Dinner in a Pumpkin

This meal is a fun way to send your trick-or-treaters out in to the cold with full tummies. My mom made it for me every Halloween and now I make it for my family. It's a fun, nutritious way to start the festivities. Plus, if the kids get to pick out, gut and decorate the pumpkin, they will be more likely to give it a try.

Dinner in a Pumpkin

1 small to medium pumpkin

1 onion, chopped

11/2-2 lbs hamburger

2 Tbsp brown sugar

4 oz  can of sliced mushrooms (drained)

1 can cream of chicken soup

11/2 cup cooked rice

18 oz can sliced water chestnuts (drained)

Salt and Pepper to taste

Cut a hole in the top of pumpkin (do this at a slight angle tilted toward the stem. If you cut straight down, your cap will fall in while baking)  and remove seeds and fibers. If you wish, draw a face on the outside of the pumpkin with a black sharpie (the pumpkin shrivels when it bakes, so scary faces work best). Brown meat and onions, drain off drippings. Mix all ingredients in the pumpkin and cook at 350⁰ until the pumpkin is soft (usually 1 to 2 hours). Make sure when you serve it that you scrape some pumpkin off the sides for each serving. It's yummy!

Taste the '80's

If decades had flavors, the 1980's would taste like these marshmallow brownies. They were at every picnic, party and family gathering of my childhood. I ate (and stole) as many as I could every time Mom made a batch. The flavors are simple and the texture is really really chewy. They are not sophisticated by any means, but I love them none the less. Besides, how often do you get to use a jelly roll pan to bake brownies? Seize the chance!

 

Mom’s Brownies

2 cubes butter (room temperature)

2 cups sugar

1/3 cup cocoa

11/2 cup flour

1 tsp vanilla

4 eggs

Marshmallows (enough to spread on top)

Icing:

¼ cup melted butter

2 Tbsp cocoa

2 Tbsp milk

½ tsp vanilla

11/2 cups powdered sugar

Dash of salt

Combine butter, sugar, cocoa, flour, vanilla and eggs in a bowl until smooth. Pour batter on a greased jelly roll pan or cookie sheet.  Bake at 350⁰ for 25 minutes. Remove brownies from oven and turn off the heat. Immediately layer marshmallows on top and place in the still warm oven until the marshmallows begin to look puffy (watch carefully so as not to overcook). Remove from the oven and spread the marshmallows with a spatula until the brownies are evenly coated. Add icing on top and refrigerate 30 minutes before serving.

Freezer Corn Tutorial

3 for $1 is an average price for sweet corn. 4 for $1 is really good and 5 for $1 is amazing. If you happen to see that kind of deal, you can't pass it up. Free up some space in your freezer if you can, because you will be thanking yourself when you are eating farm fresh corn in January. The taste is amazing and much better than canned corn and even the freezer aisle stuff.

Items needed:
Bundt pan
electric knife (try to get one with a bottom squeeze trigger if you can. Thumb triggers will tire you faster)
stock pot
Jelly roll pan
Ziplock freezer bags (I use pint sized)
Tongs
1 cup measure 
Big bowl

Ingredients:
Butter (optional)
Salt (optional)
Pepper (optional)
30 ears of summer sweet corn

Directions:

Preparation
Fill stock pot 2/3 full of water and boil on high. It will take twenty minutes or more for this much water to reach a boiling point, so you have plenty of time to husk your corn cobs while you wait. Remove all leaves and as much silk as you can. I like to stack my cobs on a jelly roll sheet so they are easy to move from the prep area to the cooking area.

Boil
My stock pot fit 15 ears of corn in each batch. You may get more or less depending on the size of your pot. Using your tongs (carefully!) place the ears in the pot. Leave a good three inches of headspace between the water level and the top of your pan so you don't over boil. The corn will drop the temperature of the water so you will have to wait a bit before it returns to a rolling boil. As soon as it does, set your timer for 6 minutes.

Blanche
Fill a clean sink with cold water and ice cubes. When the boiling time is up move the corn from the pot to the sink and let soak until they are cool enough to handle. The cold water stops the cooking process and helps seal in the color and nutrients.

Cut
This is the fun part. Place the tip of the corn cob in the center of the bundt pan. Hold the corn vertical with one hand and with the other hand slice down the sides of the corn with your electric knife. Try to stop before you reach the the end, or you will nick your pan and dull your knife (obviously I learned the hard way. Poor little pan!) When your pan fills up, dump it out in your collection bowl. Also, don't cut too deep, or you will get tough chewy stuff in your corn.

