Simple Pork Chops

I made this final recipe for last night's dinner and was surprised by how good it was.

The only challenge was figuring out a McGuyveresque way to open the cans when my can opener broke.

I added some frozen green peas to this to add some color to the white pork and white butter beans.

Saucy Steak Skillet

Except for making substitutions for the dried spices, I followed this recipe as writtern. An excellent dinner. We ate this from a bowl, and the meat was so tender I could cut it with my spoon.

Quick "N" Easy Chicken

I liked this as much as I liked the Chicken Drummies appetizer recipe Richard also submitted. I just wouldn't serve them at the same meal!

Tonight I used chicken breasts and the French dressing leftover from December.

Barbe-qued Spareribs

The sauce was wonderful. I never knew I liked 'things with chili sauce' this much until I cooked from this cookbook.

Unfortunately, the meat I bought had a lot of gristle.

Baked Salmon "Ala Cross"

Everything was perfect!

Also, I noticed that four hours later the No-Bake Cookies has indeed set. I guess I didn't remember that it would take time. Now I feel bad that I threw out two attempts at the No Bake Chocolate Cookies. Maybe its for the best because I sure can eat a lot of them.

Chicken Parmesan

Another good chicken recipe.

I didn't realize until AFTERWARDS that I made the full recipe of crumb mixture, but only used a half portion of chicken (six thighs).

Chicken Ole'

Glad to have another casserole. I have a friend (also newly unemployed) who joined the Campbell's Soup recipe of the week mailing list and is having a blast. I guess comfort foods are back in demand these days.

This was easy - I tore up about two-thirds of the package of corn tortillas and spread over the bottom of the pan. I had boneless chicken breasts, so I cut them into chunks and put across the tortilla pieces. I covered with a layer of grated cheddar, and then I covered it all with a sauce made of a can of fat-free mushroom soup, plain yogurt (instead of sour cream), and a can of diced green chilies.

I baked it for about an hour. The corn tortilla aroma was wonderful. No olives to add tonight, but that would have been good. This was nicer than I expected. A little spice from the chilies; the chicken was very moist. It could have handled the whole package of corn tortillas. My only complaint is that I should have torn the tortillas in much smaller pieces, since they were hard to cut.

Crock Pot BBQ Ribs

Delicious.

I don't have a crock pot, so I slow-cooked this stovetop for 7 hours. I mostly followed the recipe as written.

The meat is so tender I can cut it with a spoon. The sauce is delicious.

Chicken Divan

When I started assembling this, I realized I didn't have three whole chicken breasts, but one chicken breast in three parts. So...

I used the full amount of frozen broccoli. I cut the chicken breasts into bigger-than-bite-size pieces and put the pieces among the broccoli.

I had made the whole sauce recipe first, so I spooned about a third of it over the chicken and broccoli pieces. I covered the entire dish with bread crumbs and then shredded cheddar before I baked it.

Very good.

Meat Logs

This is another recipe I was worried about because I could imagine what it's supposed to look like.

I decided to make half a recipe - two pounds of ground meat, not four. I used a pound of lean ground beef and a pound of mild Italian sausage. I skipped the dried onions since I don't have any. I didn't want to chop any fresh onions either.

I made the meat mixture and put it on a sheet of waxed paper on a cookie sheet. Then I held my pan next to it so I'd know which way I needed to 'roll' to fit. (Horizontally.)

I put a thin layer of shredded cheese on the meat. I decided to put another thin layer of cheese on. I have some fresh cilantro, so I decided to chop some of that and put it on.

I have little cans of chopped green chilies and chopped olives. I put the green chilies in the vertical middle. The same size can of chopped olives went a lot further, so I put a row on each side of the chilies.

Ready to Roll!

I was happy to learn when I re-read the recipe that I just had to lap the ends and not really roll them. So I lapped one side and then the other. Either my meat layer is too thick or I'm using to much filling, because it's not realistic to seal the ends.

Next I put greased baking pan over the filled meat loaf and flipped the cookie sheet over so the loaf was now in the pan. Whew. I covered it with a jar on salsa and I baked for about an hour at 350. This was a great meatloaf.

Ham Balls or Loaf

I used a pound of lean ground beef, a pound of ground pork, and 12-ounces of ham patties cut into small pieces.

I made the loaf option because I was a little tired this afternoon. I spread the meat mixture in a 9x13 pan and poured the sauce mixture on top.

