Happy New Year!!

 

Welcome to 2008. Since our first New Years as a married couple Jesse and I have had pork and sauerkraut for our first dinner every year. I guess it is an old German/Pennsylvania Dutch tradtion that is supposed to be good luck. Well if it comes with luck that's great - but really I just use it as an excuse to make my favorite meal!! I know that sauerkraut is a love hate kind of thing. You either love it or you hate it. And I LOVE it. Especially with little sausages and slow cooked pork, of course with mashed potatoes as a side.

This year was no exception to our tradition. Honestly, I'm not sure this is even blog worthy because it is so easy but I thought I'd share any way! Happy New Year!

Slow Cooker Pork, Sauerkraut and Sausages

1 jar old fashioned sauerkraut (I prefer Claussens)
1-2 lb pork roast
10-12 breakfast sausage links cut in half
1 Polska Kielbasa cut into chunks
Salt and pepper to taste

Place all ingredients in crock pot (pork first because it takes the longest and keilbasa on top because it's already cooked) Cook on low for 8 hours or high for 4 hours. Serve with mashed potatoes.

Basil Baked Tilapia

With all of the heavy holiday food we've been eating I was really in the mood for something a little lighter. I've recently discovered that I LOVE tilapia, so that's what I decided to make. I love risotto with fish but I thought it would be a little too heavy with our light meal. Baked rice seemed like a lighter choice. At the very last minute I decided that I wanted to have a cream sauce for the fish (so much for a light meal, haha). To make the cream sauce I heated a tablespoon of butter in a small sauce pan. To that I added 1/3 cup of the lemon wine sauce that the fish cooked in and 1/4 cup of flour to act as a thickener. When the flour was well combined I added 1/4-1/3 cup of half and half. I was very please with the flavor of the sauce. Now for the tilapia recipe!

Basil Baked Tilapia
(Recipe source: recipezaar.com)

1/2 cup white wine
1 tablespoon butter
1 cup fresh basil leaves
4 thin fish fillets, like tilapa
1 lemon, juice of
1/2 teaspoon onion powder
2 tablespoons plain breadcrumbs
paprika
salt and pepper

1. Preheat oven to 450*.
2. Pour wine and butter into glass measuring cup and microwave on high until butter begins to melt, about 1 minute.
3. Spread basil leaves over bottom of 9 X 13 glass baking dish, reserving a few large ones for the top of the fish.
4. Place fillets over the remaining basil.
5. Remove the wine mixture from the microwave and add fresh lemon juice.
6. Stir or whisk the wine mixture and pour over the fish.
7. Season the fish with the salt and pepper.
8. Sprinkle the onion powder and bread crumbs evenly over the fish, then add paprika.
9. Cover the pan with aluminum foil, place in lower third of preheated oven, for 12 minutes.
10. Uncover fish and continue to cook until fish is opaque and flakes easily with a fork, about 2-3 more minutes.
11. Serve at once.

Another Christmas Cookie...

This one came from my Kraft food magazine. My friend/co-worker Michelle and I made cookies for all of the other girls in the office. And this was one of our favorites. We also made sugar cookies and buckeyes, but didn't take pictures of those. Next time I make these I will make sure to roll them into thinner ropes. Our's puffed up a lot more than I thought they would.

Chocolate Candy Cane Cookies
(Source: Kraftfoods.com)


1 pkg. (8 oz.) PHILADELPHIA Cream Cheese, softened
3/4 cup (1-1/2 sticks) butter, softened
1 cup sugar
2 tsp. vanilla
2-1/2 cups flour
1/2 tsp. baking soda
4 squares BAKER'S Semi-Sweet Baking Chocolate, melted
1 pkg. (6 oz.) BAKER'S Premium White Baking Chocolate (we dyed half of the white chocolate red with red food coloring)
12 hard peppermint candies, crushed (we didn't have any so we skipped this part)

PREHEAT oven to 350ºF. Beat cream cheese, butter, sugar and vanilla in large bowl with electric mixer on medium speed until well blended. Add flour and baking soda; mix well. Blend in semi-sweet chocolate. (Dough will be stiff.)

ROLL tablespoonfuls of dough into 52 balls. Roll each ball into 3-inch-long rope. Place, 2 inches apart, on baking sheet, bending top of each slightly to resemble a candy cane.

BAKE 10 to 12 min. or until puffed and set; cool 5 min. on baking sheet. Transfer to wire racks; cool completely. Microwave white chocolate as directed on package; drizzle over cookies. Sprinkle with crushed candies. Let stand until chocolate is firm.

