Rotel Sausage Dip

All photos by Madeline L.

Ok, so I posted this back in 2009 when I joined Saltbox House, but I decieded to re-post it after my sister took some updated photos. This may be a little late to share for the Superbowl, but still is a wonderful recipe for any occasion or just to have for a small meal. My mother in law passed this recipe onto me after I loved it so much. While she calls it sausage dip, I call just call it "Rotel" after the main product used in it. Since I've shared it, many people request for me to bring it to events or ask me for the recipe. Surprisingly it is only 3 ingredients and 3 simple steps to make it. Here they are:
 

Ingredients:
1 Pound of Ground Breakfast Sausage
I Make mine with Jimmy Dean's Maple (yes maple) ground Breakfast Sausage
1 8oz. box of Cream Cheese
1 can of Rotel brand diced tomatoes and green chilies
This is the key ingredient and even though I have tried other brands, Rotel is best.

Directions:

Brown ground breakfast sausage.

Stir in package of cream cheese (softened) until well mixed.

 

 

 

Then mix in one can of Rotel brand diced tomatoes and green chilies (with juice).

This is great served with Tortilla chips (Hint of Lime is my favorite).
I love mine wrapped in a fresh warm corn tortillas.

My Favorite Snack with ak-mak Crackers

Photo by Madeline L.

This snack has been a favorite of mine since I discovered these crackers. They are not rich or flavorful cracker by any means, but they do posses a wholesom and hearty feeling. In addition to being 100% organic, they claim to use the "whole" grain of wheat which beings you a high-protein wheat,all of which rests on their reputation for sustainability and overall nutritional value. This original Armenian cracker bread has a history dating back thousands of years and was brought to the United States in 1893. Honeslty, it just satifies me and provides a nutrious snack as well.

ak-mak Snack-

Ingredients:
4 ak-mak crackers
2 wedges of Garlic and Herb Laughing Cow Cheese (light)
1/2 of Sweet Bell Pepper and or Tomatoes

Directions:
Spread about a half of wedge on each cracker and top with slices of pepper and/or tomatoes. Enjoy!

To learn more about ak-mak products, visit their website

 http://www.akmakbakeries.com/

Chile Rellenos

We had 5 food challenges planned for this month and it seems that we are behind on 3 of them. One of them was the Mexican food challenge in celebration for Cinco de Mayo (I know we are way past that). Either way, we wanted to recognize this great holiday by challenging everyone to make a favorite Mexican dish. Chile Rellenos are a favorite in my house and I wanted to share this delicious dish. They really aren't as hard as some make it sound. They just take a little time and attention. I will say they aren't the prettiest type of food I've ever made but, don't let that fool you. For those of you that enjoy these, you understand what I mean. They are full of flavor!   

 You can use Poblano peppers or I use Pasilla Peppers. Try to pick ones with out so many dimples and have a prominent stem. I make 9 peppers at a time.

Step # 1 Wash Peppers and brush with Cooking Oil.
I use Olive oil and it works great.

Step # 2- Burn Peppers. What that means is to actually place each pepper on the open burner of your gas stove and burn the skin until it become black and blistered all over. You can use the stem to turn them.  

Step #3-Sweat Peppers
After each pepper is burned place them on a place covered by a plastic bag. Just keep adding the burned ones and cover the bag up each time. Leave all the burned peppers in the covered plate for 15-30 min. It is ok if they are left longer.

Step #4- Peel skin off peppers
The sweating will allow you to easily peel off the skin. Rinse under cool water to wash off completely.  

Step #5- De-seed and De-stump Peppers

Try to find a natural slit in the pepper of slit it open with your finger. The easiest way to de-seed the peppers is to run cool water inside them and all the seed will fall out. A very important part of de-seeding the pepper is to make sure you clip the inner stump and pull it out. When you pull it out, the top strips of the membranes will follow (those raised lines inside the pepper). This will help your peppers to not be so spicy. Otherwise, they will be extremely spicy. 

* The picture on the left shows the pepper with the inner stump and the picture on the right shows it cut off.

