Taste of Fall... Mmmmm... Pumpkin (and chocolate!)

Ahhhhh... it feels so good to finally be home.  Wednesdays are sooooo crazy for us!  It's a leave the house at 6:50 a.m. and get home at 8:00 p.m. kind of day. 

The other day, I was reading my friend Jenn Tousey's blog, Re{def}ining, and she was describing a nice fall morning.  It was cool enough to have the windows open, and she was enjoying some coffee and a pumpkin chocolate chip muffin.  When I read that post, I was like, "Wow.  That sounds perfect."  And for some reason I kept thinking about it.  This morning I was still thinking about pumpkin muffins!  I might have dreamed about them last night.  (Do you dream about food?  I do, ALL the time!) 

I really love pumpkin-flavored anything.  I haven't gotten a pumpkin latte from Starbucks yet this season, because it's hard to enjoy it and feel like it's fall when it is still over 90 degrees.  Well, today I decided I didn't care.  I was going to make some pumpkin muffins, by golly.  So I started scouring the Internet for recipes.  I read a bunch and I kept jotting down ideas until I had one I thought might work.

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins

Can you smell them through your screen???

Ingredients:

3/4 cup packed dark brown sugar

1/4 cup cinnamon applesauce

2 eggs

1 cup canned pumpkin

1/4 cup water

1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour

3/4 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1/4 tsp salt

1/2 tsp nutmeg

1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips

Directions:

Mix together sugar, applesauce, and eggs until blended.  In a separate bowl, mix together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, spices, and salt.  Add wet mixture to the dry mixture.  Stir until everything is mixed.  Stir in chocolate chips until incorporated.  Fill muffin cups 2/3 cups full.  (Makes 12-15 muffins)

These muffins were A.MA.ZING.  LOVED, loved, loved them. 

If you make them, let me know how you like them.

I did double duty tonight and have ANOTHER dessert baking in the over right now for a girls'night out at my friend Kate's house.  You'll have to wait for pics of that tomorrow.  But I can tell you that it smells sooooo good.  It's going to be hard to save it for tomorrow!

Mystery Ingredient... Broccolini!

So did you guess what my new food was going to be today?  It was broccolini! 

Can I just say-- I LOVE this pic of the broccolini.  Doesn't it look so elegant here?

Can you believe I never ate it before?  Before I cooked it, I was wondering what the difference between regular broccoli and broccolini actually is.  So like any computer nerd, I Googled it!  (Don't you love how Google, a prpoer noun, has not been made into a verb?)

According to www.cookthink.com,

Broccolini is the brand name of a vitamin-packed broccoli-like green vegetable with a registered trademark belonging to the Mann Packing Company, Inc. Nicknamed baby broccoli, it's actually a broccoli/Chinese broccoli hybrid that was developed in Japan and has a sweeter flavor than plain broccoli.

Introduced in the U.S. in 1998, it is now grown year round in California and Arizona and sprouts edible yellow flowers. Broccolini can be steamed, sautéed, boiled, roasted or tossed in a stir-fry.

But here's the thing.  I started making dinner tonight and I went to consult my recipe and noticed that it called for broccolini rabe.  So then I went, "Oh shoot... what is broccolini rabe?"  I went ahead and cooked the recipe with what I had.  But later I looked it up. 

According to www.associatedcontent.com,

Broccoli Rabe
The cabbage relative goes by many names, including broccoli raab, rapini and broccoletto, but it is most commonly referred to as broccoli rabe, and can now be found in most supermarkets and in many restaurants across the country. Often found in Southern Italy cuisine for quite some time, its popularity has seemingly migrated to the United States nearly overnight.

Broccoli Rabe appears as a leafy vegetable similar to kale or cabbage, with small broccoli-like florets mixed within the mass of leaves, all of which sit atop stems which are typically discarded, unlike broccoli stems, which are usually never discarded before consumption.