Gingerbread Bars

 

Ok, so I've not been so great at updating this thing... Oops :) I also missed my daring baker challenge this month. December and Christmas just snuck up on me and before I knew I had no time left to complete the challenge. I promise to get back on the ball with the January challenge. In the mean time check out what the other Daring Bakers have been up to here.

Even though I did not have enough time to make my Yule Log I still had some baking to do. Most of what I made this holiday season I have made before. But this I just recently saw on Peabody's blog. I thought it sounded delicious and most importantly, easy! I used the recipe almost exactly as it appears on her blog. The only change I made was using maple syrup instead of molasses because I had already started when I realized I didn't have any. I still think they came out great. Oh, and I added some colored sugar crystals to the top to make them festive.

I also think that I should mention that I am very excited because my dear husband got me a brand new SLR digital camera for Christmas. I'm still figuring out how to use all of the bells and whistles but I'm pretty happy with how this photo turned out. Now on to the recipe...

Gingerbread bars -

(Original Source: McCormick.com; as found on Peabody's blog)

1 1/4 cups flour
1 tablespoon ground Ginger
1 teaspoon ground Cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) butter, softened
1 1/4 cups sugar, divided
1 egg
1/3 cup molasses (I subbed maple syrup)
3 tablespoons water
1 package (8 ounces) cream cheese, softened
2 teaspoons Vanilla Extract
1. Preheat oven to 350°F. Line 13×9-inch baking pan with foil. Spray foil with no stick cooking spray. Mix flour, ginger, cinnamon, baking soda and salt; set aside.
2. Beat butter and 3/4 cup of the sugar in large bowl with electric mixer until light and fluffy. Beat in egg until well blended. Gradually beat in flour mixture until well mixed. Stir in molasses and water just until blended. Spread evenly in prepared pan.

3. Beat cream cheese in large bowl with electric mixer until smooth. Beat in remaining 1/2 cup sugar and vanilla extract until smooth. Reserve 1/2 cup of the icing; refrigerate remaining icing. Spoon dollops (about 1 teaspoon each) of the reserved icing over batter in pan. With knife or spatula, swirl icing through batter to marbleize.

4. Bake 30 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool in pan 15 minutes. Lift out of pan using foil. Cool completely on wire rack. Invert and peel off foil. Spread refrigerated icing over bars. Cut into bars. Store in refrigerator

I'm a Daring Baker!!!

I am very excited to announce that this month I completed my first Daring Baker challenge!! I have been watching others blog about their DB experiences for months and I finally decided to step up to the plate and give it a whirl. In case you are wondering the Daring Bakers are a group of baking bloggers that complete a challenge once a month. Every month some one new chooses a recipe and everyone follows the exact same recipe and then on the same day they post about their experience. The whole idea behind the group is that you step out of your comfort zone and really push your skills to the limits, hence the name DARING Bakers. Of course my first month would require yeast (doh!). I have a little bit of yeast experience, but not much. Plus most of the experience that I have is with a bread machine. One of the rules of this challenge was that we had to knead by hand, so no bread machine. This months challenge was Tender Potato Bread and the event was hosted by Tanna. Thanks to Tanna for hosting this event and coming up with a great challenging recipe.

Everyone kept commenting on how sticky the dough was, but, I couldn't believe it when I finally started the kneading process. I used at least an extra cup (probably more like a cup and a half) while kneading. The dough stuck to my hands, my counter top, my bowl, the scraper I was using to scrape the dough off of the counter, it was quite comical. It took about 10 minutes to knead. Then I left it rise. I was a little nervous at first because in the first hour it did not rise at all. I decided to stop peeking and not check it again until the full 2 hours had passed. To my delight it had doubled in size when I checked again.

The next part really had me laughing. Instead of falling out in a large ball when I tried to dump the dough out of the bowl, it came out like the insides of a pumpkin. Ooey, gooey, sticky and stringy. More kneading and more flour and I finally felt like I was ready to form the dough into the rolls I had been dreaming of all day. This was not as successful as I had hoped it would be. I would form the ball then set it in the pan and one minute later it would start to spread out like a big thick pancake. I some how managed to fit 12 dough "balls" into my 9x13 pan. Now if and when I make this recipe again I will skip the second rise. For one, they already filled the pan with out rising. And two, they almost tripled in size! They were sticking out of the top of the pan a full 2 inches.

