Chocolate Rasberry Truffles

Well, it's been a while since I've posted anything. I haven't stopped cooking, just been very busy. I don't want to work right now....taking a break. I am taking these truffles to an event tonight, so when someone wants the recipe, I will direct them here because they are sooooo goooood!

24 oz. semisweet chocolate chips (4Cups)

1 8 oz. package of cream cheese, softened

1/3 Cup Baileys

a couple of drops of raspberry flavor if desired

1 pound dark chocolate candy coating

white candy coating, optional

In a microwave safe bowl or double boiler, melt chocolate chips, cream cheese, Baileys and flavor. ( did three minutes at 50% power but it may be different in different microwaves). Mix well until creamy. Chill until firm enough to shape into balls. I chilled for a while, then used a melon baller to place little piles on wax paper on a cookie sheet. Then placed the cookie sheets in the freezer while preparing the candy coating chocolate. Melt the dark chocolate candy coating in microwave or double boiler. Dip balls (may use some reshaping by rolling in hands before dipping) and place on waxed paper to harden. I used two small spoons to dip. Don't worry about the mess, it cuts off when dried. If you have white chocolate, melt some of that in a sandwich bag in the microwave. It doesn't take long to melt. Kneed the chocolate until smooth, clip the corner of the bag off and drizzle white chocolate over the truffles for fancy look :) Makes about 3 1/2 dozen. They are rich, so you don't want them too large.

Pumpkin Pie (actually butternut squash pie)

2 Eggs

1/4 teaspoon Cloves

2 C Pumpkin (I use butternut squash)

3/4 C Sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ginger

1 Can (1 1/2 C) Evaporated Milk

1 Pie Crust

Mix all ingredients (except the crust - duh), pour into crust, bake in a 425 degree oven for about 45 minutes or until knife comes out clean. Top with whipped cream if desired.

I prepared the butternut squash on a different day. Just cut in half, scoop out the seeds, bake in a 350 degree oven for about an hour or so, until the squash is able to be pierced with a fork. I really didn't time that, so it could take longer. I did not cover the squash, just placed them faced down with a bit of water in the pan to help steam. Once the squash is cool enough to handle, scoop out the meat of the squash and mash with a potato masher. Pumpkin from a Can could be used, but it does not have any texture- I think it too much like baby food.

Meatloaf by Grandma Kreger

1 Pound Hamburger

1/2 Pound Sausage

2 C Diced Bread

1 C Milk

1 Egg

1/4 C Diced Onion

1 Tablespoon Sage

1/2 Teaspoon Dried Mustard

1/4 Teaspoon Pepper

Mix all together completely and place in bread pan sprayed with Pam. Cook in 350 degree oven for about 1 hour, 15 minutes.

Topping:

1/4 C Ketchup

2 Tablespoons Mustard

2 Tablespoons Brown Sugar

Pull out the meatloaf, drain the grease off, use spatula to hold meatloaf in pan as you drain, then spread topping, bake for another 10-15 minutes.

The sausage comes in a one pound tube, I usually double this recipe and place 1/2 in a freezer zip-lock bag in the shape of a loaf for a fast food meal.

Sausage, Peppers, Pasta Marinara

This dish was inspired by Olive Garden and one of our local restaurants has a version also. It is very simple and very good! My daughter says my version is better than Pompeii's, so "thank you" Danielle. Mmmmm, I think I'm still hungry, have to go get those left overs.

Ingredients

1 1/2 pound Sweet or Hot Italian Sausage Links (I do 1/2 of each & cut them different, hubby likes it hot, I do not

2 Green or Sweet Peppers of any color, cut into strips

1 Medium Onion sliced into strips

1 Cup Mushrooms - optional

2 Tablespoons of olive oil

3/4 # pasta of your choice

5 Cups Marinara (recipe below)

Parmesan Cheese - freshly grated is best

Marinara Sauce

1 Large Can Diced Tomatoes (28 oz.)

1 Can Tomato Sauce (15 oz.)

1 Tablespoon Chopped Garlic - if I have to measure ?

2 Tablespoons Olive Oil - optional, I leave this out to keep it lighter

1/2 C Fresh Basil - I've used other basil when I had to, but it is worth that trip to the store for the fresh basil, that makes the dish.

Pepper to taste

Bake or pan-fry sausage until fully cooked. Drain, cut sausage in pieces and add veggies with some water, cover to steam veggies while pasta is cooking. The veggies should not get too mushy.

