Clementine-Blueberry Muffins

Another way to use up both marmalade and slightly soft, old clementines is to make muffins. I started with this recipe, but I made use of my clementine bounty to boost the flavor. The result is about 24 flavorful, very moist muffins.Do not make mini-muffins with this recipe, as the blueberries tend to take over a mini-muffin and the muffins won't keep their shape.

1 cup uncooked oatmeal

1 cup orange juice

juice from 2 clementines

3 cups all-purpose flour

4 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1 cup sugar

1 cup vegetable oil

3 eggs

1 1/2 cups fresh or frozen blueberries

grated peel from two clementines

2 Tbsp. clementine marmalade

Preheat oven to 400. Soften oatmeal in the orange juice. Grate the entire peel of two clementines. Set aside the peel, then cut the clementines in half and squeeze the juice into the orange juice and oatmeal mixture. Combine dry ingredients in a bowl. Then add oatmeal mixture, marmalade, oil, and eggs. Mix until just combined, then gently fold in berries and peel. Divide into muffin pans and bake at 400 for 15 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

You may be asking what's frugal about a recipe using out of season blueberries? I've seen sales on blueberries this week, but I'm using berries bought fresh last summer for $.50 per pint and frozen.

Clementine Pork Chops

The surplus of clementines in our house this month has led to some interesting experiments. Clementine marmalade is a bit sticky but very tasty. Clementine pork chops are even better. I started with this recipe, then revised it to use my pre-made marmalade. If you don't have any marmalade ready, the original recipe essentially has you make it in the crockpot before starting the pork. If you plan to get this going before leaving the house in the morning, either use premade orange marmalade or make your clementine marmalade the night before.

6 pork chops
8 oz. clementine (or orange) marmalade 
1/3 cup soy sauce
3/4 tsp ground ginger
3/4 tsp garlic powder
1 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon pepper

Heat marmalade for twenty seconds in the microwave. Then mix with soy sauce, ginger, and garlic. Sprinkle the pork chops with salt and pepper. Place pork in the crockpot and pour the marmalade sauce over the top. Cook in crockpot on low for 5 hours. If you need to be away longer, add about 1/4 cup chicken broth to your sauce to prevent the sugar from scorching. Cook on low up to 8 hours.

 

Serve over rice. Makes 6 servings and reheats well. Also delicious cold, sliced, and wrapped up in lettuce wraps with thinly sliced vegetables.

Chicken Pot Pie

There are a million different recipes for chicken pot pie out there. What it boils down to is: chicken, veggies, a creamy sauce to tie it all together, and a dough topping. Pot pies are a great way to use up leftover cooked meats and veggies.

Prep time: about 30 minutes
Cooking time: 15-20 minutes

   6 potatoes (3 large, 3 small)
   1 stalk of celery
   2 carrots
   1 cup frozen peas
   1 cup green beans
   1.5 cups diced chicken
   5 Tbsp. butter
   5 Tbsp. flour
   3 cups chicken broth
   1/4 cup half and half (optional)
   1 tsp each of salt, onion powder, and garlic powder (or use 1/2 onion and 1 clove minced)
   1/2 tsp pepper
   1 sheet puff pastry or one roll of biscuits

Preheat your oven to 425.
Dice potatoes and carrots into bite-sized chunks and boil in a large pot for about 10 minutes, until they are easily pierced with a fork but not falling apart. Drain well and add to your pan. I used a 9x13 Pyrex dish. A round baker would work as well.
While the potatoes and carrots cook, dice your celery and chop green beans in half.
In a small pot over medium heat, melt butter. (If using real onion and garlic, add them now.) Then whisk in flour until combined. Mixture will thicken. Let cook for about a minute, stirring often. Whisk in the chicken broth, a little at a time. Add salt, pepper, and onion and garlic powder if using. Whisk often, allowing the mixture to come to a simmer. Mixture will begin to thicken and be ready to use in about 5-8 minutes. If using, add half and half at the end of cooking. Keep in mind that it will continue cooking later. (If you really feel uncomfortable with making a roux (the butter/flour mixture), you can substitute prepared gravy here.)
When the sauce is ready, add celery, green beans, frozen peas, and diced chicken to your potato and carrot mixture. (You can substitute other vegetables for the green beans and peas if you have some leftovers to use up.) Pour the sauce over the mixture and stir to combine. If you'd like to, sprinkle shredded cheddar over the top.
Finish off the pie with a crust. I used a thawed puff pastry sheet. Roll it out to fix your pan. Pierce it in a few places and lay it over the top. You can also use a roll of refrigerated biscuits or homemade biscuit dough.
Pop the whole pan into the oven at 425 for about 20 minutes, until the puff pastry is golden brown and the sauce is bubbling around the edges. (If you used biscuit dough, check the temperature on your roll and cook until those are done, about 13-15 minutes.)

