My Favorite Meatloaf

I have always loved Mom's meatloaf but just can't ever make it just like hers. Several years ago, though, I came across this recipe for meatloaf and have made it my own. I honestly cannot remember the original source...it may have been one of those things you get in the mail to try to get you to sign up for more. I have always enjoyed this meatloaf and it is now our family favorite. The night I made this, I also make garlic mashed potatoes, black eyed peas (which I just love to eat with mashed potatoes), and roasted asparagus.

I apologize for the pictures. I forgot all about taking pictures until after we had eaten and I was putting away the leftovers. Oops...

And, I LOVE asparagus!!


YUM - 5 stars - Absolutely love this not-your-typical meatloaf! And it isn't spicy at all even though the name and some of the ingredients might make you think it will be.

EASE - 4.5 stars - A little more work goes into this one than your normal meatloaf.

HEALTH - ?? - I don't have a clue.

Cajun Meatloaf

Ingredients
* 1 medium onion
* 1 Tbsp veg. oil
* 4 cloves garlic
* 3 Tbsp chili powder
* 1 tsp salt
* 1 tsp paprika
* pinch of cayenne pepper
* 1 cup tomato juice
* 1 lb ground beef (I used lean)
* 1 lb ground pork
* 2 slices bread, torn in pieces
* 2 eggs, lightly beaten
* 2 Tbsp Worcestershire sauce
* 1/2 tsp sugar
* 1/4 tsp hot pepper sauce

Preparation:
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Coarsely chop the onion. In a large skillet, warm the oil over high heat. Add the onion, garlic, chili powder, salt, paprika, and cayenne. Cover, reduce heat to low and cook, stirring occasionally, until the onions are softened but not browned, about 10 min. Remove the skillet from the heat, stir in the tomato juice and set the mixture aside to cool slightly.

In a large bowl, combine the beef and pork. Add the bread, eggs, Worcestershire sauce, sugar, hot pepper sauce, and onion mixture and mix lightly but thoroughly. Place the mixture in a 9x5 inch loaf pan. Or place the mixture on a foil-lined baking sheet and form it into a 9x5 inch loaf. Bake for 55 minutes (I check the internal temp and usually cook it about 10 minutes longer than this). Allow to stand for 5-10 minutes before slicing.

For the asparagus, I lined a cookie sheet with foil, drizzled the asparagus with olive oil, sprinkled with lemon pepper, and baked at 400 until tender.

For the mashed potatoes, I added a clove of garlic per potato to the boiling potatoes and mashed them with milk, salt, and butter to taste.

Now that is my kind of meal!!!

Food and 1 year olds

The other night I was cleaning up after dinner. On this particular night, my one year old had eaten SO much! I was so happy for his full little belly. So, I was cleaning up his seat (please ignore the nastiness of the straps)...

And I decided to wipe under the seat because there is this little hole (where a tray can be attached) that sometimes collects bits of food...

Afterwards, this is what the floor looked like...

Yep, even a fork that mysteriously disappeared during dinner! *SIGH*

White Bean and Turkey Chili

My husband loves chili and all of those wintery, spicy soups. Me...not such a big fan. He is particularly fond of this one EASY, EASY recipe that I make involving 5 cans of beans, a can of corn, a can of Rotel, a package of taco seasoning, a pound of ground beef, and a package of ranch dressing mix. It makes a metric ton of soup and I can only like it the first night no matter how hard I try to like it for leftovers. I will say that it is pretty great with tortilla chips, though.

I've decided that my aversion to chili is in large part due to the fact that it is usually 90% beans. I don't necessarily hate beans, but not a lot of them all at once. So, that rare chili that doesn't have any beans is by far, my favorite. But then I found a pretty good contender in this recipe.

Normally I prefer white chili anyway but this recipe takes it one step further and requires that you puree 2 cups of the bean part to thicken the soup (and, for me, reduce the number of whole beans for me to chew up). Yay!! Fewer beans, and even better...it has cilantro!

So here is the link and, just in case they remove it from the website someday, I'm including the recipe below also. Click here for the recipe!

YUM - 4 stars - Very good...but no blondie!!

EASE - 4.5 stars - Anything that involves me standing in the kitchen more than 15 minutes gets docked a star. :) No, seriously, a bit of prep work and time spent by the stove. Still easy, though! I used pre-cooked and packaged turkey to cut down on the prep time.

