Blog Surfing

From Narrating Life: Great kids birthday idea here

From Love and Homemade: Ideas for Easter here

From Cafe Johnsonia: Strawberry Pavlova Cake

From Jam Hands: Strawberry Banana Bread

From Sidewalk Shoes: Hot and Sour Chicken Noodle Soup

From Culinary in the Desert: Cornmeal Lime Cookies

From The Way the Cookie Crumbles: Strawberry Double Crisp

From Recipe Shoebox: Edible Birds' Nests

From Playing House: Chocolate Truffle Brownies

From Baking and Boys: Watermelon Salad with Tomato and Feta

From My Baking Addiction: Simple No Knead Pizza Dough

From Sidewalk Shoes: Goat Cheese, Lemon and Pea Pasta

From The Sister's Cafe: Black Bean and Sweet Corn Quinoa

From Eat At Home: How to Freeze Fresh Spinach

From Recipe Shoebox: Cute Easter Bunny Buns

From Eating, Etc.: Hashbrown Crusted Quiche

From A Recipe a Day: Easter Breakfast and Brunch Edition

From Mel's Kitchen Cafe: Easter Dinner Delights

From Sunday Baker: Mud Hen Bars

From King Arthur Flour Blog: Royal Chocolate Biscuit Cake?

I'm The One in the Cute Little Mini-Dress

Have you noticed all the cute, short mini-dresses being worn this spring? Like Jennifer Hudson on Dancing with the Stars in her pouffy, purple mini-dress with her shiny purple heels? 

It was really cute on her!

I am a big fan of clothing trends, but regarding my wardrobe for "Spring 2011," I'm sorry to say, there won't be any cute, colorful mini-dresses for me this spring or summer. Alas, that ship has been launched, sailed and is now retired! This gramma will leave that trend for the younger generation this time around.

One of my first pouffy mini-dresses

Don't feel sorry for me, I wore those cute, pouffy dresses with several pouffy slips underneath to make it even more pouffy, in my day, a few years back.
 

I even played outside in my pouffy mini-dresses

Ok, so maybe it's been more than a few years. It is hard to admit, but it has actually been over 50 years ago that I wore those cute little pouffy mini-dresses! 

My younger sister and I in our pouffy mini-dresses

You know what they say,"What's old is new again", but in this case, I don't think they are referring to 56-year-old grammas wearing pouffy mini-dresses this spring! Not this gramma, anyway! I will leave that for the 20 year-olds.

At least I have cute pictures!

P.S. I think I might need a little therapy coming to terms with that "It's been over 50 years" realization! Seriously!!

Double Chocolate Espresso Cookies

A closer look-hunks of melty bittersweet chocolate

I made these cookies recently for someone that I heard loves anything chocolate. I searched until I found a recipe that had double chocolate plus espresso powder. I love how a little coffee enhances the chocolate flavor. In place of the semisweet chocolate that the recipe called for, I used bittersweet chocolate. 

Baking them is kind of a blur because I was making 12 other things at the same time, but I'm sure they came together fairly easy. The house was filled with the deep aroma of chocolate while they baked. I can't eat any type of dark chocolate anymore, so the aroma is as close as I can get to enjoying dark chocolate. I also stay away from all caffeine. I know, how boring! It isn't that I want to, it's because they both make me physically sick! Don't worry, I still have my memories of the days long ago when I could eat dark chocolate and indulge in all things caffeine.

I never heard if the chocolate lover liked them, but my dear hubby enjoyed a couple of duds that didn't make the cut. He said they were "very, very good!"

Warm and melty, fresh from the oven

Here is the recipe:

Enjoy!

Pasta with Pesto, Chicken, Mushrooms and Cashews

"Chicken Pesto" has been one of our favorite meals for over 25 years. Actually, when the kids were young, just the smell and sight of it made them sick, so it was our dinner we enjoyed fixing for ourselves after the kids had gone to bed!

I have enjoyed adding extra things that have caught my fancy through the years, but this is our basic recipe. This is easy to make and can be on the table in less than 30 minutes. I should say, it comes together quickly, unless the phone rings, the dogs need out, someone is at the door or you realize you don't actually have any pasta in the cupboard or refrigerator!

You will need: 

1/3 lb Whole wheat linguine

1-2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, chopped into bite size pieces

Garlic - to taste, I use at least 5-6 cloves

1/2 to 1 lb. Mushrooms, sliced

1-2 tbsp Olive oil - 1 tbsp if using 1 chicken breast, 2 tbsp if using 2 chicken breasts

1-2 tbsp Butter, same as above

Salt and pepper to taste

Pesto - see recipe below

Cashews

Parmesan Cheese, fresh grated

In a skillet, add a tablespoon of water and add the mushrooms. Saute for about 4-5 minutes, until they are about half cooked and have released their water.

Meanwhile, start bringing your pasta water to a boil in a medium-sized sauce pan.

Remove mushrooms and pour off liquid from the pan. Add the butter and olive oil and heat over medium heat. Add the garlic, chicken and mushrooms, stirring until garlic is tender and chicken is cooked through. 

Add pasta to boiling salted water and cook to al dente. Pour into a strainer, saving some of the pasta water.

Pour part of your pesto into your chicken and mushroom mixture and stir until well covered. Note: We prefer our chicken and mushrooms when they are covered with cooked garlic and pesto sauce before they are added to the pasta.

Place pasta back in sauce pan and add more pesto, to taste. Stir until linguine is covered with pesto. The pesto will stick to the pasta better when it isn't coated with oil or butter. 

Pour pasta mixture back into the medium saute pan and incorporate until everything has mixed together. At this point, if your mixture is too stiff, add a little of the pasta water and stir until it thins a little. You can also add more pesto if you want more. Do this until you have a consistency that you like. 