Serves about 5 people as a full meal.

Last Minute Hostess Gift: Peppermint Bark

Exchanging gifts with neighbors or coworkers and ran out of cookies? Make a batch of peppermint bark. It takes very little time and doesn't cost much.

Ingredients:
8 oz. chocolate chips (semi-sweet or milk)
6 oz. white chocolate chips
1/2 tsp peppermint extract
red food coloring (optional)
crushed candy canes (optional)

Or use: 4 blocks of chocolate bark and 3 blocks of almond bark

Melt the chocolate and spread on a cookie sheet covered with silpat mat or wax paper. Melt white chocolate and add one drop red food coloring and peppermint extract. Taste white chocolate and add more peppermint if desired. Then drizzle over the chocolate.



Next, grab a toothpick. Run the toothpick through the chocolate horizontally in rows. Then repeat vertically.





Add crushed candy over the top if desired. Then allow to cool and harden. You can speed this up in the refrigerator. The freezer works too, but may result in bloomed chocolate. (Rapid temperature changes cause the cocoa butter to seperate, causing white spots.)

Thanksgiving: Caramel Apple Pie Bites

I love apple pie, but I'll admit it, my crusts are nothing to write home about. This year I happened to notice a great deal on puff pastry at Aldi ($2.99 per package), so I jumped on it. Each package will create 18 bites, a good amount to bring to a party.

For the puff pastry shells:
Remove one package puff pastry from the freezer. Allow to defrost at room temperature, about half an hour. Unfold the first pastry sheet. You will have three strips joined together. Cut the strips apart, then cut each into three even pieces. You will have nine squares. Pierce each square about four times in the middle with a fork (so the middle won't puff up as much, and you have a hollow to place your filling).



Then grease a muffin pan very well. (I can't stress this enough.) Press each square lightly into a muffin cup, making sure the sides are even. If you have two muffin pans, you can do both sheets at once.



Bake at 375 for about 20 minutes, until pastry is golden and puffed. Remove from oven and allow to cool briefly (about 5 minutes) before tipping over the muffin pan and coaxing the cups out. Cool completely on a wire rack.



For the filling:
Start with 4 apples. I used two medium Granny Smiths and two small Galas. You can use all the same type of apple, but differences make for a more interesting pie. Peel and chop the apples into bite-sized pieces, then dump them in a medium pot with 1/4 cup of apple juice, 1/4 cup brown sugar, and 1 tsp of cinnamon. (Add a few grates of nutmeg if you have it.) Stir to coat well and cook on medium until the apples have softened. Remove the apples, but keep all the juices in the pot. Add 2 Tbsp of butter to your pot and simmer until the sauce begins to thicken. (A spoon pulled across the bottom of the pot will reveal the pot briefly before the sauce spills back over it.) Remove the sauce from the heat and set aside.

Putting it all together:
If you are taking these to a gathering, put each cup into a cupcake paper. If not, set cups onto a cookie sheet covered in parchment or a silicone mat. Spoon filling into each cup, then top generously with caramel sauce. Warm in a 250 degree oven for 5-10 minutes if you can, and top with brown sugar cinnamon ice cream if you have it. 

Thanksgiving: Cranberry Sauce

I'll admit it. I have a soft spot for the canned cranberry sauce. The shape of the can, the way it wiggled, the way you can slice it up easily.... it brings back memories. And in fact I bought a can this year. But I also found real cranberries at $.89 a bag and couldn't resist those either.

Cranberry sauce is one of those magical dishes that looks impressive but couldn't be easier to make from scratch.  Start with a 12 oz. bag of cranberries. Rinse them in a colander.



Then toss them into a medium pot. Add:

• 1 cup cranberry juice (100% if possible)
• 1 cup sugar
• 3 tablespoons orange juice (eyeball this, precision is not necessary)
• a little orange zest if you've got it

Stir and bring to a boil on medium heat. Once the mixture is bubbling merrily, turn it down to medium-low and stir frequently until thickened, about 10 minutes. It will still look liquidy, but will firm up when it chills. You can skim off the foam if you like, but I never do. Looks impressive and takes only a few minutes of your time. Make ahead for best effect.