I baked for the entire 90 minutes uncovered.

This was quite good and would be good as a 'meatball on a toothpick' appetizer, too.

Chicken Scruda

Another of the many Cross Family recipes with a very interesting name. I wish I knew who or what it refers to.

I used the half onion left from last night's Cheeseburger Pie. I was able to cover the bottom of my 9x13 pan with only five slices of bread. I didn't have milk, since it isn't listed in the ingredients, so I just skipped it. And I added the shredded cheese at the beginning and let it cook for the full 50 minutes.

I peeked after 30 minutes. The cheese had formed a golden crust, so I covered the dish with foil for the remaining 20 minutes.

This was good. The bottom was a bit tough to cut through, no doubt because I skipped the milk.

Cheeseburger Pie

This was really good. I guess I like the flavor of Heinz chili sauce, because I really liked the Beef B.B.Q. from a few days ago, too.

I made the crust and lined a baking dish since I don't have a pie tin. All of my pie making for this project involved using a store-bought crust in a tin.

I used half an onion and sauteed it with the beef once the beef was browned.

Bread crumbs! What a great excuse to make crumbs from the crusts I cut off from the thirteen slices of bread I needed for the Seafood Salad and the extra buns from the Beef B.B.Q.

I made this a few hours ahead and then baked it for dinner.

Beef B.B.Q.

Total comfort food. I regret that I only made half the recipe.

Sweet 'N' Sour Pork Chops

1

1 can pineapple chunks in own juice
4 pork chops
2 medium onions, cut in thin wedges
1 clove garlic, minced
1/4 c light corn syrup
1/4 cup cider vinegar
1 T soy sauce
1 red pepper
1 T cornstarch
2 T water

Drain pineapple; reserve juice. Brown pork chops over med-high heat, about 10 minutes, turning once. Remove chops from skillet. Add onions & garlic; stir fry 1 minute, then stir in reserved juice, corn syrup, vinegar, & soy sauce. Bring to boil over med-low heat, stirring occasionally. Heat 30-40 minutes or until chops are tender. At this point, it sounded like the chops should be back in the skillet, so I put them back in. Remove chops and keep warm. Stir pepper strips in skillet. Stir cornstarch and water until smooth. Add to skillet and bring to boil over medium heat. I think I goofed here when I put the cornstarch directly in the watery vegetable mixture. Stirring constantly, boil for 1 minute. Stir in pineapple and cook until heated through, then spoon over pork chops. We had this over brown rice.

This was just OK - not sure if it was my cooking error, tasteless pork, or if I just had too many Chocolate Cherry Balls today.

Sweet-Sour Meatballs

I made nine very large meatballs and baked them in the oven. This made a very good dinner last night, served on rice with grilled asparagus on the side.

Sweet & Sour Chicken #2

This was good and very different from Sweet & Sour Chicken #1.

First, whip an egg or two and roll the chicken in the egg, then in cornstarch. I used cornmeal, not realizing there was a difference until later when I noticed that I had both. Oops.


Next, brown the coated chicken in Crisco, and put the pieces in a baking dish.


Then, make the brine to put over the top. The brine is a mixture of 2 bouillon cubes dissolved in a cup of hot water, 3/4 cup sugar, 1/4 cup catsup, 1/2 cup vinegar, 1 T soy sauce, and 1 t salt. The recipe is for chicken bouillon; I used vegetable. I substituted Splenda for sugar. Since I had five large chicken breasts, I doubled the recipe, EXCEPT I didn't double the sugar or salt.

Finally, bake at 375 for 20 minutes. Turn and bake another 20 minutes.

I thought of making rice, but didn't. Now I see that the recipe says to "pour sauce over rice," so I wish I had made some.

Sweet & Sour Chicken #1

This recipe from Aunt Martha made a good dinner.

4-lb chicken, cut in serving size pieces
1 can crushed pineapple, unsweetened
2 T cornstarch
1/2 c soy sauce
1 clove garlic, minced
1/4 t pepper
1/4 c sugar
1/4 c vinegar
1/2 t ground pepper

The first step was to place the chicken pieces skin side down in a baking dish. I had four pounds of boneless, skinless chicken breasts, or ten breasts. It was quite a panful.

Next, combine 2 T of the juice from the canned pineapple, cornstarch, sugar, soy sauce, vinegar, garlic, ginger and pepper in a saucepan. Heat this over medium heat, stirring constantly until it bubbles and thickens. I know this is science, but it always seems like magic to me when it reaches that moment of thickening. I had a beautiful thick brown sauce.

