Mirepoix: Wild Rice Soup

Another way to use the Canned Mirepoix soup starter I posted about here.  If you don't want to put up mirepoix (and I totally respect that), saute a cup or so of chopped onions, carrots and celery before starting the recipe below.

This recipe was the actual OR I got the canned mirepoix base from in Julie Languille's Meals in a Jar.  I held off on trying it because I have a hard time finding wild rice in any but the tiniest of packages at my grocery stores.  You *could* substitute brown rice, barley or similar whole grain here (not white rice or any kind of quick-cooking grain), but for some reason, a creamy barley soup doesn't appeal to me.

Happily, I found wild rice in the bulk bins at my local natural foods store while shopping for nutritional yeast.  Not only was it bulk-stored, it was bulk-priced.  This makes it one of the 3 things I can get cheaper at the natural foods store than I can at the regular grocery (shelf-stable almond milk and yogurt-covered pretzels being the others) LOL

I have no pictures of the finished product because I made it one night when I was the solo-parent-on-duty with the 3 kiddos and also making dinner for my in-laws.  Not enough hands for picture-taking, and also no leftovers.

This soup will take some time to cook on Dinner Day because of the cooking time on the wild rice, but it requires virtually no attention.

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Chicken/Turkey Noodle/Rice Soup

Another one from Julie Languille's Meals in Jars.  Another one involving pressure canning.  Again, if you have the freezer space, you can absolutely package this up as a freezer kit using vacu-seal bags.  I really, really recommend vacu-seal bags instead of ziptop bags when dealing with cooked chicken to ward off freezer burn.

If you prefer not to use bouillon or soup base, omit it and plan to substitute broth for water in the same amount when you cook the kit.  You could freeze homemade broth, can homemade broth or keep shelf-stable store bought broth on hand to finish the meal prep.

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Risotto

I used shallots and celery for aromatics, tilapia for protein,
seafood stock, chopped fresh spinach for veggies, savory
for flavoring

I've worked with a delicious seafood risotto recipe for many years.  It's from a fundraiser cookbook called Dewey or Don't We published by the Dubuque Public Library.

I used to follow it to the T, and finally understood that really, it was more like guidelines (as so many recipes truly are).

And then I started being able to use the technique given in that recipe and substitute my own flavors and ingredients, depending on what was in season and available.

No matter what ingredients you use, this is definitely a prep-ahead-friendly recipe.  Chop and measure everything ahead of time, combining ingredients by category.  You can also freeze this as a meal kit...combine ingredients by category, put them in vacuseal bags or ziptop bags, and freeze.  Thaw before cooking.

The use-what-you-have components are:

• fat for sauteing: use butter, olive oil, canola oil, lard, mojo de ajo
• aromatics: use onions, shallots, celery, carrots, leeks or any combo thereof
• stock: chicken, seafood, veggie (not so much beef here)
• protein: fish, chicken, shrimp, scallops, crab (again, not so much beef)
• veggies: chopped bell pepper, snow peas, chopped greens, broccoli, peas, corn kernels, pre-cooked squash cubes
• flavoring: citrus zest, minced herbs

Some favorite combinations are shallots with shrimp, green peas and thyme; celery/onion/carrot with chicken, pepper and savory; crab, leeks, spinach and lemon zest.

Chop, measure, and fridge everything in advance for next-day or same-day cooking.  You can also freeze the components ahead.  To save space with liquids, either freeze wine and stock in ice cube trays beforehand to include in the freezer kit or pour the liquid into a ziptop bag, carefully press air out of the bag, seal and lay flat on a tray to freeze.

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Shrimp 'n' Grits

This is Valentine's Day dinner at my house :D

In honor of the date, I attempted to make the bacon look like little hearts, a la Pinterest.  Mine came out heartish-shaped rather than heart-shaped.  Here is the pin I worked from. I highly recommend NOT using center cut bacon as it's somewhat shorter than "regular" bacon and you need the length to make the shapes...I screw up so you don't have to.

Note: you do not have to make heartish-shaped bacon snouts to make this dish.

This does not take long to make, but it does help if you prep some elements ahead.  It all freezes pretty well too.  I chose to cook the shrimp in the oven to keep kiddo hands away from hot pans on the stovetop but you could do it on the stovetop (or grill) as well...it will take a pinch less time.

