Sausage Cheese Biscuit Balls

This recipe came from a sampling of multiple recipes to achieve what I wanted.  The result is reminiscent of red lobster cheddar biscuits. yum!

Sausage and Cheese Biscuit Balls

Ingredients:

1.5 c. all purpose flour

½ c.  corn meal

3 tsp. baking powder

½ tsp baking soda

¼ tsp salt

½ tsp ground mustard

½ tsp paprika

4 tbl butter

8-10 oz milk

12 oz. sausage

¼ c. onion

½ tsp sage

½ tsp paprika

¼ tsp pepper

10oz shredded cheese

Cook sausage in onion,sage, paprika, and powder, set aside and let cool. In a mixer add flour, cornmeal, baking powder, baking soda, ground mustard, paprika,  and salt. On med speed add butter  until crumbly.  Add milk slowly while mixing on med. Speed until  moistened. Add cheese and sausage and continue mixing until well mixed.  Spoon tablespoon balls onto greased sheet cook at 385 degrees for 12 minutes or until just before browning.  Enjoy!!!

Amaretto Bread Pudding

I tried my hand at starting to make my own bread to avoid some of the unnecessary chemicals.  Unfortunately I didn't eat much bread this week so I had a loaf to play with.  I updated this classic recipe with Amaretto and cranberries

Comfort Food

Today was a very long Mon-Tuesday,  missing my  love more than ever today.  Decided after a long hard day I wanted a quick, comforting dish. This dish  is easy to make and can be adapted into a yummy warming french onion soup.

Balsamic Reduction Mushrooms over Bagette

Ingredients:
2 tbl butter
1 clove garlic chopped
1/2 c. onion chopped
Salt pepper to taste
1/4 c. white or red wine
4 tbl. balsamic vinegar
(for adapted frenchonion soup add beef stock and serve atop bread with melted cheese ontop.


Melt butter brown onion and garlic.  Season with salt and pepper.  Once brown add wine and vinegar. toast bread and add mixture on top. Enjoy.

Felted Soap

Over the holidays I was at a specialty boutique a cool and unique gift.  I love felting and wanted to start back felting again so I was stoked to find an easy way to felt and make cool gifts.  I embellished this with felt applicaes embroidered on  This soap is a soft wash cloth and fine soap in one and allows you to use every bit of the expensive delicious smelling soap (instead of losing the last few pieces which typically happens). 

Supplies
High quality soap (I go to Tuesday Morning, they have really nice boutique style soap for about $3 a bar)
Wool
Felt
Embroidery Thread

Take wool and layer going in opposing direction 4-5 layers, each layer should be made out of the thinest strands possible.  Take wool in one hand and with other hand slow pull off a small thin patch. Make a 4inch by 6 inch rectangular swatch.  wrap around the soap.  Get warm water in a bowl and saturate  wool wrapped bar,  continue to massage until wool is taught and does not unravel. Lay out and dry. Once dry create applicaes to embroider on.

Tuna Tetrazzini Salad

I went exactly one week into the new year before crashing on my big plans of working out and eating healthy.  After baking about 6 dozen cookies for my husband on deployment my habits got worse and worse.  I still have the remnants of healthy eating wasting away in my fridge and can't fathom the thought of them wasting away and having their only contribution be to my compost pile.   In an effort to revive these veggies on their last days I came up with a Tuna Tetrazzini Salad.  I use only things in my fridge,  but the beauty of cooking is the creative spin you put on it.  Some of the best recipes come from leftovers and last minute ideas.  Tetrazzini in itself is a meat and pasta type dish you can add whatever you would like to make it your own flavor. Take from each column to create your own.

Protein (3 cups chopped)	Starch (1.5 cup	Veggies Chopped	Herbs/spices (1/2 tbl fresh 1.5 tbl dried)	Sauce	Topping (1/3 cup chopped roasted or unroasted)
Tuna	Spaghetti	Garlic (3 cloves)	Basil	Olive Oil/Parmesian	Almonds
Chicken	Linguini	1  chopped medium onion	Thyme	Teryiaki	Peanuts
Beef	Lo Mein	1/2 chopped pepper	Cilantro		Bread Crumbs
Tofu	fuzilli	1/2 cup roasted pepper	Oregeno		Sesame Seeds
Shrimp		1/2 cup mushroom	Ginger		Feta Cheese
		1/4 cup olives	Curry
		1/4 cup celery	Turmeric
		1/4 cup carrots	parsley
		1/4 cup bamboo shoots
		1/4 cup water chestnuts
		1/2 cup tomatoes

Mango Salsa

The Tilapia Cake was delicious, a little sweet, savory with fresh herbs, and a crunch on the outside. The only thing better is to enhance it with a sweet mango salsa.