Season
I prefer to leave my corn plain and season it when I serve it, but if you know that you will always want butter on your corn, this is the time to do it. Melt your butter in your microwave. I'd do one cube per thirty ears but you can do more or less depending on how buttery you like your corn, and maybe a tablespoon of salt and and a tablespoon of pepper, but it is really up to your discretion. Coat evenly.

Measure
I used three cups per bag, because that's an ideal serving size for my family. 30 ears of corn gave me nine bags, but it will be different every time based on the size of the cobs you find.

Seal
Squeeze out as much air as you can and seal tightly. A food vacuum would be ideal for this, but I've had freezer corn last in regular ziplocks for an entire year without freezer burn.

Freeze
I like to stack my bags flat on a cookie sheet so they freeze in manageable shapes. As soon as they are frozen you can stack them them on their ends to make more space in your freezer.

Pico De Gallo

Pico De Mayo. That's what my Spanish-inhibited better half called this. I think he's confusing his holidays with his food, but at least he's in the right genre. I watched an acquaintance make this at a luncheon last summer. She didn't have a recipe, just fresh ingredients from her garden and a lime juicer. Here's my attempt at recreating her magic.

Pico De Gallo

10-15 roma tomatoes
1 large white onion (must be white. Yellow onions are too pungent to eat raw)
1/2 bunch of cillantro
2-3 limes
Salt and pepper to taste

Directions
Prepare romas by washing them, slicing them down the middle and squeezing the seeds out under running water. Once cleaned, cut the ends off and dice. Place in bowl. Next dice your white onion and add to the bowl. Wash your cilantro and cut the stems off before chopping finely and adding to the romas and onions. Slice your limes length wise and squeeze over the other ingredients. Discard lime when finished. Salt and Pepper. (I use sea salt for this, and liberally. It's hard to over salt a raw tomato in my opinion. I probably use two or three teaspoons by the time I'm done.) Refrigerate.

This should be eaten within a few days. The salt draws the juices out of the tomatoes and it can get soggy and limp after a while.

Simple and easy, right? I like to eat it with tortilla chips or use it as a topping for tilapia or burritos. It makes for a fresh summer snack or even a light lunch.

Grandma's Frog Eye Salad

Because it is summer.
Because it is delicious.
Because it's awesome to tell your kids mid bite what it's called.
Because calling it a salad makes it healthier. Psychologically.
Because it tastes good, that's why.
How many reasons do you need?
I don't need anymore. I'm taking this good stuff to an end of summer bash a few hours from now and my only regret is that I'll have to share it.
Love this stuff.

All credit for this recipe goes to my grandma, and my mom who dictated it to me from my grandmother's stained and tattered original recipe card. I love that food can connect people like that, and I want copy of that card, Mom.  

Grandma's Frog Eye Salad

Ingredients

1 cup sugar

1tbs flour

1 3/4 cups pineapple juice (drained from the 2 pineapple chunk cans)

2 1/2 tsp salt, divided

2 eggs, beaten

1 tbs lemon juice

1 tbs cooking oil

1 pkg acini di pepe (16oz)

2 cans mandarin. drained

2 cans pineapple chunks. drained

1 can crushed pineapple. drained

9 oz non dairy whipped topping

1 cup colored miniature marshmallows

1 cup shredded coconut

Directions

Combine sugar, flour, 1/2 tsp salt, pineapple juice and eggs. Cook over medium heat, stirring until thickened. Add lemon juice. Cool mixture to room temperature. Bring water, 2tsp salt and oil to boil. Add acini di pepe. Cook at rolling boil until it is done. Drain. Rinse with water and drain again. Cool to room temperature. Combine egg mixture and acini di pepe. Mix lightly but thoroughly. Refrigerate overnight in an air tight container. Add remaining ingredients. Makes about 25 servings. 

Dirty Dozen: Chicken Pot Pie

All the credit for this dish goes to my good friend Juile. When I was a new mom, she took me under her wing and showed me how to can peaches, introduced me to real vegetables, and was even brave enough to swap meals with me a few times a week for over a year (I still feel guilty about that nasty chicken-wild rice-green-bean slurry. Julie, if you are reading this, I am will be sorry until my death for trying a new recipe on you without testing it first. We're still friends, right? Right?). Anyway, this dish was one of my favorites from her and I've made it a main stay in my pantry, and it is one of the dirty dozen I mentioned in my first post. I highly, highly recommend using the homemade cream soup for this. The flavor is subtle yet surprising, and I mix it up in big batches so I always have some on hand.

