Sweet Potato Corn Chowder

I have decided that Lent is a good time for soups.  Somehow it seems a little easier to go meatless when there is a pot full of colorful veggies simmering on the stove and making the house smell SO GOOD.  Plus, there's nothing like a hot bowl of soup on a cold day.  In an attempt to have a more intense Lent this year I'm trying to be vegan every other week... I know I couldn't make it for the entire 40 days, but maybe next year!

Ingredients:

2 cups vegetable broth (I used veggie bouillon.  Someday I vow to actually make my own broth!)

2 small sweet potatoes

a handful of baby carrots

1-2 celery stalks

1/2 of an onion

1-2 cloves of garlic

1/2 cup milk or soymilk

1 cup of corn, canned or frozen

salt and pepper

Broccoli-potato-cheddar soup

It's been kind of warm these past few days, but the cold weather is coming and that means I'm craving soup.  Specifically, I'm craving broccoli cheddar soup, Panera-style.  I decided to add a bit of potato to make it more filling and try to use up the potatoes that have been sitting around in my pantry for a while.

served with some delicious Mancini's pesto bread...perfection!

Ingredients:
2 cubes of vegetable (or chicken) bouillon
5 1/2 cups of water
[alternatively, you could use 2 cups of chicken or veggie broth plus 3 1/2 cups of water]
1 head of fresh broccoli, chopped
1-2 medium potatoes
1/2 cup milk or cream
1 1/2 cups shredded cheddar cheese
(up to) 1/4 cup flour
salt and pepper

Directions:
In a large pot, combine bouillon (or broth), water, broccoli, salt, and pepper.  Use the whole broccoli stalk, not just the florets.  Bring to a boil.

mmmm, broccoli

Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer for 30 minutes.

While the soup is simmering, peel and chop the potatoes into 1/2 inch chunks.  (I say "chunks" rather than "cubes" because mine are never remotely close to cube-shaped.)

Add the potatoes to the broccoli-broth mixture and simmer for an additional 15 minutes.

Stir in flour one spoonful at a time until broth thickens.  Reduce heat and add the milk and cheese.  Stir until cheese is melted.  Serve hot, with a little extra cheese on top as a garnish.

If you plan on having leftovers, take out half of the soup BEFORE adding the flour, milk, and cheese, and finish this last step right before serving.  The first time I made this soup, it thickened so much in the fridge that you could practically chew it after reheating!  If that does happen, though, adding a little milk before you reheat it works wonders.

As usual, I'm already thinking about what else I'd like to do with this soup.  I'm thinking a little red onion might be really good.  Also red bell pepper, if you're into that kind of thing.  Maybe bacon bits?  Good thing we've got several months of cold weather coming up so I can do more soup experiments!

Spinach, feta, and cheddar muffins

I'm heading to a Christmas party this evening and I know one should never show up to a party empty-handed, but I've been to way too many potlucks featuring a half dozen versions of the same dish, so I decided I wanted to try something a little different.  After some brief meandering around the vast internet world of food blogs, I settled on feta and spinach muffins--you can find the original recipe here.  The great thing about muffins is that they're single-serving finger foods that are easy to pick up and nibble on while at a party.  Another great thing about muffins is that they're not just for breakfast anymore.  And the best thing about muffins is, well, this.

So, muffins.  The ingredients: (makes about 18 muffins)

1/2 medium-sized red onion
1 tablespoon butter
2 cups flour
cheddar cheese, shredded--I don't ever really measure cheese; I shredded about half of a block of cheese
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 cup feta cheese, crumbled
1 cup spinach
1 large egg
1 cup milk
freshly cracked black pepper, to taste

Preheat oven to 375.  Melt butter in a skillet.  Add chopped onion and saute until onions are soft.

Chopping an onion makes me cry every time.  I decided to be prepared this time.

Combine flour and baking soda in large mixing bowl.  (Whatever you do, don't dump the first teaspoon of baking soda all over the floor.  Not that I did that, or anything.)

Add onions, cheeses, egg, and milk.  Mix well.

Add spinach and mix again.  If you're using fresh spinach, chop it nice and small so it mixes well with the rest of the ingredients.  If cheap like me and using the frozen stuff, make sure to thaw it and drain any excess water before adding to the rest of the mixture.

Death by Truffle

Christmas is coming, which means of course that it's time for me to try making all sorts of desserts that I'd never make at any other time of year.  Now that I've discovered these ridiculously easy and delicious truffles, however, I think I'm going to have to make them year-round.  Or maybe just eat so many before Christmas that I'm content not to look at them again for the rest of the year.  I got the original recipe here and then played around a little bit to try out my own flavor combinations.

