Squeaky Zucchini Stew

My daughter sometimes cooks for us around here. Sunday was a HUGE work day, and I couldn’t grill for the helpers. So my daughter stepped in and made a fabulous meal. Everyone absolutely loves it; if we entered a contest, say, for a week at one of those gorgeous Outer Banks homes, I’d bet we’d win! I thought I’d share the recipe here.

Squeaky Zucchini Stew

1 pound ground sausage, cooked and drained of fat
2 small zucchini, sliced
2 small yellow squash, sliced
1 medium white onion, diced
1-2 cans spaghetti sauce (depending on taste)
1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese

Saute the sausage, zucchini, yellow squash, and onion until the vegetables are tender. Add the sauce; warm up. Throw some cheese on the top until melted. Serve as it is, or with some pasta.

It’s so good! The flavors really blend well. The veggies are slightly crunchy, too, so it’s just terrific stuff.

Four Foods For Friday #112

We have another One Question Quiz, and interesting one.

What can you make with meat or poultry, rice, cheese and a vegetable?

Hmmmm. I’m not very fond of rice or chicken. And while I like cheese, I am fussy about my cheese (only Mozzarella, Swiss, and American). So this one has me as stumped as if making photo birth announcements or something. Uhhhh….

Well, I guess I like Turkey Divan. Boring, I know. Turkey is poultry! It’s a pretty bland dish, though (which is why I dislike casseroles and why I dislike rice and chicken). Last time i made Turkey Divan, I made it this way:

Turkey Divan

4 cups diced leftover turkey
6 slices Swiss cheese
1 bag frozen broccoli florets
1/2 cup chicken broth
1/2 cup canned roasted red peppers, drained and diced
4 leaves kale, washed and sliced into strips
4 cups rice, cooked

Throw broccoli in the microwave to thaw.

In a large casserole dish, place the turkey on the bottom. Add the kale and peppers, then the broccoli. Add the broth. Layer with the cheese.

Pop in the oven until heated through (about 30-35 minutes).

Serve with rice.

The kale and peppers spruce up the blandness of the turkey and rice, and help to sneak in a few added vegetables.

Like Grandma’s Chicken Dumplings?

A recipe titled “Like Grandma’s Chicken Dumplings” is a loaded one, for me. My grandmother never cooked (not that I remember; she was always busy shifting through mounds of paperwork, perhaps life insurance rates and retirement benefits?). But seemed to always serve Campbell’s tomato soup and tuna fish sandwiches. It was fine with me, because I loved tomato soup and disliked Chicken Dumplings. Yuk.

Buuuut…. I couldn’t let my kids grow up without once trying Chicken Dumplings, now could I? What kind of mother would I be?! So I found a recipe that made it easy. I can’t say it’s very tasty… they liked it OK, but I didn’t care for it. It is certainly palatable, but I don’t like cream sauces… and this had more sauce then chicken. The original recipe is at Disney Family Food (a new recipe website I’ve discovered). I altered it a little. Here’s what I did.

Like Grandma’s Chicken and Dumplings

Ingredients
2 cups cooked chicken
1 can (10 3/4 ounces) condensed cream of mushroom soup, undiluted
1 can (10 3/4 ounces) condensed cream of chicken soup, undiluted
2 soup cans water
4 teaspoons all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons chicken bouillon granules
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1 can refrigerated buttermilk biscuits (8 biscuits)

Directions
1. Mix all ingredients, except biscuits, in 4 1/2-quart CROCK-POT® slow cooker.
2. Cut biscuits into quarters and gently stir into mixture. Cover; cook on LOW 4 to 6 hours.

Tip
Don’t add water to the CROCK-POT® slow cooker, unless the recipe specifically says to do so. Foods don’t lose as much moisture during slow cooking as they can during conventional cooking, so follow the recipe guidelines for best results.

OK, I doubled the recipe. The “2 cans” soup water made for a LOT of water. I did it anyway….

Looks… interesting….

It was just too watery. So I added potatoes. And carrots. All the Chicken and Dumpling recipes I ever saw had potatoes and carrots. This was turning more into a Chicken Stew…. but I wasn’t going to eat canned cream of chicken soup and chicken cubes! It just didn’t seem enough. Adding the potatoes probably diluted a little of the saltiness from the “bouillon” granules (I used Ramen packets). So more salt is necessary.