Simmer Marinara Sauce while all other stuff is cooking.

Boil pasta as directed, drain.

Place pasta on plate, with marinara sauce, then add the sausage veggie mix, topped with fresh Parmesan cheese. Simple, yet wonderful.

Cabbage Soup

I first had cabbage soup at Big Boys and fell in love. So here is my version of this hearty and healthy soup.

1 cup V-8 juice

4 stalks celery cut in 2-inch pieces

2 cans (14 ounces each) diced tomatoes

2 cans (14 ounces each) clear beef broth

2 cups water

1 smoked pork hock (3/4 pound) or ham steak in bite-size pieces

1 onion, about the size of a lemon, diced

1/2 head cabbage, diced and cored and outer leaves discarded

2 carrots finely diced

1 envelope onion soup mix

1 teaspoon dry minced parsley

Generous dash pepper and/or ½ teas. red pepper flakes or more

Salt to taste if desired – I do not desire, there is plenty of salt in everything else.

Put V-8 juice and celery into blender and blend on high speed, about half a minute or until minced. Pour into 6-quart kettle and add each remaining ingredient as listed.

Bring to boil.

Cover and reduce to gentle simmer — simmering two hours or until cabbage is tender.

Serves 6.

Recipe may be cut in half or freezes well. Thaw and reheat within six months. I double the recipe so I can freeze a lot and still have left overs. If I am going to the trouble of making something good and homemade, it is really nice to have some of that when I feel lazy instead of heading to McDonalds or the pizza place.

Chicken and Dumplings

In a big pot
Boil about 1 1/2 pounds of chicken on the bone, cover with water, plus a couple inches - this is a great recipe for those legs and thighs that are so cheap.

Remove the chicken from the water (now broth) after 30 minutes or so when it starts falling apart. Let it sit in colander a while until it's cool enough to handle, then de-bone. I use plastic food handling gloves from Sam's cuz I'm a wimp. You could always use canned broth and chicken, but I would not bother, it's not the same. Cut up chicken into bite size pieces, discard the bones and skin. Skim the grease off the broth before adding the chicken back. I put the "somewhat cooled" broth into a large gallon sized zip lock bag, set aside and cool. As the fat rises to the top, the zip lock bag can be held over the large pot, next to the sink. Snip the bottom of the bag while holding it over the pan. As the broth empties out into the pan, the fat layer gets closer to the opening, then transfer into the sink.

Dice an onion

Chop up 2-3 carrots, and add to the pot

2-3 pieces of celery chopped up

1/2 red pepper-optional but adds nice color chopped

1 Tablespoon of chopped garlic

1 Tablespoon of chicken soup base

1 teaspoon black pepper

1 teaspoon thyme

1 teaspoon sage

1 cup red wine

Add all the above ingredients to the soup except the 1 cup of red wine. Add the wine to a nice glass and sip while simmering the soup. Cooking with wine, it's called. Then prepare the dumplings…

Dumplings

Mix in a bowl:
1 1/2 cups whole wheat pastry flour
3/4 tsp sea salt
2 tsp baking powder
3 Tablespoons softened butter

3/4 cup milk

Cut together the first four ingredients. Then lightly stir together with the milk for soft dough!

Drop in 10-12 spoonfuls onto chicken stew.

Cook uncovered 10 minutes. Cover and cook 10 minutes longer. Make sure the soup is simmering, almost boiling. Mine stuck to the bottom of the pan, so there is a fine line not to burn it.

Pork Tenderloin with Roasted Red Peppers and Leeks

This recipe is from the internet, with my changes. It is awesome! The clerk from Meijer wanted to come to dinner after asking me about the leeks. She never showed up :) Tod says the picture does not do the meal justice.

Serve this tender pork with garlic mashed potatoes.

Ingredients

1 garlic clove
1 can tomato sauce
1 teaspoon dried sage
1 teaspoon pepper
2 pounds pork tenderloin, cut crosswise into 8 slices and flattened to about 1-inch
¼ C seasoned dry breadcrumbs
2 tablespoons + extra-virgin olive oil, divided
3 medium leeks, thinly sliced (about 1 1/2 cups) or onion
2/3 cup thinly sliced roasted red peppers (from a jar) or fresh, broiled, then sliced. Make sure the jar is just peppers, no sugar or vinegar- I made that mistake- ugh.

Instructions

In a medium bowl whisk garlic, tomato sauce, sage and pepper. Coat pork with breadcrumbs.

