Make It Rustic -- Skillet Pimento Cheese

     Pimento cheese, normally served cold, can be used as a sandwich spread or as a dip. There are many variations and this recipe pretty much includes the basic ingredients. What makes this one unique is that it is baked.

     Any old baking dish or casserole would work but for some reason I always imagine it baked in a cast iron skillet. Since we have quite a few of them in various sizes, I can bake up one batch or double, even triple it and still find a skillet that works.

Skillet Pimento Cheese    Makes 4 cups

1½ cups mayonnaise

Use a mico-grated to finely grate onion.

1 (4 oz.) jar diced pimentos, drained (or use roasted red peppers)

1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce

1 teaspoon finely grated onion

1/4 teaspoon ground red pepper (cayenne)

1 (8 oz.) block extra-sharp Cheddar cheese, shredded (8 oz. grated cheese = 2 cups)

1 (8 oz.) block sharp Cheddar cheese, shredded

Garnish - parsley, optional

1.     Stir together first 5 ingredients in a large bowl; stir in cheeses.

2.     Spoon mixture into a lightly greased 2-quart or 11”x7” baking dish.

I did spray to cast iron skillet with pan release before adding the cheesy mixture.

3.     Bake at 350° for 20 minutes or until dip is golden and bubbly.

4.     Garnish with parsley, if desired. Serve dip with crackers, bagel chips, chunks of French bread or crunchy veggies.

Ready in a “JIFFY” — Corn Muffins or Cornbread

     This is the cornbread/muffin recipe my mom swears by and mothers are never wrong! Normally I do not use boxed mixes or if I do, I make them from scratch (see our tab – Mixes and More), but this is an exception. The resulting product in sweet and tender yet doesn’t crumble when eaten.

     Mom used Jiffy® mixes when I was growing up so I got to wondering how long they’d been around. Of course, I found what I wanted to know on the company’s webpage. Jiffy® mixes are produced by the Chelsea Milling Company of Chelsea, Mi. The mill is operated by the Holmes family whose roots in the flour milling business date back to the early 1800’s; they’ve been milling flour for over 120 years. And, according to the site, Mabel White Holmes, grandmother of current President, Howdy S. Holmes, developed and introduced the first prepared baking mix product, “JIFFY” Baking Mix, in the spring of 1930.

Ingredients are assembled.

Jiffy® Corn Muffins or Cornbread   Makes 4 doz, mini muffins, 1 ½ to 2 doz. standard-sized muffins or an 8”x8” pan of cornbread

1 (9 oz.) box Jiffy® cornbread mix

1 (9 oz.) box Jiffy® yellow cake mix

½ cup water

½ cup milk

2 eggs

¼ cup oil (1 used canola)

Optional – chopped jalapeño peppers

1. Preheat oven to 400°.

2. Combine all ingredients and mix by hand just until combined (overmixing may result in tunnels in the interior of muffins or bread).

Stir just until wet & dry ingredients are combined -- the batter will be slightly lumpy.

3. Spray muffin tins or 8”x8” pan with pan release (such as Pam®).

Spray both the sides and bottoms of the muffin tin depressions.

4.     Muffins – fill muffin tins ½ to ¾ full (I used a scoop to transfer batter). Cornbread – pour batter into prepared pan.

I topped half of the muffins with chopped jalapeño peppers.

5. Place in the middle of preheated oven and bake: Mini muffins – 10 min. @ 400°; standard-sized muffing – 15 to 20 min. @ 400°; cornbread – bake 5 minutes @ 400°, then 20 to 25 minutes @ 350°.

6. Remove to cooling rack. For muffins – turn pan over so muffins can slide out (if needed, run a knife around the edge of individual muffin tins. Let cornbread baked in pan cool slightly and then cut into squares.

EGG-catly what I wanted for supper . . . Egg Salad Sandwiches

     Sometimes the simplest things are the BEST and EGG-catly what I’m craving. I have been thinking about egg salad sandwiches for the past two weeks . . . and since I haven’t been able to talk Barry into mixing up a batch, I was forced to do it myself!

     Our favorite additions to the basic egg salad recipe include . . .about a tablespoon of sweet pickle relish, 3 or 4 tablespoons finely chopped celery for crunch, a pinch or two of curry powder, a dash of hot sauce (Tabasco®) and crumbled bacon -- the bacon is what makes this recipe EGG-ceptional . . . in our opinion.