End result?

Not TOO bad. I skipped the refrigerated biscuits and served fresh rolls instead. The kids liked dipping the rolls into the soup. And the chicken was marvelously tender and moist. But the overall taste….. eh. OK. It’s always the creamy sauce stuff that I don’t care for.

So this was an OK recipe. I don’t intend to make it again, unless the kids beg me. And they probably won’t. The WILL beg me for Tortellini with Edamame and Kielbasa, which I am going to make again.

Wow Chow Pork and Beans Bake

I am blessed by four children who love to eat beans. I can’t believe it! I HATED beans as a kid. Beans are incredibly nutritious, and incredibly cheap! So I’m implementing them more in our diet. I’d like to have it so that we eventually have a bean dish of some sort two or three times a week, rather than once every other week. Served with rice, beans are a complete protein- perfect for children’s growing bodies and for maintaining a healthy heart. Beans and rice, yum! Better than the best prenatal vitamins you can buy!

My recipe makes use of budget meat, packaged dried beans (although you could use canned), and bulk rice. It’s a very budget-friendly meal. I nabbed up a large package of Southern Style pork ribs at my local supermarket– they have them on sale for $1 a pound! The dried beans cost me $1.20, and the rice (5 cups) probably cost me around .50 because I buy my rice in bulk. So for feeding six adult-sized portions, this meal cost me about $5.70 to put on the table. And we still had leftovers, after that. I did add a salad, which raised the price of my meal, but you could add something like apples and oatmeal mixed together, or sliced fresh peaches, and that would drive the cost down. This is also a recipe that keeps well, so you could make two casseroles and serve one of them later in the week.

Here’s a quick and easy (what else?) recipe that’s perfect for a chilly winter’s day. This would probably be a great meal in the summer, too!

Wow Chow Pork and Beans Bake
serves 6-8

2 Tablespoons olive oil
3-4 pounds Southern Style pork ribs (bones removed and fat trimmed, cut up into large cubes)
1 bag dried black beans boiled/prepared to package instructions (or 3 12oz cans, drained)
1 small can tomato soup (save the can, you’ll need it to measure water)
1 tablespoon Adobo seasoning
Minced garlic (according to your liking)

In a large skillet, heat up the oil and sear the meat. Add the Adobo seasoning and cook a little longer. Once the meat is almost completely cooked, place the pieces into a large casserole dish. Pour in any remaining juices from the skillet.

Open the tomato soup can and pour all over the meat. Fill up the can twice with water, and pour it in the casserole.
Take your boiled beans and pour them on top. Add the minced garlic. Chop in the beans just a little, to mix with the liquid.
Cover tightly with foil and bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour; then, turn your oven down to 325 and bake for 3 more hours.
The house will smell GREAT.

Serve with rice and green salad or a fruit salad.

Basic Baked Chicken for a Wintry Day

We saw snow fly for the second day in a row. Flurries were pretty intense for about 5 minutes. It was as lovely, but the first couple of snows are always lovely. After that, it’s either “ho hum,” or “OH NO!”

Anyway, a chilly, damp day like this is a perfect day for baking chicken. Chicken permeates the damp air and gives us something to look forward to. Plus, the day just FEELS warmer with the smell of baking poultry in the air. When I don’t feel like cooking, but I want some winter’s day comfort food, here’s what I do: Line a heavy duty pan with aluminum foil (to help cut some of the greasy cleanup– remember, it’s a lazy day today). Place chicken pieces in the pan, skin side up. Yes, this is a fatty recipe! I did say it was comfort food. You won’t be needing any hgh supplement to grow here, not with this eating.

So place your chicken skin side up. I usually buy VERY cheap chicken on sale, and freeze it for days like these. I don’t thaw it out very much before cooking, either– I simply allo the chicken to cook all day long.

Slice one large onion and place the slices on top of the chicken. Grab some basil, oregano, parsley, and paprika, and sprinkle generously over everything.

Now, wrap up the pan with more aluminum foil. Place in an oven set at 400 degree F for about 2 hours. After that, remove the foil, turn down the heat to 350, and bake for another 2 hours. At the cooking halfway time when I remove the foil, I usually throw in a dozen potatoes for baking.

The house smells so good. Yummmmm. I usually serve this dish with some green veggies. And that’s it! It’s a marvelous meal, and the kids seem to love it.

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