Drop Biscuits

Who doesn't love a biscuit? That's right, none of you raised your hands because everybody loves biscuits...especially homemade biscuits. This is Erin's recipe from $5 dinners and it's an excellent recipe!!

Ingredients:

1 cup whole wheat flour

1 cup white flour

1 TB sugar

1 TB baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

4 TB butter

1 cup milk

Directions:

In a mixing bowl, combine wheat flour, white flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Cut in 4 Tablespoons butter with pastry blender until mixed well. 

Slowly mix in milk and stir fork. Mix until thick batter forms. Drop biscuits onto greased cookie sheet. Bake at 400 degrees for 10-12 minutes. Makes 12 biscuits.

Cool on Cooling rack.

A meal that would do a Cowboy Proud... BBQ Cowboy Beans

A lot of my dinner menu meals come from the inspiration of my email. No, I don't mean I sit and stare at my inbox waiting for creativity to hit. What I mean is I get delicious tried and true recipes delivered to me by the foodies I subscribe too. Isn't technology wonderful?

Wednesday night's meal came from Erin of the $5 dinners website. I first saw Erin on an episode of Rachael Ray and thought she was the most amazing thing since sliced bread! After the episode aired, I immediately went to her website and I have been a faithful subscriber ever since. Her meals are creative, delicious, nutritious, and always amazing. I mean it, there hasn't been one recipe that I haven't liked yet! So when the cowboy bean meals came through my email a week ago I thought hey, simple ingredients this will be for a night I don't feel like cooking.

I didn't know how I right that last statement would ring to be true. When making out the dinner menu last week for this week, I forgot to take into account my darling Gracie being gone. Why is that a big deal you ask??? Well, for a couple of reasons: I haven't cooked for two people in a very long time. And even then it was our first year and half of marriage and the first I would say 9-13 months of that, Josh did the cooking seeing as how I was constantly sick from the pregnancy with Gracie and cooking made it worse. The other reason being that Gracie is becoming a little foodie. No, seriously...at 6 yrs old she is becoming a mini food connoisseur! She appreciates the meals I cook ( which couldn't make me happier) and is always open to trying new things. She is such a good eater that I dread the evenings she is gone...because cooking for her is so much fun! So when Wednesday night came along and Josh and I were both tired and we didn't feel like cooking, but we didn't want to spend the money on something out anyways, I said I would make this. I already had the ground turkey thawed out, so why not?

The dreariness of the long day quickly began to turn around and fade as I worked my way around the kitchen. For whatever reason chopping fresh garlic always makes me happy. I love the rich fragrance of it. The way my hands always smell delicious after I'm done. So after the chopping of fresh amazing garlic, I threw it into my skillet, along with my ground turkey and the air began to smell perfect! Almost like...the heavens were aligning right there in my kitchen as the meal began to come together. Josh came out from the bedroom and stepped up along side me and began to man the turkey so I could get busy making some drop biscuits to go along with dinner. (I'll blog those when I'm done here :) )

While I was busy with the biscuits Josh was in charge of the rest of the main course. I had already drained and rinsed a can of Pinto and Black beans, as well as some diced tomatoes. Josh dumped those all into the skillet along with one cup of barbecue sauce and let it simmer for 15-20 minutes.

Mmm, doesn't that look good? It sure smelled good. Once the food was done simmering and the biscuits were done, I added some corn to our meal and it was complete.

I will say this...It was soo tasty. And Josh and I both agreed that it tasted like something that was cooked over a campfire. It had a real smoky flavor to it with a little zip from the barbecue sauce. A perfect hearty delicious meal that couldn't easier. And.....drum roll please....Eden, my little Miss Eden, ate her whole helping on her plate. She loved it! I was so proud and happy. So this is a keeper :)

BBQ COWBOY BEANS

1 lb ground beef or turkey ( we used turkey)

2 cloves of garlic, minced

1 15oz can black beans, drained and rinsed

1 15 oz can pinto beans, drained and rinsed

1 cup bbq sauce

1 15oz can petite diced tomatoes, drained

Brown the meat with the garlic. Add beans, bbq sauce, and tomatoes, and stir through. Let simmer over low-med heat for 15-20 minutes. Serve over halved biscuits!

