Strawberries and Cream Mini Muffins

It has been much too long since my last post!

I wish I could say that I've studied the art of photography and the photos that I post will no longer look like they were taken in the dark.  Maybe someday.

It's not that I haven't been cooking dinner.  I just haven't cooked anything new that hasn't already been included in this blog!

This week I've made Chicken Pot Pie , Chicken Piccata , and Lemon-Marinated Chicken Sandwiches (the latter of which I'm happy to say has finally been edited to include pictures)!

I'll get my act together soon, I promise.

Erin's been baking.

Lemon cupcakes with strawberry frosting.

There were plenty of strawberries left over, so I put them to good use and made muffins.

Artichoke Dip

Today's recipe, Artichoke Dip, is easy to make and totally yummy. 

The playlist is really short.  It only takes about 5 minutes total from the time you gather your ingredients until you're putting the dip in the oven!

French Onion Soup

I'm not a fan of the cool temperatures we've been experiencing for the last week or so.  I'm not ready to give up my flip-flops and sleeveless tops just yet.

One of things this weather is perfect for, however, is making soup.  Nothing makes my house smell better than a pot of soup simmering on the stove, and nothing chases away the chill in my bones better than a hot bowl of soup.

I haven't made soup since the spring, when the warm weather arrived.  Today, I made up for it.

French onion is my husband's favorite, chicken noodle is my son's favorite, broccoli cheddar is my daughter's favorite.  I don't play favorites.

I blogged about the Broccoli Cheddar Soup earlier this year.  Today, I'll give you the recipe for my French onion soup. 

No playlist today.  Sean and Erin were both close by, doing homework, and I didn't want to disturb them and lose the pleasure of their company!

Okay, okay, I admit it..... in my head I was silently singing Rosemary Clooney's "Come On-A My House" over and over as I cooked.  I'm still silently singing it.  Can't get it out of my mind.

The following recipe will give you four 10-ounce servings of  soup. 

Buttermilk Coffeecake

This recipe is for a friend of mine. 

 I like to call her Superwoman.  My husband and kids do not disagree that "Superwoman" aptly describes her.  There's nothing she can't do!  Fact: she is always totally prepared for whatever comes her way! 

 I know this is a fact because when our kids were younger, we were all out together and the grubby hands of one of the little darlings left a stain of some sort on my white pants.  She quickly whipped a package of Shout Wipes out of her bag of tricks and promptly blotted the stain away.  I've yet to see her unprepared for any circumstance that happens to come her way.

We met 16 years ago when our daughters were in the same preschool class.  And then they played T-Ball together.  And were in Kindergarten together.  And first grade.  And softball.  And basketball.  And soccer.  And dance class.  With a few street hockey games thrown in for fun.  I think that's it.  Did I forget anything?  If I did, Superwoman will remember it for me. 

We quickly evolved from thinking of each other as "my daughter's friend's mother" to "my friend."  (And then she evolved into Superwoman.  But I digress.)  We get together to go to the movies, go to lunch, go to dinner with our husbands, have nifty little backyard soirees/Christmas parties/pick-up ball games with our families.

We were talking last week, and she told me that she was looking through my blog for recipes for tailgating (she has season tickets to her Alma mater's football games).  She made Sweet 'N Salties for the last one and they were devoured.  As an afterthought she added, "It's hard to come up with ideas when you're feeding about twenty-five people."

Of course.  Only Superwoman could prepare enough food, carefully pack it up and feed twenty-five people out of the trunk of a car.  Superwoman's tailgating parties must be legendary.  I imagine that for some of the revelers, it could be more of an event than the actual game (which is division I by the way, not Small-time University vs. Unheard-of School).

She was lamenting that she was having trouble thinking of breakfast items that traveled well (when there's an early game, there should be some breakfast items on the menu for the college kids that just rolled out of bed).

This yummy Buttermilk Coffeecake is just what Superwoman ordered.

Chicken Piccata

My neighbors returned from a vacation on the cape with a couple of Cape-themed treats for Gus.

How cute is this lighthouse??!!  They also brought him a lobster-shaped treat, so cute and eagerly devoured.  I'm inspired now.  I want to make and decorate adorable doggy cookies.  One more thing to add to my never-ending to-do list.

In the meantime, I'll continue cooking family favorites, like the Chicken Piccata in this blogpost.

Broccoli and Chicken Stir Fry with Noodles

I can't believe I've been blogging for six months now and I haven't posted any stir fry recipes!

Here's a yummy one.......very basic chicken and broccoli over noodles.

I switched up the playlist.........as much as I love my Italian music, it just doesn't set a good stir-fry cooking mood.

Kettle Corn!

I'm thinking that since I am blogging my recipes, I no longer need to hold onto the pieces of paper that the recipes are written on. 

I did throw some of them away.  These posts are forever, aren't they?  So why do I need a written recipe?

This is my recipe for Chicken Pot Pie .  I've already blogged about it, so I happily tossed this grungy piece of paper, which is probably about 20 years old.

I love this one.  It's the roast tenderloin I make on Christmas Eve.  It took a few years to get it right.  You can see my notes--by year--on the right side of the paper.

On the flip side, we have the recipe for the mushroom gravy to accompany the tenderloin roast.  I double-starred it because I like the way it came out and that's my own personal code for "no more tweaking."  I love the way I ran out of room on the bottom of the paper so I just continued it up the right side.

The care-package-to-Caitie I mentioned in a previous post was shipped, received, and she loved it.