Mango Salsa

1 Fresh Mango cut into chunks
2 Tbl. roasted red pepper
1 tbl. green onion/chives
1 tbl. fresh herbs cut (parsley, cilantro, oregano, and basil)
1 clove garlic
1/2 tbl. balsamic vinegar
1 drop sesame oil
1 tbl. rice vinegar
1 tsp. paprika
1 tsp pepper

Take about 1/3 c. mango and place in blender, add half herbs, garlic, sesame oil, and vinegar.  Blend together and mix all remaining inredients in bowl.  Add the liquid mixture and shake to mix.  Put on top of heated crab cake or tilapia cake or even Caribbean chicken or a Caribbean burger. This is also the same base for my mango dressing (just add equal parts evoo) and I also use this on top of my delcious sushi rolls (minus the herbs and add just a sprig of sugar).

To finish this I added a japanese mayo with japenese hot sauce, rice vinegar, sesame oil, and mayonaise.  This is also what I had to my crab salad when making sushi and a delicious  accent to sushi rolls.  The spicy ofthe may pairs nicely with the soft sweetness of the mango.  Enjoy!!

Crab cakes

So the marinade last night was delicious but I didnt allow enough time for the marinade to soak into the fish.  Instead of scrapping the meal I thought to re-invent it.  I shredded the meat and added a few ingredients to create a crab cake (well fish cake but that does not sound as appetizing).  Patties are great ways to reinvent any of your dishes that are about to go bad or you are tire of eat off it. I have made patties using a base mixture of crab, bean, fish, ground meat, and/or tofu.  The premise is the same just change your ingredients to modify the flavor to your liking.  This one was an asian-caribbean infusion.

The basics.  For a basic patty you need:

Some type of maluable substance that can act as a base (beans, meat, tofu)
onions chopped (cooked or raw it will be delicious)
about a clove of garlic
1 egg
spices/flavoring- (fresh herbs, chutney, veggies, fruit, anything to flavor it the way you want.  stay away from too much liquid though this will make it moist and difficult to pat together.
and about  1 cup of bread crumbs (get creative, I used croutons b/c i ran out of bread crumbs, you can also use corn flakes, bread, anything that will thicken the mixture and start to allow it to stick together.

Mix ingredients together, add bread crumbs until it is a thick consistency and able to be packed together.  you can sprinkle with flour to help brown and adhere.  I recommend covering the mixture and placing in the fridge for an hr if you have time to really thicken up and stick together.

This crab cake was made with sweet potato, tilapia, fresh (thyme, dill, parsley, cilantro), 1 tbl. may, hot sauce, pepper, and focacia croutons.  It was a bit sweet and crunch very delicious. 

This crab cake would be perfection with a mango salsa on top.  Might save that for tomorrow night!  Enjoy!

Sweet and Sour Meatballs

Sweet and Sour Meatballs

This recipe was easy I made my sweeet n sour sauce (look at beginning of blog).  I added this to sauteed onion, garlic, pineapple, carrots, green pepper, and frozen meatballs.  this is also delicious with shrimp. Steam broccoli to add some veggies to the dish.

Sweet N Sour Sauce

Ingredients:

1 clove garlic, chopped

1 tbl. onion chopped

2 tbl. Chopped pineapple

1 c. ketchup

1/2 c. sugar

2/3 c. soy sauce

1 tbl. Sesame oil

½ c. rice vinegar mix with 1.5 tb. cornstarch

Mix ingredients over heat.  ensure cornstarch is fully diluted in vinegar and add to mixture, this thickens it.

Pizza Dough Concoctions

The kids were over on new years day and wanted to explore in the kitchen.  I pulled up a recipe for pizza dough and let the kids go wild creating their own creations.  Here are 2 of them pizza roll ups and a brie cheese and ham pizza.  If I had to do it again I would just use this recipe in pizza form.  I made it with wheat flour and the roll ups did not do well and was a bit dry, the pizza was delicious. I had brie leftover from a sale around the new year.  A great combination is caramelized onions, roasted garlic, prociutto, and brie. 


this is for www.allrecipe.com  its pizza dough I recipe

Original recipe makes 1 pizza 

• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 (.25 ounce) package active dry yeast
• 2 tablespoons vegetable oil

• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon white sugar
• 1 cup warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)

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Directions

1. Combine flour, salt, sugar, and yeast in a large bowl. Mix in oil and warm water. Spread out on a large pizza pan. Top as desired.
2. Bake at 375 degrees C (190 degrees C) for 20 to 25 minutes.

