New recipes

These last two months I have been trying at least one new recipe a week. To make things easier, the recipe doesn't have to be a main dish. It can be a side dish or salad or something like that. I think even a new salad dressing would count. Here are some of the things we've tried:

• Baked macaroni and cheese (like regular macaroni and cheese, but after you are done making it, you bake it for 30 minutes). We like the regular stuff just as much, so I don't know that I will bother to bake it.
  
• Zucchini-chicken pasta (Mindy's recipe, which I will put in the new cookbook). This was a good recipe. I used the sauce technique on another pasta recipe.
• Garlic-butter sauteed Brussels sprouts. Much better than it sounds, but not something you would do every week. Maybe once every two months with different vegetables.
• Eggs Benedict. This was a big hit with the children. The Hollandaise Sauce was very nice. I think it was the original sauce that would have been used in the broccoli-chicken recipes we have, but that has been changed to something easier using canned chicken soup and sour cream.
• Breakfast burritos. This was a big flop. No one would eat them.
• Grilled chipotle steak tacos. This was great. Even the children ate the meat.
• Beef rogan josh. This was like a beef curry with onions, served on rice.
  
• Cucumber dill salad.
  
• Chipotle chicken salad tacos. Another good, quick recipe from a Rick Bayless Mexican cooking book.
  

As always, if anyone has a good recipe to share, I'm happy to try new things. Sometimes we get tired of eating the same dishes every month--except for macaroni and cheese. The children don't ever get tired of that.

New granola recipe

Granola, plain
8 cups oats (old fashioned, rolled)
8 oz. coconut, optional
1-1/2 cups wheat germ or wheat bran
1 cup brown sugar
2 tsp. cinnamon
2 cups nuts, chopped (pecans, almonds, etc.)
½ cup sunflower seeds
2 Tb. sesame seeds, optional
½ cup water
½ cup oil
½ cup peanut butter
½ cup honey
1 tsp. vanilla, optional
Mix dry ingredients in large bowl. Combine the water, oil, peanut butter, honey, and vanilla in another bowl or measuring cup. I use a glass 2-cup measuring cup. Heat in the microwave for 1-2 minutes until warm and easily mixed together. Pour liquid over the dry ingredients and stir until everything is well mixed. Spread granola on two greased baking sheets. Bake for 45 minutes at 250°. Stir and switch location of baking sheets. Bake for an additional 45 minutes (1-1/2 hours total). Add dried fruit or other items as desired. This makes a chunky, nice granola.

Vegetables in Garlic Butter

1 lb. vegetables (Brussels sprouts cut in half, green beans, etc.)
1-1/2 Tb. butter
1-1/2 Tb. olive oil
3 cloves garlic, slightly smashed
Salt
Pepper
Parmesan cheese, if desired
Heat the butter, olive oil, and garlic in a saucepan until the garlic is lightly browned. Remove the garlic. Add the vegetables, being careful not to get splattered with hot oil when they hit the oil. Cover and cook for about 10 minutes until the vegetables are done. Add salt and pepper to taste. Serve hot.

This recipe was originally for Brussels sprouts and it is probably the only way that Brussels sprouts taste good. In fact, they were so good, I wanted to eat all of them myself and not share. (And I thought Brussels sprouts were among the worst vegetables to eat.) However, this technique can also be used for other vegetables, making a nice side dish to almost any meal. For example, I tried it on green beans yesterday.

Baby quilt

I made a baby quilt the other day, and after making several of this style, I think I have the correct dimensions now. This is a typical rag-style quilt, except I do stripes instead of blocks and I add a blanket binding around the edge since that's all my children really like about their blankets anyway.


For this quilt, I used four differently patterned fabrics (flannels), which I will call A, B, C, and D. I bought the following amounts of each fabric:
A=1 yard
B=20 inches
C=20 inches
D=20 inches
I washed, dried, and ironed the flannel. Then I re-folded the fabric in half and cut 5-inch wide strips of B, C, and D using my nice 5-inch wide ruler and a rotary cutter.