Weekly Menu 7/25-7/31

Sorry to be posting this a few days late. The beginning of the week was a bit hectic around here and then my wireless mouse stopped working. So I had to buy new batteries for it. But everything is fixed now :)

Sunday

Bacon Cheeseburgers and fries

Monday

It was to hot to cook so we went to Moe's for tacos

Tuesday

Teriyaki Chicken Thighs with rice and green beans, and

leftover broccoli (steamed)

Wednesday

BBQ Cowboy beans with homemade drop biscuits and corn

Thursday

Frankenstuffers and a fruit salad

(pending- we have maintenance coming to spray the apartment and Josh gets off work early)

Friday

Grilled Citrus-rosemary salmon with garlic potatoes and veggies

Saturday

Chicken tetrazzini with rolls

Polynesian Chicken

You know when you're invited to someone's house for dinner and the meal is just so good that you have to have the recipe? This was such a meal for my family. Back in June, we were over at my in-law's house because I was going to meet one of my husbands cousins who he hasn't seen since he was a wee little boy. June is a crazy time for my in-laws and us because our family from Africa comes into town and we spend pretty much every night there. I enjoy seeing my husband's family and enjoying the perk of getting out of dinner ;)

On this particular night, my sister in law who is quite the little master in the kitchen for being only 15 yrs old, made dinner.  She made Polynesian Chicken. Have you ever had it? Oh my, it's so good. It was so good in fact several people went back for seconds and by the time my hubby and I finished eating, any leftovers that existed were gone.  I could tell Josh really enjoyed the meal so I inquired to my sister, what she used.  Now...not all cooks are a like. Jewelissa is more of the Rachael Ray type in seeing as though...she doesn't really measure. She has this gift of throwing things together and it tasting amazing. I do not have such a gift. I'm more of the Paula Deen type, ( not that I would ever compare myself to her...she is a goddess in the kitchen) I have to measure everything...perfectly! I blame it on my OCD tendencies. So after getting the gist of the recipe and remembering somewhere far away my other sister in law asking about this same meal and I heard it was an Uncle Ben recipe...I zipped on over to dear old Uncle Ben and found the recipe there.

So last week, I went ahead and decided to make the dinner.

I took some advice from my sister in law Jewelissa, she used crushed pineapples instead of diced pineapples and I could only find apricot marmalade in the store and it worked just fine. Also I didn't have peanut oil so I just used evoo and everything tasted amazing.  My husband was in heaven, my 6 yr old wanted more, and my nearly 2 yr old...who we all know to be a picky eater, cleaned her plate! She even ate all the broccoli!!! This is a new family fave and one I will make many many times I'm sure!

Polynesian Chicken

Serves 4

Prep: 10 min Cook Time: 20-30min.

2-4 boneless skinless chicken breast, diced into bite sized pieces

1 can crushed pineapple in juice 

2 TB soy sauce

1 cup apricot pineapple marmalade

1-2 servings cooked white or brown rice

Prepare rice according to directions. Heat oil in a large skillet. Add chicken breast and cook 3-4 minutes or until nearly cooked through.

Add juice from pineapple to chicken in skillet just before chicken has finished cooking.

Mix pineapple, marmalade, and soy sauce together in a bowl. After pineapple juice has evaporated from skillet, add the marmalade mixture to chicken. Cook until sauce is a glaze. 

Remove from heat and serve over rice.  

Peach & Blueberry Cobbler

I love Summer time desserts because they tend to be on the lighter side and full of sweet little fruits. When I was a little girl I would love and loathe blackberry season. My mom would always drag me along to where the blackberries grew on our street and we would spend hours picking them off the vines. I would generally complain and not offer much in the way of full bucket.  Looking back...I wish I had acted differently. Those could of been fun times with my mom if I had allowed it, but instead I acted like a spoiled 10yr old :( But I loved the fruits of the labor. My mom makes the BEST blackberry cobbler and it was always a summer time treat I looked forward too.

