SOUP-ER!

I love soup. I could eat soup every day. I usually eat Campbell's Condensed Tomato Soup a few times a week. I generally don't make canned soup as a meal for other people, but I still make them eat homemade soup with me all the time! My attempts lately have been trying to use up ingredients (namely, pastas and rices) that are sitting in the cabinet. This week I made Meatball and Orzo Soup. The conclusion was this is the second best soup I have ever made!

Ingredients

• 8 cups of chicken broth (I used water and chicken base)
• 24 oz bag of Italian Meatballs (Kroger is tasty!)
• 1 small zucchini
• 3/4 cup orzo pasta
• 1 tsp black pepper
• 1 tsp parsley
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• 1 tsp onion powder
• 1/4 cup lemon juice
• 2 eggs
• 1/4 grated Parmesan cheese

Directions

1. Bring chicken broth to boil. (This is most important if you are using water and chicken base.
2. Shred zucchini.
3. Add meatballs, orzo and zucchini to broth.
4. Season with pepper, parsley, garlic powder, and onion powder.
5. Bring to boil, reduce heat to low and simmer, uncovered, for 30 minutes.
6. In a bowl, beat together lemon juice and eggs.
7. Mix 1/4 cup of hot broth from the pot into the lemon/egg mixture.
8. Stir mixture into the full pot of soup.
9. Add Parmesan cheese.
10. Serve hot.

 Easy and SOOOOO tasty! For left overs, you may need to add a little water to thin out broth. I thought it tasted better the next day. I forgot to take a picture that night, so this is my left overs at lunch the next day. MMM mmm good.

Smoked Sausage and Sauerkraut with Mashed Potatoes

I love my slow cooker! Another thing, besides the food chopper, I think everyone should have is a slow cooker. You will find a lot of my recipes that I use are with a slow cooker. Most of them can be modified to make on the stove top or in the oven. 
 
Ingredients

• 16 ounces sauerkraut, bag or can
• 1 pound smoked sausage
• 2 cooking apples, peeled, cored, and sliced
• 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/8 teaspoon pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon caraway seeds
• 2/3 cup beer (anything you have around will work)

• 5 pounds baking potatoes, peeled and cubed
• 2 teaspoons garlic powder
• 1 teaspoon onion powder
• 1 tablespoon sea salt
• 1 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 3/4 cup butter
• 3/4 cup cream cheese
• 1 cup milk

Directions
For Sausage and Sauerkraut

1. Rinse sauerkraut; drain and squeeze dry. 
2. Place half of the sauerkraut in a slow cooker.
3. Cut sausage into 2-inch lengths. Place in slow cooker. 
4. Continue to layer in slow cooker, apples, brown sugar, salt, and pepper, sprinkling with caraway seeds. 
5. Top with remaining sauerkraut. Add beer. Do not stir mixture.
6. Cover and cook on high for 3 to 3-1/2 hours or on low for 6 to 7 hours, or until apples are tender. 
7. Stir before serving.

Mashed Potatoes

1. Place potatoes in pot covered with salted water.
2. Boil for 15-20 minutes, or until tender all the way through.
3. Drain the water from the potatoes.
4. Add garlic powder, onion powder, sea salt, pepper and butter.
5. Begin mashing potatoes while adding cream cheese and milk.
6. Serve HOT!

Breakfast Time!

I am not a fan of breakfast. First off, I don't like greasy food too much and breakfast meats seem to be all grease. Secondly, I can't eat when I first get up, so by the time I am ready to eat I am either at work or it is lunch time. I do make breakfast for others though... and of course I eat it at some point most of the time. Here is a casserole that was pretty good.