Quick & Easy Dinner: Sausage Skillet

In all the hubbub yesterday with cooking and waiting for the furnace to be repaired, I totally failed to consider what we would eat for dinner tonight. Never fear! I generally have some items on hand for quick meals. Tonight I went with a simple sausage skillet that comes together in about 20 minutes.

1.5 cups of white rice
3 cups vegetable broth
1/2 tsp onion powder
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1 cup green peas
1 can black beans, drained and rinsed
1/2 package (about 8 oz.) of cubed kielbasa
salt and pepper to taste

Slice kielbasa, then cut each slice into four pieces. Cook sausage in a skillet on medium heat until cooked through. Remove sausage and set aside. Add broth to skill, and wait for the broth to boil. Add rice, onion, and garlic. Cover and reduce heat to low. Cook for 15 minutes. Fluff rice and add beans, sausage, and rice to the skillet. Mix together and cook a few more minutes, until peas are warmed through. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Serves four.

Freezer Cooking Day: Baking Time

Well, yesterday I set out to bake two items: banana bread and potato bread.

With the banana bread I wanted to use up 5 bananas in my freezer and some yogurt that was about to expire, so I searched All Recipes and found this recipe. I doubled the recipe to make one large loaf and some mini-muffins. I also altered it in several ways, but the loaf fell after it came out of the oven, so I think it still needs more work.

Rich Banana Bread

1/2 cup vegetable oil
3/4 cup white sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups flour (next time I'll try 2 cups)
1/2 cup yogurt (next time I'll try 1/3 cup)
1/3 cup ground nuts (Trader Joe's nut meal is ideal) or 1/2 cup chopped nuts (OPTIONAL)
2-3 bananas mashed (2 large or 3 smaller)

Mix together oil and sugars, then add eggs and vanilla extract. Mix until combined. Add baking soda and salt to flour, stir, then add the flour mix to your batter. Mix until just combined, then add yogurt, nuts (optional), and mashed bananas.

Pour your batter into a well greased pan. I used baking spray with flour and it came out the pan easily. Bake at 350 for 60 minutes. Check the center for doneness with a toothpick. If the top is brown but the center is still gooey, cover with aluminum foil and bake until toothpick comes out clean. Check every few minutes.

As I said, I doubled this, so I got a 10x5 loaf and 4 dozen mini-muffins. The muffins turned out well. They cook for about 13 minutes per batch. The loaf fell. It's tasty, but very dense. The batter was just too wet, hence my tweaks to the recipe above.


The other baking task for the day was to make yeasted potato bread, one of my husband's favorites. I've not made a successful batch, so I wanted to try a new recipe. I went with this one from King Arthur Flour. Unfortunately I couldn't make the dough until late last night because I ran out of flour and had to make a Jewel run that went poorly (more on that later). The dough rested all night and will rest more while I'm at work today, then I'll put it in the pans when I get home and bake it tonight.

Two lessons learned so far with this recipe:
1. Cube your softened butter, or the mixer blade will slosh yeasty water all over your counter. And while the softened butter looks really weird, it will integrate into your dough eventually.
2. This dough is too much for a 4.5 quart stand mixer to knead. The dough wormed its way up over the top of my dough hook and tried to get into the machinery. If you knead this using a mixer, divide the dough before kneading and knead each piece separately. Then rise each piece separately as well. The recipe makes 3 regular loaves or one large and one medium loaf.

Easy Meat Pasta Sauce

We love good meat sauce at our house, but jarred pasta sauces are often too sweet (and not meaty enough) for my taste. As long as you have a little time or a crockpot, meat sauce is a snap to make at home.

 Easy Meat Sauce
1.5-2 lb ground beef (93% lean is best, but 80% is fine)
2 15 oz. cans tomato sauce
1 6 oz. can tomato paste
2 tsp garlic powder (or 2 cloves of garlic, minced)
1.5 tsp onion (or 1/2 onion, minced)
2 tsp Italian seasoning
1/4 cup red wine
Salt and pepper to taste

Place ground beef in a pot and break up into small pieces. Brown meat over medium heat (saute garlic and onion with the meat if using), then add red wine, tomato paste, tomato sauce, and spices. Mix well, cover, and reduce heat to low. Stir every 10-15 minutes and let simmer for at least 30 minutes. Taste and add salt and pepper. (Start with 1/2 tsp of each if you're not sure where to start.) Simmer up to 3 hours for best flavor. If not serving that night, chill sauce overnight, then remove excess fat that will solidify on the top of the sauce.

Or: put all ingredients into a crockpot, mix well, and cook on low at least 8 hours. Stir and adjust seasonings. Crockpot cooked sauce may need additional spices.

