Archives for January 2015

Veggie Buffalo Wings

January 28, 2015 by Ginger Leave a Comment

Veggie Buffalo Wings

News from the grapevine is that there’s a Superbowl this weekend. To be honest, I’m not a sports fan, but I AM a food fan. Unfortunately, this Snackasaurus can’t quite keep up like I used to, so I’m re-imagining the delicacies of my youth. Tonight, we’ll start with Buffalo Wings. This is a wonderful little recipe that will offer a vegetarian option of an old game day standard. Enjoy!

First let’s make the blue cheese dip then the flavors can mingle while we work on the veggie “wings”:

1/2 cup sour cream
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
1 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp seasoned salt
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp dry mustard
1/4 tsp turmeric
4 0z blue cheese (crumbled)
a bit of pepper to taste

Mix the sour cream and mayo together well, then blend in all the remaining ingredients. Cover and set aside. Tip: I would recommend purchasing a wedge of blue cheese and crumbling yourself, but do whatever is easiest for you. Additionally, I add turmeric to just about everything – it helps with arthritis in my fingers, and Alzheimer studies have shown its benefits to the brain. Win win in my book!

Veggie “Wings”

Cauliflower florets (bite size)
Baby carrots (halved lengthwise)
Parsnips (cut like French frie wedges)
Frank’s Red Hot Buffalo Wing Sauce
1 cup water
1 cup flour
1/4 tsp salt
Baking spray

Heat oven to 450 deg F. Wash, dry and cut your vegetables. If there are other vegetables that you prefer and roast well in the oven then definitely go for those – variety is the spice of life!

Now for the production line – in a bowl mix your water, flour and salt well. Then prepare a roasting pan, or cookie sheet with parchment paper OR a Silpat baking mat. In small batches place your veggies into the flour mixture, shake off excess batter then place on baking sheet. Allow space between all your veggies. (It’s best to just use your fingers, wielding spoons for this stage is a waste of time.)

When your pan is full take your baking spray and lightly spray across the tops to get them a little crunchy. Bake in oven for approximately 12 mins or until veggies begin to brown. (My oven is convection, so you may have to adjust to your oven type). When they begin to brown, remove from oven and place veggies into a bowl, add enough Wing Sauce to coat lightly, and return to baking pan, then oven. Set the “wing sauce bowl” aside, you’ll be using it again! Cook until sauce begins to bubble on the veggies, about 3-4 minutes.

Remove from oven and return to the bowl of wing sauce. Lightly coat the veggies again and serve immediately with blue cheese dip. Enjoy!

Chicken and Sweet Potato Pie

January 21, 2015 by Dan Leave a Comment

Chicken and Sweet Potato Pie

It’s 5:00pm. It’s been “one of those days”. Your butt would be dragging except it’s cushioned in the car seat and your on your way home. Thoughts soon turn to dinner. You want something easy, but it needs to be healthy too!

Such was our situation as we ambled into the grocery store. We walked out with the fixin’s for a one dish dinner that satisfied all our needs – and it’s non-dairy!

Ingredients:

1 Rotisserie Chicken from the grocery store (we chose “Savory” spiced)
1 bag of your favorite frozen vegetables
2 to 3 cups mashed potatoes (Instant are fine as are left overs, we used mashed white sweet potatoes – WAY better fiber and vitamin content)
3 cups chicken stock
1 egg, beaten
2 tablespoons flour
3/4 teaspoon dried rosemary
3/4 teaspoon dried thyme
Salt and Pepper to taste

Over medium low heat, pour 3 cups of chicken stock into a large skillet and add one beaten egg. Whisk to combine well, then mix in 2 tablespoons flour. Stir frequently until it starts to bubble and thicken.

If you don’t already have leftover mashed potatoes, it’s time to get your potatoes going too – and instant is well, nearly instant! Get ’em ready, they’re going to be needed shortly.

Next add the bag of vegetables (they’ve been defrosting on your counter, but if they’re still hockey pucks you can place the bag in lukewarm water to thaw a little). While the mixture comes back to a simmer, strip the meat off of your chicken and cut into bite sized pieces. We remove the majority of the skin from the pieces, true enough the skin has the most flavor, but it also has the majority of the fat – but if your long day calls for chicken skin then roll with it!

Add your chicken pieces to the skillet. When the mixture comes back to a simmer taste a wee bit to see how much salt and pepper to use then add accordingly. Stir well. Turn off the heat and put the mixture into a 9 x 9 baking dish. Top with the mashed potatoes and cook at 350 degrees F for 30 minutes. Be sure to put a cookie sheet on the lower rack to catch the liquid that is likely to bubble over. Turn your oven to broil and broil until lightly browned on top.

Enjoy!

Spice Trek……..Operation: Annihilate!

January 14, 2015 by Ginger Leave a Comment

Chef’s log, bottle date unknown. During a routine mission into the cabinet-nebula spices have been found faded, tasteless, as if some force has changed their very nature. Our mission is one of rescue and, if necessary, extermination of expired contents.

I have a confession to make, my spice cabinet had become so crammed full of spice bottles I had to start storing new ones in a second cabinet. Then, regularly used spices bottles were kept on the countertop. It was a horror. In total 104 bottles of spices “littered” my kitchen. With the resolve of a starship captain on an away mission of discovery I bushwhacked my way into the unknown.