And then she texted me yesterday, to say that "I SUCCESSFULLY MADE BRUSCHETTA!!! so good!"

So she's putting the blog to use.

And then I thought of my friend, Danielle, who told me earlier last month that her son (21, a college senior) made the Cheesy Chicken Quesadillas With Spinach while at school.

So that started me to thinking, what would be another good recipe for a college kid?

That is the thought process which brought me to today's recipe for Kettle Corn.

Lemon-Poppy Seed Scones

This past weekend, with hurricane Irene in the forecast, my plan was to cook all day on Sunday while riding out the storm.

How does the saying go........"life is what happens when you're making other plans"......or something like that?

My plans to cook all day were dashed when the electricity went out at 11:30, but thanks to an early start I was able to cook my scones before we lost power!

This recipe is for a small batch (I didn't want to overdo it since only three of us in the house will eat scones), but you can easily double the ingredients and cut the dough into 8 wedges instead of 4.

Marinated Steak Kebabs

How is it possible that it is almost September?  I'm not ready for summer to end.

Caitie has already gone back to school.  Yesterday was move-in day.  It's unsettling to think that she is over 400 miles away.  

There have been lots of preparations for the move during the past few weeks; lots of purchases and checking lists and more purchases and last-minute runs to buy more things that we forgot to buy during all the shopping excursions.  And there are still items we forgot to buy.

Like this colander, which I bought for her today, after speaking to her last night and hearing her describe how she had to drain her pasta by spooning it out of the pot because we forgot to buy her a colander.

The colander went into the care package I put together for her today, the first of many care packages that I'll send to her throughout the year. 

There are some really cool things in the care package, but since she reads this blog I can't share anything else with you because it will ruin the surprise. 

And maybe, just maybe, she will cook a recipe or two from this blog, and not just mac 'n cheese.  Oh, that's right, I forgot to mention that the pasta she was cooking was from a package of Kraft macaroni and cheese dinner.  And I should also mention that I'm not dissing her because she cooked Kraft dinner because I certainly cooked lots of it during my college days.  I'm just saying this:  Caitie-pie-honey-bunch, if you're reading this, you should consider cooking some of the recipes in this blog because a lot of your favorites are on here and all the how-to's and how-much's are all written out for you, dear.  Love, Mom.

And Caitie, while we're communicating here, I may as well tell you that the fabric you picked out for the pillowcase I am going to make you is at this stage in the process:

In other words, not a pillowcase yet.  But you may not be able to tell by the picture that I have already washed the fabric to pre-shrink it and I have ironed it.  So there's been progress.  Now I just have to cut it, and sew it, and decoratively trim it.

When the fabric grows up it will resemble the pillowcases I have made you in the past, I promise.  Probably more like the one on the right, as I am planning on crocheting white trim.  Unless you prefer white pom poms.  Love, Mom.

Okay, I digress no more.  On to today's recipe.  Marinated Steak Kebabs.

You can use whatever type of steak looks best at your market.  If I had my choice, it would be top sirloin, about 1 1/2" thick, cut into cubes.  Second choice, New York Sirloin, ditto.  Of course, tenderloin is also good, but it's a shame to cut such a fine piece of beef into cubes.  Sirloin tip steak and flank steak also work.

As luck would have it, when I went to purchase the steak for this recipe, the only types of the above-mentioned steaks in the meat case were tenderloin, sirloin tips and flank steak.  I nixed the tenderloin (see above) and the sirloin tips (I've cooked sirloin tips twice in the last two weeks) and went with the flank steak.

All of the other types of steak can be cut into cubes, but flank steak is special because of the grain of the beef.  It needs to be sliced diagonally, about a half inch thick, and then threaded onto the skewers.  The good news is that because you slice it thinner, it cooks faster than the larger cubes of other types of steaks. 

Gosh, have I totally confused you?  I hope not.  See the accompanying pictures and hopefully the visuals will explain better than my words. 

Pasta With Spinach and Prosciutto.......and Erin's Latest Baking Pics!

I can't believe summer is almost over.  Caitie leaves in five (5) days. *Sigh.*

What am I going to do next year, when Sean will be leaving as well? 

Will my undivided attention drive Erin crazy?

I'm going to stop dwelling, and focus on now.

These are the brownies that Erin made last week for her picnic with Abby.  Brownies and frosting from scratch.  Topped with lots of M&M's!

They tasted just as good as they look, or better.  She made them the night before her picnic, and Mr. Terrific was a bit distraught that she wouldn't let him cut into them that night.  She made him wait until after her picnic.

There were plenty to go around.

They had been meticulously planning this picnic for quite some time.  The only help Erin would allow me to give her was to find a blanket and a picnic basket to put her goodies (brownies, sandwiches and juice boxes) into.  Abby supplied the chips and watermelon, and they spent the better part of two hours eating and talking, and talking and eating.

This is what summer is for.

And this week, her creativity in the kitchen continued.

How cute are these cupcakes?

By the time she was through, we had quite the cupcake-flower garden.

(To make flower cupcakes:  after you frost your cupcakes, simply snip some marshmallows into "petals" and sprinkle with colored sugar.  The marshmallows will stick to the frosting and the sugar will stick to the sticky marshmallows.  Place an M&M into the center of the petals.) 

Okay, okay, back to our regularly-scheduled blog.

The recipe I'm about to give you is a wonderful melange of pasta, prosciutto, mushrooms and spinach with just a hint of gorgonzola cheese in the creamy spinach/wine sauce.  Sound good?