Onions only on half…

We are a pizza eating family!  You would think that we would get tired of it, but we never seem to.   Frozen, delivery, California Pizza Kitchen, Y Not, Primo,or Bella, you name it, we love it – always with onions only on half!

Ralph used to make pizza dough in the bread machine on weekends when the kids were little, somehow we got away from that.  Probably because of South Beach…(sigh).  In any case, we were delighted with the requirement to make homemade pizza dough for Grace’s AHG Cooking Badge!  Feeling certain that using the bread machine would be cheating, we picked up Fleishman’s Yeast ‘specially for Pizza Crust and followed the recipe on the package using white wheat flour from King Arthur.  Ralph, who has more experience with homemade pizza, took the lead on this one!  To make things super easy we used pre-shredded cheese, a jar of sauce, pre-sliced pepperoni and a large can of sliced olives.  My kids love olives, and whatever doesn’t make it on to the pizza they snack on.  I chopped the onions to save time.  The whole wheat crust was pretty good, next time we will try adding some garlic to the crust for a little extra punch.   We really enjoyed making pizza together!  It was tasty, relatively economical and no big deal to fix it with onions only on half!

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Yummy Baked Pasta Casserole for AHG

Grace’s AHG Cooking badge requires Explorer Level girls to make an easy casserole for family dinner time!  We found an easy recipe that involved pasta and cheese, and then added some ground beef and spices  – ingredients that are always well received in the Garner household!  Grace followed the directions, and did all of the work herself!  Mom hovered, and took lots of pictures (how annoying!) except I didn’t get a picture of the finished casserole…of course, it didn’t last long either.  Easy and delicious!

 

Ingredients:
1 jar of Pasta Sauce (26 oz) *
1.5 cups of water  (we used a can of V8 for extra nutrition)
15 oz container Ricotta Cheese
2 c shredded Mozzarella cheese (divided)
1/4 cup grated Parmesan
8 oz uncooked Ziti pasta (we used Penne)
1 lb ground beef
garlic and onions to taste
fresh basil leaves ( a handful)

Directions:
Preheat oven to 400. 

Brown ground beef, and drain on paper towels.  In a saute pan, brown minced garlic and chopped onions in a little olive oil.  Set aside.  

In large bowl combine Pasta Sauce and water or V8, spices, ** add Ricotta cheese, and 1 cup of Mozzarella and the Parmesan, mix well, then add uncooked pasta . 

Lightly spray a 13×9 casserole dish with olive oil, then spoon the pasta mixture into the dish.  Cover tightly with aluminum foil and bake 55 minutes.

Remove from oven, remove foil, and sprinkle with remaining 1 cup of Mozzarella cheese;  return uncovered casserole to oven and bake 5 more minutes until the cheese is melted.

Remove the casserole from the oven and let it rest for 10 minutes before serving.

*  We rarely buy pasta sauce because they are loaded with sugar, and frequently overpriced.  We make our own from a large can of crushed tomatoes and a 15 oz can of petite fire-roasted diced tomatoes, this time I had scored a great deal on a discontinued line of Newman’s Own.  

** If we are tired, and don’t feel like making a salad, we often add frozen spinach leaves (or wilted fresh) to our pasta sauce for a boost of vitamins and a nutritionally complete one dish meal.  Simply mix in a one or two large handfuls of washed fresh spinach leaves in step two with the pasta sauce, or as much as a cup or so of frozen spinach if you buy it in resealable bags (my favorite way to keep spinach).   The Garner kids are happy to eat spinach this way because the flavor is barely discernible.

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The last of the summer’s blueberries…

were tossed today into thick quick-bread batter.  My mother-in-law spends mid-summer in the company of friends at the local pick-your-own Pungo Blueberry Farm .  The farm family’s gratitude for her inability to sit still and her ready willingness to pitch in, often reaps benefits like homemade strawberry-rhubarb jam, and vast quantities of plump, delicious blueberries, which she shares with us!  I have juggled the last two cups of frozen blueberries in my very small freezer through several months and two holidays because I knew that today would come – the mid-winter, rainy-day blahs.  So today the Garners are looking forward to the taste of sweet summer blueberries embedded in a lemony sweet bread bringing a ray of sunshine to our palates!

And some fragrant hot tea...

I found this delicious recipe for Lemon Blueberry Quick Bread from Joy of Baking (dot) com.  It’s easy and no exotic ingredients are required.  We always bake with King Arthur flour, and I used their White Wheat for our loaf.

* Post Update – Apparently the site, or the link isn’t working so I’m posting the recipe ingredients.  For instructions please visit Joy of Baking (dot) com. 

Lemon Blueberry Bread Ingredients:
(makes 1 9×5 loaf, 350 degrees for 50-55 minutes)

1 1/2 cups (195 grams) all-purpose King Arthur flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon grated lemon zest 
1 cup (240 ml) fresh blueberries (I used frozen)
1/2 cup (113 grams) unsalted butter, room temperature
3/4 cup (150 grams) granulated white sugar
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup (120 ml) milk

Lemon Glaze:
2 tablespoons (25 grams) granulated white sugar
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

 

Mmmmolasses Crinkles!

One of our all time favorite cookie recipes is from my first cook book, Betty Crocker’s New Boys and Girls Cookbook.  A gift from my beloved Aunt Janet, when I was 9 or 10,  this cookbook took me through college and beyond until it was joined by Good Housekeeping Illustrated Cookbook, a wedding gift from my bff’s mother. I still treasure both and they look it.  (See the binding?)

Grace is working on her American Heritage Girl Cooking Badge, and is also on the lookout for opportunities to meet her Service Hour goal, so happily agreed to work on two goals in one by making cookies for a Bake Sale at our church, Ghent UMC, to benefit the Vacation Bible School. 

What to bake? Our other seasonal fave, Pumpkin Chocolate Chip was already claimed.  Having been off and on South Beach for several years, we don’t do a tremendous amount of baking (not the right sort of carbs); and I’ve never been one to spend hours on fancy Christmas cookies that look better than they taste!  If we’re going to eat cookies, they at least need to be worth falling off the wagon.  I pulled out the cookbook and showed her  the recipe for Molasses Crinkles and promised her that despite the lack of chocolate and holiday cookie bling they would taste great! 

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The recipe is easy!  We increase the spices because we love them!  I only use King Arthur whole wheat flour products – we used King Arthur White Wheat for our cookies, and topped them with Turbinado sugar instead of granulated because I love the warmth of the golden crystals against the brown spicy cookie.  Here is a link:  Betty Crocker’s Molasses Crinkles.   The recipe makes 4 dozen cookies.  We doubled the recipe, planning to donate 4 dozen of the best looking ones to church and keep some to nibble a few for a day, and then freeze for Christmas Dinner.  By the time we packaged up the cookies for the sale, I was lucky to freeze one dozen!   My hungry husband and teenage son had devoured 3 dozen cookies!  (I didn’t eat any -wink, wink!) When I complained about so few being left, Grace said, “No problem Mom! I’ll bake you some more. They were awesome!”