Every Photo Tells a Story

Sunday, December 9, 2007

Don't get saucy with me!

Our kids didn't know what it meant when Dad told one of them, "Don't get saucy with me." I said that a sauce adds flavor or spice to something bland like pasta, rice, potatoes, etc. Well, I was in the middle of making Alfredo sauce for the first time. Last night we had spinach ravioli, which we boiled and served marinara sauce over. We boiled way too much, so we had ravioli for leftovers today, but wanted a different sauce.

One of ours made the observation that whatever has sauce has more calories. She is so right and is on a sauce strike, but our pickiest eater loved it!

You've probably made it hundreds of times, but since I had never made Alfredo sauce, a quick google search showed me the basic ingredients and directions over and over again listed below.

Alfredo Sauce
Ingredients:
1 cup butter or margarine
1 1/3 cups heavy cream
2 1/2 cup grated *Parmesan cheese
1/4 teaspoon salt
dash of pepper

I melted the butter and milk in a frying pan, then removed it from the heat and added the cheese, salt and pepper. *We didn't have enough parmesan cheese on hand, so I used shredded mozzarella and some swiss cheese.

Our vegetable was asparagus and the sauce even tasted great over it, as did the toasted bread the rest of us dunked into olive oil.

Saturday, December 1, 2007

Merry Christmas Tree!

We'd never taken our kids to cut down our own Christmas tree before, so on the advice of another family, who'd done it, we decided it would be fun. Later we found a few others in our neighborhood who have had this tradition, or have now started it as well. I think we've started a Christmas tradition as you can see and read about below:

Merry Christmas Tree!

Dashing through the snow
In a Ford 150 sleigh
O'er the steep hill we go
Sliding all the way
Through the forest we sing
Making kids spirits bright
What fun it is to ride and bring
A Christmas tree home tonight
Oh!
Jingle Bells,
Christmas tree smells!
It's snowing all the way
What fun it is our 12 footer fits
In our Ford 150 sleigh, Hey!

Monday, November 19, 2007

Old World Fresh Apple Butter Cake Tastes Great

Using the same castle mold I bought at Wal-Mart, I made this recipe, for our sister-in-law's birthday. I was worried the apples, may leave holes in the turrets, but it came out perfectly again. Also, I really recommend Pam with Flour.

Categories: Desserts

Title: Old World Fresh Apple Butter Cake

Description:
My Mother made this every fall during apple harvest time. It is often my choice for my birthday cake.

Ingredients:
1 cup butter
2 cups sugar
3 eggs
3 cups flour
1 1/2 tsp. soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
2 tsp. vanilla
3 cups peeled grated apples
2 cups chopped walnuts

Directions:
In a bowl, beat butter and sugar until well mixed. Gradually add the flour, soda, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Stir in vanilla. Fold in apples and walnuts.

Pour into a greased tube pan or bundt pan. Bake at 325 degrees for 1 hour 15 minutes. Cool 15 minutes. Glaze if desired. I don't. I did sprinkle powdered sugar on it, so the castle looked like it had freshly fallen snow on it.

Tuesday, November 13, 2007

Baked Bars for FHE treat

My sister-in-law was talking about some yummy bars she made for her Dad's visit on Sunday, so I tried them last night for our FHE treat. Here is her recipe:

Baked Bars

1 1/2 packages crushed graham crackers

1 cube melted butter
IN a 9x13 melt the butter as the oven warms up.
Pat down crackers when butter is melted. (no need to mix)
Pour one can of sweetened condensed milk over (leaving 1/2 inch on the sides)
Sprinkle 1/2 cup crushed walnuts,
1/2 cup toasted (or not- it will become toasted in the oven) coconut,
1/2 package chocolate chips,
1/2 package of butterscotch chips.
Bake 350 for approx. 25 min. until the milk is bubbling up between the chips and nuts.
Cut and serve with ice cream or cool in fridge and cut for bars when hardened.

I used finely crushed peppermint sticks instead of butterscotch chips, since I was out of them. I served them hot with vanilla and chocolate ice cream. I think peppermint ice cream would have been dynamite on them drizzled with hershey's chocolate syrup. What do think?

This morning our kids each put one in their lunches for dessert.

Sunday, November 11, 2007

Hogwart's School of Witchcraft and Wizardy Birthday Cake

Our son wanted a Harry Potter birthday party, so my latest entertaining was with several "first years" Friday. I used my mother's bundt cake recipe for the castle mold I purchased.