In a large skillet heat, 1 tablespoon of the oil over medium-high heat. Add pork; cook 3 minutes or until golden brown on both sides. Remove to a plate. I had to add more oil as needed to brown the pork.

Add more oil to pan, reduce heat to medium-low; add leeks and cook 2 minutes, stirring occasionally, or until wilted. Return pork to skillet; add red peppers and broth mixture. I also had some left over asparagus I added. Bring to a simmer, reduce heat, and simmer until pork is cooked through and sauce is nice thick consistency. Serves 8.

Mushroom Salisbury Steak

1/4 C Cornstarch

4 C Beef Broth (2 cans)

6 oz. Mushrooms

4 teas. Worcestershire Sauce

1 T Fresh Basil or 1/4 teas. dried

1 egg - beaten

1/2 C Soft Bread Crumbs

1 small onion finely chopped (1/2 C)

1/2 teas. black pepper

1 1/2 # ground lean hamburger

Mix corn starch with cold broth, add the remainder of the first group of ingredients, bring to a boil slowly, stir until thick, then let simmer on low.

Mix the second group of ingredients together in a bowl. Form about six patties and place in baking dish (sprayed with Pam). Bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes or so until patties are done. When gravy is done, place about a cup over the patties while they are baking. Reserve the rest of the gravy to place over the potatoes or noodles.

Apple Cinnamon Oatmeal

Now this seems way too simple to put down a recipe, but when we were camping one time, many of the people were amazed at this dish when I made it over the fire. Maybe they were just really hungry, not sure, but I love this easy, "fast food" breakfast.

3 C water

1 small apple cut up (I don't bother pealing, just take the core out)

1/4 teas. cinnamon

Bring to a boil.

Add 1 1/2 C Oatmeal (the old fashioned kind - the instant stuff is baby food)

Continue the boil/simmer until the right consistency.

We top this with some skim milk and maple syrup (Tod makes maple syrup mostly for his oatmeal). Another alternative to this is to add a banana and a handful of walnuts to the oatmeal and water- wonderful if you like banana nutbread!

Chicken & Broccoli Pot Pie

This is great for leftover chicken or turkey! This recipe would make two pies. One is never enough. My friend that does not eat anything green eats this and says it's good....he's either polite and gagging on the broccoli, or it's really really good. I'm partial to the really good idea of coarse.

1 T Olive Oil

1 C Onion Chopped

1 T Minced Garlic

2 T fresh Sage or 1 T dried rubbed sage

1 teas black pepper

Simmer above until onion is tender, then add:

4 Carrots chopped

2 Broccoli Crowns chopped

2 C chicken broth

(optional 1/4 C freshly grated Parmesan)

1 T chicken soup base or boullian

2-3 C chopped chicken or turkey

Simmer for 5-10 minutes, then in a separate bowl, stir together:

2 C skim milk

2 T corn starch

Slowly add milk mixture to bubbly veggies and meat. Stir until thickened. Pour into pie pans lined with Pillsbury pie crust. Cover the pie with another layer of crust, put slices into the crust for air vents, you can rub some butter on the top and sprinkle some pepper for a glistening savory crust.

Bake in 400 degree oven for about 30-40 minutes, until crust is brown and sauce is bubbly. It is best to let the pie sit for 20 minutes so it will come out like pie and not like soup. Gotta be patient.

Tuna Casserole

Really, it is good.....no joking!

Enough of the sweets already, I'm hungry for some comfort food on this beautiful Fall day. This is an indulgence in salt, but every once in a while is ok.

4 C Homestyle Egg Noodles- cooked and drained

2 cans of Cream of Mushroom Soup

1 can of Milk

2 cans of tuna in water (I don’t bother draining)

1 teaspoon pepper

Optional Items to take this Homey Dish Uptown ;)

½ C Onion Chunks

Fresh Sliced Mushrooms and/or some fresh Baby Spinach chopped to add more texture and color.

While cooking the noodles, mix all the other ingredients in a large baking dish sprayed with cooking oil. Add cooked noodles, mix and top with “French fried onions”. Bake at 400 degrees for 30 minutes or so until hot and bubbly.

Can be served with lemon juice sprinkled on top. If it seems dry as a left over, you can add more milk. Serves 6.

Apple Crisp

This is a good recipe to get typed, since it is falling out of my cookbook. It was my kids favorite as they were growing up, but since we had a wonderful pear tree at our old house, we always had "pear crisp". I remember their surprise when they saw someone that had made apple crisp; "mom, why would someone use apples in pear crisp?" The picture here is from a large pan of apple crisp I took to church from apples we picked last Sunday at McCallum's Orchard.

