Pantry Revisited

This month in our group that virtually travels to a different country each month, it was my choice.  I chose Belize because my wonderful son and beautiful daughter-in-law went there on their honeymoon and loved the country.  I wanted a "taste" of what it might be like to visit there.  As I googled to search for native Belizian recipes, red beans and rice and bread pudding kept popping up so I thought. . . why not? I like to start my blog with a joke that is relative to the country we are visiting.  I hope you like this one!  No offense intended.. . just good fun! Two Belizians were riding their bikes across a university campus when one said "where did you get such a great bike?" The second Belizian said, "I was walking across town yesterday minding my own business when a beautiful woman rode up on a bike, threw it to the ground, took off her clothes and said "take what you want." The first Belizian nodded in approval and said, "good choice...

Hello and happy Friday! This week in our Ina Garten Group we did desserts.  I'm going to a "A Day at the Races" party tonight and I thought what a great time it would be to just make some brownies to take and share.  Plus, if I don't share them, I will eat them all and that much chocolate and butter and sugar cannot be good for anyone!  These beautiful brownies have a pound of butter in them and almost two pounds of chocolate!  I actually halved the recipe and put them in an 8x8 pan so I had to cook them longer than the recipe called for.  Really, what dessert could be better than just some good ole brownies!!  These brownies are rich. . . I'm sure I could not eat a square as large as Ina says to cut them.  I ended up cutting each brownie into four pieces. After a pretty bad winter for us here in the south, our weather looks great for this weekend and I am planning to enjoy every minute of it I can.   My entire mood lifts when the sun is out...

Not a good photo here.  Our group this month decided on Czech Republic recipes.  I googled and there were a lot to choose from.  I decided on this "potato pie" because we love potatoes.  I served it with a crockpot Boston Butt smothered in sauerkraut and some whole green beans. If you do not know where the Czech Republic is located, it is in Europe surrounded by Poland, Slovakia and Germany.  The capital and largest city is Prague. I enjoy our monthly group because it is diverse.  We all enjoy choosing the different countries and trying recipes from them.  I have made some good recipes and some bad ones.  But every recipe teaches me something about a country that I might have known nothing about. As for the potato pie, it was a very easy and economical dish, but rather bland. Recipe: 3 eggs 3/4 tsp. salt 1/4 tsp. pepper 3/4 cup milk 3-4 large potatoes, peeled and grated 3 T. flour 1/4 tsp. baking powder 3 T. bacon fat Beat t...

This month in our Ina Garten group is main dishes.  I chose a chicken dish. Normally, I would not even think to buy chicken that has the skin on it.  And if I did I would promptly pull it right off.  But this recipe called for chicken breasts skin on so that you could stuff underneath the skin with the goat cheese and sundried tomatoes.   Ready to go in the oven!!  The chicken breasts I bought were really large so it took a lot longer to cook than Ina's recipe called for.  She said to cook for 40 minutes.  Mine took a little over an hour.  This recipe is delicious.  I highly recommend it.  The breasts are so tender and juicy. I served this with green beans and some ranch baked potatoes.  We really enjoyed it. You can get the recipe here: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/ina-garten/chicken-with-goat-cheese-and-sun-dried-tomato-recipe.html Our hearts go out this week to our group friend, Chaya, whose da...

In our My Kitchen My World group we visit different countries each month and choose a recipe from that country.  This month is Poland.  There are so many wonderful Polish recipes out there that it was hard for me to choose.  I wanted to do something with kielbasa so I chose this cabbage and kielbasa dish.  We really enjoyed it.  We first had a cup of my chicken corn chowder (see post below) and then followed that with the cabbage dish.  It was sweet and yet a pop of heat from the red pepper flakes.  My DH really enjoyed it.  He went back for seconds. . .. and maybe thirds!  As you can see, it is all made in a skillet making it a one dish meal for easy cleanup! A topping of bacon really brings out the flavor of the cabbage and kielbasa.  You could also add diced potatoes to the mix.  I left out the caraway seed because we do not care for it. Check out what all is going on in our group by clicking on this link.  We ...

I think because the weather here has been unbelievably cold, I have been in soup mode.  Last week I made Ina Garten's Leek and Potato soup.  Yesterday I made a chowder that I have not made in probably 25 years.  We really enjoyed it for dinner last night so I thought I would share with you.  It's really creamy and tasty. Here is the recipe.  I used rotisserie chicken for easy and I only added two russet potatoes to mine. Original recipe makes  8 servings      1/2 cup   butter 1 small   carrot, finely diced 1 stalk   celery, diced 1 small   onion, finely diced 1 clove   garlic, minced 1/2 cup   all-purpose flour 1 bag of frozen yellow corn 4   russet potatoes, diced 2   cooked rotisserie chicken breast halves, shredded 4 cups   chicken stock, divided 2 1/2 cups   half-and-half 1 pinch   nutmeg salt and ground black pepper to taste ...

It's the day after New Year's and after a wonderful meal last night with some of our close friends, I am ready to begin 2014!  Yes, I ate the collards and the peas, but not the hog jowl. Will bacon in the collards suffice for my good luck this year?  I hope so! I figure the year will be pretty much what I make of it and I anticipate a good one.  It is 9:30 this morning and I am sitting here enjoying a most delicious bowl of potato soup.  It's our Fridays with Ina Garten (the Barefoot Contessa) and we are checking out some of her delicious dishes.  I chose her potato soup.  It is very cold here this week and it just sounded warm and comforting.  I made a few adjustments however making the recipe a bit simpler and using ingredients I had on hand.  I left out the leeks, but definitely will put them in next time! HAPPY NEW YEAR TO YOU AND YOURS.  May you always have "enough."  Put the past behind you, love, laugh, forgive, enjoy and...