Spinach Artichoke Macaroni and Cheese

As we enter the winter months I always want nice warm and filling meals. Macaroni and cheese always fits the bill for those really frigid days! This version of mac and cheese is a lot like that spinach and artichoke dip that you get at restaurants as an appetizer. I found this on a bunch of different websites, but I went with a recipe from tablespoon.com.

Ingredients:
1.75 Cups Jack Cheese
1/2 Cup Pecorino
1 Box Frozen Chopped Spinach
2 - 6oz Jars Marinated Artichoke Hearts
1.75 Cups Milk
3/4 Cups Sour Cream
4oz Cream Cheese
3/4 Box of Macaroni


Directions:
Mix the milk, sour cream, and cream cheese and whisk until combined. Add the jack and pecorino and mix. Cooke the pasta, strain, and add to the milk/cheese mixture. Mix well until creamy. Thaw the spinach and squeeze out extra liquids. Strain and chop artichokes. Add to the pasta mixture and mix well. Pour pasta mixture into a large baking dish. Bake at 400 for around 30-40 minutes.

Enjoy,
Becky

Apple Gruyere Panini

Did I ever mention I love sandwiches? I have? Well, I still do. Josh found this sandwich and I was excited to try it especially because it is the simplest thing to make too. I have had fruit in sandwiches before and loved them, so I knew this wouldn't be any less delicious. Depending on how big you like your sandwiches this makes about two sandwiches for two people.

Ingredients:
1 Granny Smith Apple
8 Slices Tuscan Bread
6 oz of Gruyere Cheese
Honey has a spread

Directions:
Spread honey on all slices of bread. Cut apple and cheese into thin slices. Place cheese slices and apple slices on one side of bread. Sandwich together and press on panini press until cheese is melted. That's it!
Simple and delicious!

Enjoy,
Becky

Caramel Pecan Sweet Rolls

There's nothing like a delicious breakfast pastry to start your day. Whether for a holiday treat, group gathering, or a Friday at work, sweets first thing in the morning will always give you a head start to a great day. The first time I made these was for a group gathering I was invited to by a friend from work. It was a hit and my friend told others at work they loved it and I started getting requests to make it again. So it has now become my go to recipe for work treats. I found this recipe on a news site and can't seem to find it anymore...good thing I printed a copy.

Ingredients:
5.5 - 6.5 cups flour
2 packages active dry yeast
1.75 cups milk
1/2 cup water
2 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon salt
3 tablespoons shortening
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup melted butter
2 tablespoons corn syrup
1 cup chopped pecans
4 tablespoons softened butter
1/2 cup sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon

Directions:
In a large mixing bowl combine 2.5 cups flour and the yeast. In a saucepan, heat the milk, water, 2 tablespoons sugar, salt, and shortening until warm and add to the dry ingredients. Beat at a low speed for 1 minute: scrape the sides of the bowl constantly. Beat on high for 3 minutes. Stir in enough of the remaining flour BY HAND to make a soft dough, turn out on a floured surface and knead until smooth. Cover and allow the dough to rest for 20 minutes.
In the meantime combine the brown sugar, melted butter, and corn syrup in a saucepan. Cook and stir until blended. Pour the mixture evenly in two greased 9 inch round pie tins. Top mixture with pecans.
Punch down dough. Divide the dough in half into a 10x6 rectangle. Spread with softened butter. Combine the 1/2 cup sugar and cinnamon and sprinkle over the dough. Roll up, jelly roll style beginning with the long side: seal edges. Cut the dough into 1-inch slices and place cut-side down in prepared pans. Cover and refrigerate 2 and up to 24 hours. Remove frome refrigerator and let stand up to 20 minutes. Bake at 425 for 20 to 25 minutes. Place under a cookie sheet in oven to avoid dripping. Allow to cool on racks. Serve warm.


It seems like there is a lot to this recipe, but it's so simple once you get going. I usually make them the night before so all I have to do is place them in the oven and enjoy the next day.

Be prepared for compliments and requests for more!

Enjoy,
Becky

Garlic Pita Chips

GARLIC PITA CHIPS

I find that hummus is delicious and addictive, especially with the homemade chips.

I have successfully prepared these for parties, watching movies or playing a game with the gang, or just simply sitting on the porch with one of Chris’ brews. I love them with his summer ale called LemonadeAle Stand, it’s so refreshing and satisfying.

