My Lime Green Kitchen

This recipe is not low fat, nor is it low cal, though you could probably make some adjustments.  But, it’s very good, very easy and leftovers are even better!

Ingredients:

2 cans Veg-all
1 can Cream of Mushroom Soup
1 can sliced Water Chestnuts
1 cup Mayonnaise
2 cups shredded Cheddar Cheese
1 med. onion, chopped
1/2 stick butter
1 pkg. of Ritz Crackers

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350.

Saute onion in butter. Mix all ingredients except butter and Ritz Crackers. Crush crackers and brown in butter. Sprinkle on top of casserole. Bake at 350° for 30 minutes.

For the cake portion, you can use any brioche type recipe. The “cake” is more like a slightly sweet bread.

Ingredients:

1 envelope Active Dry Yeast
2 T. warm water
1 tsp. salt
4 T. granulated sugar
1/4 c. milk
2 c. all purpose flour
1/2 tsp. cardamom (If you don’t have cardamon, use 1 tsp. cinnamon. Cardomom is a bit less common for most of us and seems a bit “mystical” but cinnamon will certainly work too.)
2 eggs, beaten
1 – 1/4 sticks cold unsalted butter, cut into very small pieces.

Dissolve the yeast in the water and let stand til frothy.

Dissolve the salt and sugar in the milk. When dissolved combine the milk mixture with the yeast mixture.

Mix the cardamom with the flour.

Add the eggs to the yeast/milk mixture. Gradually add the flour. Knead for about 10 minutes until smooth and elastic. Add a little more flour if needed but leave the dough slightly on the sticky side. Just as the dough is almost ready, add the chopped butter and knead only until the butter is incorporated into the dough.

Turn the dough into an oiled bowl, loosely cover with plastic wrap and let rise for 1 hour in a warm spot.

When the dough has doubled in bulk punch it down, cover and place in the refrigerator overnight.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

Roll the dough out to a 8 x 20 inch rectangle. Spread the almond filling(recipe below) out in the middle of the rectangle along the whole length, leaving about 1 inch on each side. Fold the length of the dough over the filling and roll up tightly, leaving the seam side down. Turn the roll into a circle, seam side down and put one end inside of the other to hide the seam, and seal the circle. Place the cake on a baking sheet and let rise, loosely covered with plastic wrap, for 45 minutes or until doubled in bulk.

Bake at 350 for about 30 minutes, or until golden brown (seems to only take about 20 minutes for me).

When the cake cools, spread on some of the glaze (recipe below). Decorate with the colored sugars and drizzle some of the thicker glaze onto the cake.

For the Almond filling:

1 can almond paste
1/2 stick butter
2 c. dry bread crumbs
1/3 c. sugar
1 tsp. almond extract

This gets real thick and it is better to use as stand mixer.

Mix the almond paste and butter. When totally mixed, add the bread crumbs, sugar and almond extract.

Glaze:

1 c. powdered sugar
1 tsp. melted butter
Half & Half to make the glaze the consistency desired
1/2 tsp. almond extract

NOTE: Because I love lots of icing/glaze, I double this recipe.

Last year I stayed with a fellow quilter, Darlene, while in St. Louis.  She had made this soup and it was so good.  I asked for the recipe, which she gave me and she also gave me permission to share it here.

This soup is hearty and so good.  I do believe Chad could eat the entire batch by himself!

Iowa Chowder

Ingredients:

1 cup onions, diced
1 cup celery, diced
1/4 cup butter
2 T. flour
2 cups water
3 cups potatoes, diced and cooked
1 – 17 oz. can whole kernel corn, drained
1/8 tsp. ginger
salt & pepper to taste
2 bay leaves
2 cups ham, diced
1-1/2 cups evaporated milk
8 oz. cream cheese

For the ginger, I don’t always have fresh ginger around and I like it so much better than powdered ginger.  This is what I use.  I can keep it in the fridge much longer than fresh ginger would keep.

Directions:

Saute onions and celery in butter.  Mix flour with water.  You can use the cooking water from the potatoes, or liquid from the corn.  Stir until flour is completely mixed and lumps are gone.  Add to onion and celery mixture.  Stir until thickened.  Add potatoes, corn, bay leaves, ginger, salt, pepper and ham.  Stir in milk and cream cheese.  Heat until cream cheese is melted.