Basic Egg Salad    Enough to make 3 to 4 sandwiches or 2 very full ones!

4 hard-cooked eggs

About 1/4 cup mayonnaise

About 1 tablespoon prepared yellow mustard

Salt and pepper to taste

Egg Salad ADD Ins: pickle relish, onions, celery, and peppers. Spice it up with curry powder, hot sauce, horseradish, or chili powder. For a meaty filling, try adding 3 slices of crumbled, crisp bacon.

1.     Chop hard-cooked eggs and mix with additional ingredients.

Mixing up the ingredients in one of Barry's hand-thrown pottery mixing bowls.

2.     Cover and refrigerate for up to 2 days. (If making ahead and using bacon . . . wait and add it as the sandwiches are being made.)

To make the sandwich:

1.     Butter bread (we prefer wheat or marble rye), if desired.

2.     Pile on egg salad on one slice of bread and spread it over the bread.

3.     Add fresh spinach or a lettuce leaf and top with a second slice of bread and ENJOY!

Simple Supper or Lunch: Egg Salad on Wheat Bread / Fresh Veggies (radishes from
our garden) with Comeback Sauce Dip

“Crack” Cookies x’s 2 = Chocolate “Crack” Cookies & Vanilla “Crack”

My cookies are ready to go to Cortney Schields bridal shower.

     Seems only fitting that Eddee Anderson made these cookies (or are they candy?) for a recent Ladies Literary League meeting. The recipe came from a book by Joanne Fluke, Apple Turnover Murder (one of those books that interjects recipes with the text).

   The cookies are super easy and addictive – surely that’s the reference to crack! And, actually I’ve seen variations of these cookies on several sites (and Pinterest) lately.        

     The basic idea is not a new one . . . at least for the chocolate version. We were making them in the late 1960s in Home Economics classes . . . we topped them with chopped pecans and called them “Hotrods” (I have no idea why); since then I’ve seen them referred to as Chocolate Toffee, etc.

     Helen Farley, another LLL member, recalled that Mrs. Leonard (she owned a music store in downtown Abilene) used to make the vanilla version back in the 1950s.

     Recently I’ve seen recipes where the chocolate “crack” begins with saltines and the vanilla “crack” begins with grahams; instructions for both variations are very similar.

Chocolate “Crack” Cookies     Makes a 10”x15” jellyroll pan full of cookies

Honey graham crackers – I used 13 crackers (about 1½ of the 3 packages in the box of grahams)

2 sticks (1 cups) salted butter

1 cup packed brown sugar

2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips (12-oz pkg.)

1.  Preheat oven to 350°; position oven rack in the middle of the oven.

2.  Line a 10”x15” jellyroll sheet or jelly roll pan with heavy-duty foil. Spray the foil with Pam®.

3.  Line the pan completely with a single layer of graham crackers. Cover the whole bottom. (You can break the crackers in pieces to make them fit if you have to.)

A 10"x15" pan is lined with foil and 13 graham crackers.

4.  Set the cracker-lined jellyroll pan or cookie sheet aside while you cook the toffee mixture.

5.  Combine the butter with the brown sugar in a saucepan. Bring it to a boil over medium high heat on the stovetop, stirring constantly. Boil it for exactly five minutes, stirring it constantly. 

Brown sugar mixture is bubbling and boiling.

6.  Pour the mixture over the graham crackers as evenly as you can. It'll spread out quite a bit in the oven.

Brown sugar mixture has been spread evenly over the graham crackers.

7.  Slide the pan into the oven and bake the cookies at 350° for 10 minutes.

8.  Remove the pan from the oven and sprinkle the chocolate chips over the top. Give the chips a minute or two to melt and then spread them out as evenly as you can with a heat-resistant spatula or a frosting knife.

Chocolate chips are added to the cookies once they are removed from the oven. Let them set for a couple of minutes and then . . . 

. . . spread so the chocolate forms an even layer on top (an off-set spatula works well for this task).

9.  Slip the pan in the refrigerate to chill. When the pan has chilled, peel the foil from the cookies and break them into random-sized pieces. (I just let mine completely cool at room temperature – takes awhile but the chocolate does become firm.)