I kept seeing bags of pita chips at the grocery store, but they were way too crispy, not that crunchy/chewy I like and way too salty. I mean, who doesn’t love anything crunchy and salty?  So I decided I would make them myself and control the texture and saltiness.I happen to be at the deli counter waiting for my cheese to be sliced and I notice where the wraps and pita bread lay Kangaroo Flatbread. Interesting, they look like pitas but they were not hollow inside, perfect for making pita chips. I purchased several bags.  However the local stores here no longer carry Kangaroo bread and I cannot find them anywhere. I have on occasion found other brands of round pita like flatbreads but it is hit or miss. So I have to resort to using regular pita bread which may be a good thing. Cheaper and the hollow makes them a bit more crispy.  

Preparing these is so simple:

Preheat oven to 400°

What you’ll need: 1 Bag of Flatbread or Pita (6 to 8) - Olive Oil - Garlic Salt*

*Mixing ground cayenne pepper with the garlic salt is a nice spicy version.

I like using a pizza pan with vent holes for assured crispness. But a shallow baking pan or cookie sheet works too.
Using a pastry brush, cover both sides of bread with Olive Oil, sprinkle lightly with Garlic Salt. Using a pizza cutter I divide each flatbread into 12 wedges. Spread wedges out on the pizza pan so they are not overlapping each other. Place pizza pan in preheated oven for about 10 minutes.










Let cool on a rack and serve with your favorite Hummus or dip.

Store in a plain paper bag if you possibly made too many or you are transporting them as they will stay crisp. Placing them in a plastic bag or container tends to turn them soft and chewy.

Ravioli in Garlic Cream Sauce

I made this last week and then made it again this week with the leftover sauce! Oh the sauce was so good. I wanted raviolis, but I was tired of having it with spaghetti sauce and I was really craving a nice creamy white sauce, so my search for a good creamy sauce began. I finally found one from Cooks.com under Fettuccine with Garlic Cream Sauce. I halfed the recipe because it called for a ridiculous amount of butter and that made me a little ill thinking about. So here it is!

Ingredients:
1 1/2 Sticks of Butter
3 Cloves Garlic (I used crushed garlic in a jar)
3/4 qt. Whipping Cream
3-4 oz Parmesan Cheese

Directions:

Melt butter over medium-low heat in a pot.
Mix in crushed garlic.
Stir in whipping cream.
Bring to a simmer, then reduce heat and let sauce simmer until the volume has been reduced by 10%.
Season to taste with salt and pepper.
Add Parmesan cheese and stir until sauce thickens.
Serve over ravioli and dip some garlic bread into sauce to sop up that creamy goodness. Serve with a yummy side salad. This was good for two and had plenty leftover for another full meal the week after.

Enjoy,
Becky

Chicken Avocado Panini and Caprese Salad

I love sandwiches....like a lot. I had bought a skillet/panini press so that we could have a skillet to make french toast, but I use it for sandwiches a lot more. It's amazing. My favorite sandwich to make on it, which is equally amazing, is a Chicken Avocado Panini. I sort of made it up as I went along and picked ingredients that I thought would taste yummy together. This is also one of Josh's favorites too, albeit the vegetarian version. Recently, I made a caprese salad and I thought it would be a perfect side with this or any sandwich. So today, I will be discussing two recipes! Aren't you lucky?

Ingredients for Chicken Avocado Panini:
4-6 Slices of your Favorite Deli Sliced Rotisserie Chicken Breast
4 Slices Provolone Cheese
One Hass Avocado
4-6 Slices Ready to Serve Bacon or Regular Bacon
4 Slices Garlic Tuscan Bread
Ranch Dressing to spread

Directions:

Spread each slice of bread with ranch dressing...mmm tangy. Place two slices of provolone on one half of each sandwich, chicken breast slices on top of that, and bacon slices on top of that. I learned a cool trick from Alton Brown of spreading avocado. Hold an avocado half in one hand and mush the avocado in it's skin with a fork with the other hand. Scoop out the goods and spread it onto the half of bread without the fixings. Put the two slices together and press the sandwiches in the panini press until the cheese is melted and everything looks fused together - about 5 minutes. Enjoy the deliciousness that is the Chicken Avocado Sandwich!

