Chicken Noodle Soup Casserole

Today I made this recipe I found on The Pioneer Woman's Tasty Kitchen Blog.  It was absolutely wonderful! Our entire family devoured it and couldn't think of a single thing we didn't like about it.  So I wanted to share how I made it since it is a little different than the actual recipe.  And it is full of things that are common to have around.  I felt a little sinful not sharing it too, it was great.

First, I roasted the chicken breasts in the oven at 425 with some olive oil and salt and pepper.  The recipe calls for boiled chicken but I hate the smell of boiled chicken so I chose to do the more flavorful option. 

Then I cut up carrots, celery, and half an onion to saute in 1/2 a stick of butter.

I also grated up some garlic into the pot.  In with the veggies I sprinkled thyme and some pepper.  I didn't use salt because the butter was salted already.

After the veggies got pretty soft and the onions translucent, I spooned in a huge spoonful of sour cream and a can of cream of mushroom soup.  The original recipe calls for a can each of cream of chicken and cream of mushroom but I cut it down for our family and just used one can. 

The next step was to boil some pasta.  The recipe called for quite a bit but I cut it down.  You'll have to check the recipe for sure and then I used about 3/4 of what it said.  The noodles can overpower it and we really loved all the chunks of other stuff.  And if you use too much pasta it can get a little dry.  The recipe also called for angel hair pasta, I thought that was perfect.  I got a lot of lip about it from Dustin (he thought they should've been fettuccine noodles) but when it was finished he agreed that those were perfect.

About this time, I checked in and of course my lovely assistant was up to no good.  You might not be able to see it here, but she was covered in green, as in crayon, that she had been eating.  Yes, she is missing a shoe and yes, we need to sweep our floor (or let the vacuuming dogs take a stroll through)!

Once the pasta is cooked, the chicken is probably cool enough to chunk up into smallish pieces.

Then I mixed everything together in a big bowl.  Mix it really well because I do have to admit that the only complaint we had was that the chicken wasn't distributed enough.  Also, I broke the pasta in half to help with this step too.  At this point, Dustin came in and asked if he could just put his face in the pan and start eating.  It smelled awesome already and it really looked great.  I couldn't help but agree with his thought!

This goes in the oven at 375 for about 30-35 minutes.  In the meantime, clean up the green crayon, sweep the floor and read a few books to your baby.  She'll appreciate the extra love.

And then once your casserole has been cooking for awhile, crunch up a whole sleeve of Ritz crackers.  I used the whole wheat kind and they were delish.   Let it cook about 10 minutes more after that. 

This is what comes out of the oven!  YUM!! 

And this is what the crowd thought.

Applesauce

My parents have a couple of apple trees that are ripe right now. Everybody and their brother has been there picking apples for pies and apple butter and whatever else. They're REALLY good apples so I wanted to do something with them too and Marsha, Dustin's sister, and I talked about making and canning applesauce so I decided to try a test run to see how it would turn out.

How they turned out was delicious! Wow were they good. I was quite a process but definitely worth it. Plus right before they turn to applesauce they are just the right texture for a baby to chew up without teeth. Here's the process, I totally recommend you try it yourself!

First you must wash and peel the apples. This is by far the least fun part but it actually goes quicker than one would think. Even chasing my beautiful helper around it only took about 20 minutes.

Here she is "assisting."

And here are all the peeled apples.

Then I cut them all up in chunks, nothing fine cut about it. Just big hunks of four. I threw them in a medium low pot with some cinnamon, allspice, vinegar, a pinch of salt and sugar. Delish!

Then comes the cooking. It really takes quite awhile, but it is low maintenance. Just put the lid on them and stir every so often. It probably took a couple of hours, but it is soooo worth it. When the apples break up just by stirring, they are done. It is pretty easy to tell. I just took them off the heat and let them cool enough to put them into plastic bags.

I put in about 4 ladle fulls in each bag and let them cool completely. Then you can put them in the freezer and have applesauce all year long! And trust me, it is worth it!

Beautiful Sunday Afternoons

Today has been a gorgeous almost fall but still summery day. We hated to waste the day inside but Reese is still too small for the park and our back yard is a land mine of, well with two dogs, use your imagination.