Amaretto French Toast

For new years breakfast with the kids,  we decided to make french toast with the leftover beer bread from the fondue the night before. 

Ingredients
Bread cut into 1 inch slices
4 eggs
1 tbl. Vanilla
2 tbl. amaretto (almond flavoring)
1/2 c. milk
1 tbl. brown sugar
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp cinnamon

Mix all ingredients together and soak bread in it. Leave to absorb for 4 hrs. or overnight.  After a few hours flip bread to fully absorb.  Bake at 450 for 15 minutes or until done.

Baked Tilapia in a White Wine Mojo Marinade

Wow been a while since I posted. My hubs is due back soon from deployment soon and I have been organizing and cleaning in prepping for his return.  I have a bunch of recipes on backup so get ready for a bunch soon.  This recipe came from the leftover broth for my fondue entree.  I just defrosted tilapia and added it to the marinade and cooked at 350 for 35 minutes. I started with the dish covered with aluminum foil for about 20 minutes.  The tilapia I had was pretty cheap and old.  It did not absorb the marinade and tasted fishy.  The marinade however is fantastic!!! I recommend using it for chicken, shrimp (used these in the fondue, yum!) or a fresh white fish and marinade for at least 30 minutes.    Also,  I added ramen noodle (forgot i didnt have spaghetti noodles) to the bottom of the pan and placed this mixture and fish on top.  The noodles, whatever you try, absorbs the flavor of the marinade and tastes delicious. Its a great and easy starch to go with your main dish.

Baked Tilapia in a White Wine Mojo Marinade

Carribean Mojo

1 c. white wine
2 c. chicken broth
1/4 c. fresh herbs (taragon, dill, parsley, basil, oregano, thyme, cilantro)
2 cloves garlic (I like roasting garlic and reserve in the fridge)
1 tsp. oil
1/2 c. chopped mushroom
1 med.onion chopped
1 med. lemon sliced
1 small lime sliced (or 1/3 c. lime juice)
1 small orange  (or 1/4 c. orange juice)

Caribbean Mojo to cook the meats and veggies in. To create this I roasted garlic, onion, mushrooms in 1 tsp oil.  Once roasted I added about 2 tbl. of fresh herbs thyme, tarragon, basil, oregeno, parsley, and cilantro.  Add 1 cup white wine and remaining herbs, 4 slices of fresh lemon, organge, and lime.

Easy Fondue For the Family

Just before NYE I received an email from the Melting Pot boasting about their great deal for the holiday, $50 pp.  I knew I could create something comparable for less.  I invited my niece and nephew  for a sampling. To create my meal I looked to the Melting Pot menu. Here I will spell out the 4 course feast. I only had one fondue pot so to keep this moving I used a 2 qt crockpot for the cheese, and a 4 qt nesco roasting oven for the main course, the fondue pot was for the dessert.  All worked well so no need to think you need an expensive fondue pot to have a fun interactive dinner.

Course 1: Cheese

I took cheese left in my fridge (Monterrey jack cheese, mozzarella, brie, and cheddar) and added it to a sherry mixture with roasted garlic and onion.  Season with pepper.

Dippers-apples, bread, crackers

Course 2: Salad

Again, took leftovers from steak salad for our course 2.  Romaine, tomato, and carrot ginger dressing.


Course 3: Entree

I created a Caribbean Mojo to cook the meats and veggies in. To create this I roasted garlic, onion, mushrooms in 1 tsp oil.  Once roasted I added about 1/2 cup of fresh herbs thyme, tarragon, basil, oregeno, parsley, and cilantro.  Add 1 cup white wine and remaining herbs, 4 slices of fresh lemon, organe, and lime.

Dippers-green pepper, onions, mushroom, potatoes, chicken, steak, shrimp

This is best with dipping sauces I used what I had left in the fridge a sweet n sour ( see earlier recipe), a dijon mayonnaise (1/2 c. miracle whip, 3 tbl. stone ground mustard, 2 tbl. maple syrup)  and an asian sauce, (green onions, 1 tsp sesame oil, 3 tsp soy sauce, 2 tsp rice vinegar) 

Course 4: Dessert

Take about 2 cups semi sweet chococlate chips add to 3 tbl. amaretto.  Once melted pour in evaporated milk or sweeteneed condensed milk till consistency you like.

Dippers-pineapple, marshmallow, brownie, pound cake, strawberries, cheesecake