Ingredients for Caprese Salad: 
1 Pint of Cherry Tomatoes
A Shake or Two or Three of Basil
16oz of Mozzarella Cheese
Italian Dressing to Taste

Directions: 
Chop all the cherry tomotoes in half and place them in a medium sized bowl. Cut up mozzarella cheese into bite sized cubes and place them in the bowl with the tomato halves. Shake some basil and mix the cheese, tomatoes, and basil in the bowl. Add Italian dressing to your tastes. I didn't really measure how much I put in, but it was less than a cup. You don't it to be soupy when on your plate, but just enough to be able to taste it with the other flavors.

Put the Caprese Salad mix on the side of your sandwich and enjoy!

Vegetarian Alternative: Replace the chicken and bacon with tomato slices and onion! Still just as delicious!

Enjoy,
Becky

Molten Lava Cakes

A few months ago we went to Friendly's and my husband, Josh, had ice cream with molten lava cakes for dessert. He loved and craved them and asked if I thought I would be able to make them. I found a recipe that looked simple enough and I realized that with lava cakes you don't have to make a separate mix for the filling which I found interesting.....and less steps are always A+ for me! These particular lava cakes were adapted from Paula Deen's Home Cooking.

Ingredients:

10 tbls. (1 1/4 stick) butter

8 oz (1 cup) of semi-sweet chocolate chips (or whichever you prefer)

1/2 cup of all-purpose flour

1 1/2 cup confectioners' (powdered) sugar

3 large eggs

3 egg yolks

1 tsp. vanilla extract

                                                                                         

Directions:
Preheat oven to 425 degrees F. Grease muffin tins (preferably non-stick) use butter or Crisco. DO NOT use cooking spray on muffin tins. I did this the second I made these and they wouldn't come out of the tin so I had to cook them longer and the lava dried up...it was very extremely upsetting *sniff sniff*...okay, moving on. Melt chocolate chips and butter in the microwave every 30 seconds or so and stir until completely melted and smooth. Next, add the sugar and flour to the chocolate butter mixture. Stir in the eggs, egg yolks, and vanilla until smooth and combined. Fill each of the muffin tins until the mixture just about fills them. Bake your mixture for about 10 minutes until the edges are firm, but the center is still runny. Loosen each of the cakes by running a knife around the edges. Place a cookie tray over the muffin tin and flip over so they all come out nicely onto the tray. Serve immediately for that warm gooey deliciousness!

I sprinkled powdered sugar, chocolate syrup, and raspberries over each of them to make them look profesh! The raspberries give it a nice light flavor compared to the rich chocolate cake, too. 

Enjoy,
Becky

Applebee's Seasonal Berry & Spinach Salad

My husband, Josh, had Applebee's Seasonal Berry & Spinach Salad a month or so again and has been requesting I make it more than once. Last night, to his delight, I decided to try it. I had been dragging my feet because I didn't like the idea of fruit in my salad, but since summer is coming to a close I thought I would see it off with one final summery meal before we head into fall. Applebee's must keep their meal recipes on lock-down because I couldn't find a recipe for it anywhere! Only going off of what Josh told me was in it, pictures, calorie counts, and a great commercial about it I did my best are recreating it.. It came out pretty delicious and Josh said it was as good as Applebee's. Here's my take on it.

Ingredients:

1 bag spinach leaves

1lb strawberries

6oz blueberries

1lb thin sliced chicken cutlets

1/2 cup honey glazed pecans

some blue cheese crumbles to your liking 

raspberry vinaigrette dressing to taste

Directions:

First honey glaze the pecans by cooking pecans and a little more than 2tbsp of honey in a skillet on medium-high for about 4-6 minutes. Spread them out on a plate and let them cool completely while you make the rest of the salad. Cut chicken into strips and season to your liking. I sprinkled some salt and pepper on each side and called it good. Grill those babies up...I used my Cuisinart Panini Press. Throw the spinach leaves into your salad bowl, toss the blueberries, and blue cheese crumbles (which, like an idiot, I forgot to do so there they sat in the refrigerator until after we ate dinner...duh),  and slice up those delicious succulent strawberries into thin slices and add those to the salad as well. Once the chicken is done grilling add those and finally the honey glazes pecans. Add the raspberry vinaigrette or whatever dressing you like...or none at all.

Enjoy,
Becky


Here's the commercial I watched on it.