Ingredients:
1 c. cake mix (I started with a good old classic white)
1/4 cup plus 1 tbsp sweetened evaporated milk
a splash of vanilla (let's face it, I never actually measure vanilla.  I think the original recipe called for 1/2 tsp)
1/2 to 1 cup chocolate chips

Combine cake mix, evaporated milk, and vanilla.  Stir until completely mixed.  The mixture should be nice and dry, but not flaky.  If it's too dry, add more milk.  If it's too runny, add a little more cake mix.  Refrigerate mixture for 15 minutes.

More Pumpkin: Stuffed Shells

Okay, so I'm more than a little bit obsessed with pumpkin right now (or all the time).  I was searching for a recipe for stuffed chicken breasts, but Google apparently likes to steer me away from healthy things because a stuffed shell recipe came up first.  The great thing about pumpkin is that I can somehow justify eating all this cheesy goodness because, hey, there's a lot of vegetable in here!  Plus they're pretty:

I told myself I'd never be one of those girls who posts pictures of all of their culinary achievements on facebook.  These just looked too exciting not to share.  But once I opened that door I couldn't stop.  Now I take pictures of all the new foods I make...maybe it's to prove to myself that I'm not a terrible cook after all.  Or maybe it's to validate the time spent on all of my days off.

I based these loosely off of some recipe that I apparently forgot to save.  If I ever find the original author I'll be sure to credit them here :)

Ingredients:

1 box jumbo shells

1 small container ricotta cheese (I have no idea what size it was. maybe 8oz? 12 oz? I just bought the smallest one)

1 cup pumpkin puree

1/2 cup shredded cheese (I used the Kraft 5-cheese Italian blend, but plain mozzarella or parmesan would be fine too)

1 handful fresh spinach, chopped

1/2 cup milk

1/2 tsp sage

1/2-1 tsp basil

1-2 cloves garlic (or 1 tsp garlic powder)

salt and pepper

1/2 to 1 cup pasta sauce

parsley and grated parmesan (optional, for garnish)

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 350.

Cook shells according to package directions.

Combine ricotta, pumpkin puree, shredded cheese, milk, and spinach.  Mix well.  Add spices, plus salt and pepper to taste. (I finally got myself a black pepper grinder so I like to use that bad boy as much as possible.)

Fill each shell with that cheesy, pumpkiny goodness.

After arranging shells in the baking pan, drizzle shells with pasta sauce.  Since there is already a lot of vegetable (aka pumpkin) I decided that I needed less sauce than I would normally use with traditional stuffed shells.

Sprinkle with parsley and grated parmesan, if desired.  I find that adding parsley to just about any Italian-inspired dish makes it look way more classy.

Cover and bake at 350 for 15-20 minutes.  Because there's no egg in this recipe, you really only need to heat them til they're warm, so if they start to dry out go ahead and take them out of the oven.

Bon appetit!

Crustless Apple-Sausage Quiche

A few weeks ago,  my brother and his girlfriend came to visit for the weekend, so we went apple-picking.  More accurately, I went to work, and everyone else went apple-picking:

Which of course meant that I came home to a delicious apple cobbler...mmmmmm....  Anyway, Steve didn't want to bring the apples home in the car, so the majority of the pickings were left in my kitchen, which I'm certainly NOT complaining about.  Since fall weather deserves delicious fall cooking, and since I'm unfortunately allergic to raw apples (yes, weird), I've been cooking up apples any way I can think of!  Basically I've been googling "apple-[insert random ingredient here] recipe" and seeing what comes up.  The favorite so far: Apple-Sausage Quiche.  I couldn't find one recipe that I really loved so this is kind of a mixture of a few different ideas I gathered from other recipes.

Note: I'm not a huge fan of pie crusts, so I usually skip the effort of making a crust (and the calories!) and just enjoy a crustless quiche.  I'm sure this would be just as tasty with a crust as well.

Ingredients:
2-3 medium sized apples (any variety, I tend to prefer the sweeter ones)
6 oz ground pork sausage
1/2-1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
3 large eggs
1/2 cup milk
orange zest (optional)
salt and pepper, to taste

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375.

Brown sausage in a skillet; drain the fat.  Alternatively, you could use precooked sausage links cut into small pieces.

Slice apples and arrange on the bottom of a pie pan.  Try to cover the whole bottom of the pan...make sure you get that apple-y goodness in every bite!

Spread cooked sausage over the layer of apples.  Top with shredded cheese.

Mix eggs and milk in a small bowl.  Add salt/pepper and orange zest, if desired.  (Confession: Orange zest is my new addiction. I like to put it in EVERYTHING.  But it's probably not essential, since the apples contribute a lot of sweetness.)

Pour egg mixture over other ingredients in the pan.

Bake uncovered at 375 for 15-20 minutes. 

Finally....enjoy!