At this point that I decided to only use half of the chicken breasts because when I turned the page to continue the recipe, I saw that there is another Sweet & Sour Chicken recipe following this one. So I removed five of the breasts and put them in the freezer. I also decided to make rice to soak up the delicious sauce.

I poured the sauce over the remaining five breasts and put them in the oven at 400 for half hour. After 15 minutes, I checked to baste and saw that the sauce had thickened even more. I spooned it over the chicken breasts. Never mind on the rice because there won't be extra sauce. I'm glad I'm only using half of the breasts.

After 30 minutes, I was supposed to turn the chicken, cover it with the crushed pineapple, and spread the sauce that's left over it all. In my excitement, I put the pineapple on before I turned, so I had to scrape the pineapple off, turn the chicken, and then spread the pineapple-sauce mixture. Oh, happy day - It looks like there will be extra sauce after all! So I started the rice while the chicken continued to bake. When the rice was done, so was the chicken. Yum.

Salami

This recipe is from Aunt Martha. The recipe is simple, but getting it done took some time.

The recipe as written calls for 5 pounds of hamburger and then very small quantities of Quick Salt (5 t), mustard seed (2 1/2 t), garlic salt (2 1/2 t), ground pepper (2 1/2 t), and Liquid smoke (1 t). I decided that making one-fifth recipe, or a pound of hamburger, would be reasonable.

I had to do a little research to find out what Quick Salt is: http://web1.msue.msu.edu/imp/mod01/01600815.html
I saw that there's a Morton's Quick Salt, so I was hopeful that my grocery store would have it in their vast selection of salts since it's a critical ingredient, but no such luck.

I also didn't find Liquid smoke. I know this doesn't mean they don't have them - I have eventually found pimentos, Tang, cream of tartar, Accent (!) - for all I know they even sell Pream!

But I did find a company online that sold both Quick Salt and Liquid Smoke. Next decision - Did really want to spend nearly $20 for the ingredients + shipping to use 1 t Quick Salt and 1/5 t Liquid Smoke?? I've made exceptions in the past and skipped recipes for an ingredient that would not be used (Fruit Sauce, Sweetened Condensed Milk), made substitutions for ingredients I couldn't find (rhubarb, Pream), but I've never skipped a recipe because a key ingredient was a challenge. Heck, I ordered brandy extract for Brandy Whip and even made sourdough starter for all those rewarding soudough recipes! So I placed my order with The Great American Spice Company and waited.

Monday, UPS delivered my order.

Tuesday was Day 1: Using hands , mix thoroughly. Cover & refrigerate.
Wednesday, Day 2: Knead and refrigerate.
Thursday, Day 3: Knead and refrigerate.
Today, Day 4: Divide into rolls and place on baking sheet on broiler shelf. Bake 8 hours at 140 degrees. Turn every two hours.


I just took the salami rolls out of the oven after eight hours. The look like little meatloaf logs. They are red in the middle, but research tells me the meat will appear red when fully cooked. I tasted a bite, and they are OK. But I can't get the food safety issue out of my head for some reason. There's nothing on the internet that tells me homemade salami is unsafe to eat (except for pregnant women or young children). I'm not usually weird about this stuff - I eat sushi, caesars salad dressing, and lick beaters even though I used a raw egg. So I'm not sure why this is weird for me. I'll probably have to pop them in the microwave until the internal temperature gets to 160 just for my own peace of mind.

P.S. We did eat the salami. It was good, and we are fine!

Mom's Porcupine Meatballs

I wasn't really in the mood to cook tonight, but decided I needed to since tomorrow will be a busy day and the ground beef is already thawed. This recipe turned out to be so simple I'm glad I went ahead and made it.

• 1/2 c raw rice


• 1 1/2 lbs ground beef


• 1 can tomato soup


• 1 T grated onion


• 1 t salt


• 1/2 t pepper


• 1/2 c water


• 2 T green pepper, chopped

Mixed the rice and meat together. Forgot to put in the S&P. Shaped into small balls and dropped into tomato soup to which had been added water, onion, pepper. I almost skipped the onion and pepper (such small amounts!), but I'm glad I added them because it looks nice. Of course, I used a non-green pepper (orange). I used Aunt Martha's option of making this in a casserole and baking for 40 minutes at 350. The missing S&P was obvious; otherwise, very good!