What We’re Eating: Blueberry Crisp (Bread & Wine)

I received the book Bread & Wine, and to be honest, I just thought it was really cool to read a book that some of the bloggers that inspire me were reading and reviewing. Little did I know… this book is a whole lot more than just a book with some stories and some recipes. There are recipes, but it is not exactly your typical cookbook. You can head over to our review blog to read my thoughts on Shauna Niequist’s book BREAD & WINE.

Note: These are all phone photos, so I apologize for the blurriness of the photos.

Below is the account of the girls making Blueberry Crisp, one of the recipes from the book.

Here are the ingredients, from one of the stores that Shauna frequents, Trader Joe’s. And we also frequent it because it is located right next to our church!

Melody reading the instructions to me so that we can double check that we have all the right ingredients and measuring cups/spoons.

The girls are pouring in oats.

Melody mixing together the oats, almond meal, maple syrup, olive oil, and salt.

Emily adding the crisp topping to the blueberries.

I really love this book, and it’s going to be one that I will read over and over again. If you haven’t already, head over to read my review of BREAD & WINE. It will make you want to cook, and throw a dinner party, even if you don’t know how to cook…or throw dinner parties, like me!

- Joyce

Kids in the Kitchen: Sushi Rolls

We decided to make sushi one night. Random. On the menu: edamame, miso soup, shrimp tempura, potstickers (aka gyoza), and lots and lots of yummy sushi rolls. They were all veggie rolls, or had chicken or smoked salmon, so nothing raw for those of you who don’t like that kinda stuff. :p If anyone is interested, I can post (links to) recipes later on.

Here is Melody getting ready to roll her first roll.

Rollin’

Ta-da!

Another roll…

It was an inside-out roll, so adding just a bit of sesame seeds…

Some of the rolls Melody made

And…a close up!

Digging in…and taking a pic :p

Getting chopsticks ready

Emily made a ‘smiley face.’

And here’s Melody’s plate.

Yum!

What I’m learning these days:

Don’t estimate what you kids can do, they will surprise you!

Check out the meal that these kids (age 7 and 4?) put together! Focaccia? Impressive!

MOPS Craft: Dip Mix and Spice Blend

I’m not a crafty person, so any of the crafty items you see around our home was made at MOPS. I love that I don’t actually have to go out to buy the materials. I’ve gotten compliments on all the things I’ve made. Thanks to our wonderful Creative Activities coordinators Monica and Genevieve for preparing all the great crafts!

At the last MOPS meeting we put together a Ranch Dressing & Dip Mix and a Moroccan Spice Blend. Definitely something that I would not do on my own but fun to do with the group.

Materials:
*container for spices (I think ours were 6 oz.)
*measuring spoons

Ingredients for Ranch dressing and dip mix (40 servings):
*2 Tbsp dried onion powder
*4 Tbsp dried parsley
*2 Tbsp dried chives
*2 tsp garlic powder
*2 tsp dried celery flakes/powder
*1 tsp white pepper
*1/2 tsp paprika
*1/4 tsp dried dill
*1/2 tsp salt, or to taste

Instructions for Ranch dressing and dip mix (makes 2 cups):
*Mix 3 Tbsp of dry mix with 1 cup mayonnaise and 1 cup buttermilk. Let dressing rest in fridge for 1 day for best results.
*Lighter Version: Mix 2 Tbsp of dry mix with 1/2 cup plain yogurt, 1/2 cup reduced-fat mayonnaise, and 1/2 cup buttermilk.
*Optional: Buy dry buttermilk powder from the baking section. Add 1/2 cup powder to the dry ingredients in the tub. When adding the wet ingredients, you can substitute regular milk for the buttermilk.

Ingredients for Moroccan Spice Blend:
*4 tsp ground cumin
*4 tsp ground ginger
*4 tsp salt
*2 tsp black pepper
*2 tsp ground allspice
*2 tsp ground cinnamon
*2 tsp ground coriander
*1 tsp ground cloves
*1/2 tsp cayenne

Recipe Ideas for Moroccan Spice Blend:
*Use as a dry rub on chicken and pan fry.
*Mix 2 Tbsp of dry mix with plain yogurt and coat chicken. Let marinate for 1/2 hour. Place in foil packets. Bake for about 25 minutes at 450*F. Comes out super juicy and flavorful.
*Mix with olive oil and coat potatoes or vegetables. Roast in oven until tender.

And also, not pictured was the chalkboard contact paper used to label the tops of the containers so that you can write down what spice was inside. We ran out of contact paper, so I don’t have that one mine.