Chicken Pot Pie

Filling

2 medium frozen chicken breast pieces

1 Can cream of Chicken or 1/4 cup Cream Soup mix with 1 cup cold water*

2 cups water with two cubes bullion

1 bag frozen peas and carrots

½ tsp tarragon

½ tsp parsley

½ tsp sage          

½ tsp rosemary

Biscuit Topping

1½  C flour

3½ tsp baking powder

½ tsp salt

½ C  melted butter

1½  C Buttermilk **

Directions
Preheat oven to 350⁰

Boil chicken in water/bullion mix until cooked through and set aside. Do not drain the water, as this is the base for your filling. If you are using the homemade soup, mix it with 1 cup cold water before whisking into the base. Stir over medium heat until mixture thickens. If you are using canned soup instead, just dump it in and stir it up.  Cut up chicken into bite sized pieces and add it along with the frozen peas and carrots to the base. Remove from heat.

Mix biscuits.

Pour filling into a greased 9x13 pan and dallop with biscuit mix. It doesn't matter if it is lumpy, as it will even out while baking, but try to distrubute evenly so the top is mostly covered.

Bake at 350⁰ for 1 hour.

**If you don’t have butter milk on hand, you can substitute using plain yogurt or 1½ C Milk mixed with 2 T lemon juice or vinegar. Let it stand for 5 minutes to thicken up before mixing in.

This recipe freezes really well. To reheat at 350⁰ until warm (about an hour).

Cream of Whatever You Want It To Be Soup

½ C  nonfat dry milk

2 T cornstarch

2 ts chicken bouillon

¼ tsp onion powder

⅛ tsp garlic powder

¼ tsp basil

¼ tsp thyme

¼ tsp white pepper

9 oz cold water

Heat to boil, stir frequently. For cream of celery use ¼ cup celery, for cream of mushroom use ½ C mushrooms.

And just because this post isn't long enough, here's the measurements for a batch of ten:

Cream Soup Batch of Ten

5 C  nonfat dry milk

1½ C cornstarch

⅓ C chicken bouillon

2½ tsp onion powder

1 ¼ tsp garlic powder

2½tsp basil

2½ tsp thyme

2½ tsp white pepper

Mix ingredients and divide into 10 Ziploc bags (a heaping ½ Cup for each bag). Seal and store until you are ready to use them! When you are ready to use one, just mix with 9 oz. cold water and heat to a boil.

 

Hawaiian Haystacks

There are as many ways to build a Haystack as there are people, which is why it's such a great crowd-pleaser. Also, this is a meal in and of itself (carb. check. veggie. check. protein. check) so you don't really need any side dishes, but I do occasionally serve mine with a side of red grapes.

Ingredients:
6 cups cooked white rice
1-2 broccoli crowns
2 cans mandarin oranges
1 can cream of chicken soup
1 can pineapple (fresh pineapple would be AMAZING in this dish, but it's rarely on sale)
1 cup sour cream
2 grilled chicken breasts
Sliced green onions
shredded coconut
diced tomatoes
dry chow mien noodles
Salt and pepper
Shredded cheddar

Directions:

Start your rice. I use an old Aroma rice cooker, and I'm happy with the results every time. I use the steamer insert to cook my broccoli at the same time.

While rice is cooking, grill or saute your chicken until it is no longer pink and juices run clear. Wash your hands before you move to the next step. Raw chicken has some bad juju in it and you don't want to spread it. When chicken is cool enough to touch, cut into cubes or strips.

Prep the toppings. Tomatoes are diced and green onions sliced. Open and drain fruit cans. Set out cheese, coconut, and chow mien noodles. Since I serve my haystacks buffet style, I put each topping in it's own bowl and lay it out on the counter.

The last thing you do is make the sauce. You can do this over the stove, but I prefer the microwave. Heat cream of chicken soup in a glass bowl on high for 2 to 3 minutes. Add sour cream and stir until blended.

My husband swears there is only one way to build a perfect haystack: lay down the rice, spread a few dollops of sauce over it, salt and pepper, and then layer on cheese, chicken, broccoli, onions, tomatoes, oranges, pineapple, chow mien (in that order) and then finally a sprinkle of coconut.