Darlene’s hints:

I dice the potato before cooking and cook until just tender – do not overcook.
Sometimes I add more corn than is called for.
Do not over salt as the ham adds saltiness.
Keeps well for several days in the fridge or can be frozen.
Serves 6 – 10 depending on serving size.

My Hint:

Do not try to feed 6 – 10 people if Chad is eating at your house!

One night on TV I saw this dish being made but there was no recipe.  I’ve searched and tried a couple of versions and came up with this one that we loved.  Feel free to add more or less of the spices — build it to suit your own tastes.  Many of the recipes I found showed serving this over noodles so if you don’t want to make the potato dumplings, just boil a package of noodles!

This recipe looks a lot harder than it is. It was harder for me to take all the pictures and write all these words than it is to make the darned recipe!

Chicken Preparation:

1 whole chicken, cut up
1 small onion, sliced

The night before you plan to serve:
Season chicken with salt, pepper, garlic powder (anything else you want to add). Pour 1/4 cup oil over the chicken. Refrigerate overnight.

The day of serving:
Slice onion and place in 9″ x 13″ baking pan. Place chicken on top of onions.

Bake uncovered at 350° for 1 hour.

Ingredients for Potato Dumplings:

1-1/2 c. mashed potatoes – make sure there are no lumps or use instant mashed potatoes
2 eggs
1/2 c. sour cream
Flour
2 cups bread crumbs
1/2 stick butter

Directions for Potato Dumplings

Make the mashed potatoes and season them with salt and pepper. You may want to add just a little more salt than you would for regular mashed potatoes. By the time you add in the flour, they end up needing a bit more salt.

Stir in the eggs and sour cream. Turn out onto a floured surface, adding flour and kneading til the dough is just a bit sticky but can be worked with.

Pinch off little marble sized balls. Roll in the palm of your hand almost like a tootsie roll. Drop into boiling salted water and gently boil until the float. Remove from water as soon as they float. Drain on paper towels. Place in buttered casserole dish.

Melt the butter. Stir in bread crumbs. Spread over dumplings. Set aside for now.

Ingredients for Sauce:

¼ c. olive oil
1 chopped onion
1 chopped green pepper
3 cloves garlic, chopped
1 can tomato paste (I used about 1/2 cup of double strength tomato paste in a tube)
2 cans chicken broth (I used one quart of home canned smoked chicken broth)
1 tsp. black pepper
½ tsp. marjoram
1 tsp. paprika
½ tsp. red pepper flakes
1 tsp. garlic powder
1 T. beef boullion granules
1 T. chicken boullion granules
2 bay leaves
3 T. flour
1 c. sour cream

Directions for Sauce:

Saute onion, garlic and bell pepper in olive oil. Add tomato paste, chicken broth, boullion and spices.

Simmer slowly for about  an hour. If too much of your liquid cooks out, add 1 cup (or more if needed) of water.

NOTE:  Stick the potato dumplings in the oven at 350º for 30 minutes.

Add cooked chicken to sauce and simmer for another half an hour.

Remove chicken.

Mix flour with 1 cup cold water. Stir into sauce and continue simmering and stirring til sauce thickens.  Stir in sour cream and continue stirring til dissolved.  Return chicken to sauce. Serve immediately or keep warm til time to serve.

To serve, place potato dumplings in bowl. Spoon meat and sauce over dumplings.

My great grandma was Grandma Stroud . . not Grandma Himel.  She always had tea cakes.  I have tried every tea cake recipe I find hoping to duplicate my great grandma’s tea cakes.  I probably don’t even remember at this point what they tasted like but I have this thought in my head about them.  My lovely friend from south Louisiana, Nita, shared a recipe from one of her neighbors from their Grandma Himel.  I immediately made them and they’re very, very close to my great grandma’s . . as close as I’ve come.

When I made them, I halved the recipe.  For three eggs, use either 1 very large or 2 very small eggs and it works.  The recipe calls for vanilla butternut extract.  I’d never heard of that and used clear vanilla.   Nita said she ordered the vanilla butternut extract from Amazon.

Ingredients:

6 cups flour
6 teaspoons baking powder
2 cups sugar
2 sticks butter or margarine
1 cup milk
3 eggs
1 oz. vanilla butternut extract

Directions:

Melt butter.  Add extract, eggs, sugar, and milk. Mix well.  Stir in flour and baking powder.  Roll out, cut with cookie cutter.  Bake on an ungreased cookie sheet at 350° for 13 – 15 minutes.  They will not be brown but a light yellow.