HEALTH - 5 stars - It was originally in Cooking Light. That has to count for something, right?

White Bean and Turkey Chili
Source - www.myrecipes.com, Cooking Light November 2006
Ingredients
• 1 tablespoon canola oil
• 2 cups diced yellow onion (about 2 medium)
• 1 1/2 tablespoons chili powder
• 1 tablespoon minced garlic
• 1 1/2 teaspoons ground cumin
• 1 teaspoon dried oregano
• 3 (15.8-ounce) cans Great Northern beans, rinsed and drained
• 4 cups fat-free, less-sodium chicken broth
• 3 cups chopped cooked turkey
• 1/2 cup diced seeded plum tomato (about 1)
• 1/3 cup chopped fresh cilantro
• 2 tablespoons fresh lime juice
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 8 lime wedges (optional)
Preparation
Heat oil in a large Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Add onion; sauté 10 minutes or until tender and golden. Add chili powder, garlic, and cumin; sauté for 2 minutes. Add oregano and beans; cook for 30 seconds. Add broth; bring to a simmer. Cook 20 minutes.
Place 2 cups of bean mixture in a blender or food processor, and process until smooth. Return pureed mixture to pan. Add turkey, and cook 5 minutes or until thoroughly heated. Remove from heat. Add diced tomato, chopped cilantro, lime juice, salt, and pepper, stirring well. Garnish with lime wedges, if desired.

Nutritional Information
Calories: 286 (19% from fat)
Fat: 6g (sat 1.2g,mono 2.1g,poly 1.6g)
Protein: 32.4g
Carbohydrate: 24.3g
Fiber: 5.5g
Cholesterol: 85mg
Iron: 4.8mg
Sodium: 435mg
Calcium: 105mg
Jennifer Martinkus, Cooking Light, NOVEMBER 2006

Cookies!!

The hubby and I are still trying to eat healthy and light and this led me to look for a light cookie recipe. Actually my stomach was leading me to look for a cookie recipe and the diet thing insisted it be light. SO, I found something that made my tummy rumble in anticipation and was very pleased with the results.

The recipe I found is called Chewy Chocolate Cherry Cookies (try saying that 10 times in a row!).
Click here for the recipe.

These cookies are like little bite-size brownies with Craisins in them (oh yeah, I used Crasins instead of dried cherries because I had those on hand). They were SO yummy. My only complaint with the recipe is that they serving size is just one. ONE!??? I'm on a diet here, I need a cookie recipe where the serving size is 10!

The batter is a little dry when you are mixing it up so it is best to used a mixer rather than a spoon. I suppose getting your hands dirty and mixing with your hands would work well too and then you'd have an excuse to eat a little more when you lick your fingers. :-O

Biscuits and Lettuce Wraps

I have a few things to cover in today's post. The first is a photo of my new-fangled biscuits but I have to make a few apologies first. You should know now that I am NOT a photographer and I do NOT have a photographer's camera so I can't even make that great of an attempt at faking it. That said, the biscuits were very tasty and did not look this out of focus in person (even bright and early and before putting in the contacts). [When I previewed this post the picture doesn't look quite as bad as the full res version...Whew!!]

The other night, my dear husband and I were eating some yummy P.F.Chang's food and he asked if I would make some lettuce wraps sometime. So, I found a recipe for Spicy Asian Lettuce Wraps and decided to give it a go. I attached a photo even though I'm a little embarrassed by the way it looks. I could not find any cellophane noodles at the 3 stores I tried and used rice vermicelli instead. The result was a bit mushy. For the original recipe, and a MUCH better photo, check out this link: Spicy Asian Lettuce Wraps




I really think I would have liked the firmer texture of the cellophane noodles so I will be making a trip to one of our many Asian grocers before repeating this recipe. Until then, here's the low down...

YUM - 4 1/2 stars - VERY flavorful and I loved the spiciness. It is too spicy for small children, however, so it is not necessarily a good family meal. Again, next time I try it I will be using cellophane noodles.

EASE - 5 stars - It took me about 10 minutes to put this meal together. I used pre-cooked chicken to speed it up.

HEALTH - 4 1/2 stars - Light and filling. A great combination!