Doreen & Becky

Doreen

I wasn’t always proficient in the kitchen, as my sisters and I were not encouraged to cook growing up. I lived in my Grandparents home for ten years along with a cousin, mother, and my three sisters. Only my Grandmother and Mother cooked and we were shooed outside or in our rooms. My Grandmother’s tolerance had diminished after all the years of raising her own children, who eventually one by one moved back in with their children. The only time we were permitted in the kitchen to actually cook was Saturday...leftovers night. If there weren’t enough leftovers to feed all seven people in the house we made plain cheese omelets and toast. It was a treat to be able to crack open eggs plopping them in a bowl, tearing a slice of processed cheese food in little pieces dropping into the egg and clumsily beat them with a fork. This could be the reason I love breakfast for dinner! Breakfast is my favorite mealtime; I love the smell of coffee brewing, the sound of bacon spitting in the fry pan, the taste of salted butter, and the sight of the browning filigree edge of egg whites with bright golden eyes as they slide off the spatula onto warm toast.

When I met my husband Chris back in 1979 I don’t think I even knew how to boil eggs, let alone bake a potato. One evening I decided to serve baked potatoes, I wiped off the spuds carefully and placed them in the oven, probably not pre-heated and the temperature dial turned on with reckless abandon. Sitting in the small apartment Chris and I shared we suddenly hear a loud BANG! What was that we wondered as we rushed to the kitchen? Slowly opening the oven door we discovered a starchy mess; the potatoes exploded. I didn’t know you were supposed to pierce the skin of the potatoes before shoving them into the oven. Needless to say I not only learned how to bake potatoes properly but it was my first lesson on cleaning the inside of an oven. Chris knew how to cook certain meals as his Mom worked and when Chris would come home from school/work he would find a note his Mom left with instructions on how to get dinner ready. His specialties were sausage with peppers, onions & potatoes and the best baked chicken with crispy skin, delish. But Chris does make claim he invented the melted cheese on English muffin, he still prepares with perfection.

With the help from my wonderful Mother-in-law I learned to cook and developed the desire to try new things. Not the mundane foods that never changed when growing up.

I began a love for cook books and magazines; I would delve into them, marking pages in the cookbooks and tearing out the recipes in magazines. Excited about the new adventure I would head to the grocery store with my list, ready for anything.

Having three children made my cooking projects more exciting. This meant birthday cakes, brownies, pies, kid friendly meals, pizza, grilled cheese and of course cookies many cookies.

When my daughter Becky was in middle school I tried to get her to help out in the kitchen, as I hoped she would like it as much as me. She wasn’t interested unless it was something sweet that once put in to cook she could lick the bowl. I didn’t know what kind of meals she would turn out once she was married, but my fears were for naught as she has proven to be a fine innovative cook. We have so much fun when we are together in the kitchen. The music get turned on and our bodies respond with rhythm and kitchen utensils. Hoping you will enjoy our recipes and antics.

Becky
I used to make cookies when I was living at home. I used to make brownies too, but only because I liked to lick the batter out of the bowl.....but that was about the extent of my cooking. My mom would try and teach me because, "I would need to know how when I got married." I would ignore her of course and go about my teenage business. Before I knew it I was married to a man who thoroughly enjoyed my mother's cooking and liked to eat....a lot. Which meant that I had to start cooking actual meals. Which meant mom would be getting a lot of phone calls when I didn't know how to cook something, to find out what I could use to substitute, or to learn the what a roux was. She would always be ready to answer with step by step instructions and I have always been grateful for my personal Martha Stewart..it's a good thing.
 Cooking, for the most part, came naturally and I began to really enjoy it, always wanting to try new things to make (except for mushrooms and squash). Now that I have been cooking and baking for around 6 years consistently, I am very confident in the kitchen and not afraid to try new recipes.

There are other reasons why I love cooking other than the shear delight of eating. The second best part of cooking is hearing how well you can by those who have tried your meals. My husband, Josh, asks for certain meals because of how much he loves them and I love how he tells other people that I am a great cook too nothing makes me feel more proud. The praise I get from him alone always gives me the motivation to cook after a long day at work. But most importantly the fun mom and I have when we get together and cook makes me wish I didn't dismiss her all those times she asked. Christmastime is one of my favorite times with mom because we blare music, laugh hysterically, dance like crazy, and bake tons and tons of cookies. Those are the best memories of cooking and is one of the reasons that inspired this blog.We hope you enjoy this blog as we each will share our favorite recipes throughout the week as well as during the holidays.