Hearty Ground Turkey and Vegetable Soup

A soup like this you cannot have all the time, because the amount of sodium would likely be lethal. However, this soup was SO easy. Looking at the recipe, I knew I could throw it together quickly, even on a so-called zombie night (after I've slept something like 10 hours out of 56...). So yesterday I made this one. Besides the sodium content I don't think it's too bad. It reminds me of a childhood staple of mine which we call goulash, but other people call chop suey. Macaroni, hamburger, and a can of tomato soup. Yum. Now that I'm a grown up I add chopped onion and worcestershire sauce. And I use whole wheat pasta. It's so yummy. We have it every couple of months, and the kids love it too. This soup is the last recipe I have marked from the Everything Soup cookbook. Now that I'm done with it, I'm putting it in the Goodwill bag. I can't even remember where it came from, so hopefully nobody's feelings will be hurt. I put all the good recipes in my keeper book, so it's kind of like it's going to live forever. Or something.

Hearty Ground Turkey and Vegetable Soup
1 lb ground turkey
1 small onion, chopped
1 small green pepper, chopped
1 16 oz can green beans, drained
1 16 oz can diced potatoes, drained
1 16 oz can stewed tomatoes
1 can tomato soup
Salt (are you kidding me??) and pepper to taste

Brown the turkey in Dutch oven until cooked through (it doesn't tell you to drain the fat here, but I did). Add the onion and green pepper (I added these when the turkey was about half way done, because I like the onions to get a little bit brown). Mix in the green beans, potatoes, tomatoes, and tomato soup. Heat until warmed through, about 15 minutes. Add salt and pepper to taste.

This was so yummy, and so easy. Definitely keeping this one. I even think my sister is going to make it (with modifications--hamburger instead of turkey, and leave out the tomatoes). I won't make it often, but I will make it sometimes. Comfort food.

Hearty Smoked Sausage Stew

We love smoked sausage. So of course I wanted to try this stew...from the Everything Soup cookbook.

Hearty Smoked Sausage Stew
1 pound dried red kidney beans
6 cups chicken broth
2 cups water
1 pound smoked sausage, sliced (this comes in 14.5 oz pkg now so I used 2...also I had a coupon for 2)
1 cup barley
2 bay leaves
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp thyme
Salt & pepper

Rinse the beans and soak them overnight in a bowl with enough cold water to cover. Drain and rinse again. In crockpot, combine all ingredients except salt and pepper. Cover and cook on low for 8 hours. Discard bay leaves. Add salt and pepper to taste and serve.

Okay so this wasn't that good. Pretty disappointing after you smell it all day. It just tasted bland. The sausage lost a lot of the flavor, and despite that, the broth wasn't very flavorful either. The barley made the broth kind of glue-y, I thought. Steve ate his but he is easy to please. Melissa said it was "good." The kids didn't really like it either. So definitely not keeping this recipe. On to my next one...

Mom's Pancakes

This is most definitely not a new recipe. In fact, it's probably the first recipe I ever learned. These are the best pancakes ever. They are from an ancient cookbook of my mom's. She has been making pancakes this way our whole lives. Except like twice when she tried to be sneaky and use Bisquick when we were out of an ingredient or when she was trying to be faster. But you cannot pass off Bisquick pancakes as these pancakes. They even looked different on the plate and we instantly knew, and were very accusatory, i.e. "are these from a MIX??" in a mortified tone. My kids love these and Emma makes them with my mom sometimes. I am putting them on the blog today because my sister texted me and asked me to email her the recipe again. I told her "I already gave you the recipe once. You should write it down if you like it so much." To which she replied, "why don't you just put it on your blog so I can get it when I need it?" She has cookbooks, I don't know why she can't write this on a paper and stick it in the front of one. But oh well, since I aim to be a service-oriented blog, here is the recipe. It's mostly for Jessica but any of you can feel free to make it if you want to.