There are as many ways to make meatballs as there are most anything else you might want to do.

For this recipe, there are no specific amounts.  I never measure for meatballs.  I’m just going to tell you step by step what I do and you can take it from there.

When I make meatballs, I make LOTS of meatballs and freeze them.  In the summer, when tomatoes are plentiful, I make and can my spaghetti sauce.  We have spaghetti and meatballs almost every Sunday.  It’s so simple to open a couple of jars of spaghetti sauce, throw in some meatballs and let it all simmer and with little effort, we have a yummy meal.

For this batch of meatballs, I used two bowls and exactly the same ingredients are in each bowl.  I don’t have a bowl large enough to mix up this size batch so that’s why I used two bowls.

Start with bread crumbs (in the lighter blue bowl).  When I see marked down sour dough bread at Wal-Mart, I buy it.  I either cut it into chunks and freeze it for bread pudding or I put it in the food processor and make bread crumbs and put those in the freezer.  These particular bread crumbs came from the freezer.  Pour milk over the bread crumbs til they’re moist — no milk standing but the crumbs are very moist.

The white bowl in front on the left is onions/garlic.  I put that through the food processor and it’s soupy.  That’s how I want it.

In each dark bowl I have 3 pounds of ground beef and 1 pound of ground pork.

To the meat bowl, dump half of each:

• the soaked bread crumbs
• the onion mixture
• 3 eggs

Chop the parsley and add half to each meat mixture bowl.  Season with salt, pepper, basil and oregano.

Add about 1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese to each bowl.  Mix thoroughly.

Start out by browning one little patty in hot oil.

This little patty is for you to taste and make sure the seasonings are correct.  If it needs more of anything, fix it up, then cook another little patty and taste it to be sure it’s right.

Once you’re happy with the seasonings, shape the meatballs and brown them.  I don’t cook mine all the way through but just kinda brown them on the outside so they hold their shape and then drop them into simmering sauce to continue cooking.

When freezing them, my preferred method is to flash freeze them (lay them out on a cookie sheet and freeze them, then place them in ziplock bags.  You can then take out as many as you need without them being all stuck together.) but my freezers are so full, I didn’t have room to flash freeze these.

I put 16 meatballs in a vacuum seal type bag, barely vacuum it (too much vacuuming will smash them all flat), seal the bag and freeze them.

From this batch, I got 7 bags, each with 16 meatballs.  When we have spaghetti and meatballs on Sunday, we have meatball sandwiches for lunch on Monday or Tuesday . . that’s why I put 16 meatballs in each bag.

Chad isn’t much of a carrots fan and he loved these.  He even asked for them another night.

Dilly Sweet Carrots

Ingredients:

3 c. sliced carrots
3 T. butter
3 T. brown sugar
2 tsp. dill weed
1 tsp. black pepper

Directions:

Gently boil carrots in salted water til al dente.  Drain.

Add remaining ingredients, simmering slowly til butter and sugar are melted.

Serve them hot (vs. chilled).

Crunch, sweet, sour . . so good!  This keeps for several days in the fridge.  If you’re making more than you’re going to serve right away, keep the crunchies (ramen noodles, sesame seeds, and slivered almonds) separate and add them right before serving.
1 head napa cabbage
1 bunch minced green onions
1/3 cup butter
1 (3 ounce) package ramen noodles, broken
2 tablespoons sesame seeds
1 cup slivered almonds
1/4 cup cider vinegar
3/4 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup white sugar
2 tablespoons soy sauce

Shred  the head of cabbage. Combine the green onions and cabbage in a large bowl, cover and refrigerate until ready to serve.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Make the crunchies: Melt the butter. Mix the ramen noodles, sesame seeds and almonds into the pot with the melted butter. Spoon the mixture onto a baking sheet and bake the crunchies in the preheated 350 degrees, turning often to make sure they do not burn. When they are browned remove them from the oven.  Cool completely

Make the dressing: In a small saucepan, heat vinegar, oil, sugar, and soy sauce. Bring the mixture to a boil, let boil for 1 minute. Remove the pan from heat and let cool. Combine dressing, crunchies, and cabbage immediately before serving. Serve right away or the crunchies will get soggy.

Two things I want you to know about this recipe:

1. If you think you don’t like lamb . . just try this recipe.  It’s so good . . so very good.  I think we’re going to have it every day in 2010! 
2. If it looks hard . . it’s just because it’s long and I took too many pictures.  It’s not hard.  It’s so easy and it sits in the oven forever while you sew or knit or shop online.  And, while it’s cooking, it makes your house smell so good!