Makes about 7 cups of very meaty sauce. If you prefer less meat, either use 1 lb of meat or an additional can of tomato sauce. If you use more sauce, add an extra 1/2 tsp of all spices. Freezes very well.

Brown Sugar Cinnamon Ice Cream

You may not be thinking about ice cream in November, but a scoop of this ice cream really takes an apple crumble or slice of pumpkin pie to the next level.

Brown Sugar Cinnamon Ice Cream

2 cup half and half
1 cup heavy cream
1 cup brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla (preferably vanilla paste)
1.5 tsp good quality cinnamon

Mix together half and half and heavy cream in a saucepan. Whisk in sugar, vanilla, and cinnamon. Some of the cinnamon will stick to the sides of the pan. Don't worry about this. Heat the mixture to 170 degrees, whisking frequently. Remove from heat and chill for at least four hours. Freeze in an ice cream maker for about 30 minutes. Scoop into a plastic container and freeze until firm, at least 4-6 hours.

Easy Halloween Cookies: Two Ways

Do you want to make some festive Halloween cookies without cutting anything out or spending much time? These very different cookies start with one batch of dough. The total recipe makes about 3 dozen cookies depending on how small you make them.  One batch of dough, about 10-15 minutes of effort, and you'll have two kinds of cookies to show for it: spiced pumpkin chip cookies with sprinkles and chocolate Halloween M&M cookies.

Easy Chicken Soup

Chicken soup is one of those meals that seems like it might be complicated, but it definitely doesn't have to be. Apparently Ina Garten's recipe requires hours of work, tons of ingredients, and a 14-20 quart stockpot. If you have that, then great! I don't, but I can still make a good pot of soup with minimal effort.

Easy Philadelphia-style Ice Cream

If you like ice cream, then you know how expensive it can be. And you've definitely noticed that the "half-gallon" container is no more. Containers now hold 1.5 quarts, a full pint less than they used to. If you like super-premium ice cream, Ben and Jerry's and Haagen-Daaz are still a full pint, but prices have jumped. In some grocery stores you will pay $4 or more for a pint. Even on sale a 1.5 quart container of Edy's/Dreyer's or Breyer's will set you back $2.50.

Quick Cookies for Toddlers

If you’ve spent much time with a toddler, then you’ve probably seen some of the cookies marketed specifically to this age group. Teddy Grahams, Annie’s bunnies, Honey Maid honey bees, and Earth’s Best alphabet cookies are a few types, and they are fairly expensive. Not only that, but no matter how organic the brand, they’ve all got preservatives. If you have twenty minutes, you can save some money and make your own. If you're brave and don't mind a little mess, let your child help you. Kids love to help measure ingredients.



Tiny Toddler Cookies

¼ cup butter or shortening
¼ cup mashed banana or applesauce
¾ cup sugar
½ tsp vanilla
1 egg
½ tsp baking soda
½ tsp salt
1 ¼ cup flour

Variations: Add 1/3 cup mini chocolate chips, diced dried fruit, or nut pieces if no allergies are present. Peanut butter, any other nut butter, or sunbutter may also be used in place of the fruit. White or brown sugar is up to your preference. Using all brown sugar results in a moister cookie. For the flour, you may use all whole wheat, but the cookie will be tougher. I recommend at least ¼ cup of the flour be white.

Preheat oven to 350.
Cream together butter/shortening with fruit and sugar, then add vanilla and egg. Mix until well combined. Add baking soda and salt, blend well. Then add flour slowly until dough is thick and only slightly sticky.
Drop dough by teaspoonfuls onto a cookie sheet with a little space around each one, as they will spread slightly.
Bake 4-6 minutes or until slightly browned. Cool briefly and then remove to a cooling rack. Cookies will store for 3-4 days at room temperature, two months in the freezer. Alternatively, bake only one pan and freeze the remaining dough, either in one block or in cookie-sized pieces for later baking. Uncooked dough will remain fresh for two months in the freezer.

The first time I tried this recipe, I made the entire batch for my 20 month old with a small appetite. He ate them enthusiastically for a few days. He tends to get burnt out on everything after a few days, so the rest of the batch went stale. Subsequently, I started making a single pan and then freezing the rest.

While I like the look and ease of drop cookies, this works equally well as cookie bars. Just press the dough into a 9x13 pan (it doesn’t matter if it doesn’t touch the sides) and bake as before. The dough will likely take longer to cook, so watch it carefully. Slice into tiny bites with a pizza cutter or knife shortly after removing from the oven. Allow to cool then store.