Broccoli Rabe can tend to be quite bitter, and is usually blanched in boiling water before additional preparation to help remove the some of the bitterness. An increasingly common way to serve broccoli rabe after fist blanching it is to then saute it with garlic and olive oil and some red pepper flakes. I also sometimes use white cooking wine and mirin or sake for additional subtle flavors. Many restaurants have taken to serving it with pasta dishes.

Broccoli Rabe is rich with phytochemicals that help fight against cancer, and also contains great amounts of Vitamin C, A, K and potassium.

So... it's a leafy vegetable... definitely not what I had in my kitchen!  Oh well.  I still tried something new and the recipe was still good. 

There were several things that went wrong in the cooking of this recipe.  First, midway through the recipe I went to reach for my red pepper flakes... only to find... you guessed it... I was OUT of red pepper flakes.  Yep-- the jar was empty!  Oops.  Forgot to check that.  So I used about 1/2 tsp of cayenne pepper instead.  It actually worked fine. 

This recipe was inspired by one of Giada de Laurentiis's recipes in Everyday Italian, but it was changed so much from the original that I am going to give it a new name and call it mine. 

Let's call it... "Spicy Sausage and Broccolini Pasta"

Ingredients:
1 large bunch of broccolini, chopped
12 oz. dry sea shell-shaped pasta
1/2 lb chicken sausage
2 tbsp EVOO
3 cloves of garlic, minced
1/4 cup shredded parmesan
1/2 tsp. cayenne pepper

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil.  Add the broccolini.  Cook about 2-3 minutes.  Then add pasta.  Cook until pasta is al dente.  Reserve 1 cup of cooking liquid.  Then strain pasta and broccolini. 

While pasta cooks, heat oil in a heavy skillet over medium heat.  Add sausage, breaking up as it cooks.  When sausage is cooked through, add garlic and cayenne pepper.  Cook until fragrant (about 30 seconds).  Add pasta and broccolini.  Stir to coat.  Add liquid, 1/4 cup at a time, to add moisture.  Add as much as you like.  Add parmesan.  Stir to coat.  Finally, season with salt and pepper.  Stir to coat.

We really ended up liking this dish!  Funny how sometimes kitchen disasters turn into great meals sometimes! 

I'd love to hear some of your "food flop" stories.  Whether they have a good or bad ending, share!

I'm excited because today I signed an agreement to be a featured publisher with FoodBuzz website.  Yay!  FoodBuzz has been a great inspiration to me.  There are so many great food bloggers out there.

By the way, my little munchkin had "picture day" today.  Can you imagine being the photographer for a class of 2 1/2 year olds?  I cannot imagine.  I am sure they have lots of funny stories to tell!  We practiced saying "CHEESE!" for the camera as I was dropping her off this morning.

Thanks for reading!

Too tired to cook...

Well... guess what DIDN'T happen today... I did not try my new green ingredient.  I have plans to try it tomorrow.  When I got home tonight, I just couldn't do it...



"Sausage", Egg, and Cheese Sandwich



I had one of my regular favories for breakfast: a "sausage", egg, and cheese sandwich.  I LOVE that Morningstar Farms Maple "Sausage!"  It is sooooo delicious!  Sweet AND spicy... like you dipped your sausage patty into rich maple syrup.  But with only 80 calories (or 1 point) instead!

Also-- just a little side note... hubby and I were watching the news this morning and guess who was in Charlotte today?  Sandra Lee!  I wish I'd known ahead of time.  It would have been fun to try and go see her at the Southern Women's Show.



For lunch, I made my experiment for a teacher meeting: "Sorta-Homemade Chicken Tortilla Soup"!  I have to say, this one is a keeper!  It made a huge batch and was not expensive at all to make.  AND-- I made it in the Crock Pot!  Here's the recipe...

1 pouch of Bear Creek Soup Mix (Tortilla Flavor) (about $4)

1 can of white corn (less than $1)

1 can of diced tomatoes with onion and green pepper (less than $1)

1 1/2 cups of chopped, cooked chicken breast (about $3-- maybe less)

baked tortilla chips, cheese, and light sour cream to mix in (optional)

Directions:

Pour 10 cups of water into crock pot.  Turn to high.  After 30 minutes, mix in all ingredients except for the toppings.  Stir and cook on high for 3 hours.  Stir occasionally.  After two hours, turn to low for another hour.  Then you are done!  Add the optional mix-ins if you want. 