Our carpet has been wet and we can't figure out what is leaking so Dustin wanted to work on that. He tore up our kitchen so Reese and I were going to have to take it outside if we wanted to have any peace and to avoid the risk of poison from who only knows what is under our kitchen sink.

Before Dustin did that, Reese and I decided to bake some banana cookies and take them outside and have a picnic. The recipe turned out delicious so I wanted to share with you how we made them. Here is what you need:

I put some cinnamon in too to give it a little extra flavor. But you must cream together the sugar and butter. Add an egg, vanilla and 2 ripe bananas. Finally add the dry ingredients and continue to mix until it resembles a mixture. It kind of looks like thick cake batter and it's very soft so make sure you use a cold pan when you make additional batches.

After I mixed them all up, I baked them for 10 minutes at 350. I mixed up some icing but there was no recipe because I had a tub of frosting that I just added some cinnamon and brown sugar to, but there is a recipe that I will list below. Here is a shot of my little helper. Instead of mixing today she made sure nothing escaped the refigerator. Please excuse the mismatched outfit. It's laundry day and earlier in the morning I let her play with tupperware filled with water. It was fun but a little sloppy.

The cookies are amazing. Light and fluffy almost like cake. They were a perfect little snack to use up those overripened bananas. Finally, we were ready to take our picnic outside. We feasted on our delicious banana cookies and examined the leaves. We also enjoyed the sun and just laid back to relax.

Here is the recipe for banana cookies with icing:

3/4 c butter (1 1/2 sticks) 6 Tbsp brown sugar

3/4 c brown sugar 1/2 tsp vanilla

1 egg 4 Tbsp cream

1 tsp vanilla 4 Tbsp butter

2 bananas, smashed powdered sugar

1/4 tsp salt

1 tsp baking soda

2 c flour

Cream 3/4 cup butter and sugar, add egg, banana and 1 tsp vanilla. Beat well. Add dry ingredients and bake for 10 minutes at 350. For icing: cook over medium heat the brown sugar, 1/2 tsp. vanilla, cream and butter. Remove from heat and add sugar until spreading consistency.

Putting up Corn

After our trip to the Farmer's Market yesterday, we ended up with a bunch of corn (3 dozen) that needed shucked, cleaned, cut and cooked.

Early this morning we sat outside and shucked and flicked at silk worms and peeled silk off ear after ear of corn. Our little helper, looking cute as always, helped us by playing nicely on her blanket and watching the squirrels run up the tree.

Then we cleaned it and cut it all up. This is really the hardest step because it takes forever and it's hard to get down as far as possible while not sending it flying all over the kitchen. I've heard of using a bundt pan and putting the ear in the middle of the hole and cutting it. Maybe if I were a little taller and I could get on top of it it would work better for me. But I used a dip serving dish and it worked out pretty well. Here is all of the corn, seems like sooooo much, yet my grandparents used to do about 5 times this much. I can't even fathom it!

Once it's all cut up, it goes in a pot with some salt, sugar, and butter. I cook it for 5 minutes and then scoop it into snack size ziplock bags. (my grandma says you can ONLY use ziplock and who am I to defy 50 years of practice?) It makes about 10 portions that are just right for us and we'll be able to eat on it all winter. The rule is frozen corn isn't to be eaten until the first snow falls, but that is easier said than done.

And now we have lots and lots of yummy summer-fresh corn for the whole winter. And we might have a little for dinner tonight, there is nothing better than when it is still warm from being cooked fresh, yum!

Mexican Fiesta!

When we got married, we got these amazing serving dishes that I loved. They are Mexican themed and really cool BUT, I usually don't have Mexican when I friends over. Last night we had some friends over and I was craving guacamole so out came the fiesta wear! It was a low-key night at home but we had a great time with some old friends making us wonder why we don't do it more often.

And for you, a little peek at my awesome dishes....because I know you really wanted to see them! (or not)

Fish Tacos

I am NOT a big fish lover. Sure, I appreciate good salmon or seafood (crab legs, shrimp) but when it comes to white fish I just don't really care that much about it. But I also know that it is good for me so I try to eat it on a kind of regular basis. That being said, I am always looking for ways to disguise the fishy taste. Here is one way that is not only edible but actually enjoyable for me.

First I make a baja sauce. Here are all the ingredients I use. I can't tell you measurements but I'll at least show you what's in it.

