3 Quarters Today

My Life, my photography, my passions

kitchen

Day 196/365:Pampered Chef, My Collection

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My Pampered Chef Collection
My Pampered Chef Collection

I am having an online Pampered Chef show! You have lived vicariously through my food, so here is some of what I use to make it. If anyone wants to order I have my own order page on the Pampered Chef website. A far cry from catalog orders of days gone by.

Seeing how I post so much food to my blog I thought I would highlight some of the tools I use on a regular basis. I love my Pampered Chef cookware and tools. My ultimate favorite is the stoneware bar pan, it’s the dark pan on the bottom for those of you unfamiliar with stoneware.

The date on the bottom is 1998 and it’s been well used for everything from cookies, chicken, pork chops, to biscotti. The rich brown cured hue has taken years to obtain and it is now a nice smooth non-stick surface which I love to use every week.

Who doesn’t love their handy chopper? It’s sturdy enough to chop hard candies that I use on my chocolate covered pretzels, and still stays sharp enough to prepare soup vegetables.

The mini roller in the middle is also a favorite for not only rolling pie crusts in the pan, but granola bars.

What is your favorite Pampered Chef item and why? I might just add it to my wish list.

Day 83/365: Egg and Sausage Breakfast Casserole

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Day 83: Breakfast Egg Casserole
Day 83: Breakfast Egg Casserole

I don’t know why I procrastinate in posting to my 365 Blog, I really do take pictures everyday. But, I seem to wait until the end of the week and post everything at once and try and catch up. This leaves me with an empty blog for several days and my statistics crash and burn.  Since I’m goal oriented and like to challenge myself the decrease in viewing numbers is not a pretty site.  So now I’m going to spread out the posts to just once a day and do a better job of twitter updates and lets see how that works.

Today is another recipe. I had teenage boys over for an Xbox Black Ops party last weekend, which means they stayed up until 4 am, something like that. It also means they slept until almost noon. To help wake them up I prepared an breakfast egg and sausage casserole. Not only is this is easy to make, but it’s a great way to use stale Italian/French bread and there are so many variations that you can create your own variety every time.

I used a silicon pan, just got this last year, haven’t decided whether I like them or not. I’m a traditionalist and silicon cookware doesn’t have the rigidity of metal. But there are benefits, as I learned from the Shakin N’ Bakin blog, silicon bakeware doesn’t need to be greased or oiled and it cools down quickly after being taken out of the oven. It’s also not supposed to stain, but mine did. I do have a few other pieces I’m going to try out. I’ll let you know how I like them.

Egg and Sausage Breakfast CasseroleRecipe

Ingredients

  • Sausage (ground, link, or patties, ham can also be used)
  • Bread (I used Italian, but stale bread works best)
  • 1 cup cheese
  • 8 Large Eggs
  • 1/2 Cup Milk
  • Dried Mustard
  • Salt
  • Pepper
  • Onions (other veggies can be added, tomatoes, peppers, mushrooms)
  • Sweet Basil (optional, I like sweet basil on everything)

Directions

Cube the bread and place in the bottom of a casserole dish, layer the sausage pieces, cheese, and vegetables, until ingredients are gone. Sprinkle each layer with salt, pepper, dried mustard, and sweet basil.  Scramble the eggs and milk in a bowl. Slowly pour over the layered ingredients making sure to soak the pieces of bread. Bake in a preheated 350F oven for approximately 25 minutes or until the eggs are set.

Photoshop Notes: general layers and resizing, brightened and added slight contrast. Biggest edit was cleaning my stove on the computer. Thought it was clean, but had grease splatters from cooking the sausage, so I cloned out the spots.

Day 45/365: Beef and Barley Soup

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Day 45: Beef & Barley Soup

It’s time for food again, specifically soup since it’s still winter. This is another version of my Beef & Barley Soup, each version varies slightly depending on what I have in the refrigerator as leftovers. I love soup, with a little planning it’s so easy, and simple. I keep chopped celery, onions,  carrots, pre-cooked hamburger  in the freezer along with frozen stock and it all goes in the pot together in less than 5 minutes.

The joy of homemade stock/broth. Stock is a bit heartier and gives homemade soup a hearty flavor, nice and rich. What I make is more like broth, but it accomplishes the same thing. You can buy chicken stock from the grocery store in boxes, cans, or even bullion cubes (only if your desperate on the cubes…) if you don’t have any prepared, but homemade is healthier, less salt, and I think tastier.

For those who haven’t saved or made their own stock it’s easy, really. I save chicken broth, potato water (from boiling potatoes for mashing), pork drippings, (just add some water to the juice at the bottom of pan), and lately even the drained water from corn. Okay, purist will say this isn’t stock, but broth, but I get wonderful results in the end, so who’s to say I’m wrong.

When I roast a whole chicken for supper I put the leftover carcass in a big pot, add water to the top, bring to a boil, then simmer for oh…an hour, maybe two. Sometimes I’ll throw in some celery or onions for added flavor, but it’s not necessary, especially since I’m putting all those ingredients in the soup. Then I pull out the bones and put the liquid and chicken meat bits in plastic containers (glad containers, ziplock, orange juice jugs, ice cream buckets, whatever I have) and store in the freezer.

Recently I had a couple pieces of leftover chicken that didn’t get eaten, a leg and thigh. I put them in a smaller pot and made 2 cups of stock. Easy, easy.

Now that I’ve covered stock/broth let’s get to the recipe, remember exact amounts are NOT crucial, soup is a magical food that is actually hard to mess up. More water can be added if the mixture is too thick.

Ingredients

  • 8 cups stock
  • 16 oz fine stewed tomatoes (I used my homemade with celery, onion, carrots)
  • 1 1/2 lbs cooked hamburger (I prepare 5 lbs ahead of time and put in 1 lb bags in freezer)
  • 1 cup green beans
  • 1 cup corn
  • 1 cup diced or sliced carrots
  • 2 TBSP dried parsley
  • 1 TBSP dried sweet basil
  • 1 tsp black pepper (to taste)
  • 1 tsp Lowrys Seasoning Salt (my daughter calls this “special salt”)
  • 1 cup barley (added the last hour)

Directions

Add all the ingredients except the barley, bring to a gentle boil, reduce heat and simmer for one hour. Then add barley. Simmer for an additional 45 minutes or until the barley is tender. Makes approximately 12 one cup servings. Eat, and freeze leftovers in single serving containers for later. If you have any.

When is it done? I tell my kids when you can smell it outside it’s done. My Marine son recently tested this method when he was home on leave. The aroma was driving him crazy inside, his sister came home and said “What smells so good? I could smell it from outside” Nathan declared. “Soups done!”

More Soup and Stew Recipes