You can also cook your bacon in advance (even in heartish-shaped forms) and fridge it until needed.  Just be sure to save the bacon grease for cooking the shrimp.  If you fridge the cooked bacon, just reheat it lightly in the microwave or put it back in the oven for a few minutes to warm up.

One last note...how much bacon you use is up to you.  You can go with "bacon as seasoning" and use just a couple of slices or you can go with "bacon as major protein" and use a half pound or even a whole pound if you want.  I used a half pound to make 8 heartish-shaped bacon pieces in the oven.  If you're turning on the oven, you might as well make a lot of bacon IMHO.  If you're doing this on the stovetop, less bacon works better.

To make this super-delicious, cook the grits in chicken or seafood stock.  Water is just fine though.  Tips on dealing with stock/broth for freezer kits here.

If you make a freezer kit, you could measure out the dry grits and freeze them (be sure to get all the air out!) but really, grits keep for-eh-ver in the pantry.

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Honey Beer Chicken

Adapted from Cooking Light.

Delicious!  And freezable!  I'm starting to make and freeze meal kits in preparation for the arrival of Kiddo #3 and this one is on the list.  I made a kit of this recipe for my husband to make for dinner one night that I worked late...he said it was easy to make, easy to follow and tasted great.  So it's even husband-proof ;)

My grocery store had 4 lb. bags of frozen chicken breasts on sale, so I'm making two kits of this recipe along with 4 kits of gumbo.  If you wanted not to have extra of anything hanging around (like 4 oz. of beer out of a 12 oz. bottle), plan to make 3 honey beer chicken kits.  Fortunately, I have a willing volunteer to take care of the extra for me today (the aforementioned test cook/Dear Husband).

Btw, I completely spaced out and didn't take a *single* photograph of this dish, any of the 3 opportunities I've had.  Go see the Cooking Light site for a beautifully food-styled picture.

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San Francisco Pork Chops

Original recipe here.

These are just so good!  The finished reduction is a mite salty thanks to the soy sauce, so I strongly recommend using low-sodium soy sauce and maybe even going halfsies on the soy with some no-salt broth.

These are completely prep-ahead and freezer-friendly.  Just mix up all the sauce ingredients in a container to fridge or freeze, make sure you've got pork chops available and have cornstarch in your pantry. 

The sauce reduces as the pork chops cook on the stovetop, giving a thick, glossy, flavorful glaze that is just out of sight.


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Shrimp Amatriciana

This is a Rachael Ray recipe originally.  She wraps the shrimp in pancetta for beautiful presentation.  I don't worry so much about that presentation crap.  My less-attractive-but-still-delicious way of prepping this dish ahead also lets you organize it as a freezer kit, which I don't feel comfortable doing with shrimp that you've had to thaw and handle as you'll do if you wrap it with pancetta.

I've made this dish with regular ol' American bacon instead of pancetta and it's quite tasty.  The difference between Italian pancetta and most conventional bacons is smoking...bacon is smoked, pancetta is not.  Bacon is also usually cut much thicker than pancetta is.  So if you want to use it to wrap the shrimp in, unless you have really big shrimp or really thin bacon, you'll need to halfway-cook the bacon first to keep from having overcooked shrimp with still-raw bacon wrappers.  Of course, if you skip the wrapping (like I do), you don't need to worry about this at all.

To make a freezer kit, dice up your bacon/pancetta and wrap well.  Dice the onion and put in a freezer container.  Combine white wine and basil (I have basil puree already frozen and just take a lump out of that stash) in a freezer container.  Package all together with shrimp and cooking instructions.  Make sure to have some whole canned tomatoes in the pantry along with your pasta (I label the boxes and cans that belong to a kit so I don't forget and use them for something else). 

Mise-en-place

If you're just prepping ahead for same day or next day cooking, you can use fresh tomatoes.  I'm using 1 pint cherry tomatoes and 3 medium normal tomatoes cuz that's just what I have on hand.  Chop/combine ingredients as suggested above and fridge.

Slap a note somewhere in your workspace when you start cooking that you'll need to grab 1/2 cup of pasta water before draining.  I *always* forget this part.