Ingredients

• 3 cups of croutons (pick a flavor that sounds good to you)
• 1/4 cup butter, melted
• 2 cups shredded cheddar cheese
• 6 eggs
• 1 3/4 cups milk
• 1 bell pepper, diced (your choice of color)
• 1 tablespoon mustard
• 1 tablespoon basil
• salt and pepper
• breakfast meat can be used, I did not

Directions

1. If you choose to use meat, you will want to thoroughly cook, and crumble or dice, it.
2. Preheat 325 degrees F.
3. Spray a 9 X 13 casserole dish with cooking spray.
4. Place croutons in the bottom of the dish and drizzle with melted butter.
5. Sprinkle with shredded cheese.
6. Crack eggs in a bowl and add milk, diced bell pepper, mustard, salt, basil and pepper, and beat until well-combined. (At this point add your meat as well.)
7. Pour on top of the croutons and cheese in the casserole dish.
8. Bake in the preheated oven for 40 minutes.
9. Let stand for 10 minutes before serving.

Not bad! 

This recipe is pretty versatile. You could add any chopped vegetables you wanted, as well as any meat. You can also change up the flavor of your croutons and cheese. This could easily become garlic flavored croutons with mozzarella cheese and some Italian seasoning in your eggs, Caesar croutons with Parmesan cheese and a bit of Worcestershire Sauce, or omit the cheese add bacon or ham and make some hollandaise sauce to pour over, an Eggs Benedict casserole. This is a great recipe to use your imagination!

Moo Shu Pork with Mandarin Pancakes

I got to cook a little more than usually this week. I do most of my cooking on the weekends. Especially the cooking I want to share with you guys. (Although, if you want to learn to make things like Hamburger Helper feel free to email me! Haha!) Well, this was a long weekend for me, thus, more cooking. 
Last night's meal was a really quick meal. I found a recipe in a cookbook, so I took it and made it the way I wanted... so, really, not the same food they wanted me to make at all! I also rearranged the directions so they read in the order I made them. Also, the recipe offered an easy way to make "mock" Mandarin Pancakes, well, ALRIGHT!

Ingredients

• 1 cup white wine (I used semi sweet)
• 3 boneless pork loin chops
• 5 green onions
• 1 can waterchestnuts
• 1/2 cup hoison sauce
• toasted sesame oil
• 8oz bag of coleslaw mix
• 2 eggs
• 8 flour tortillas (fajita size)

Directions

1. If your chops are thick, flatten with a mallet. (Pork loin roast was on sale, so I bought one and had my boyfriend slice about 5 very thin steaks for me.) Cut into strips.
2. Marinade the strips with the wine for at least an hour.
3. Thinly slice green onions and save about 1/4 cup for garnish.
4. I bought whole water chestnuts and chopped them in my mini chopper. (I am telling you, if you are going to follow my blog GET ONE!) You could also used sliced water chestnuts and then, just open a can.
5. Cook pork in skillet until no longer pink.
6. Mix hoison sauce and 2 tsp sesame oil.
7. Add green onions, water chestnuts, cole slaw mix, and sauce mix to skillet.
8. Cook for 2-3 minutes, just to warm the mix, you want it crunchy.

On to the pancakes!

1. Heat 1 tsp sesame oil in a small skillet.
2. Beat eggs in a shallow bowl or deep plate.
3. Dip the tortillas in the egg and place in skillet.
4. Cook each side about 20-30 seconds, you want the to be a light golden brown.
5. Add and heat oil as needed to complete all the pancakes.

I had a small amount of eggs left, so, I scrambled it in the pancake skillet and added it to the pork.

Now you are done! Spoon the pork into the pancakes and sprinkle with your green onion mixture.

Sooo... tasty!

My first experiment with Persian Cooking!