Vanilla “Crack”     Makes a 10”x15” jellyroll pan full of cookies

Original Saltine crackers – I used 1 sleeve from the standard-sized box of crackers, 40 total crackers)

2 sticks (1 cup) salted butter

1 cup white (granulated) sugar

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1/2 cup salted nut pieces, optional – I used dry roasted and salted peanuts

1.  Preheat oven to 350°; position oven rack in the middle of the oven.

2.  Line a 10”x15” jellyroll sheet or jelly roll pan with heavy-duty foil. Spray the foil with Pam®. (You want to be able to peel it off later, after the cookies harden.)

3.  Cover the pan completely with a single layer of soda crackers, salt side up. (You can break the crackers in pieces to make them fit if you have to; I just overlapped a few of them.)  Set. the cookie sheet aside while you cook the topping.

A 10"x15" pan is lined with foil and 40 saltine crackers.

4.  Combine the butter with the white sugar and vanilla in a heavy saucepan. Bring it to a full boil over medium high heat on the stovetop, stirring constantly. (A full boil will have breaking bubbles all over the surface of the pan.) Boil it for exactly five minutes stirring it constantly.

White (granulated) sugar mixture is bubbling and boiling

5.  Pour the mixture over the soda crackers as evenly as you can. Don't worry it will spread out quite a bit in the oven. If you are using nuts, sprinkle them on top now.)

 White sugar mixture has been spread evenly over the saltines & then chopped peanuts have been sprinkled over the top.

6.  Slide the pan into the oven and bake the cookies at 350° for 10 minutes.

7.  Remove the pan from the oven and let it cool on a wire rack. When the cookies have thoroughly cooled, peel off the foil and break them into random-sized pieces (acutally I just left them in cracker-sized pieces).

For another cracker based sweet treat, check out the recipe for Nutty Cracker Delights.

Still Experimenting with Quinoa – Cheesy Quinoa Patties

     Quinoa has become one of our favorite grains and is also a source of protein. I often cook up a large batch and keep it in the fridge for salads or side dishes (but it only takes 15 minutes so it can easily be done at the last minute).

     After watching someone on the Food Network make a couscous patty, I decided to adapt the method to quinoa . . . and we liked the results. However, in our opinion, the thinner the patty, the crisper and more delicious it becomes. They make a tasty meatless meal or a super side dish.

Cheesy Quinoa Patties   Makes 8 thin, crispy patties

2 cups cooked quinoa (cooked in stock w/ sautéed veggies – use our recipe for Calico Quinoa but do not add the peas; 1 cup of quinoa cooked in 2 cups stock equals the 2 cups cooked quinoa called for in this recipe)

2 large eggs

1/2 cup grated cheese Monterey-Jack, Parmesan cheese or Cheddar cheese)

2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon seasoning salt

1/4 teaspoon coarsely ground pepper

¼ to ½ teaspoon cayenne pepper

Just enough olive oil to keep patties from sticking – about 1 to 2 tablespoons or use pan spray

1.  Combine and mix all ingredients except olive oil.

Ingredients are ready to mix.

2.  Heat oil in skillet set on medium high heat.

3.  Shape quinoa mixture into 8 patties or add to round egg rings like I did. (I fried 4 at a time – that’s because I actually used the mixture for two different meals.)

Patties have been added to egg rings to help define their shape; the skillet is hot.

4.  Fry for just a few minutes, until patty is very crisp and lightly browned. Turn, and brown and crisp on second side.

Supper is ready!

I served this with a lettuce salad and Comeback Sauce.

Other ideas that we plan to try:

·      Add Italian herbs (fresh or dried) to quinoa mixture; serve with a marinara sauce.

·      Add sage and sausage seasoning to create a Quinoa “sausage” pattie.

 

Comeback for more sauce! Comeback Sauce

Full to the very top -- a pint jar of Comeback Sauce.

     Who wouldn’t be attracted by a name like Comeback Sauce? When I saw both the name and a pint jar full of the stuff on Pinterest, I just couldn’t resist checking it out. Discovered that the recipe originates in the South, One source refers to Comeback Sauce as the “queen mother of all Mississippi condiments.” Another source calls it a cross between a rémoulade sauce and Thousand Island salad dressing; the ingredients seem to be fairly standard with slight variations. The original recipe is credited to The Rotisserie, a Greek restaurant that was located in Jackson, Mississipi.

    A very versatile condiment; here are just a few of the uses I found listed on several internet sites: burger condiment, sandwich spread, salad dressing, veggie dip, seafood sauce, sauce for onion rings or fried green tomatoes. Others use it in place of plain mayo . . . like in deviled eggs. I used it over Quinoa Patties.

