

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I’ve been making homemade chicken broth for a few years now. I used to call it “stock” but I have since discovered that because I make it with the chicken meat and not just the bones it is considered broth. Broth is also normally seasoned with salt, and stock is not. Stock is more of a base to be used in another recipe, which would then be seasoned. Broth is more of a finished product, because of the use of the meat giving it a richer flavor. I guess technically the way I made it this time is more of a stock than the other way I make it…Ok, I’m obsessing. For the most part you can use either interchangeably. Either way, homemade is much better than store-bought, and much less salty!

This was the first time I ever made “roasted” chicken broth. I normally just simmer the chicken with the carrots, celery, etc, but I found out about two years ago that my turkey broth is MUCH better roasted, so I wanted to try it with chicken. I made a roasted chicken a few days before, so I had the bones right on hand, but you can also freeze a carcass with some leftover chicken meat in a freezer bag to make into broth at a later time.

Roasted Chicken Broth

Carcass, whole wings and legs ( meat and skin still on) of a 5-6 pound roasted chicken

3 carrots, peeled with the tops cut off and cut in half

3 stalks celery with some leaves

1 whole yellow onion, unpeeled

4-5 cloves garlic, unpeeled

small handful fresh parsley, stems on

5 black peppercorns

2 bay leaves

cold water ( enough to cover everything in the pot)

Put the carcass, legs, and wings on a roasting pan and put in a preheated 400 degree F oven for 40 minutes, turning after 20 minutes. Remove from the roasting pan, letting the grease drip off,  and put in a large stock pot along with the carrots, celery, onion, garlic, parsley, peppercorns and bay leaves. Cover with cold water, bring to a boil, reduce heat and cover. Simmer for 2-3 hours. You can skim the foam that rises to the top with a spoon over the simmering time. The longer it simmers the more flavorful the finished broth will be! I admit I’ve made broth/stock in a hurry before, and it’s just not as flavorful, so I end up adding a lot of salt.

When it is done simmering, strain the broth through a fine mesh strainer lined with cheesecloth into another pot. Discard the vegetables.  Reserve and remove the chicken from the bones if you are planning on making chicken soup with the broth.  To cool the broth quickly, fill your sink with ice water, adding more ice as the water warms and stir the broth often. The easiest way I have found to skim the fat that rises to the top is to put the broth in containers and refrigerate until the fat hardens, but if you need the broth right away skim the top of the cooled pot with a spoon. You won’t be able to remove as much fat, but it will still be good! Once you have skimmed the fat, the broth can be frozen for up to 9 months. I normally always have some in my freezer, then make more as soon as it’s gone :)

Someday I will share the other way I make chicken broth, using a whole chicken, but right now I’m thinking I might stick with this way!

Linked to:

Home Cooking Memories Weekend Link Party #10

My First Foodie Meet Up!

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Did you ever plan a vacation based upon food? You know, choosing where you are going based on the culinary experiences available in the area?  This September 20-22 Taste Trekkers will hold the nation’s first food tourism conference. Organized by Seth Resler, the founder of the social dining group Mystery Meet, the conference will take place in Providence, Rhode Island, and I’m so excited to possibly have the opportunity to attend with a few of my food blogging friends! The conference isn’t just open to food bloggers or professionals, anyone with an interest in good food can attend. It will start with a cocktail reception on Friday evening, followed on Saturday with a keynote address by Chef Matt Jennings of Farmstead. The events will then continue with a tasting pavilion featuring regional foods and wines, breakout sessions focusing on the cuisine’s of different regions, and group dinners. Then on Sunday a food truck circle, sampling the great food trucks in downtown Providence, finally ending with culinary walking tours. You can find more information on the schedule of events and tickets at http://tastetrekkers.com/.

I love this idea, because it’s more about the food than the blogging side of it. I mean I love blogging, and sharing recipes with all of you, but the real reason I’m doing this blog is the food experiences I get to have. This would be the first time I get to attend a “foodie” event like this, in part because of the location! Most of these events seem to take place in the West, or I only find out about them two days in advance in New York City :( .

There is a catch, though. This conference will only happen if they can raise the funds needed to do so. They are relying on a Kickstarter Campaign to receive backers for this great idea. Now before you think I’m here begging you for money, I’m not. I know times are tough for most people. What I would like you to do is help me spread the word about this campaign. Just share this link wherever you can, that’s all. Of course, if you can afford it I’m not opposed to finding backers, either ;) . There are tons of people who would love to go to this event, and right now the cost isn’t that bad, but if they can’t get enough backers it won’t happen at all. There is a list of great things backers will receive including tickets to the events! All the information about supporting the conference can be found on the Kickstarter Project Page (http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/mysterymeet/taste-trekkers-food-tourism-conference/). I’m sure that if enough word gets out this conference will happen and then if I get to go I will be able to share this great experience with you all, including all of the great foods and wines I would sample and my first visit to Rhode Island ever! Of course, someone is going to have to talk my husband into letting me go…