- Joyce

What We’re Eating: Make-Ahead French Toast Casserole

Image Source: I Can Teach My Child

I’ve been looking for some simple recipes for dishes to make for MOPS brunch. Usually I sign up to bring fruit, since it’s easy and we love fruit. But I wanted to try some new things this year. This French Toast Casserole recipe came into my inbox, and it looked simple enough.

CHANGES
None.

SUGGESTIONS
None.

VERDICT
I personally don’t know how this tasted because I brought it to MOPS, and I got called to work in the 2′s room. When I came back at the end of the meeting, it was all gone. I got a small piece that got stuck to the side. It tasted pretty good, but at that point, it had been the previous night’s dinner since I last eaten, so anything would have tasted pretty good. Looks like everyone at MOPS gobbled it up though. I will have to make it again.

- Joyce

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FRENCH TOAST CASSEROLE recipe from I Can Teach My Child:

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup of butter
• 12 slices of white bread
• 3/4 cup of brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 5 eggs
• 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 cups of milk
• Powdered sugar for dusting

Instructions:

1. Melt 1/2 cup of butter and pour it in the bottom of the 9×13 casserole dish.
2. Lay 6 pieces of white bread on top of the melted butter.
3. Mix 3/4 cup of brown sugar and 1 teaspoon of cinnamon.
4. Pour half of the brown sugar mixture on top of the first layer of bread.
5. Add the second layer of six pieces of bread over the top of the brown sugar mixture.
6. In a separate bowl, mix 5 beaten eggs, 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract, and 1 1/2 cups of milk.
7. Pour the egg mixture over the casserole.
8. Top with the remaining brown sugar mixture.
9. Cover and refrigerate overnight.
10. The next morning, cover the casserole dish with aluminum foil and then bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes. Uncover and bake for another 15 minutes. dust with powdered sugar.

*Bold instructions can be done by younger kids.

What We’re Eating: Baked Cream Cheese Spaghetti Casserole

Image Source: Plain Chicken

Jodi posted about a new recipe she tried. It sounded simple enough. Baked cream cheese spaghetti casserole, what’s not to love? On the spur of the moment, I decided to make it yesterday. We didn’t have all the ingredients handy, but it was still yummy. I used Classico Sweet Basil sauce like she did too since that’s what we had. And I also used sausage like she did because, again, that’s all I had. Pantry cooking at its best. =)

CHANGES
Our jar of pasta sauce was only 24 ounces. It would have been better with the listed 28 ounces. We only had sausage on hand, but you can use whatever meat you like with your pasta, or no meat at all. Bummer, no Italian seasoning, but I did add garlic salt. Will add Italian seasoning on the grocery list this week. We also only had a Four Cheese package of shredded cheese. It worked fine. Basically, you can add or take out whatever you like, and the recipe still works. Well, mostly.

SUGGESTIONS
None.

VERDICT
Everyone gobbled it up.

- Joyce

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BAKED CREAM CHEESE SPAGHETTI CASSEROLE recipe from Plain Chicken

Ingredients:

• 12 oz spaghetti
• 1 (28 ounces) jar prepared spaghetti sauce
• 1 lb lean ground beef
• 1 teaspoon Italian seasoning
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 8 ounces cream cheese
• Vegetable oil spray
• 1/2 cup parmesan cheese, grated

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
2. In a skillet, brown the ground beef until cooked through; drain fat and stir in spaghetti sauce. Set aside.
3. Cook spaghetti. Drain and place cooked spaghetti in bowl.
4. Add cream cheese, Italian seasoning, and minced garlic.
5. Stir until cream cheese is melted and the spaghetti is thoroughly coated.
6. Lightly grease a 9×13″ pan. Spread a small amount of meat sauce in the bottom of the dish.
7. Put spaghetti on top of sauce and top with remaining meat sauce.
8. Sprinkle parmesan cheese on top.
9. Bake for 30 minutes, until bubbly.

*Bold instructions can be done by younger kids.

What We’re Eating: Cauliflower “Mac” and Cheese Casserole

Image Source: The Best of Thymes

I kept seeing this recipe everywhere awhile back. We finally decided to try it (aka we finally bought cauliflower). There are many versions of this CAULIFLOWER “MAC” AND CHEESE CASSEROLE out there, so you can try whatever you find by googling or on Pinterest. We tried the one from Food Network. There are also similar recipes that has actual “mac” in them.

CHANGES
None.

SUGGESTIONS
It is a little heavy on the cream as expected. I’m almost positive there is a “healthier” version of this somewhere.