Note: You can keep them separate and place the pasta in a warm bowl and top with the chicken mushroom mixture if you prefer.

Using a pasta scoop or tongs, place mixture into a warm bowl. Top with freshly grated Parmesan cheese and sprinkle with cashews.

 

Enjoy!

I Love These Boys!

Orange-Ginger Oatmeal Scones

I enjoy mixing different flavors and spices together, especially in baked goods. On this particular day, oatmeal with orange and ginger sounded good, so I decided to make scones. If you prefer a subtle taste of ginger, I would suggest using one teaspoon of ginger instead of the two+ teaspoons that I used. I use Penzys ginger because I prefer it to the others brands in my cupboard. In my opinion, their spices have a more intense flavor, probably due to their freshness. I can't get enough of their ginger. That is why I usually add at least twice the amount called for in a recipe. I was very happy with how they turned out. 

Especially nice served warm with someone special!

Enjoy!

Birthday Dinner Side Dishes: Vegetable Saute with Orange and Balsamic and Root Beer Apples

Vegetable Saute with Orange and Balsamic

Fine Cooking magazine is my favorite cooking magazine! When I found this recipe in my April/May 2011 issue, I knew I wanted to make it for our birthday dinner. Because it was one of those "fix it and serve immediately" dishes,I did everything step that I could a couple hours before. I steamed the haricot verts and kept them chilled in the fridge. I had the shallots sliced and bell pepper cored and sliced.

Most everything was in place to have it perfect for the dinner. Everything was ready and we were ready to sit down as soon as we finished this dish. All was well... until.... my dear hubby....was slicing the orange for the fresh orange juice....and....sliced his finger instead of the orange. 

I digress for a moment: In our kitchen, we have two sets of knives:

HIS: Top-of-the-line Henckels, plus several more that don't fit in the knife block

 And:

HERS- Misc. (23) Paring and slicing knives- all under $10.00 each

Now believe me, we share everything in our house. But, when it comes to knives, HIS, which were actually a gift for me, they scare me! I mean I am very afraid of them. They are large, heavy and always very sharp! So, I deal with that by having my own knife drawer. This situation is why I keep my 23 cheap knives; I am afraid I will slice my finger of and not even know it!

Back to the birthday dinner: Just like this post, it came to a screeching halt! There was a LOT of blood, he almost cut his thumb off! Talking and sharp knives are not a great combination. For about 15 minutes we were all encouraging him to go get it stitched up, but no, he wrapped it up and in 15 minutes I was back to finishing this dish. I re-warmed it and put the glaze ingredients in, but, in the heat of the moment, I forgot to add the fresh baby spinach. It had a great flavor and textures, but would have been even better with the spinach. Such is life!

Vegetable saute sans baby spinach

Recipe from: Fine Cooking April/May 2011
Vegetable Saute with Orange and Balsamic recipe:

This healthful, brightly flavored side dish is perfect for a weeknight - (or a dinner party) it cooks in less than 10 minutes.
Yields 4 servings

1/2 lb haricots verts or thin green beans, trimmed
2 tbsp olive oil
2 medium shallots, halved and thinly sliced (about 1/2 cup)
1 tsp chopped fresh rosemary
1 medium yellow bell pepper, cored and sliced 1/4 inch thick
3 tbsp fresh orange juice
1/2 tbsp balsamic vinegar, I used white balsamic vinegar
1 tsp finely grated orange zest
3 cups lightly packed fresh baby spinach leaves
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

Steam the beans for about 2 minutes, transfer to a bowl and set aside. 
Heat the oil in a 12-inch skillet over medium high heat. 
Add the shallots and rosemary and cook, stirring until the shallots begin to brown, 1-2 minutes. 
Reduce the heat to medium, add the beans and peppers and cook, stirring until  the pepper begins to soften, about 2 minutes.
Stir in the orange juice, balsamic vinegar and orange zest.
Add the spinach and cook, stirring until just wilted, about 20 seconds.
Remove from heat, add salt and pepper to taste.
Serve.


Root Beer Apples 

Fortunately, I had made the root beer apples earlier in the day! My vision for these apples was to recreate the apple side dish that the Blue Bayou restaurant in Disneyland served for years with their pork chop dinner. For many years we enjoyed eating dinner there on Friday evenings and I asked several times if they would share the recipe. Every time the waiter would return with a recipe card for their potato dish. They were very good also, but I really wanted that apple recipe.

The obvious option was to saute them in root beer until tender, but I don't add sugar to applesauce and I knew root beer would make the side dish too sweet. My new plan was to find a root beer extract and I was confident that would be the secret. And yes, I believe it was! The apples made a perfectly delicious side dish with the pork tenderloin! There is no recipe. All you have to do is peel and chop your apples, add a tablespoon of apple juice or apple cider if you want, it isn't necessary, cover them and simmer on the lowest temperature for around 20-30 minutes, stirring often, until they reach the texture you enjoy. I like them tender but chunky. I added the extract after they were cooked. I didn't measure but I just kept adding a little at a time until it had the flavor I wanted. They were really good! I plan to make them for another dinner party very soon.

Root beer apples

The good news is that my dear hubby's thumb is doing well without professional doctoring. Within 72 hours, he went and got that tetanus shot he had put off getting. The nurse looked at his thumb and was very impressed with the great job he did with the butterfly bandages to keep it together. In less than a week later, it was completely healed up with a barely a trace of a scar. I'm convinced that if he had gone and had it stitched up, he would have had a scar and it might not be completely healed up. I'm not suggesting that we self-doctor, but I'm saying sometimes you need to follow your own instincts.

Oh, and did I mention that while working on dinner that day, I was also laboring through a kidney stone?

We are not looking to repeat that eventful day any time soon!