Autumn Chopped Salad

I feel like a broken record saying this, but are you using Pinterest yet?  It's such a great place to get ideas.  Anyway, I found this recipe for Autumn Chopped Salad there, but I changed the recipe quite a bit.   I know it's not Autumn yet, but school started today around here, so it feels like it!

 

Autumn Chopped Salad

1 large head of romaine lettuce, washed and chopped
2 medium pears, chopped
1/2 cup dried cranberries
1/2 cup chopped walnuts

3 slices bacon, cooked and crumbled (I did this in the microwave)
4 oz. crumbled feta cheese

Rotisserie chicken, chopped white meat

Honey Balsamic Vinaigrette

Toss salad with vinaigrette right before serving.

Honey Balsamic Vinaigrette

1/4 cup balsamic vinegar

1/4 cup honey

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon pepper

1/4-1/2 cup olive oil

Combine ingredients in a small jar with a lid and shake it up.

Quick Bread Recipe

I made purple hull peas for dinner again tonight, since I surprisingly found some fresh ones at my Walmart Market today.  I realized I was out of cornmeal at the last minute, so I couldn't make cornbread.  And what's a good southern dish like purple hull peas without cornbread?  Then I remembered an old recipe I have for Beer Bread.  This bread is so quick to put together, and so delicious, that it doesn't even bother me that it takes an hour to bake. I completely do not understand the science behind why pouring beer into flour makes bread, but it does!

 

Beer Bread

3 cups self rising flour

3 tablespoons sugar

12 oz beer

Preheat oven to 350.  Mix ingredients and pour into greased loaf pan. Bake for 30 minutes.  Butter top of bread and bake 30 additional minutes. Butter top again. 

Caprese Salad

The Caprese Salad is my favorite summer salad.  I just love it. And because of our crazy hot weather, perfect tomatoes have been in short supply!

If I told you ever crazy thing that happened today, you would think I'm exaggerating...But I had dinner alone (it was quite nice, I might add), after the air conditioner repairman left at 9pm...

Here's what you need to make a glorious Caprese Salad:

Perfect tomatoes
fresh mozarella
fresh basil
balsamic vinegar
olive oil
salt and pepper

Just throw it all together and you'll be happy!

Lemon Buddies

I won't bore you with what we had for dinner, because we're working on cleaning out the fridge and pantry before our family vacay.  So here's a recipe for the Lemon Buddies I made this afternoon.

These are like Muddy Buddies/Puppy Chow snacks that have been around forever, except with lemon.  In my opinion, they need a lot more lemon, but I like lemon more than most people... I made them for a friend who did an awesome favor for me, but my family loved the leftovers, even without extra lemon. 

Lemon Buddies

9 cups Rice Chex cereal

1 1/4 cup white chocolate chips

1/4 cup butter

4 tsp grated lemon zest

2 Tbsp fresh lemon juice

2 cups powdered sugar

Measure cereal into a large mixing bowl and set aside.  In a microwaveable bowl, microwave chips, butter, lemon peel and juice uncovered on high for 1 minute; stir.  Microwave about 30 more seconds or until mixture can be stirred smooth.  Pour mixture over cereal, stirring until evenly coated.  Pour into a 2-gallon resealable food storage plastic bag.  Add powdered sugar, seal bag and shake until all the cereal is well-coated.  Cool on wax paper or foil.

Homemade Laundry Soap

Yep, I got the idea of making homemade laundry soap from the Duggars, but I’ve since learned that a lot of regular people make it, too.  Because we do 1-2 loads of laundry every DAY around here, we go through a lot of Tide, so I thought we'd give it a try.  I also thought it would be a good super hot day activity for the kids…

Here's the recipe I used, with step by step instructions. I found all the ingredients at my Walmart.

1 bar of soap (any kind you want, but pick something that has a nice scent)
1 cup of Borax
1 cup of washing soda
a big pot
a cheese box grater
2 empty gallon containers

And here's how the process went down.  You won't make a huge mess like I did.

First, we grated a bar of soap with a box grater. If I were doing this process alone, I'd probably use my food processor to grate the soap, but what fun would that have been for the girls? :)

 

Then we added one gallon of water to the pot with the grated soap, and cooked it until the soap dissolved.  To that, we added the borax and the washing powder and brought it to a boil.  I had to rescue my son from immediate danger, but I turned around quickly when Beta yelled, "Mommy, it's a volcano!"  It boils quickly!

So after it boiled, I removed it from the heat and added one gallon of cold water.  I had to transfer the mixture into a larger plastic container (and at that point I spilled a bunch on the floor, you won't do that, I'm sure), and then into a pitcher so I could pour the soap into the empty milk jugs.  The pitcher actually worked perfectly.  

After the soap cools it gets thicker, and after washing a few loads with it, I think it works great.