4 C sliced tart apples (or more- fill up the pan w/ a couple of inches of apples over a buttered pan)

2/3 C packed brown sugar

1/2 C flour

1/2 C oats

1/2 C crushed walnuts

1/3 C butter softened

3/4 teas cinnamon

1/4 teas nutmeg

Heat oven to 375 degrees. Arrange apples in a buttered 8" X8" square pan. (I always double the recipe for a 13" X 9" cake pan) Mix the remainder of the ingredients together. A pastry cutter may be the easiest way to mix. Sprinkle over the apples evenly.

Bake until topping is golden brown, some apple juice is bubbly and the apples are tender enough for a toothpick (about 30 minutes or so)

Serve warm with whipped cream or ice cream. (It is still good cold though)

If you want to try Pear Crisp, use canned pears (I like the light Pears- less sugar), slice up the pears into smaller pieces. This is way easier than peeling apples and is tasty and unique.

Gluten Free Baked Apples were made for my friend without the oats and flour....She said they were very good.

Rhubarb Sauce

Second day of Blogging, we are doing good now.

4 C cut up rhubarb

I use a food processor because I'm lazy

Heat up 1/2 C water with 3/4 C sugar, bring to a boil. Sometimes I have to add more water, but then you just simmer it longer to get the consistency that you want. Add the rhubarb.

Are ya ready for my secret ingredient that is not in the Betty Crocker Book? 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon added to taste. I also added red food coloring to this batch, it looks more fruity that way, without it, it's kinda greenish red......Simmer all together until it is sauce.

Spoon this over ice cream or eat it straight up. Super simple, super addictive.

Pumpkin Cheesecake

This is easy and one of the best fall deserts around. It can be made with rice flour too if you want a gluten free dessert. Desert, dessert, I can't remember what Kris told me :) This recipe came from a Libby pumpkin can a long time ago. You can use fresh pumpkin or squash or the canned - un-spiced pumpkin. I prefer butternut squash, but no one would eat butternut squash cheesecake.....they never know, ssshhhh.

Crust

1 C Flour

1/3 C Brown Sugar

5 T Butter

½ C Chopped Nuts

Cut together crust w/ pastry cutter and set aside ¾ C of crumbs for topping. Press crust into 8’ X 8’ pan and bake @ 350 degrees for 15 minutes.

Filling

8 oz. Cream Cheese

¾ C Sugar

½ C Pumpkin (or squash)

2 eggs

½ teas Cinnamon

1 teas Vanilla

Blend the filling together in food processor (or blender) until smooth, pour over pre-baked crust, top with the ¾ C crumbs, finish baking for an additional 30 minutes.

Homemade Sloppy Joes

This recipe is.  Sandwiches from Tod's Mom (Bonnie Rodgers). Once I had this, I never had a Manwich again. The ingredients may look a bit "redneck", but let this simmer for a day and you have a great comfort food!

1 to 1 1/2 pound ground beef (or turkey if you wish) browned and drained

1 C onion chopped

1/2 celery chopped

1/4 C green pepper chopped

2 Tab vinegar

1 Tab brown sugar

1 Tab Worcestershire Sauce

1 C ketchup

1/4 teas cayenne (Bonnie didn't use this)

Brown meat, drain, add remainder ingredients, simmer for at least 30 minutes. Crockpot works well too to allow the flavors to really co-mingle.  Makes about 8 sandwiches.  

Black Bean Soup

1 Tablespoon olive oil

4 thinly sliced scallions (or 1C onions)

1 thinly sliced celery stalk (1/2 C)

4 minced garlic cloves (1 Tb minced)

2 teaspoons ground cumin

1/8 teaspoon cayenne

Pinch of salt

Freshly ground pepper

Cook and stir until veggies soften.

2 (15 oz.) cans black beans and their liquid (or 1/2 pound bag of dried black beans soaked overnight, rinsed and cooked in 3 C of water)

1 (15 oz.) can diced tomatoes with juices

1 ½ C chicken broth (or one can) - Vegetarian I used 1 C water, 1/2 C red wine

Simmer and cook for 10 minutes.

Blend 2 C up this in blender, return to soup. Simmer and enjoy. This is a new favorite that is healthy too. Adapted from the South Beach Diet Book. Finish with a dollop of sour cream if you wish :)