Mom's Pancakes
2 cups flour (these days I use half white and half whole wheat pastry flour...the WWPF is so light you can't even tell...back when I was using all purpose wheat flour you could tell)
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp sugar
2 eggs
2 cups sour milk (just in case you don't know, you make sour milk by putting 2 tbsp of lemon juice or vinegar into a 2 cup measure, then filling to the 2 cup line with milk)

Mix all ingredients together using a wire whisk to get all the lumps out. Fry on a hot griddle.

Growing up we sometimes had these with blueberries. My kids don't like them like that but sometimes I will make 3 or 4 with blueberries for me. For the rest of the pancakes I add about 3/4 cup mini chocolate chips. If I give them pancakes without chocolate chips they are very sad children.

If any pancakes get flipped onto the floor inadvertently, those can be Dad's. It's possible that is what we did if our flipping went awry. The first time mom let me flip pancakes, I flipped one onto the (clean) floor. We scooped it up real quick but I was so upset. Mom said it was fine, that one could be Daddy's, because he doesn't care if it fell on the floor. It is now a long-standing joke when we drop anything off the plate, or frying pan, or whatever. We call out "That one's Dad's!" I estimate this practice has been going on for 20+ years and he is still fine.

So there you go, Jess (and whoever else). Best pancakes ever.

Slow Cooker Hula Chicken

I have come to the conclusion that it is impossible to make food from a crock pot look good on a plate. Even though it usually tastes great, it looks like glop. It's a good thing that the meat falls apart, etc, but it just looks terrible. Everything becomes the same color, and just looks unappetizing. I bet if it weren't for the great smell you'd been smelling all day while it cooked, you wouldn't even want to eat it. We had this the other day and I just haven't had a chance to post it yet. It's from the latest Simple & Delicious.

Slow Cooker Hula Chicken
6 bacon strips, divided
6 boneless skinless chicken thighs (about 1.5 lbs)
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
1/2 cup chopped red onion
1 cup crushed pineapple, drained
3/4 cup barbecue sauce

Cut three of the bacon strips in half; cook until partially cooked but not crisp. Drain on paper towels.

Season chicken with salt and pepper; place in 5-qt slow cooker. Top each thigh with a half piece of bacon. Top with onion, pineapple, and barbecue sauce.

Cover and cook on low for 4 hours or until thermometer reads 180 (I had mine on high for the first 2 hours, because it didn't seem likely that having it on low for only 4 hours would cook it enough, but my crock pot is over 10 years old, and I've heard that newer ones cook faster). Cook remaining bacon until crisp; drain and crumble. Sprinkle over each serving.

They probably want you to sprinkle more bacon to make it look better. I didn't do that. Sam and I are the only ones that really like bacon, and it seemed like there was enough there to make us happy. The kids all liked the chicken, and we had this with mashed potatoes and carrot sticks. So overall a good, easy meal. It just looked awful.

Southwest Chicken Pockets

We had this last night. It was great. We love stuff like this. Favorite genre lately. The chicken bacon tart that I made last week used puff pastry, and it comes in a package of 2, so I had one left to make this recipe. This recipe is from the latest Simple & Delicious.

Southwest Chicken Pockets
1 medium onion, chopped
2 tsp olive oil
1 pkg (9 oz) ready to serve roasted chicken breast strips (once again you can just cook and chop a chicken breast)
1 can (15 oz) black beans, rinsed and drained
1 medium tomato, seeded and chopped (on Take Home Chef I saw a great way to seed a tomato so that was no problem for me)
1 can (4 oz) chopped green chilies, divided
1 sheet frozen puff pastry, thawed
1/4 cup shredded cheddar cheese
1 egg, beaten
1/2 cup sour cream
salsa for serving

Saute onion in oil in large skillet until tender. Remove from the heat; stir in the chicken, beans, tomato, and 1/4 cup chilies.