Vine Ripe Tomato Pie

This recipe encompasses two of my favorite things: tomatoes and pie. I've always wanted to try the Paula Deen tomato pie, but my disdain for mayo has always stopped me.  So I decided to edit the recipe a little, and I really like how it turned out. 

Vine Ripe Tomato Pie

1 refrigerated pie crust (or make your own if you can, I cannot)
ripe tomatoes, enough to fill crust
3 green onions
2 tablespoons chopped fresh basil
1 tablespoon fresh thyme
1/3 cup mayo
1/3 cup Greek yogurt
2/3 cup sharp cheddar, grated
1/3 cup freshly grated parmesan cheese
1/3 cup fresh mozzarella, grated
salt and pepper, to taste

Roll out the pie crust and bake unfilled at 450 for 5-7 minutes, or until lightly brown.  Lower oven temperature to 350 and assemble pie. 

Mix cheese, mayo, and yogurt.  Layer tomatoes, onions, herbs, and cheese mixture, finishing with cheese.  Salt and pepper to taste.  Cover with foil and bake for 15 minutes.  Uncover and bake another 15-20 minutes, or until brown and bubbly.  Let the pie cool just warm before cutting. 

French Breakfast Puffs

You know it's happened to you.  You tell somebody you are going to do something, and then completely forget.  Well, I told my friend I was bringing snacks over for our visit today (I was planning to make mini blueberry muffins) but I completely forgot until late last night.  I didn't have any blueberries; I actually had very few ingredients at all.  Enter: French Breakfast Puffs.  These muffins are made completely with pantry ingredients AND they are delicious.

Warning: don't google French Breakfast Puffs or you might stumble across a calorie count.  You don't want to know.

Like my Real Housewives of Arkansas pose with the muffin?

French Breakfast Puffs
Yield: about 18 muffins

3 cups flour
1 cup sugar
1 tbs. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg
2 eggs
2/3 cup shortening
1 cup milk

For the coating:
2 sticks butter
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 tbs. cinnamon

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and grease muffin pans.
Combine flour, salt, baking power, and nutmeg in a large bowl.
In a mixer cream together sugar and shortening.  Add eggs and beat again.
Alternating between dry ingredients and milk, add 1/3 of each until everything is well combined.
Fill muffin cups 2/3 of the way full. 
Bake for 20-25 minutes until golden brown. While baking melt butter in a dish and combine sugar and cinnamon in another.
Remove from the oven and coat each muffin in the melted butter then in the cinnamon/sugar mixture.

Simple Salmon

I did a whole post about where to buy salmon locally in Arkansas and how to cook it back in January when I wasn't too hot to type.  But today, I'm just too darn hot to blog. 

I made Simple Salmon for dinner, along with a spinach and arugula side salad tossed with leftover marinated tomatoes.  I'm in love with those tomatoes, have I mentioned it? Now I'm sitting inside for the evening in my comfy air conditioning.

Bruschetta, again

I made these marinated tomatoes the other day, then I made them again, and tonight I made them again.  They are just so darn good, especially on top of garlic toast and topped with goat cheese.  I got some tomatoes at a farm stand yesterday, but they started going bad really quickly.  I knew I had to eat a bunch of them today, and this was the best way I could think of.  Yum.  The kids ate macaroni and cheese, though.  I wouldn't say this Bruschetta is exactly kid friendly...

Purple Hull Peas

If you are from the south, you've no doubt eaten purple hull peas (a cousin to black eyed peas) at some point in your life. I've never particularly cared for them; I've always thought they were mushy and tasted like dirt.

Purple hull peas come in a pea pod that is purple, hence the name, and you have to shell them before cooking which also make them unappealing to me.   My blog friend, Lyndi (@nwafoodie) blogged about them today too, coincidentally, and she has some good pictures of what they look like before they are shelled.

This morning I stopped by a farmstand (local friends, you know that one in Johnson?) on a tip from a neighbor, and the gentleman there said his wife had shelled these peas this morning. I knew I had to give them a try.

While researching how to cook them, I learned that a city in Arkansas actually has a purple hull pea festival in June every year complete with a pea cook off, and this recipe was the grand prize winner a few years back. I see why. The peas aren't mushy, and they don't taste a bit like dirt. I did a couple of things differently, based on other recipes I had seen, but I didn't want to mess with a blue ribbon winner too much.... My kids ate every bit, too!




Purple Hull Peas

5-6 cups shelled purple hull peas

6 oz. centercut smokey bacon

half a yellow onion, root left intact so you can remove it

1 quart of chicken stock

Salt and pepper to taste

Cut bacon into inch size pieces and lightly brown in a dutch oven. Do not drain bacon grease. Add washed peas and stock plus water to cover plus one inch. Add 2 teaspoons salt and 1 teaspoon pepper. Boil over medium heat until tender (about 45 minutes). Remove onion before serving.