Following the advice of several other Daring Bakers I baked the rolls at 425 for the first 10 minutes then dropped down to 375 for the last 20 minutes. The end result was more of a bun than a dinner roll, but they were still pretty tasty. I served them for a late Thanksgiving that we had with friends on Saturday night. They all seemed to enjoy the rolls and actually took the left over ones to make breakfast sandwiches the next day.

All in all I am very pleased with my first challenge. I hope to have a prettier picture next month (these rolls were not very photogenic). But until then, happy baking!

Thanksgiving Shepard's Pot Pie?

Tonights dinner was kind of a cross between Shepard's pie, pot pie and thanksgiving dinner. I was inspired earlier today by the Shepard's pie in Elly's blog. But I don't like to use peas as an ingredient and I didn't have any corn. So I decided to make it more pot pie like with a Thanksgiving like feeling. It turned out really great. We both had seconds and I almost went back for thirds.

Shepard's Pie
(source: me)

2 cups mashed potatoes (I made mine with red potatoes,skin on, sour cream, milk and butter)
1 lb ground turkey
2 carrots cut into bite size peices
1 celery stalk cut into bite size piecs
1/2 small onion
2 tbsp butter
1 cup chicken broth
2 tbsp corn starch
1 tsp poultry seasoning
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp fresh ground black pepper

Melt the butter in a large skillet, then add the carrots, celery and onion.
Cook until the vegetables are tender.
Season the vegetables with salt, pepper and poultry seasoning.
Add the ground turkey and cook through.
Dissolve the corn starch in the chicken broth.
Add the chicken broth slurry to the cooked ground turkey and let simmer until the broth begins to thicken.
Put the turkey mixture in the bottom of a casserole dish.
Top the mixture with 2 cups of mashed potatoes and smooth the potatoes out using a spoon to create small peaks.
Bake at 350 for 15 minutes. Then broil on high for 2 or 3 minutes until the peaks turn golden brown.

Tilapia and Risotto

After having only 2 posts for the entire month of October, I had to redeem myself. I needed to make something that was really really good. Luck would have it that yesterday the Allrecipes recipe of the day actually looked really good to me. It has also been a long time since Jesse and I have had fish, so it was perfect. Unfortunately, when I went to the store they only had frozen halibut and that wouldn't work. The gentleman behind the counter was very helpful and told me that Tilapia is also a great mild flaky fish and would make a good substitute. And it turned out fantastic. For the side dish I made risotto, but I made it very very plain because usually Jesse isn't a huge fan of risotto, so I wanted it to be more rice like with a touch of creaminess. I also served this with julienned carrots, orange bell pepper and red bell pepper.

On to the recipes.

Pan Fried Halibut Steak with Light Green Sauce
(Recipe source Allrecipes.com , Submitted By: Charter Guy)

* 4 (8 ounce) halibut steaks
* salt and pepper to taste
* 1/2 cup all-purpose flour for dusting
* 1/4 cup melted butter
* 1/4 cup dry white wine
* 1 lemon, juiced
* 1/2 cup heavy cream
* 2 tablespoons finely chopped fresh parsley
* 4 tablespoons finely chopped fresh basil
* 2 tablespoons drained capers

DIRECTIONS

1. Rinse the halibut steaks and pat dry. Season with salt and pepper, then dust with flour.
2. Melt the butter in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Fry the halibut steaks in the butter for 4 to 5 minutes, until nicely browned. Remove from the skillet and keep warm.
3. Reduce the heat to medium, and stir the wine into the pan, scraping up any browned bits stuck to the bottom. Mix in the lemon juice, then stir in the cream. Simmer for 2 to 3 minutes or until it starts to thicken. Season with parsley, basil and capers, and stir for another minute. Serve halibut with sauce spooned over it. Garnish with additional parsley if desired.

My changes and tips :
Obviously I used tilapia instead of halibut, it was a nice substitute.
I also cut the basil and parsley in half.
I forgot to use capers (whoops!)
When I flipped the fish over to cook on the other side I added the julienned vegetables to pan and let them cook.
I only used about 1/2 of the juice from my lemon and it was still very powerful.

My Plain Risotto

1 cup Arborio rice
2 tbsp butter
1/2 cup dry white wine
4 cups HOT vegetable broth
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp black pepper

Melt butter in a large skillet
Add the arborio rice and let it soak up the butter. Next add the white wine, let simmer until it is cooked out.
Add the HOT vegetable broth 1/2 cup at a time, stirring constantly and waiting until the broth is almost completely absorbed before adding more.
When adding the final 1/2 cup of vegetable broth season with salt and pepper.

NOTE: We served with just a touch of the sauce from the tilapia, since there was soooo much extra!