I was surprised to find that I had not one, or two, but 4 spice bottles of celery (flake and/or seed), and I hate celery! I was also astonished to uncover not two or four but SIX bottles of allspice (2 whole, 4 ground). One by one, I removed each bottle from its place and lined them all up neatly by spice or herb on the counter. Then, with the help of McCormick’s Support Site I was able to remove 37 expired bottles from my collection. Not all of my bottles were stamped with an expiration so the guidelines that McCormick’s provided was really helpful! However, when all else fails, take a sniff. If it doesn’t smell fresh or “clean”, throw it out. Herbs and spices should delight our senses, from the bold color of curry to the sweet peppery odor of basil.

McCormick’s site recommends the following shelf life of herbs and spices:

• Ground Spices – 3 to 4 years
• Whole Spices – 4 years
• Leafy Herbs – 1 to 3 years
• Bottled Seasoning Blends – 1 to 2 years
• Extracts (Except Pure Vanilla) & Food Colors – 4 years
• Pure Vanilla – indefinitely
• Recipe Mixes (gravy, taco, etc.) – 2 years
• Marinades and Sauces – 12 to 24 months
• Seafood Box Mixes – 18 to 24 months

The greatest recipe known to man will fall flat if the herbs and spices used are outdated and tasteless. Next time you change the batteries on your smoke alarm (that’s every year btw), or for the overachievers – each time your car gets an oil change, do a quick check of your spice cabinet so that every dish you make can be it’s yummiest.

Pecorino Crisps

January 7, 2015 by Ginger Leave a Comment

It’s been fairly cold in our neck of the woods and a big plate of spaghetti was calling to me, but I wanted something different than just a hunk o’garlic bread beside my plate. So I tracked down this wonderful little recipe over at Pillsbury’s website called Herbs & Seeds Parmesan Crackers.

I altered the recipe to accommodate our wheat free, gluten free and bovine milk free household. To do that I used Bob’s Red Mill Biscuit and Baking Mix which is wheat free, gluten free, and dairy free. The texture is slightly grainy probably due to the bean flour, but it is delicious, and goes well with the silky gluten free rice pasta sold by Ronzoni.

Feel free to change out the herbs and seeds to better suit your palate!

2 Cups Bob’s Red Mill Biscuit and Baking Mix
1/4 teaspoon Garlic Powder
1 tablespoon crushed Rosemary
1 tablespoon Poppy Seeds
1 tablespoon Sesame Seeds
~ 1 cup of shredded Pecorino cheese
dried Basil
Sea Salt (we used pink Himalayan)

Place your baking sheet into the oven and preheat oven to 400F.

Prepare biscuit mix per instructions on back of the flour package. You’ll then want to turn this mixture out onto a flat surface for it’s final mixing by hand with all your assorted sprinkles. I covered my breadboard with a large sheet of freezer paper so I could keep the dough cold in the freezer while I did all the rolling & cooking of batches. It also made moving the dough off the breadboard (to roll out the dough balls) much easier!

Sprinkle the garlic powder, rosemary, poppy seeds, sesame seeds and about half a cup of the pecorino over the dough. Mix well by hand. Now it’s time to roll out the crisps. Note: My baking sheet is small so I rolled 3 crisps at a time, adjust your count by the equipment you have available.

Cover your breadboard with parchment paper. Roll dough balls in your hand approximately 1-inch in diameter and place onto this parchment spaced out for easy rolling. Now cover these dough balls with a 2nd sheet of parchment and roll out using a rolling pin, can of soup, or bottle of wine. I rolled mine ~1/8 to 1/4 inch.

Remove the top sheet of parchment, place onto your baking sheet, prick crisps with a fork, place in the oven and bake, check them in about 8 mins. If they are as crisp as you want, remove, sprinkle with basil, salt and more cheese. Enjoy the yumminess!

Christmas Oatmeal Cookies

January 1, 2015 by Dan Leave a Comment

oatmeal cookies

If you’re reading this post you’ve survived the holidays, congratulations! We have emerged from our food comas too to share with you one of our Christmas family traditions – baking a “goodie”. We bake lots of goodies going into the Christmas season, and this one is a favorite that combines healthy oats with dried fruits and nuts. Oh there’s chocolate of course, what would it be without that?!

Our recipe started as Quaker Oats “Vanishing Oatmeal Raisin Cookies” recipe at http://www.quakeroats.com/cooking-and-recipe/vanishing-oatmeal-raisin-cookies.aspx , we tweaked it a bit to put a little tingle in your kingle. Enjoy!

1 1/2 cups (3 sticks) Butter, softened
1 1/2 cups packed Dark Brown Sugar
1 cup Granulated Sugar
4 Eggs
2 teaspoons Real Vanilla Extract
3 cups All-purpose Flour
2 teaspoons Baking Soda
2 teaspoons Cinnamon
1 teaspoon Salt
6 cups Quick Quaker® Oats
2 cups Dried Cranberries
1 10 oz package Dark Chocolate Chips
1 12 oz package Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips
2 cups chopped Pecans

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Use your mixer to cream together the butter and sugars. Add the eggs (1 at a time) and then the vanilla. Beat until well combined.

In a separate bowl, mix well the flour, baking soda, cinnamon and salt. (You can also sift this together if you like.)

Slowly, a little at a time, add the dry ingredients to your wet ingredients. (At this point, the batch was too big for our mixer, so we had to move to a large metal mixing bowl and finish mixing by hand).

Now add the oats, cranberries, chocolate chips and pecans. Mix until evenly combined. (This part took both of us, one to hold the bowl and one to mix.)

Drop by round teaspoonsful onto an ungreased cookie sheet. Use your fingers or a spoon to press them into flat disks. These will not flatten out on their own. Bake until golden, about 8 to 10 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool on the cookie sheet for a minute or two. Move to a cooling rack and let cool.

We made just over 10 dozen small cookies with this recipe – enough to hand out for unexpected guests and of course a few to leave for Santa Claus.