I use kitchen scissors to cut mine.  

 

Step # 6- Stuff the Peppers

Try to maintain the shape of the pepper and leave the stems on (There will be more natural slits in the peppers). Cut your cheese (I use Monterrey Jack) in an angle like it is shown below. The wedge should be as long as the inside of the pepper. Wrap the sides of the pepper around the cheese. Secure with 1-2 toothpicks. (sorry no picture of that)

Step #7- Make Meringue

Beat 6 egg whites with 2 ounces of water until it resembles stiff peaks. Add yokes back into the meringue and mix until blended ( like 20-30 seconds). Use Immediately.

Step #8- Dip and Cook Peppers

Dip each secured pepper into the meringue and fry in a shallow pan of hot cooking oil (I use Canola). Cook until meringue is completely like to dark brown. Lay on a plate with a paper towel.  

 Step #9 - Take out toothpicks and cover with red sauce

Click here for Tomato Onion Sauce recipe

Step #10- Serve with rice, beans, homemade tortillas and enjoy! 

Stuffed Mushrooms



Photos by Madeline L.

These are super simple to make and you can change them up any way you want. I make them all the time that they make the perfect snack.

Mix together:

1 softened package of cream cheese

some minced onions

and some shredded Italian cheeses

You can add what you'd like from there.

Cut the stems out of your mushrooms (you can cut up the stems and put them back into the cheese mix too). I like to pack my cheese mixture into the mushrooms like this picture shows. Then, I top it with some more Italian cheese.

Put your mushrooms into a pre-heated oven set at 350 degrees for like 5-10 minutes or until cheese is melted.

*

Madeline made these and sent me the pictures. She added some Paprika and Chives to give these mushrooms a little color. She also used a different mushroom that I ususally do but, I'm sure any small mushroom that you can stuff would be good.

Super Snack Foods

It's almost game time! This week counts down to one of the biggest chowdowns of the year! Setting up for a great game with good food can make the game that much bigger. Are you ready?

Share Your Snack Foods 

Since February celebrates National Snack Food Month and Superbowl Sunday, I went ahead and experimented in some serious snacking business and want to share my ideas with everyone.

My snack food that I am sharing with you today is something that I threw together with left over chicken.

I took some Garlic and Herb Laughing Cow cheese (I bet Garlic and Herb cream cheese would be equally great) and mixed it with some chunks of chicken (I also throw in a few minced onions from time to time).

Then I thinly slice a sweet apple and place it on whole grain cracker. Yep, not much going on here.

I can't get enough of it and the combination creates the perfect creamy, salty, and sweet snack.

I also have used left over breaded chicken and that created even more flavor. Wow!

So to list those ingredients out:

Sweet Apples

Cooked Chicken (boiled, baked, grilled or fried)

Garlic and Herb Laughing Cow or regular cream cheese

Crackers

and minced onions (if desired)

Winter Squash Meets Harvest Lasagna

Whenever I can, I love to add fruits and veggies to my meals, ecspecially being married to a picky eater who doesn' have much of an opinion of vegetables. Among pastas and pizzas, Lasagna's are the most requested from my husband. The nice thing about making lasagnas is that you can throw almost any kind of veggie into this delightful chessy cuisine, making it your own special creation. I actually like to think of it as a harvet lasagna so to speak. My typical harvest lasagna consists of Carrots, Zucchini, Spinach, and Tomatoes for the veggies of choice. Since I'm storing so much squash this year, I decided to add some cooked Butternut squash to my Ricotta Cheese mixture in my Harvest Lasagna. The result was fabulous. Who knew vegetables could taste so good!