Comeback Sauce was really good over Quinoa Patties.

     Yes, it is good and I will keep it on hand in the fridge so we can comeback to it whenever we need a dipping sauce, salad dressing or flavor boost.

Comeback Sauce (The recipe is pretty standard but Syrup & Biscuits blog is where I first saw it and I couldn’t resist using that blogger's instructions for assembling – don't they just sound Sooooo Southern?)

1 cup mayonnaise

The sauce is easy to mix up by hand.

1/4 cup ketchup

1/4 cup chili sauce*  

1 heaping teaspoon Dijon mustard

1 teaspoon onion powder

1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce

1 teaspoon ground black pepper

1/4 teaspoon hot sauce (such as Tabasco®)

1/4 cup olive oil

Juice of one lemon (2 to 3 tablespoons)

1.     Mix all ingredients well.

2.     Store in refrigerator overnight. Sauce needs to sit to let the flavors meld.

*To make a homemade chili sauce, combine 1 c. tomato sauce, ¼  c. brown sugar, 2 Tbsp. vinegar, ¼  tsp. cinnamon, dash of ground cloves & dash of allspice (this can also be located in the Substitution chart under the MIXES & MORE tab at the top of the page – scroll down the page to locate the chart).

“Magic" Chicken – it’s so easy & fast that it’s like of like magic! (2 variations)

"Magic" Chicken is ready to go into the oven.

     Chicken tenders are so handy and quick cooking and this recipe, including prep and cooking time takes just about 20 to 25 minutes. We almost always pound chicken tenders (creating  “cutlets”) to insure that  they cook evenly and quickly + the portion size “seems” to increase as the poultry is flattened.

     Rather than the usual breading technique (involving dipping into wet and dry ingredients), I simple smear the “cutlet” with mayo and then cover with bread crumbs and bake. It doesn’t get much easier. And, the side dish, Calico Quinoa, is also an equally quick fix.

Since our original posting, we've added another recipe option -- both are good but we now prefer the revised recipe at the bottom of this post! 

"Magic" Chicken -- Original Recipe   Ingredients & instructions for 1 serving

1 chicken tender

1 scant tablespoon mayonnaise (regular, reduced fat or olive-oil based)

About 1 tablespoon dry bread crumbs with about ½ tsp. Italian seasoning mixed in

Thyme sprigs, optional

1.  Preheat oven to 425°.

2.  Line a baking sheet with foil. (You’ll be glad you did when it’s clean up time!)

3.  Pound the chicken tender a couple to times until it flattens and is of an even thickness.

We put the chicken tender in a plastic bag & then pound it with the bottom of a saucepan.

4.  Position tender on foil-lined baking sheet; spread with mayo and top with bread crumbs and thyme.

5.  Bake 10 to 15 minutes or until chicken in thoroughly cooked.

Dinner for Two—"Magic" Chicken, Calico Quinoa & Steamed Asparagus are all ready in less than 30 minutes.

          Check out some of our other menus by clicking on the MENUS tab at the top of this page.

Revised Recipe -- Basically the same, but in this version we used Panko and then bake the chicken on a rack which keeps the bottom of the chicken really crisp . . .

"Magic" Chicken - Revised Recipe    Ingredients & instructions for 1 serving

(The amounts below are for 1 chicken tender; when I’m doing this in quantity, I just dump a bunch of mayo in a pan, a bunch of Panko and oil – I really don’t measure!)

1 scant tablespoon mayonnaise

About 1 tablespoon Panko with enough olive oil drizzled in to make the crumbs slightly moist

1 chicken tender

1.  Preheat oven to 425°.

2.  Line a baking sheet with a cooling rack; spray rack with pan spray.

3.  Put mayonnaise in a low, flat container for dipping.

4.  Mix Panko with olive oil in a low, flat container for dipping.

5.  Immerse chicken tender in mayonnaise to coat, shaking off excess. Then dip in Panko, coating both sides.

6.  Arrange breaded chicken tenders on cooling rack. Ideally they should be refrigerated for at least a couple of hours (overnight is fine, too) as this helps coating stick as chicken bakes.

7.  Preheat oven to 425°

8. Bake 15 min.+, until bread crumbs are golden brown. (170° internal temp).