Roll puff pastry into 14 inch square on a lightly floured surface (this was tricky and I couldn't get it all the way out to 14 inches, I think mine was maybe 11). Cut into 4 squares. Spoon chicken mixture into the center of each square; sprinkle with cheese (I forgot to do that!). Brush egg over edges of squares. Fold dough over filling, forming a triangle. Pinch seams to seal. Transfer to a greased baking sheet and brush with remaining egg. Bake at 400 for 18-22 minutes or until golden brown. Combine sour cream and remaining green chilies in a small bowl. Serve the sour cream and salsa with the pockets.

We did not have this with sour cream. And since I forgot to put the cheese inside the pockets, I sprinkled it on top once they were done. These came out so good. Yum. I made peanut butter sandwiches for the little ones, because such yumminess is wasted on them. Also I only used about half of the filling (probably because I couldn't get my squares rolled out to the right size) so now I have enough left to make chicken nachos with. Yum again.

Lentil Soup

I've never had, or made, lentil soup. I had some lentils left from another recipe a while back, and didn't have to buy anything to make this soup, so I decided to try it. It's from the Everything Soup cookbook.

Lentil Soup
1 cup dried lentils, rinsed very thoroughly
1 onion, diced
1 garlic clove, minced
2 tbsp butter or oil
1 tbsp tarragon (it doesn't say dried or fresh, I had dry and used 1 tbsp, I think it was too much)
1 tsp paprika
1 bay leaf
4 cups vegetable or chicken broth

In a large saucepan or soup pot, melt the butter (or warm the oil). Saute the onion for 5 minutes on low heat. Stir in the tarragon, paprika, and bay leaf. Add the lentils. Pour in the vegetable broth and bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and cook for 30 minutes. Remove from heat and allow to cool slightly. Discard the bay leaf. Using a blender or food processor, puree the mixture (I used our new blender and it worked great). Reheat for 5 minutes.

Well. Nathan and Emma did NOT like this. To be fair, it did look like baby poop. They didn't even want to try it. Sam & Steve LOVED it. They shoveled it in with their bread pieces and it was gone in no time. Me...I liked it at first. The more I ate of it the less I liked it. I had to add salt at first because it was so bland. Then by the time my bread was gone I tried to eat some bites of it, but all I could taste was the tarragon. Maybe I feel about tarragon the way Jill & Melissa feel about cilantro, I don't know. I just couldn't eat any more of it. Not a keeper, but at least I'm not out anything.

Loaded Breakfast Potatoes

But you can have them for supper if you want. That's what we did tonight. We have breakfast for supper a lot here, since I can never get my act together enough to actually have breakfast for breakfast. Plus my mom and my grandma did it a lot, too. The first time my dad had dinner at my mom's house, when they were "courting," my grandmother served pancakes and bacon. Love it. Apparently my father was taken aback, and said that at his house, that's what they had for breakfast. I can't remember what my grandmother replied. Apparently my grandmother on my dad's side had it together in the mornings. You can see which side I got more DNA from, then. We had this with "cheesy eggs," which is just scrambled eggs sprinkled with cheese. This recipe is from the latest Simple & Delicious.

Loaded Breakfast Potatoes
1 1/2 lbs red potatoes, cubed
1/4 lb bacon strips, chopped
3/4 cup cubed fully cooked ham
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper

Place potatoes in a microwave safe dish and cover with water. Cover and microwave on high 4-5 minutes or until tender (this recipe must have been tested in a lightning microwave. It took mine almost 20 minutes to get tender). Meanwhile, cook bacon over medium heat in a large skillet until crisp. Remove to paper towels with a slotted spoon. Drain potatoes; saute in bacon drippings until lightly browned. Add the ham, cheese, salt, pepper and bacon. Cook and stir over medium heat until cheese is melted.

These were really good. Next time I am going to add hunks of onion in, because that's the only thing I thought was missing. A very yummy breakfast. I mean supper.