Fish Vegetable Bake

I meant to post this recipe many moons ago...but it seems I never got around to it.  This was one of the only ways I liked fish when I was a kid and I still love it. 

Ingredients

-          4 medium to large potatoes, peeled and sliced

-          1 large carrot, sliced ¼ inch thick

-          1 small onion, sliced ¼ inch thick

-          2 Tablespoons butter, melted

-          1 teaspoon dried dill weed

-          1 teaspoon dried basil

-          ¼ teaspoon salt

-          ¼ teaspoon pepper

-          16 ounces of favorite white fish (I love Swai), thawed

-          1 small green pepper, sliced

-          2 teaspoons lemon juice

-          2 medium tomatoes, coarsely chopped (or one can of chopped tomatoes)

 

Directions

Place potatoes, carrot, and onion in a casserole dish.  Combine melted butter, dill weeds, basil, salt, and pepper.  Spoon half of the butter mixture over the vegetables.  Cover and bake in a 425-degree oven for 25 minutes.  Place fish on top of vegetables in baking dish.  Add green peppers.  Combine lemon juice and remaining butter mixture and spoon over fish.  Cover and bake about 15 minutes, or until the fish flakes easily with fork and vegetables are tender.  Uncover and add chopped tomatoes.  Return to over and bake about 5 minutes more or until tomatoes are hot. 

Serves 4

 

 

 

 

Evelyn's Stew

The college student home from a short break requested this as his first meal...figured that means it's definitely a hit!  I know I love it!  It's a throw back to when I was a small child attending Church luncheons.

Sauté together:

-          1 pound ground beef or ground turkey (I usually double the recipe, so mix 1 pound of each)

-          ¼ cup teriyaki sauce

-          1 tablespoon soy sauce

-          2 tablespoons steak sauce

 

Steam until just tender:

-          Sliced potatoes

-          Sliced carrots

-          Chunks of cabbage

-          Onion  - quartered

-          Red, yellow, and/or green bell pepper

(cut enough of the veggies to feed your family)

 

Place steamed vegetables on bottom of casserole dish.  Top with meat and sauce.  Mix 1 can of mushroom soup and one can of milk and pour mixture over top of meat and vegetables.  Bake at 350 for 30 minutes, until bubbly. 

 

 

 

 

Sausage Apple Overnight Breakfast Casserole

I personally am NOT a fan of sausage, (what I would consider) soggy bread, OR baked egg dishes...BUT...I was looking for a quick, easy breakfast that I could make the night before and feed to a hoard of hungry boys starting VERY early in the morning - and I found this recipe (where, I cannot for the life of me remember!) and thought I'd give it a go.  It made TONS and was very filling, easy (did almost all the prep while dinner simmered), made the house smell AMAZING as everyone woke up, and got the stamp of approval from the hoard of boys! :-)  I highly recommend it...if you're into breakfast casseroles - or are feeding hoards! 

 

Sausage Apple Overnight Breakfast Casserole

1 pkg. (1 lb.) Pork Sausage Roll
6 cups bread cubed into 1 inch pieces (I had a coupon for french bread...so used that - it was under one loaf when cut up)
10 eggs
3 cups milk
1 tsp. vanilla
2 large baking apples, peeled and chopped
2 Tbsp. sugar
1 tsp. cinnamon
2 cups shredded cheddar cheese, divided
maple syrup, if desired

Brown sausage; drain. Whisk together eggs, milk and vanilla. In another bowl, mix apples, sugar and cinnamon together until well coated. In a greased (forgot to grease the pan the second time I made this dish...definitely stuck to the pan!! So don't skip this step!) 9 x 13 inch baking dish, place half of the bread cubes followed by half the sausage, half the apples, and 1 cup of the cheese. Repeat layers with remaining ingredients. Pour egg mixture over the layers making sure to evenly coat it all with the egg mixture. Refrigerate overnight. In the morning, preheat oven to 325 degrees. Bake uncovered for 55-60 minutes or until knife inserted in center comes out clean. Serve topped with a drizzle of maple syrup if desired. (the boys ate it plain and with syrup and loved it both ways)

Tomatoey Spinach and Couscous Bake

Found this recipe on a new blog that I've recently discovered called The Naked Kitchen.  I was going to make it just the way the recipe called for but it had some specialty ingredients that I didn't have, a few steps I thought unnecessary and I thought it could use some mushrooms.  So ... here is my version.  