My boyfriend is from Iran and I feel that this means I should attempt a couple of Persian recipes. When I told him about my intentions he informed me that it would not be as good as his. Because my hobbies include cooking and his hobbies include practicing medicine I feel that I can win this bet pretty easily.
I searched the internet and found a website that made Persian food look appetizing, and most importantly, easy! You can find it here, My Persian Kitchen.
I perused the site for a while and decided that the easiest thing I could make would be tahcheen. This is an easy recipe, but very time consuming. One thing I learned is you can not use too much salt in this... LOTS of salt in the yogurt, chicken and especially rice!
Here it is for your enjoyment:

Ingredients

• 2 chicken breasts
• 1 medium onion
• 2 cloves garlic
• 2 cups yogurt
• 2 egg yolks
• 4 tbsp brewed saffron
• 3 cups rice
• 2 tbsp butter
• canola oil
• salt & pepper

Directions
To start the rice:

1. Scoop out 3 cups of rice in a bowl.
2. Wash rice several times until water runs clear.
3. Soak rice with salt over night.

To make brewed saffron:

1. Grind a pinch of saffron. (I just used a cup and spoon.)
2. Place ground saffron in a small bowl and pour hot water over it. Make sure that you always use hot water as it helps release the aroma and works much better than room temperature water.
3. Stir well. Now you are ready to use the saffron in your recipe as needed.

On to the chicken:

1. Cut onion in large pieces and crush garlic cloves. (I recently got a mini chopper, it makes crushing garlic AWESOME!)
2. Place onion and garlic in a pan. Season chicken breasts with salt and pepper and place on top of onion and garlic.
3. Add 1 cup of water, cover and cook for 20 minutes or until chicken is cooked through. (FYI, the cup of water did NOT cover the chicken, we are not boiling the chicken.)
4. In the mean time mix yogurt, egg yolks and saffron together. Season with salt and pepper.
5. After cooking the chicken, shred in chunks with two forks. The pieces should not be too big or too small.
6. Add chicken to yogurt mix. Cover and refrigerate over night.

Now back to the rice. (This is the next day.)

1. Bring a pot of water to a boil with a sprinkle of salt. Add rice to water, without the water used for soaking. Keep an eye on it, as soon as the water starts boiling again it should take about 10 minutes for the rice to cook.
2. While the rice cooks gently scoop the rice from the bottom of the pot and bring to the surface and release. Do this step several times. NOTE: Do not stir.
3. Place a colander in the sink.
4. Check the rice to make sure it is cooked. It should be soft and cooked but not mushy. Drain rice in colander.
5. Rinse with cold water to stop cooking process.

Finally,

1. Remove chicken from marinade.
2. Add rice to the remainder of the yogurt and mix well. Season with more salt if needed.
3. Pour 2-3 tablespoons of oil in the bottom of a pirex dish. Spread the oil all over including the walls of the dish.
4. Place half of the rice in the dish and make sure that it is all even.
5. Arrange the chicken on top in a single layer.
6. Add remainder of the rice on top and flatten the top slightly pressing down with a spatula.
7. Melt the butter and pour over the rice.
8. Cover the dish with foil and bake at 350° for 2 1/2 hours. 

This is how it turned out!

I decided that we also needed some vegetables with our meal, so I made a traditional Persian salad, Salad Shirazi. This is something I have had on a few occasions, but have never made.

Ingredients

• 1 English cucumbers
• 3 round tomatoes
• 1/2 medium red onion
• 1/4 cup lime juice
• 1 tbsp dry mint
• 1 tbsp oil (optional)
• salt & pepper

Directions

1. Dice cucumber, tomato and red onion into pieces roughly the same size. I suggest chopping the tomato last, it gets all slimey and juicy on the cutting board. (FYI, you should have about the same amount of cucumber and tomato and as much onion as possible without overpowering the taste.)
2. Mix all ingredients and add, while mixing, salt and pepper to taste and mint.
3. Refrigerate for 20 minutes. (I started the salad after I put the tahcheen in the oven and just stuck it in the fridge when I was done until about an hour before dinner.)
4. Pour lime juice and olive oil over the salad. Mix well and refrigerate for at least one hour before serving.

YUMMY! (Ok, I am not a huge fan of raw tomato, but this isn't half bad!

Next meal is Moo Shu Pork... look for it in my tummy soon!