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Ginger pork chops

I saw the original recipe for this one in an email recipe newsletter (you know, the ones that usually go straight to the junk mail folder sight unseen).  I'm glad that newsletter didn't get automatically junked this time!  I've modified the original recipe significantly in order to make the recipe freezer kit-friendly, a leetle more calorie-friendly and because it's the wrong season to be finding candied ginger easily at the store. 

If your grocery store sells packages of "assorted pork chops" (meaning a mix of bone-in and boneless, loin and sirloin chops), this is a great recipe for those guys.  Please note there is no pepper or salt called for here...the ginger carries plenty of zing so pepper would be overkill and the soda brings sodium to the party. 

To shortcut the actual cooking of this recipe, you can skip the browning step if you are really pressed for time or only brown on one side...if you choose the latter, be sure to put the browned side up in the baking pan.  I highly recommend roasting some broccoli, cauliflower or carrots alongside the pork chops to cut down on the allover dinner workload.

 I like Vernor's ginger ale for this recipe (and just in general). It's got the strongest real ginger flavor IMHO of the ginger ale brands that are widely available. I'm sure there are micro-soda companies making really good ginger ale or ginger beer (not an alcoholic beverage, btw), and if you have some available (especially ginger beer) use that!

Extra double bonus cocktail recipe: Dark and Stormy...1 shot dark rum over ice in a 12 oz. glass, fill with ginger beer. 

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Tofu Parmesan and BBQ Mushroom Quesadillas

It's a twofer!  What unites these recipes is the sauteed onion-and-mushroom component of each...it's a small element of the Tofu Parmesan sauce and a main part of the BBQ Mushroom Quesadilla filling.  If you're slicing, chopping and sauteeing for one dish, you might as well do enough for both.  Both recipes are adapted from the 28 Day Diabetic Meal Plan from diabeticconnect.com.  I apologize for no finished product pictures...I cooked these two meals on two of my busiest nights (and they cooked up FAST!) and consequently forgot to photograph. 

Tofu scares a lot of people, but in this dish it's nothing to be frightened of.  Freezing "toughens" the tofu, usually a problem with other foods, but a bonus here.  It gives the tofu "steaks" a toothier, meatier texture, so making this one into a freezer kit suits the recipe extremely well. 

I will say though that my Dear Husband and I decided we prefer the tofu unfrozen for this recipe, so in future, I will fridge the 'fu rather than freezing it as part of a freezer kit.  If do you freeze the tofu, pat the cutlets dry gently rather than pressing hard...you want moisture to remain in the cutlet to allow the crumb coating to stick.  I think I'd also go for more, thinner cutlets for freezing...6 instead of 4...for a more appealing texture.  Carry on!

Quesadillas are wonderfully fast to put together and cook.  You can assemble the quesadilla in its entirety (as I do) to freeze, or just the filling to thaw and assemble later.  It simply depends on whether you have more time on the front end (in prep) or on the back end (in actual cooking).  If you make the quesadillas up fully, you can bake them off from their frozen state for a super-fast, no-plan dinner.

To make both dinner kits, start with:

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Coca Cola BBQ Chicken Crockpot version

As promised, the results of my home experimentation.  I don't think I'll make this recipe any way but in the crockpot from now on!

This version of this recipe double-ups the goodness by 1) becoming crockpot-friendly and 2) reducing the amount of fat in the recipe. 


You'll need to buy skinless bone-in chicken parts, or more likely yank the skin off your cut-up chicken.  It's not hard.  Hold the chicken in one hand (my left, since I'm a rightie), and use a paper towel to get a better grip on the skin with your other hand (my right, since I'm a rightie).  Pull.  Don't be afraid.  Just do it.  Yank.  Yank some more.  It will come off.  Don't sweat getting every tiny bit of skin off. 



Skinned chicken, chicken skin and sauce

Now what to do with that skin?  You can fling it, or if you want to be extremely resourceful and frugal, you can a) render it like bacon for chicken fat, a.k.a. schmaltz or b) spread it flat on a rack placed over a baking sheet and bake it until crisp to make a poultry version of pork rinds.  Or you can chop it up, saute it quickly and feed it to your dogs.

If we're taking the skin off, why don't we just use boneless chicken and save ourselves the fuss of working around bones in the cooked dish?  Because i) the bones will fall right out after a day of crockpot cookery and really not present much of a problem and ii) the bone-in structure will help keep your crockpot from way-overcooking these bad boys.