Bang Bang Shrimp

Tonight is date night...Yay!! And we're going to Bonefish...double Yay!!! And I'm having Bang Bang Shrimp...There's not enough Yay for this one!

I once posted a copycat recipe for Bang Bang Shrimp on my Facebook page (a friend found it). I have not tried it so I can not attest to how well it actually measures up, but I thought I'd share it nonetheless. Let me know how it turns out if you try it!


Almost-Famous Spicy Fried Shrimp from Food Network Magazine, April 2010 page 66

Sauce:
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1 Tbspn plus 1 tspn Asian chili sauce (such as sambal oelek)
2 teaspoons honey
kosher salt
water

Shrimp:
vegetable oil for frying
2 large eggs
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup cornstarch
kosher salt
freshly ground pepper
1 1/4 lbs small shrimp, peeled and deviened
Bibb lettuce leaves for serving
thinly sliced scallions

1. Make the sauce: mix the mayo, chili sauce, honey, 1/4 tsp salt and 1 Tbspn water in a large bowl;set aside.

2. Prepare the shrimp: Heat about 2 inches of vegetable oil in a heavy-bottomed pot or Dutch oven over medium heat until a deep-fry thermometer registers 350. Meanwhile, whisk the eggs in a shallow bowl. Whisk the flour, cornstarch and 1 tspn each salt and pepper in another shallow bowl.

3. Working in batches,dredge the shrimp in the flour mixture, shaking off an excess, dip in the beaten eggs, then return to the flour mixture, turning to form a thick crust. Fry the shrimp in the hot oil until lightly golden, 1 to 2 mins, adjusting the heat as needed to maintain the oil temperature. Transfer to a paper-towel-lined plate with a slotted spoon.

4. Toss the shrimp with the prepared sauce. Arrange the lettuce in a shallow serving bowl or on individual plates. Top with the shrimp and garnish with scallions.

An Experiment

Today I conducted a little experiment. I know it can be dangerous experimenting in the realm of baking. Experimenting with a tried and true baking recipe can easily become a flop and mean throwing out a bunch of dough (realistically and figuratively). However, I have really been wanting to make some changes to my family recipe for Freezer Biscuits (previously posted) to use butter instead of shortening and to use whole wheat flour in place of at least some portion of the all purpose flour.

I talked it over with Mom first to see if she had any suggestions for the experiment and she thought I might at least want to let the dough rise some before rolling it out in order to let the yeast increase. Hmmm....makes sense.

So here's the original recipe again:

Freezer Biscuits
Ingredients
5 cups of all purpose flour (I recommend Gold Medal)
1 tbsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup shortening
2 pkgs yeast
1/4 to 1/3 cup warm water
2 cups buttermilk

Mix together the dry ingredients. Cut in the shortening. Dissolve yeast in water. Add yeast mixture to flour mixture and mix. Add buttermilk and beat until incorporated. Turn dough out onto a floured dough board and knead. Roll out to about 3/4 - 1 inch thick. Cut biscuits and put them on a pan that can be placed in your freezer. Once the biscuits are frozen, you can store them in a large ziploc bag in your freezer. When you are ready to use them, thaw and bake at 400 degrees until golden brown.

And here, is the new recipe:
Whole Wheat Freezer Biscuits
Ingredients
2 1/2 cups of all purpose flour (I recommend Gold Medal)
2 1/2 cups whole wheat flour (I used Pillsbury)
1 tbsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup butter
2 pkgs yeast
1/4 to 1/3 cup warm water
2 cups buttermilk

Mix together the dry ingredients. Cut in the butter. Dissolve yeast in water. Add yeast mixture to flour mixture and mix. Add buttermilk and beat until incorporated. Let rise for about 45 min to an hour. Turn dough out onto a floured dough board and knead. Roll out to about 3/4 - 1 inch thick. Cut biscuits and put them on a pan that can be placed in your freezer. Once the biscuits are frozen, you can store them in a large ziploc bag in your freezer. When you are ready to use them, thaw and bake at 400 degrees until golden brown.

The outcome? I'm surprised to say that I actually like the new recipe BETTER! I'll go through the entire batch and get in lots of taste tests before I give the final verdict, but they were super yummy! I can't wait to try them with a little honey in the morning.

Good night, all! Sweet biscuit and honey dreams!