I fed 7 people, 2-3 of which had seconds, then I ate it again for dinner tonight and there is STILL another serving left!  So there are about 10-12 servings, I would say.  That's less than $1 per serving!

Doesn't that look delicious?????  It WAS!

I also made some corn muffins to go with the soup.  I LOVE corn muffins.  But I can't take any credit for this recipe.  It was a box of Jiffy Corn Muffin Mix.  All I added was some milk and an egg.  Sometimes, we don't need to reinvent the wheel.

After work I came home and did a little choreographing for a Zumba class I have coming up at Oakland Baptist.  (See the note on the right side of this page for info about that.)  Then I headed to the YMCA to catch Zumba with Katie.  So much fun.  She's the BEST!

I have not been very diligent about tracking points or doing what I need to do at the Y.  I need to get back to doing more weights and cross-training.  Zumba is awesome, but I need to do some of the other classes and workouts, too.  Do you ever get into an eating or workout rut? 

So... after all that... I didn't have the energy to cook tonight.  I will cook the mystery ingredient tomorrow.

Cooking Up a Storm: Sausage Scramble, Pan-seared Chicken, and MORE!

Today, I think I spent the entire day in the kitchen.  I didn't plan it that way, but that's what happened!

I started with breakfast.  Had to make some eggs because I didn't eat any eggs yesterday!  I made a "Sausage" and Cheese Scramble.  I put sausage in quotation marks because it is Morningstar Farms Vegetarian Sausage Patties.  I LOVE the maple syrup flavor.  With products like that, I could really be a vegetarian.  I used 1 oz. light colby cheese, 1 egg, 1 egg white, and a thawed "sausage" patty all chopped up.  It was soooooo tasty!  The patty gave it a little sweetness, and the cheese made it creamy.

We went to church, and on the way home, Ryan and I talked about making dinners for some of our friends who have been sick and have had babies yesterday.  So I whipped up two Baked Spaghetti with Chicken Sausage Casseroles.  It was hard not to take a bite as I was making them!  But I did make lots of Angel Hair pasta so I could finish up my semi-homemade sauce from Thursday this week, too.  Now I have some lunches ready to go!

Then I cooked and cut chicken breasts.  I chopped some raw chicken chunks for a recipe later this week.  I had to have somecooked chopped chicken to go in some Tortilla soup I am making for coworkers tomorrow, and I also made some pan-seared chicken for Ryan to make wraps for lunch this week.  (He may or may not be addicted to wraps after "Wraps Week.")  I'll tell you what-- this is the best way to prepare chicken breasts, in my opinion.  They will be so tasty, moist, and delicious.  Your family will ask for them all the time.

Preheat oven to 375.  Spray a skillet with nonstick spray.  (I coat it pretty well.)  Heat to medium-high.  Then, salt and pepper the chicken breasts on both sides.  You can add other seasonings, if you want, but you don't need them.  When the oil is hot, add the chicken.  Let it cook until golden brown on that side-- about 5-8 minutes.  Then tuen over.  Cook for about 5 minutes.  Then cover the skillet and place the entire skillet into the hot oven.  Cook for 10-15 minutes, or until cooked through.  Let stand 3-5 minutes before slicing.  (This keeps the juices inside!)  TIP: when you pull the pan out of the pot, keep the potholder on the handle.  This will prevent you from forgetting it it HOT and burning yourself.

Another tip: if you do burn yourself (as I did today) pour yellow mustard all over the burn and let it sit a few minutes.  Then rinse with cold water.  Don't know why this works, but it's like a magic eraser for burns!

Then I maked some corn muffins to go with the Chicken tortilla soup.  I hope I can remember everything I need to take with me!  I am trying something new-- another "Sorta-Homemade" recipe.  I know that's risky, but we'll see what happens.