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Coca-Cola BBQ Chicken

A little more than ten years ago, my then-boyfriend and I decided it was time to get married.  I was still a grad student, anticipating graduation.  I had little interest, less money and even less time to spend on cooking real food.  But I decided that I should do something very old-fashioned...learn to cook for my future husband.  And I started collecting recipes. 

This is one of the first recipes I harvested, scrawled down frantically in real time while watching a cooking demonstration on a Nashville talk show (did anybody else ever see Crook & Chase?)  It wasn't all that long ago, but informatically it seems like the Dark Ages, or at least the early Enlightment, when recipes featured on morning talk programs weren't available instantly on the show's website.

I can't say now how closely the recipe I still have in my 3-ring binder replicates the original recipe, but it's still a good 'un.  Use a low or zero calorie soda, if you prefer.  Even though we don't keep soda routinely in the pantry any more, I still make this occasionally with a single bottle bought from the impulse aisle at the grocery store. 

I think this recipe would also do well in the crockpot, but I've never *actually* tried it that way.  I'd probably skin the chicken and skip the browning...or maybe not LOL  I'm going to do up some freezer kits this weekend b/c, duh-duh-da-duh! I'm going back to work after 3 years of full-time SAHM-itude, and I'll try this one as a crockpot kit and post results.

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Roast turkey breast three ways

My grocery had those 3 lb. boneless turkey breast roasts on sale this week. We're far enough away from Thanksgiving that I can safely put turkey on the dinner rotation without protest LOL Turkey makes an interesting change-up from chicken, is leaner than beef and this week was cheaper than pork. A 3 lb. roast is a lot o' turkey for 4 people though, so I'm roasting it once and making 3 meals out of it. Observe and be amazed :D

1st: Roasted turkey with rosemary-orange sauce and mashed mixed root vegetables (both recipes adapted from the 28 Day Diabetic Meal Plan available from 28daymealplan.diabeticonnect.com...you have to register with them to get it, but it's worthwhile!  Lots of good recipes in this one!)

Turkey Tequila Fettucine with broccoli rabe

2nd: Turkey Tequila Fettucine (adapted from Guy Fieri's recipe )

3rd: Turkey Royale sandwiches

Meals #1 and #2 are prep-aheadable (and #1 is freezer kit-able too!).  Meal #3 is a quick and easy no-prep meal.  Tequila is optional for meal #2...substitute white wine, vermouth, sherry, chicken stock or orange juice if you wish.  The flavors in Meal #3 seem weird but are Ah.May.Zing together...don't count this one out just because it looks unusual!

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Doomsday Chicken and Peppers

Doomsday Chicken n Peppers with rice and bok choy salad

I misread a blog post title here and I can't get the idea of Doomsday Peppers out of my mind now LOL  Red, orange and yellow peppers are on big sale at my grocery store this week, so I am taking advantage!

Actually, if you had to throw together dinner quickly b/c the world was about to end, this might the recipe for you ;)  I'm prepping it ahead b/c I am doing Big Things later today but the prep is so quick that you could easily do this at the last minute without turning a hair.  You could freeze this as a kit as well since you cook the peppers and onions into a soft, chunky, peperonata sauce anyway so the fact that they loose their crisp in the freezer isn't an issue.

The red-yellow family of peppers is certainly attractive and highly nutritious with all those colors, but if you'd prefer, you certainly can use green peppers.  If you do have an abundance of inexpensive colored bell peppers available, you can roast them and freeze them in bulk or incorporate some of these recipes into your weekly menu:

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Sauerbraten

A beef roast that's been marinated in spiced red wine, then braised in the crockpot with gravy thickened with gingersnaps...that so says "holiday season" to me!  My recipe is a mash-up of a recipe from a 1975 cookbook called The Crockery Pot Cookbook by Lou Seibert Pappas and the Frugal Gourmet's Immigrant Ancestors recipe.

Sauerbraten can be made with a variety of beef roast cuts...I used a rump roast, but eye round, chuck pot roast, bone-in, bone-out, it all works.  It does need to marinate for at least 3 days, if not longer, so making this up and freezing it works well.  The marinade recipe I use is about 2 parts wine to 1 part vinegar, and I'd be comfortable freezing it for up to 3 weeks before I'd start to worry about the acid level of the marinade making mush out of my roast.  You can also leave the beef and marinade in the fridge until you cook it, if you have the space.