The A color was cut into four 6-1/2 inch strips and two 5-inch strips. In total, I had 6 strips of the A fabric and 4 of each of B, C, and D. I matched the fronts and backs of the strips of flannel together like you do for a rag quilt, but omitted any batting. I think the batting can make these blankets too heavy.

I used my nifty walking foot and guides (set at 2-1/2 inches) to get a pretty-near-perfectly-stitched straight line down the center of each strip--except for the two wider A strips, where I stitched the seam 2-1/2 inches from on side.

Then I arranged the strips in the pattern A-B-C-D-A-D-C-B-A and sewed them together. The two wider A strips were used at each end, sewn so the wider edge was toward the outside edges of the quilt. I started from the "top" of the quilt each time I sewed a strip on so that one end was all nicely matched and straight. The other end was "raggedy" since the strips weren't all the same length.

I trimmed off everything on the raggedy side and then sewed the ribbon binding around the edge. I used one package of binding ribbon and had a few inches left over. It is a 2-inch ribbon, so that when it is sewn on the quilt, it covers the outer 2 inches of the larger A strips; all the strips appear to be the same width.

I cut the seams and washed the quilt. Then I gave the quilt away.

The quilt took about 2 hours of ironing and sewing and an hour of clipping.

Sugar Cookie Icing

Here is another photo of sugar cookies frosted with my new favorite sugar cookie icing:


1 cup powdered sugar
4 tsp. milk
1 Tb. light corn syrup
¼ tsp. vanilla, almond, or other flavoring extract
Food coloring
Mix all ingredients until smooth. Brush or drizzle on cookies. This makes enough icing to cover a little more than one cookie sheet full of cookies. If the icing gets too thick, you can thin it with more milk or corn syrup. The icing hardens completely in 1-2 hours, though after about 1/2 hour it is hard enough to drizzle a second coat over the first one. You will need to thin it even more than the recipe if you just want to drizzle it over something.

These cookies were made with a regular recipe, which isn't quite as good as the peppermint recipe, but better than any sugar cookie you can buy in a store.

Sugar Cookies
3/4 cup butter
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
½ tsp. almond extract
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
2-1/2 cups flour
Cream butter and sugar. Add eggs. Mix in vanilla, almond extract, baking powder, and salt. Add flour and mix well. Roll out about ¼-inch thick, cut out cookies. Avoid handling dough too much or the cookies will be tough. You can make the dough beforehand and refrigerate it until needed. Bake at 375° for about 6-8 minutes. Frost or decorate.

Valentine's Day Cookies

This year we made some Valentine's Day cookies.


Peppermint sugar cookies
1-1/3 cups butter
1-1/2 cups sugar
2 tsp. baking powder
¼ tsp. salt (if unsalted butter)
2 eggs
¼ tsp. peppermint extract
4 cups flour
½ cup crushed peppermint candy canes
Cream butter, baking powder, and salt. Add eggs and peppermint extract. Mix in flour and peppermint candy. Chill dough until easy to handle. Roll dough out and cut out shapes. Bake at 375° for 8-10 minutes. Cool on cookie sheet for a few minutes so the candy has time to solidify again. Frost with Sugar Cookie Icing.

Sugar Cookie Icing
1 cup powdered sugar
4 tsp. milk
1 Tb. light corn syrup
¼ tsp. vanilla, almond, or other flavoring extract
Food coloring
Mix all ingredients until smooth. Brush or drizzle on cookies. This makes enough icing to cover a little more than one cookie sheet full of cookies. If the icing gets too thick, you can thin it with more milk or corn syrup. The icing hardens completely in 1-2 hours.

They were a big hit and looked good as well. I used peppermint flavoring in the icing.

Oatmeal-Buttermilk Muffins

Mix and let sit for 15 minutes:
2 cups oats
1-3/4 cups buttermilk
¾ cup milk

Mix and add to oats and milk:
2 eggs
½ cup oil

Sift together:
2 cups flour (can use ½ cup whole wheat)
2/3 cup brown or white sugar
1-3/4 tsp. baking powder
¼ tsp. soda
½ tsp. salt

Stir the liquids into the dry mixture. Bake for 15-18 minutes at 375°. Makes about 24 muffins. You can add 1 cup of blueberries or other fruit, if you wish.