Saturday, August 15, 2015

Food for the Weekend

Friday dawned early - sleeping poorly has been an issue for me this month - and I had a list of things to get done.  Unfortunately, a blog post was way down on the list.

So, this morning after a trip north to gather our two boxes of Colorado Peaches, a stop for sustenance with a breakfast burrito, coming home and dealing with a few daily chores, then finishing up some left-over work from yesterday, I am able to take a short break before church to put up this post.

Whether you need something quick for tonight, something for tomorrow or recipes for menu planning, here are a few I tried recently, with thoughts, for you.


I made this 5-Ingredient Honey Mustard Grilled Chicken on In-Law dinner night.  I used cutlets, so I didn't double the marinade.  They had good flavor.  Next time I would make double the marinade and reserve some to serve on the side.


I had some potatoes languishing in my pantry and a baked potato sounded pretty good. But the thought of turning on my oven was not an idea I relished.  I went, instead, to look for a Slow Cooker Baked Potato recipe. These came out really well, plus I liked I didn't have to wrap them in foil.  I turned them down to warm probably an hour before I needed to because I was afraid they might over-cook (they were on the smaller side) but I could have let them go.  I will happily cook them this way again.


I made ice cream for dessert one night.  I decided I needed to replace another store-bought staple.  So when I saw this 4-Ingredient Hot Fudge Sauce I figured it would go good with the ice cream and be a test for the pantry.  It was awesome - and so fast and easy it will be found in my 'fridge often.


The blueberries in my 'fridge were showing their age and this Blueberry Sour Cream Pancake recipe helped me use some of them up.  The batter mixed up thick and creamy, but the pancakes baked up light and airy.  They will go in my pancake rotation.


What blueberries I didn't use in the pancakes, were used up in this Lemon Blueberry Pound Cake.  I didn't have lemon yogurt, though I did have vanilla yogurt, so I used that and added a 1/2 tsp of lemon extract.  Personally, I like a bigger lemon punch, so I'll reduce the vanilla to 1 tsp and up the lemon to 1 tsp next time.  Still it was a good, moist cake.


It's been hot; hot outside and hot in the kitchen.  This is the time of year for grilling or for simple sandwiches.  I liked these BLT Wraps for their sun-dried tomatoes.  The recipe came together easily, with minimal kitchen-heating.  In the cooler weather, they'd pair up nicely with tomato soup.


I wanted burgers, but not beef, so I opted for these Cheddar Ranch Chicken Burgers.  I use a dark and light meat mix, whether I use chicken or turkey, the extra fat helps keep them moist and holds the flavor.  They were okay.  Easy enough, but they didn't have the seasoning I was expecting.  I deleted the pin because I have others to test and others I've tried and liked better.


Ice cream seemed a good dessert again, but I made chocolate this time and while I'm all for chocolate, when I saw this Homemade Marshmallow Sauce recipe, I just thought BINGO!  I'm not a huge fan of candy making - at altitude it can be trickier than usual - so when I saw the use of a candy thermometer I paused, but only for a moment.  The thought of marshmallow cream pushed me past my misgivings.  The recipe calls for vanilla bean paste, which I've looked for here but will probably have to purchase online, and I think the paste would have packed a bigger punch than extract.  Still, it's a good recipe and I like that it's thinner than store-bought fluff.  Plus, there's nothing in it that doesn't make sense, like oil; what's up with that?


I needed dry Ranch Dressing for the chicken burgers above and opted to mix up some myself with this Copycat Hidden Valley Dry Mix recipe.  A finger taste proved good, but I'll leave the final judgement for mixing it up into a dressing or dip, since I found the burgers a bit lacking.

I'm off to get ready to enjoy the remainder of the weekend and search for ways to use up the 36 pounds of peaches I have.  Some will be canned, but the others we'll stuff ourselves with.

Happy Saturday,

2 comments:

wendipooh13 said...

yum!!!! On all the food, esp those blueberry recipes!!!

Lori said...

It helps the blueberries have been pretty good this year!