A word on browning meat before putting it in the crockpot.  It's a pain.  It completely detracts from the no-fuss appeal of using the crockpot.  It's usually not *really* necessary.  In this recipe though, I think you need to brown at least the top side of the roast.  Reason being that when you take the roast out of its 3-day booze bath, it will be purple.  Purple.  Not purple-y.  Purple.  Like Violet in Willa Wonka.  Purple.  Browning, well, makes it brown instead of purple.  Now if you don't brown the roast, it's not like you'll end up with a roast that looks like a grape popsicle at the end of the day, but it won't be quite as roast-colored as usual either.

To slice a roast well, let it rest several minutes before touching it.  Look for the direction of the grain of the meat...if you see long ridges in the meat, that's the "grain".  Don't cut directly across the grain, or you'll wind up with shredded beef.  Don't cut with the grain or you'll have tough slices of beef.  Make slices at about a 45 degree angle to the grain for the right balance of tenderness and cohesion.

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Garlic Artichoke Pasta

I <heart> artichokes.  They're supposedly cancer-fighting and they're exotic and they're amazing with butter.  That's the first thing that made me want to try this recipe from the Better Homes and Gardens Better Than Mom's Slow Cooker Recipes book.  The second thing was that this is a recipe that is made practically entirely from pantry goods without being one of those can-of-cream-of-death-soup type of recipes.  You can buy all the ingredients you need for this ahead and keep them on-hand as a pantry meal kit.  You can also prep the crockpot mixture ahead to fridge or freeze.

Until I had a toddler, we never had dairy beverages in the fridge routinely.  I had to buy milk or cream or half-and-half specifically for a recipe that called for it.  These days, I use whole milk for all recipes calling for cream or half-and-half because it is what we have in the fridge.  So use whatever you happen to  have here (or use canned evaporated milk, if you are like pre-toddler, dairy-drink-less me) if you throw this recipe together out of "ingredients on hand".  If you're planning to make a meal kit for this recipe, you can freeze an appropriate amount of milk or cream, rely on having some in the fridge on Dinner Day or buy canned evap milk for the "pantry kit". 

Comparatively, cream and half and half will be the highest in calories and fat, then evaporated milk and regular milk.  If you get non-fat evap milk, you'll get the best of both worlds...the lighter caloric/fat profile of milk with the rich mouthfeel of cream.

So a meal kit for this recipe will look like this: canned tomatoes, canned artichokes, box of pasta and can of evap milk (if using) labelled and stored in the pantry with garlic+dry herbs and milk/cream (if using) on hand or frozen in ziptop bags.  OR everything except milk mixed together and frozen with pasta/evap milk in the pantry.

The one gripe I have about this recipe is that it's a crockpot recipe that still requires significant cooking right before dinner.  The joy of the crockpot is that you don't have to cook at dinnertime, right?  Boiling pasta isn't hard, but getting the water up to a boil takes time...more time than I'm willing to spend to "finish" a crockpot meal. 

The solution is to cook the pasta almost fully in advance, toss it with a bit of oil or butter to keep it from sticking, fridge it and stir it into the crockpot at the end to warm up and finish cooking through.  Or you can boil the pasta at the last minute, whatever works with your schedule.  Just please don't rinse the pasta...rinsing washes away starch which will prevent the pasta from sticking to itself but then it also won't stick to the sauce.  Besides, the starch is where the flavor lives (yes, pasta does have a flavor of its own) so rinsing washes away flavor, too.

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Pumpkin Soup and Pumpkin Muffins

Oh look!  There I am, reflected upside down, in the spoon!

I was reading a newspaper article recently that claimed Halloween was the only "major" American holiday that didn't have a signature food or meal associated with it...Thanksgiving has turkey, Mother's Day has brunch, St. Patrick's Day has green beer, the list just goes on LOL

That statement rang true at first, but as I thought more about it, I realized Halloween does have a signature food...the pumpkin!  I think most of us tend to think of pumpkins as edible only in pie form, but they're part of the winter squash family and as such, are versatile menu players. 