Oh, and we had a quick, fun visit from Meredith and David today!  They were shopping in Charlotte and were able to stop by on their way home.  That was a nice surprise.

So now... I am getting tired of my kitchen.  I just sat down to a bowl of angel hair pasta with my semi homemade sauce and a simple salad.  (And a beverage.) 

I am dubbing this week "Try Something New Week."  I've decided I am going to try 5 things that I have never tasted before this week.  Just for fun. 

So tonight, I am going to make a batch of Pistachio pudding to snack on tonight-- because I found a random box of it in the pantry today and I have never tasted Pistachio pudding.  Green pudding... strange stuff.  But I am going to try it!  That's my "Try Something New" for today.

Tomorrow, I have another Giada recipe using another ingredient I have never used!  Can you guess what it is???  It's green and it is found in the produce section.....

Oh, and my little Sadiecasso (get it?  Sadie + Picasso?) painted me a BEAUTIFUL painting today.  What a sweetie...

Thanks for reading!  See you soon!

More Steel-Cut Oats, Birthday Cake, and Pasta from Giada!

This morning, I made a new batch of oatmeal.  I used steel-cut oats-- they are really growing on me!  I made the apple cinnamon flavor again.  Ryan liked them too!  Luckily, I made enough for tomorrow, too.  I can't believe I didn't eat an egg today!  That's unheard of for me on a Saturday!

See the steam?

Apple slices

Then we headed to visit some friends who have a new baby; Baby Avery is sooooo cute! 

Ryan holding Baby Avery

Today we had a special birthday party to attend.  Sadie's cousin, Jack, turned one yesterday, and today was the big celebration!  We had a great time watching Jack smear cake all over his face and open his presents!

Baby Jack seems excited!  Can you tell?

I never would have thought I would like Barbecue Chicken Pizza, but this pizza from Donato's is delicious!

Aren't these little figurines cute on the cake?

He's not too sure about that candle...

Jack got some help from his big brother, Jerry, and Sadie

Then we all got to enjoy some cake and ice cream!

What a mess!

He sure looks content!

Birthday presents!  Big brother Jerry helps out.

When we got home, Sadie was pretty tuckered out, so she (and Ryan) headed upstairs for a little siesta.  I used that time to catch up on The Real Housewives of D.C. and flip through a cookbook I haven't used in a while: Everyday Italian by Giada de Laurentiis.  This cookbook has some really simple but delicious meals!  I found two that I wanted to make, so I headed to the store and got ingredients for two meals, the first of which I made tonight: Ziti with Asparagus, Mozzarella, and Black Forest Ham. (This is adapted from the original, just a tad-- see my notes below.)

Ingredients:
1 box of penne pasta
3 oz. light mozzarella, cubed (this was supposed to be smoked mozzarella, but I couldn't find it-- even in the specialty cheeses!)
3 oz. ham, thinly sliced (originally supposed to be prosciutto, but I had ham I needed to use up)-- don't use the woody ends, though
1 1/2 tbsp EVOO
1 lb asparagus, diagonally sliced into segments about the same length as the pasta
2 cloves of garlic, minced
3 tbsp thinly sliced fresh basil
1/2 tsp each salt and pepper

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil.  Add penne.  Cook for 5-6 minutes.  Add asparagus cuts.  Vook for an additional 3-4 minutes, until pasta is al dente and asparagus is a little tender.  Reserve one cup of the cooking liquid.  Drain pasta and asparagus.  Heat oil in a large skillet.  Add garlic and saute for about 20-30 seconds, until it is fragrant.  Then add pasta, reserved liquid, and salt and pepper.  Toss to combine.  Remove from heat.  Then add mozzarella, ham, and basil.  Toss to combine.  Serve hot. 

This recipe is delicious!  The flavors went so well together.  The mozzarella was so gooey and melty and the ham added a little extra saltiness.  It was a big hit with everyone.  I will definitely make this again.

Thank You, Crock Pot...