I adapted this recipe from a FoodNetwork recipe.  One thing I changed from the original recipe is their recipe calls for lamb shanks and while I generally prefer shanks for soups and stews, for lamb I prefer chops.  The bone is still in there so you get some added flavor, they’re very tender and they don’t have all that connective tissue and fat that has that kinda strange “lamby” taste.  I love lamb chops but do not like leg of lamb at all so maybe it’s just me.

And, in my picture you’ll see that I have whole cloves and the recipe calls for ground cloves.  I ran out of ground cloves!

Ingredients:

3/4 c. flour
Salt & Pepper to taste
8 or 9 lamb chops, trimmed of all visible fat
Olive oil
5 cloves garlic, chopped
1 pound carrots, sliced about 1/2″ thick
1 large onion, coarsely chopped
2 bay leaves
1/2 tsp. dried thyme
1/4 tsp. ground cloves
3 cups red wine
2 quarts beef stock
1 cup barley
6 large russet potatoes

For Topping

12 – 14 cloves garlic, finely chopped
Salt & Pepper
1-1/2 cups chopped fresh parsley
1 stick butter
2 T. olive oil.

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350°.

Season flour with salt and pepper . . whatever amount you think you need.  You can adjust seasonings later.  Dredge lamb chops in flour.

Brown the chops in olive oil over medium-high heat.  They do not need to be fully cooked — just nice and brown.

Remove lamb chops to another dish.  If you need a bit more olive oil in the pot, add it.  Add the carrots, onion and 5 cloves chopped garlic.  Cook til onions are clear.

Add thyme, cloves and bay leaf.  Continue to cook for a couple of minutes.  Return lamb chops to pan.  Add wine, beef stock and barley.  Cover and place in oven for 2 hours.

For the Topping:

While the stew is cooking, chop the remaining garlic and parsley.

Melt butter in a pan and add olive oil oil.  Add the garlic and parsley. Season to taste with salt and pepper.  Simmer over low heat for 20 minutes.  Remove from heat and let sit til needed.

After the stew has been cooking for 2 hours, remove from oven.  Peel potatoes and cut into half lengthwise.  Lay on top of stew (like a crust).  You may have to cut some of the potatoes to get all the holes covered and get them to fit.  It doesn’t have to be perfect though.  Put about half of the garlic/parsley mix on top of the potatoes.  Cover the dish and place the dish back in the oven and cook another 45 minutes.

Add the remaining garlic/parsley mix and continue to cook, uncovered for another 15-20 minutes.

Serve, making sure to place a lamb chop or two in every dish.

These rolls are great and the best part is you can make them ahead and keep the dough in the fridge for up to two weeks. The dough can be rolled out (like a biscuit) or shaped into a roll. They don’t rise as much as the typical yeast bread so if you want big, fluffy rolls, roll them out about 1/2″ thick. The story is that they’re called jailhouse rolls because they were rolled out thinner and passed between the bars in the jail. I can’t say from personal experience if that’s true or not.

Jailhouse Rolls

1 c. mashed potatoes
2 sticks butter or margarine
3 whole eggs
7 c. flour (maybe a little more)
1 1/2 tsp. salt
1 c. sugar
1 1/2 c. lukewarm water
1 pkg. dry yeast

I make mashed potatoes and use the potato water for the liquid.  Make sure the liquid is cooled down to about 110 – 115° before adding the yeast.  If the water is too hot, it will kill the yeast and dead yeast is not good!    I usually use about 1 cup of the potato water and add enough cold water to get it to 115°.  Make the potatoes as usual.  I use butter and cream.

Mix yeast in the warm water and let sit for 5 – 10 minutes.

Melt the 2 sticks of butter in a large bowl.  Add the sugar, eggs and salt.  Depending on whether you added salt to the potatoes as they were cooking (I do), you may want to add less salt than suggested.

Stir in potatoes.

Stir in flour.  Near the end, it may be easier to dump it all onto a floured countertop and knead it til smooth.

To make the rolls, shape into rolls or roll out and cut.  Place in a buttered baking dish.

Place the leftover dough in a zipper type bag and keep in the fridge til needed.

Let the rolls rise for several hours.

Butter the tops.  Bake at 450° for about 10 minutes.