I have yet to take my kids berry picking, I would really love too...but so far, it hasn't worked out. But that's okay, because I can still make my kids excited about the desserts I make, just like my mom did for us. This past week I strayed from my mom's delicious cobbler recipe and opted to try something new. And I took the inspiration from a fellow blogger...maybe you subscribe to her posts too...Smitten Kitten?? Her blog is amazing, and her photos make my mouth water. So when this post came through my email, I immediately tucked it away into one of my food folders until I had exactly what I needed to make the recipe.

I feel like last week I fell into luck in the blueberry department. Fred Meyers was having a huge blueberry sale so we bought a huge 5lb box of blueberries and the next day I got to work on rinsing them and dividing all the blueberries into labeled ziploc bags of what I wanted to make with them. I have like 6-7 freezer bags divided and labeled of how many cups of blueberries are in the bag and what the bag is for. I even made Josh is own little freezer bag full of blueberries for the smoothies he likes to make in the warm summer mornings.

Friday evening we had a friend over for dinner and to watch a few episodes of "Lost" with us since that  is the show we are currently watching on our Netflix instant viewing and I thought a sweet cobbler was the perfect addition to the evening.

The peaches need to be skinned for the recipe so I took the hint from Smitten Kitten and made a small x at the bottom of each peach and boiled them for 30-40secs. It helped the process of removing the skins a lot easier...though I still had to stand there and peel for awhile...which my feet did not appreciate, lol!

Josh only grabbed me 4 peaches from the store and I could of used about 6 so I had to cut all the peach strips in half to make it seem like more. And it worked out just fine. While the peaches and blueberries hung out I got to work on making the biscuit topping for the cobbler. Who would of thought to use Cornmeal? I would like to declare here and now that I am finally getting better with a pastry blender. The first few times I played with it, I got bored with it and impatient. But I had a breakthrough making this recipe and I think I figured out what I was doing wrong when adding butter and then using the pastry blender. I wasn't cubing the butter enough...and if you do that, it makes the process much easier, not to mention faster.

I waited till I had the crust blended before adding the rest of the ingredients to the fruits. You have to add lemon juice and I didn't want it to dry up before I was done. So after that was done I added the buttermilk ( which I made) to the crust and mixed it all together and smeared it around the cobbler. Smitten Kitten just dropped spoonfuls over the cobbler, but I like it better in a crust form so I spread it as evenly around the top as I could and it turned out well I think.

Time to pop it in the oven!! And while my delicious goodness baked up, we got lost in "Lost" haha, I am so corny!! When the oven finally did beep, my kitchen smelled so good and so sweet!

Pardon this last picture, I wanted one in a bowl, but my hubby didn't want to turn on all the lights so he just snapped this one for me. It really doesn't do this dessert justice though. We served the cobbler with vanilla ice cream and a bit of whipped cream and I was pleasantly surprised by how tasty the cornmeal crust was!! This recipe is going to officially get filed away in my recipe binder for future use :)

Peach & Blueberry Cobbler

For the fruit
1 1/2 (about 4 cups) pounds peaches, pitted and cut into slices*
1 pint (about 2 cups) blueberries, rinsed and dried
2/3 cup packed dark-brown sugar
2 tablespoons flour
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon salt
For the biscuit topping
3/4 cup (3 1/4 ounces) all-purpose flour
1/4 cup fine stone-ground cornmeal (yellow or white)
3 tablespoons dark brown sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces
1/2 cup buttermilk
Preheat oven to 425°F (218°C).Toss peaches with blueberries, sugar, flour, lemon juice, cinnamon and salt in the bottom of a 2-quart ovenproof dish.
Make the biscuit dough: Stir together the flour, cornmeal, brown sugar, baking powder and salt. Cut the butter into the dry mixture with your fingertips, a fork or a pastry blender. Stir in buttermilk with a rubber spatula until a wet, tacky dough comes together.
Plop spoonfuls of the biscuit dough over the filling; don’t worry about covering entire surface. Bake until the cobbler’s syrup is bubbly and the biscuit tops are browned, about 20 to 25 minutes. Let cool slightly and scoop it into bowls. Top with whipped cream, vanilla ice cream, of if you’re having an accidental run-in with this cobbler before noon, plain yogurt.
* Want to peel your peaches? Here’s how: Cut a small “x” in the bottom of each peach. Dip them in boiling water for 30 seconds, and the skins will slide right off.