Yesterday after a fabulous (very productive) day at work, I arrived home to the delicious smell of stew beef in the crock pot... ahhhhh...  This is one of my favorite fall meals because it is so easy.  There are different types of Crock Pot Recipes.  Some of them are the kind where you do some prep work, like brown the meat, and then throw everything in and let it cook.  Then, there are other recipes where you do little to no prep work and let it cook.  This was the latter. 

Mornings in the Bridges household are always a little crazy.  The rule is, we have to be out the door by 7 a.m., and really I would rather be out the door at 6:50.  So when the alarm goes off at 5:50 (or 6 if I hit snooze) it is a mad dash.  Having a child will add some work to your morning routine.  And having a child who is potty training will add some MORE work.  And having a child who is potty training AND cranky at 6:30 a.m. will add some MORE work. 

Around 6:30, I go into Sadie's room a nd turn her light on.  This is the first stage of her wake-up process.  If we're lucky, about 5 minutes later, she'll come wandering into our room, hair looking very lion-like (wonder where she gets that from?) and say, "Good morning, Mommy!  Good morning, Daddy!"  But sometimes Ryan has to go in and drag her out of bed to screams of  "Noooooo!  Go away!  I don't want to get up!"  Then we've got to go potty.  This is easy if we're in a good mood.  But if we're in a bad mood, welllllll..... you try getting a crank two-year-old to pee pee on the potty first thing in the morning.  You'll see.  The next hard part is the outfit.  Now, if we have clean Cinderella panties and a dress, we are golden.  It's a breeze.  But if all the "pretty panties" are dirty and we only have plain white ones, and then we only have pants or shorts... well... it's a scream-fest.  

Once all that is done, we're over the big hurdle.  Then we're all downstairs in the kitchen grabbing lunch items, fixing our "to-go breakfasts," pouring Cheerios ("Not the Honey Nut ones, Mommy!  I want the real ones!  In the yellow box!") into a baggie, mixing chocolate milk ("Is it brown now, Mommy?"), and getting hair brushed.  All of this happens at mind-boggling speed.  And if all goes well, we're out the door between 6:50 and 7.  I remember when I was growing up, we sat around the table and had breakfast together.  I remember my dad making us muffins or cheese toast or, if we were REALLY lucky, Corned Beef Hash.  (If you don't know what this is, you missed out.  And if you go out and get it, don't judge it by the appearance!)Can you imagine?  A sit-down breakfast!  All 5 of us.  I don't know HOW my parents managed that! 

I say all this to you to stress that doing ANYTHING extra in the morning is a big deal.  There's not a lot of time to spare.  So if you ever hear me saying that I started a Crock Pot meal that morning, you KNOW that it was something EASY.

This recipe is easy, but when you come home after work, it will smell AMAZING.  And it tastes so delicious.  You'll be glad you spent that extra 5 minutes in the morning getting it all ready. 

So here's the recipe for my Stew Beef over Noodles, or as Sadie calls it, "Beefy Noodles."

Ingredients:
2 lbs of Stew Beef (I like larger chunks, rather than smaller, because they really shrink as they cook.)
1 can of Campbell's French Onion soup
1 can of Campbell's 98% Fat Free Cream of Mushroom soup
1/2 cup light sour cream
sliced green onions for garnish
pasta (whatever you like, but something broad works best.  I used Mueller's whole-wheat egg noodles.)

Directions:
In the morning, mix the beef and both soups in the Crock Pot.  Turn Crock Pot to low and cook for 8-9 hours, until beef is very tender.  Then, turn Crock Pot to warm setting.  Stir in the sour cream.  Let everything sit on warm for about 30 minutes.  Meanwhile, prepare the noodles.  If you like, add a pat of butter to the noodles once they are cooked and are still warm.  Garnish with green onions.

I served it with french green beans cooked with garlic, butter, and salt.  And some sliced tomatoes.

Sadie ate... in her princess nightgown... with a princess cup... see a pattern here?

And one of us left this mess on the tablecloth.  Any guesses?  Yep, it was Ryan...