Peeling a fresh whole pumpkin for a recipe is an undertaking, and I prefer when possible to use canned puree (not pumpkin pie filling which is actual pumpkin plus a bunch of other stuff).  The following recipe for soup (which I made for our pre-trick-or-treating repast) only calls for 1/2 a can, so I made muffins with the remaining puree...less waste = less cost = less aggravation.  I am brilliant ;)

The soup recipe is from the Frugal Gourmet Cooks American.  You can make this soup up to the point of adding the scallops and milk and fridge or freeze it (be sure to include scallops and milk as part of the freezer kit to finish the soup).  Just reheat the soup base to a simmer, add the milk and scallops and simmer 5 minutes to finish.  Or if you don't have front-end time to make the soup in its entirety, prep and group the ingredients for next-day or same-day cooking: onion/celery/garlic/ginger in one bowl, flour/spices in another, stock/Worcestershire/Tabasco in a bowl, pumpkin/squash cubes in yet another and scallops/milk saved for last. 

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Gingered scallops



Sea vs. bay scallops

This is stupidly easy.  Saute bay scallops with sliced ginger in butter and season with salt and pepper.  Really. There's the whole recipe. 

What makes this worth blogging about is 1) you rarely see a main dish recipe that calls for the smaller, less expensive bay scallops front and center instead of the large, spensy sea scallops and 2) the ginger does things to the scallops.  And to your taste buds.  I mean, things like you wouldn't believe.  Naughty, delicious, page 227 in a romance novel kinds of things.  Oh yeah, this one is a repeat.   

No picture b/c I was too busy having a gustatory climax.  Sorry, sort of ;)

I suppose you could make this into a freezer kit, but it's so simple to prep, it's probably not worth the storage container.

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Root Beer Sauce for Pork

I want to make this again just to have the house smell like A&W all night (I do prefer A&W for this, having tried it with Barq's as well). 
The root beer reduces to a slightly syrupy, but not overly sweet, jus that is intriguingly spicy and rich in flavor.  This sauce will top grilled chops, braised shanks, fried ham, sliced roast or pulled pork shoulder equally well.  You can measure and combine ingredients a day ahead of time (or freeze the mixture), or make the sauce to reheat up to a day ahead as well.

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April's Microwave Salisbury Steak

The original recipe is from a friend who writes a gluten-free cooking (and other stuff too) blog at An April a Day.  This recipe, she tells me, is not gluten-free thanks to the canned golden mushroom soup.  I'm not wild in general about using store-bought canned soups, but golden mushroom soup would be a PITA to recreate homemade (and I'm willing to go aways in the direction of homemade substitutions) so take that as you will.  And it's so good that it's worth it...my 18 month old would have licked his plate, if he had better hand-eye coordination.

This is an awfully fast dish to put together thanks to the store-bought help and use of the microwave for cooking, but it's EVEN FASTER when you prep it ahead and stash it in the freezer.  Plan ahead for your storage needs...the patties will  need to cook in a microwave-safe baking dish, so you'll either need to freeze in an appropriate container or be prepared to transfer the somewhat delicate patties between freezer container and microwave cooking dish.

I have also used this recipe as the basis for a crockpot roast.  Instead of making patties with ground meat, brown a roast on all sides, then put in a crockpot.  Combine the remaining seasonings (omit breadcrumbs and egg) and sauce ingredients and pour over.  Cook 8-10 hours on low. 

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Hungarian Stuffed Peppers

The thing that makes these peppers stand out from all the other stuffed peppers in the world is the paprika...it's in the meat, it's in the gravy, it's in the smell that permeates the house while you're baking this dish. 

The pepper-and-paprika infused gravy is built on an intensely flavorful stock and finished in the original recipe (Frugal Gourmet's Immigrant Ancestors) with a "beurre manié" of flour and sour cream.  Since I've never had good things come of freezing sour cream, I use buttermilk inside for a freezer-friendly version.  Just be sure when you add the buttermilk-flour slurry to whisk constantly and pour slowly to avoid lumps.

Since this does take a little prep work, it's worth it to make a LOT and freeze these puppies up.  Especially if you hit a good sale on bell peppers at your market.  Doubling this recipe is no problem, just freeze the peppers in the number of portions you want with appropriate division of the gravy stock and flour-buttermilk mixture.

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