Recipe and direction taken from the Smitten Kitten site- These are her words, not mine :)

The end of June grocery summery

June has been over for a bit, but as I've mentioned, we've been busy.

Today, was the first chance I've had to go through all my receipts from our grocery shopping from the month of June and add up the grand total of how much we spent and how much we saved. I was very pleased with June's outcome :)

Our monthly grocery budget is $300.00

For the month of June we spent $ 273.38  :) Which means we were $26.62 from reaching our set amount. Not to bad :)

For the month of June, I saved us $94.87 with all my coupons :)

SCORE!!! I feel like I'm on top of the world. My goal is to always be under budget and carry a lot of savings with that. I think for June, I succeeded!

Smoked Sausage Kabobs

I'm so glad to be home from our vacations! It feels really good to fall back into the routine of things and to be cooking in our home once again. I didn't realize how much I had missed it, until I was getting dinner together last night. Sometimes, I think I take for granted being able to cook in my home and really enjoy it. It's always nice to be reminded about the simple things that you enjoy.

While going through the fridge last week, I was looking for inspiration with some of the things we had leftovers of. I had about 3/4 left of a sausage Kielbasa and I wanted to use it up before it went bad, so I took to the internet to see if I could find something there. I went to the Hillshire Farm site to look for recipes there on what to do with the leftover meat because usually, we use the Kielbasa in breakfast meals. The site offered a lot of helpful ideas but the one that caught my eye was very easy and looked delicious.

Kabobs are such a fun way to eat dinner. The kids think they are getting away with something and for us adults, we really are getting away with something...that whole messy clean-up thing. What's easier than throwing little wooden sticks away after you've used them? This is a cheap, quick, and fun summer dinner to throw together with your family. 

Smoked Sausage Kabobs

(Source: Hillshire Farms)

1 pkg. Hillshire Farms smoked sausage

1 large onion, cut into 1" pieces (optional)

1 large green bell pepper, cut into 1" pieces

cherry tomatoes

1 can (8oz) pineapple chunks, drained and reserved

1/2 cup teriyaki marinade sauce

Cut sausage into slices. Thread sausage, onion, pepper, tomatoes, and pineapple, leaving a small space in between each item. 

Grill over medium heating, turning frequently for 10 minutes. While grilling, brush skewers with teriyaki sauce and pineapple juice. Grill until vegetables are crisp tender. 

Serve over white or brown rice and enjoy!

Weekly Menu 7/19-25th...Starting Monday

Well wouldn't you know it, we finally went grocery shopping. Yes, the long awaited payday/grocery day had arrived...as of Thursday evening. I was so glad it finally came because as of Thursday night...I had no idea what I was going to feed us and I was lucky enough to stumble upon a Chevy's coupon earlier this week so that was our dinner Thursday night. Today (er, tonight) is Friday and we just finished up the rest of our grocery shopping.

Lately, our regular grocery store hasn't had the greatest selection of produce :( and since we've been gone, no Farmer's Markets...but we ended up buying our produce tonight at Lambs which is the Wilsonville grocery store and everything is pretty much fresh, local, and gorgeous to the eye. How can you go wrong there? And now that the grocery shopping is complete I can post my Menu for the week. I would post it Monday...But Monday's are my hectic cleaning days. So I just figured why not get a jump start on the week, eh?

Monday

Smoked Sausage Kabobs with Veggie Mix

Tuesday

Grilled Steak Tacos and Mexican Rice

Wednesday

Polynesian Chicken with rice and steamed broccoli

Thursday

Lemon Pepper Cod with Rice Pilaf and Seasoned Corn

Friday

Teriyaki Chicken Thighs, Grilled Potato Salad, and Green Beans

Saturday

BBQ Cowboy Beans with Homemade Drop Biscuits and a Garden Salad

Sunday

Spaghetti Carbonara, Garlic Bread, and a Garden Salad

As always the order of the meals is subject to change. But it is my hope that it follows the flow I've set for it because I think it would be the most conducive to our week ahead. Saturday and Sunday night, we didn't eat at home. Saturday Night, Josh and I had our first date night since March, and we had dinner at the Macaroni Grill and Sunday night, we had a family BBQ at my parents house since my cousin was in town from Texas.