VERDICT
Everyone loved it for dinner and as leftovers the next day! We added spaghetti noodles, and some ham from Easter dinner the night we made it and some lunch meat from a sub sandwich (the bread got too hard to eat) when we had it for lunch the next day. Yum!

- Joyce

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CAULIFLOWER ‘MAC’ AND CHEESE CASSEROLE recipe from Food Network

• Prep Time: 15 minutes
• Cook Time: 20 minutes
• Total Time: 35 minutes
• 6 servings

Ingredients:

• Kosher salt, as needed, plus 1/2 teaspoon
• 1 large head cauliflower, cut into small florets
• Vegetable oil spray
• 1 cup heavy cream
• 2 ounces cream cheese, cut into small pieces
• 1 1/2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
• 1 1/2 cups shredded sharp Cheddar, plus 1/2 cup for topping the casserole
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 1/8 teaspoon garlic powder
• Equipment: 8 by 8-inch baking dish

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
2. Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Season the water with salt.
3. Spray the baking dish with vegetable oil spray.*
4. Cook the cauliflower in the boiling water until crisp-tender, about 5 minutes.
5. Drain well and pat between several layers of paper towels to dry.
6. Transfer the cauliflower to the baking dish and set aside.
7. Bring the cream to a simmer in a small saucepan, and whisk in the cream cheese and mustard until smooth.
8. Stir in 1 cup of the cheese, salt, pepper and garlic and whisk just until the cheese melts, about 1 to 2 minutes.
9. Remove from heat, pour over the cauliflower, and stir to combine.
10. Top with the remaining 1/2 cup cheese* and bake until browned and bubbly hot, about 15 minutes.

*Bold instructions can be done by younger kids.

What We’re Eating: Pizza

So it looks like Friday is officially Pizza and Movie Night at our house. We’ve tried a variety of frozen pizza, but haven’t found any that is given a good grade by the Fooducate app. We decided to try Boboli.

I’ve only done homemade pizza once, but the girls didn’t get a chance to help out with that. They had a blast creating their own pizza. We each picked a quarter of the pizza and added the ingredients that we wanted.

VERDICT
The pizza crust definitely tasted healthier than any frozen pizza that we’ve tasted, but it does come at a cost since buying all the different ingredients was more. We all like it except for Emily, but I think it was the sauce more than the actual pizza crust.

- Joyce

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CREATE YOUR OWN PIZZA recipe from The Moys! =p

• Prep Time: <15 minutes
• Total Time: 25 minutes
• Serves 4

Ingredients:

• Boboli pizza crust
• Pizza sauce (we got this from Trader Joe’s)
• Shredded mozzarella cheese
• Assorted toppings: Ham, artichoke, chicken, tomato, pineapple chunks, and whatever else you feel like adding in there

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees F.
2. Prep toppings.
3. Spread pizza sauce on crust.
4. Top with desired ingredients.
5. Bake on ungreased cookie sheet 10 minutes or until crust is crisp and cheese is melted.

What We’re Eating: Chocolate Covered Spoons

Image Source: Living on a Dime

Okay, so the image doesn’t shout Valentine’s Day! but I made these chocolate covered spoons for Melody’s class for Valentine’s Day. They didn’t look anything like the ones in the photo.

CHANGES
I melted the chocolate in a glass bowl over a pot of boiling water, instead of in the microwave.

SUGGESTIONS
Afterwards I found another way to make these. I can’t find the link now, but you basically use one of those cake decorating frosting thingies to fill the spoons instead of just dipping the spoon into the melted chocolate.

VERDICT
It’s a fun gift to make. Bummer I totally forgot to tell them that they should probably put it in hot chocolate for flavor. I hope no one tried to just eat it off the spoon, because I tried and it didn’t work. =p

- Joyce

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CHOCOLATE COVERED SPOONS recipe from Living on a Dime

Ingredients:

• chocolate chips, or chocolate melting wafers, or chocolate baking squares
• decorations (crushed peppermint, mini white chocolate chips or white chocolate shavings, small candies, red hots, shredded coconut)
• you’ll also need plastic spoons

Instructions:

1. Lay out waxed paper on the counter.
2. Melt the chocolate in the microwave.
3. Then stir the spoon into the chocolate chips.
4. Lay on the waxed paper and decorate.