Recipe for my Harvest Lasagna with Winter Squash

Ingredients:

Whole Wheat Lasagna Noodles (9)

2 cups of Ricotta Cheese

1 Egg (slightly beaten)

1/2 cup Parmasean Cheese

2 Teaspoons Oregano

2 Teaspoons of Parsley

1 Teaspoon Minced Garlic

1 Teaspoon Dill Weed

Olive Oil

Sharp Chedder Cheese

Mozarella Cheese

Favorite Spaghetti Sauce or Seasoned Tomato Sauce

(I actually like to use 1 can of diced Italian Tomatoes and 1 jar of Spaghetti sauce)

Veggies of Choice (use any and all):

Butternut, Acorn, or other favorite winter squash

Zucchini

Carrots

Spinach

Asparagus

 Broccoli

Directions:

Layer # 1 Cheese Mixture:

Cook Squash as desired. While cooking, mix Ricotta Cheese, seasonings, and egg together. Spoon out cooked squash and mix with a little butter to make it creamy. Stir into Cheese mixture.

Layer # 2- Lasagna Noodles:
Cook Lasagna noodles by boiling until almost tender (don't over cook).

Layer # 3- Veggies with Sauce:
Thinly Slice all Veggies and saute together with Olive Oil an minced garlic (just so they are slightly cooked). (You can also blanch or steam them). Put partially cooked veggies in a sauce pan and add (can of diced tomatoes) Tomato or Spaghetti Sauce. Simmer until ready to layer in lasagna.

Assembly:
In a Deep Dish Baking Pan, pour a little Veggie mix along the bottom of pan, followed by these layers:
3 Noodles, Cheese mix, Veggie Mix, 3 Noodles, Cheese Mix,Veggie Mix, 3 Noodles, Cheese Mix and thenVeggie Mix. Top with Shredded cheeses (sharp chedder and Mozarella). You can also put some shredded cheese in between layers for a cheesier lasagna.

To Cook:
Cover with tin foil, bake in a pre-heated oven set @ 350 for 1 hour and then uncover and cook for an additional 15-20 mintues. Let it cool for at least 5- 10 minutes.

Pastrami Pickles

This creation was passed onto my husband by his aunt Carol who made these since he could remember. They are fast, easy and great for parties. Better yet, they taste better than you'd think. They can become addicting so watch out!

This one pretty much explains itself.

1 Whole Dill Pickle

Cream cheese to spread over

(I have also used Laughing Cow Cheese)

Wrape in a thin slice of Pastrami

Slice and serve chilled.

Delicious.

Garden Egg Crepes

Mother's Day this year i ended up having breakfast at Ihop...i ordered the "Garden Crepes" they were really delicious but ten bucks for two small crepes with not much filling in them, i figured i could do better! This is what i came up with...i added herbs to the crepes themselves and added scrambeled eggs to the filling inside. I served them to Madeline when she was stayed the night at my house and she really liked them...we ate way too much but it was well worth it!

I didn't measure anything...just use your own judgement...add more if you're feeding more people or less if its just one or two eating. Slice and Saute mushrooms. When sauteing mushrooms you should not add salt untill your mushrooms are nicely browned...thats how you get good mushroom flavor. If you add the salt before they are done, the water will be drawn out of the mushrooms and they will just soften and never brown.


Add a big bunch of fresh spinach(this shrinks down soooooo much so add quite a bit more than you think you would need). You could use thawed and drained frozen spinach if you wanted.



Add scrambled eggs... and cook untill done.





This is a basic crepe recipe that i added fresh parsley and dill to. I think it just adds a little more fresh flavor.



Crepe recipe:

1 large egg
1 cup Milk
1 tbs butter, melted and cooled
1/2 cup Flour
1/2 tsp Salt
1/2 tsp Pepper
a couple tbs of fresh chopped herbs of your choice

Just blend all ingredients together and use a 1/4 cup of the batter for each crepe. Heat pan over low/med heat, lightly brush the pan with some oil and pour 1/4 of the batter in the center of pan. turn and rotate pan untill the batter thinly coates the bottom of your pan, they only take maybe 30 seconds on each side to cook.

Fill the Crepes with the scrambled egg and spinach mixture roll up and top with Hollandaise sauce(i just used the dry mix). Garnish with crispy,crumbled bacon and more parsley if you desire!

Enjoy!

A delicious combination in every bite!