I mix all those together and it makes a really yummy sauce with a little bit of spice to it.

Then I dredge chunks of fish in seasoned flour and fry in a little bit of oil for about 3 minutes on each side. Until they are golden brown.

I chop up some veggies for toppings, I love cabbage, onions, cilantro (big surprise), and shredded carrots. And put out the baja sauce (Dustin doesn't like it so I leave it as a side).

Warm up some tortillas and voila! Yummy Houlihans-style fish tacos!

You can always add pico de gallo, salsa, or even guacamole for added flavor but those things go over like a lead balloon in my house!

Chocolate Chip Cookies

Last night Dustin said he would do anything for some chocolate chip cookies. Normally, I would've said tough luck but because of my newfound confidence in the kitchen I jumped up and looked to see if I had all the stuff. And I did! So, after clearing the smoke in the oven from the cinnamon rolls, I set out to make some yummy chocolate chip cookies.

First I looked at the recipe and gathered the ingredients. All pretty basic.


I mixed up the batter. Cookie batter is quite a bit thicker and I didn't use my wooden spoon. I was sadly mistaken by doing that because I broke my favorite spatula. Bad idea, next time wooden spoon only!!
I portioned them out, put them in the oven and waited. Now here is the key; the batter is easy enough. No big crazy secrets just dump and mix. But the key is, you have to know the EXACT minute to bring them out of the oven. Too soon makes a pile of goo and too late makes a crunchy cookie, and in my house, NO ONE likes a crunchy cookie. But this is what we got and we were very pleased.

They were perfect. I made quite a few but decided to freeze the dough for another time when we decided late at night that we needed some cookies. These were probably the best thing I made this week!!

Puff Pastry Cinnamon Rolls

Today's creation was one I thought would probably be the most difficult. I have never made cinnamon rolls before and I just couldn't imagine that this was for the faint of heart. I started with puff pastry (the frozen kind), cinnamon, melted butter, pecans, and brown sugar. I rolled out the dough, and slathered all the yummies on top.
Then, my lovely assistant smoothed it out and made sure it was just right.


Next I rolled up the dough and cut it into pieces which would later become the actual roll.

These were more of the sticky bun variety so I filled mini-muffin cups with cinnamon, brown sugar, and pecans.


Then I put the rolls on top of the sticky stuff and put them in the oven.


They baked awhile (the recipe said 40 minutes) and about 30 minutes later, Dustin stepped out of the shower and asked if it was smoky in here....it was. My cinnamon rolls got done, really done. But I coated them in icing hoping no one would notice the "over carmelization."

They were still pretty good, just not quite as doughy as I like. This is definitely a recipe I would try again, I'd just keep a better eye on them.

Peanut Butter/Cornflake No Bake Cookies

Well, Day 1 consisted of a trip to Hyvee for all my stuff. Last night I researched recipes and wrote down ingredients I needed. I was all psyched up to make cheddar dill scones so I made sure I bought everything for that one, well all things but cream. That really annoyed me because I wanted to make those dang scones so bad I could already taste them! But I had everything I needed for the no bake cookies so I thought I'd run to the store again later to get the cream.

I've never had these cookies before. My mom isn't much of a baker either so we really never made any homemade cookies or confections. So these cookies were a little foreign to me but Dustin loves them and requested them. He might as well get what he wants now because there will probably never be a chance for him to get stuff like this again. Anyway, I digress.....

First, you have to assemble all your ingredients (or you could be halfway through scones and realize you don't have cream). Here's what you need for these no bake cookies.

Then I boiled together corn syrup and sugar (not so healthy with this double whammy).


Next comes the whole stick of butter and a cup of peanut butter melted into the sugar mixture off the heat.


Pour out 6 cups of cornflakes.


Mix together and scoop out into clumps on wax paper.



This recipe called for 50 cookies. Why is it that the recipe always calls for WAY more than what ends up being made up? Do I just make gargantuan proportions or are they just being super conservative?



They turned out delicious and Dustin was thrilled.

**On a side note, Reese has taken 2 naps already today. The kid is a sleeper. I am hoping that the aftermath of these shots will quickly be over because she was a sick little girl all night long. Let's pray she falls into somewhat of a consistent routine by the end of the week.