Have you planned out your weekly menu yet?

4th of July food get togethers

I figured since I'm on a roll I might as well post a blog of some of the food I made while we were at the beach. I know that if I don't post this now, I may not get around to it at all since were leaving again Thursday.

Saturday night, Josh grilled burgers and hot dogs for us and my Grandma made her really yummy potato salad. Sunday, my dad and Grandma made fish n chips. Delicious halibut my dad deep frys and he did the same thing to some cute little shrimp too. My mom made her delicious scalloped potatoes (which she won't give me the recipe) and texas toast. And the Dessert...well I just might do a separate post for that...because for whatever reason...it looks awful but tastes good. No idea what went wrong. So here are some fun food pics from over the weekend!

I feel bad because pictures don't capture flavor and the food was amazing!!! It makes me so mad because my Grandma made a delicious breakfast Sunday morning...I love her breakfasts...I only get them when I come down to the beach and though they aren't anything special as she would say, I think they are so yummy. I adore her pancakes and breakfast potatoes. BUT...I ate my breakfast to fast and I forgot to snap a pic. :( Maybe another time. 

So I just thought I would share some of the food we had :)

Weekly Menu 7/5-7/11

We're back!!! Yeah, were back from the beach, got home yesterday only to turn around and leave again in 2 1/2 days. Were leaving Thursday for California for my Family Reunion. That is going to be a short trip. So because we got back from the beach yesterday (Monday) and were leaving on Thursday, that doesn't make much of a weekly menu.  So here is the plan for the week.

Monday

We walked over to Taco Del Mar for dinner

Tuesday

We might either make Fish Tacos ( I doubt it )

or Breakfast Burritos

Wednesday

Dinner at Josh's family's house

his grandparents are in town one last time from Africa

Thursday-Sunday

Fast Food I assume on our way out the door for

our long drive ahead of us and then a lot of homey cooking while were gone.

Anything after Sunday

No idea...I have a few things I could make...but really I don't have a clue.

Have a great week everyone, I hope your 4th of July was amazing!

Sour Cream Blueberry Bread

I'm in the process of mentally preparing a "to do" list in my head for my families trip to the beach this weekend for the 4th of July. I should just take the 5 minutes it would take me to write something down, but I've been so busy, I guess there hasn't been time for it.

Along with the million things that needs to happen before we jump in the car and head out, like making sure we all the clothes we need which means I need to do more laundry ( I don't mind, I love doing laundry), making sure I have enough toys and books for the kids, and packing up the food I'm going to bring for the dessert I'm making on Sunday. I also decided today on a spur to make a delicious snack for my kids while were at the beach.

Were going to be staying at my Grandma's house at the beach and though I know she will have the fridge stocked with food, I have two growing girls and I don't want them eating all of the food. So today I decided to make them a snack for them to eat while were there. Something healthy but still yummy. Sour Cream Blueberry Bread. I almost made Banana Bread, but I polled it out on Facebook and the consensus was the  Sour Cream Blueberry Bread....which I probably would of made anyway. With the Blueberries it just seems appropriate for the Holiday Weekend.

I came across the recipe probably two weeks ago on one of the blogs I follow Raising Homemakers (click the link, I know it's hard to see) and it looked delicious. The post was made by a guest blogger and she said it's," a Family Favorite." Well if it's a favorite, I knew I had to try it. So this afternoon (Thursday) I decided to give it ago...(especially since fruit flies were wanting my bananas)

After assembling everything I put in the oven and by the time it had been cooking for 25minutes, you could really begin to smell the bananas cooking. When the timer buzzed at 57 minutes, the bread was done and it smelled heavenly.

Doesn't that look good? I would of posted the picture of the slice of bread I took, but it didn't come out very well and I have already wrapped the bread up for our trip, but I can say that it tasted very good. A lot like banana bread, but very moist and when you get a taste of the blueberry the flavor just kind of explodes in your mouth because of how surprising it is. Very good. I would make it again in a heartbeat and it couldn't be any easier which we all know I love :)