Here is the recipe,
1/2 lb. soft butter
3 cups flour
2 cups sugar
crumble together
2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
stir together
3 beaten eggs
1 can evaporated milk
2 tsp. almond or lemon extract

Beat well; grease and flour bundt pan well; Bake 350 degrees for about 50 minutes.

the mold,

the cake

and the final product with Professor Snape setting Hogwart's a blaze.

Saturday, November 3, 2007

Just click here and bam the cookie recipes appear!

Tuesday, October 9, 2007

It's "Spud Harvest" so it's time to glean, bake or mash, etc. some potatoes.

The kids are out of school for "Spud Harvest"! That's the name given to the time to harvest and the vacation from school to help with the harvest.

The "Activity Days" girls are out today "gleaning" the Bishop's spud fields. Last time they made bags they'll put the potatoes in to give to local needy families.

I have fond memories of this time of year working in the spud fields. I also remember going to the high school football games and buying piping hot "baked potatoes" at the concession stand. I like baked not steamed potatoes! When you wrap the potatoes in foil, they become steamed.

I like to wash the skins well, poke a couple of fork holes in each (You must poke each potato whether you bake or microwave them or they'll explode out of their skin) and sometimes roll them in salt. To me, the best way to bake potatoes is to bake them in a 400-425 degree oven for about an hour for 6 medium sized potatoes. Where I live you can buy a box of potatoes based on their size, so you can buy a box of 90s, 80, 60s, 50s, etc. The higher the number refers to how many potatoes fit in the box. I just heard another tip about baking potatoes. Put your potatoes in muffin tins, so that you can remove all of them from the oven at once by taking out the tin. Great idea!!

Baked potatoes can be served so many ways. Growing up my brother would empty the potato out of its skin, mash it down on his plate and smear butter and corn on top of it. If I only ate half of my baked potato, he'd ask me if he could eat the other half with the rest of his meal. I like to keep bake potatoes in their skin and even eat some of the skin -- this is why you wash it well.

Names of potatoes:

spuds:
In Dec 2006, I discussed spudnuts, delicious doughnuts made with potatoes, on this blog.

taters:
I love to order tater tots vs. fries to eat, when they are available.

murphies:
I understand that my paternal Grandfather used to call potatoes this, since potatoes supposedly came to America with the Irish.

tatties:
When my husband lived in Scotland, they used to boil turnips with their potatoes and call it "nips and tatties". I really like the taste of these mashed together. I use about 2/3 potatoes to 1/3 turnips. Another variation is to add carrots. We were at a friend's house for Sunday dinner and the husband was making mashed potatoes, but he threw in some dehydrated carrots from their food storage. This combination also tasted great.

My Father tells us cream was often their gravy for mashed potatoes, since it was readily available growing up on the ranch. I like to combine red potatoes with yellow or other potatoes in the same mashed potatoes too. What do I add, whatever I have on hand -- anything from real butter to butter buds, minced garlic or garlic salt, cream cheese sometimes but always milk (if you warm it, your potatoes won't cool off as quickly). Smashed potatoes versus whipped potatoes seem more satisfying to me.

peruna:
This is the Finnish word based on the fact that potatoes came from Peru.

papas:
This is Spanish for potatoes of course, but we call my Dad's mashed potatoes Papa's papas.

"Massilan Pojat" The Massila Boys -- When my Mother was young, her Mother always read to them while they ate. Sometimes she had a hard time getting them to eat. It become a tradition to here this story about 2 magpies stealing shiny jewelry from the neighbors window as her parents got them to eat their boiled potatoes. My maternal grandfather liked his "Massilan Pojat" or boiled potatoes with just a little bit of butter on top of each bite her ate. We still call them this.

Share how you like your potatoes.

Every Photo Tells a Story

Sunday, December 9, 2007

Don't get saucy with me!

Saturday, December 1, 2007

Merry Christmas Tree!

Monday, November 19, 2007

Old World Fresh Apple Butter Cake Tastes Great

Tuesday, November 13, 2007

Baked Bars for FHE treat

Sunday, November 11, 2007

Hogwart's School of Witchcraft and Wizardy Birthday Cake

Saturday, November 3, 2007

Just click here and bam the cookie recipes appear!

Tuesday, October 9, 2007

It's "Spud Harvest" so it's time to glean, bake or mash, etc. some potatoes.

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