What We’re Eating: Pancakes

Image Source: Martha Stewart

I was trying to make dinner from the pantry, but couldn’t come up with anything good, so I decided to do “breakfast for dinner”, which we hadn’t done for a long time. We didn’t have any bread left, and I had made waffles for breakfast on Waffle Wednesday, so I decided to make pancakes. So pancakes have always been a little scary for me (like cookies had been). I think it’s because of the flipping over of the pancakes. Anyhow, I’ve only tried pancake mixes maybe twice. This time I decided to go see if Martha had a trusty recipe for me. And she did!

CHANGES
None. We had all the ingredients on hand. I used veg oil instead of butter because I was too lazy to melt the butter. Oh wait, I did add chocolate chips to a few of them. Oh, and I used a griddle instead of a skillet.

SUGGESTIONS
None…well, except I might try the melted butter next time instead of veg oil.

VERDICT
They were great. I browned them a little too much because I stepped away (actually, aside) to get working on the eggs. But even with that, everyone gobbled them up. Yum! I’ll try to add different things in there next time. (Anyone have tips on doing that?) I saved the remaining batter that we did use, and made some more for breakfast. Still good!

- Joyce

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PANCAKES recipe from Martha Stewart from Everyday Food, September 2006

• Prep Time: 25 minutes
• Total Time: 20 minutes (I’m not sure how this worked out…)
• Serves 4 (I think it made about 12-15 mini pancakes)

Ingredients:

• 1 cup all-purpose flour, (spooned and leveled)
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup milk
• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted, or vegetable oil
• 1 large egg
• 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
• Assorted toppings, such as butter, maple syrup, confectioners’ sugar, honey, jams, preserves, sweetened whipped cream, or chocolate syrup

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 200 degrees; have a baking sheet or heatproof platter ready to keep cooked pancakes warm in the oven.
2. In a small bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt; set aside.
3. In a medium bowl, whisk together milk, butter (or oil), and egg.
4. Add dry ingredients to milk mixture; whisk until just moistened (do not overmix; a few small lumps are fine).
5. Heat a large skillet (nonstick or cast-iron) or griddle over medium.
6. Fold a sheet of paper towel in half, and moisten with oil; carefully rub skillet with oiled paper towel.
7. For each pancake, spoon 2 to 3 tablespoons of batter onto skillet, using the back of the spoon to spread batter into a round (you should be able to fit 2 to 3 in a large skillet).
8. Cook until surface of pancakes have some bubbles and a few have burst, 1 to 2 minutes.
9. Flip carefully with a thin spatula, and cook until browned on the underside, 1 to 2 minutes more.
10. Transfer to a baking sheet or platter; cover loosely with aluminum foil, and keep warm in oven.
11. Continue with more oil and remaining batter. (You’ll have 12 to 15 pancakes.)
12. Serve warm, with desired toppings.

Kids can help:  measure ingredients and whisk

What We’re Eating: Game Day Nachos

Since the Super Bowl is now scheduled to fall on the first Sunday of every February, this will happen to coincide with Melody’s birthday party every year.  In honor of the big game (which wasn’t really a big deal around here since the teams happen to be all from the Northeast this year), I decided to throw together a football/game-day type of food: NACHOS!

Ingredients:

• Tortilla Chips
• Sauce
  • Cheddar Cheese Sauce (if you don’t want the spice of Salsa or Chili)
  • ….or Salsa/Chili Con Queso
• Meat
  • 1 lb. of Ground Beef (can also use Carnitas/Kalua Pork, Carne Asada Steak, or Shredded Pollo Chicken)
  • Taco Seasoning Mix to flavor the meat (or BBQ sauce if you want to go Southern)
• Black/Refried Beans (optional)
• Halved Olives (optional)
• Sliced Jalapeno Peppers (optional)
• Guacamole (optional)
• Sour Cream (optional)
• Shredded Lettuce (optional)
• Sliced Cherry/Grape Tomatoes (optional)
• Slices of Lime to squeeze on the chips or as decoration (optional)

Here’s how I made it:

1. Line toaster oven baking sheet with aluminum foil.
2. Cover the foiled baking sheet with tortilla chips.
3. Brown the meat on a skillet and then drain it.
4. In the same skillet, throw in the taco seasoning mix with a bit of water and wait until the sauce thickens to the meat.
5. Pour the meat mixture on top of the tortilla chips.
6. Pour beans on top of that.
7. Pour the cheese sauce or con queso on top of that.
8. Spread olives (and optionally jalapeno peppers) on top of that.
9. Bake in the toaster oven at 350 degrees for about 8 minutes (or until everything heats up……if the chips start turning brown, you’ve done it for too long)
10. Spread remaining “cold” ingredients all over the nachos and serve hot.

- Norm