Ingredients:

1&1/4 cups dry whole wheat couscous

2 cups water

Panko Breadcrumbs (I didn't measure but I'd say it was less than 1/4 of a cup)

5 cups raw baby spinach leaves, (I roughly chopped mine but that's personal preference)

2 cans (400g each) diced tomatoes, undrained

1 onion, finely diced

3 cloves garlic, finely diced

olive oil, for sauteing 

fresh oregano, basil and parsley ... a handful or so of each, washed and chopped

1/2 cup mozzarella cheese

salt, a couple of pinches

3 sliced mushrooms ... unless your kids love 'em and then you can use more.  (mushrooms are the one thing that both of our kids despise and I often, but not always, take pity on them and do half with, half without ... tonight was one of the times I decided to go half and half.)

What you do:

Preheat your oven to 350F/180C 

Saute onions and garlic in a blub of olive oil til onions are soft and beginning to be see through. Add cans of tomatoes, juice and all.  Add herbs.  Cook maybe 8 - 10 minutes, til sauce has reduced and thickened just a little bit.  Add spinach and stir through sauce ... remove from heat.  This is just to get the spinach to wilt a little bit. 

While the onions and garlic are sauteing, put the water in a separate pot over high heat and bring to the boil.  Add couscous and a pinch of salt, give the pot a little shake to stir it, cover and remove from heat.  Let sit a few minutes, fluff with a fork and set aside.  

Mix couscous and tomato mixture together in a baking dish.  Lay mushroom slices flat (if using).  Top with cheese and sprinkle with breadcrumbs.

Bake uncovered 25 minutes (or til cheese is melted and starting to brown).  Serve hot.

Senator Russell's Sweet Potato Souffle

(table decorations H.L. ~ original photo E.O.)

We were invited to share Thanksgiving with friends this year and I was given the task of making Senator Russell's Sweet Potato Souffle. A favorite in the family ! NO PRESSURE ! ha ha. I had never made this dish before but I had eaten it once so I had that at least ! Anyway ... it turned out well and I think it will be a regular at our future Thanksgiving feasts !

(recipe D.L.)

Don't you just love handwritten recipes ? I do !!

You can pretty much see everything there to make it ... But a couple little things I should tell you. You can start with 1/4 cup sugar and taste as you go. I added a little bit more than 1/4 cup but didn't get up to 1/2 cup. Actually I double the recipe and for that whole thing I used 3/4 of a cup. It depends on the sweetness of your sweet potatoes ... and palate, I suppose :)

AND ... mash the potatoes smooth. My friend who gave me the recipe said "you're not lookin' for rustic here, you're lookin' for smoooooth ..." I used my food processor.

For the Aussies ... 350F is 180C.

**
I forgot to take a photo ... can you believe that ? ME ?? Forgetting to take a photo ?? Of food ?? Crazy !! Luckily, photos went up on facebook and I found this one ... well, sort of ...

Edited 15/12 ... the photographer of this photo emailed me the original after he saw the ridiculous photo I posted in it's place !! Thanks !! Here is the photo I wanted to have here ...

(photo by E.O.)

I could NOT for the life of me get the photos off of facebook ! Seriously !! I could drop and drag but when I clicked on the photo on my desktop it just took me back to facebook. I did 'save photo' but then when I clicked it told me no such photo existed ! Stinking thing ! Never one to be defeated ... I just took a photos of the photos with my iPhone ... emailed them to myself and voila ... !

I hope you make this soon. It's YUM YUM YUM !! If it wasn't summer, I'd be making it again today ....

Chicken Pot Pie ...

This is a great meal to cook if you are taking dinner to someone. It stays hot FOREVER and is super yummy. Great comfort food ... which people are usually needing when you are taking them dinner !!

Whatcha need :

500g or 1 lb chicken breast
garlic
3 and 1/2 cups water
4 chicken stock cubes ( boullion )
5 medium sized potatoes
2 cups milk
1/3 cup flour
salt and pepper
2 cups shredded cheese of your choice ( I used a mix of mozzarella and "tasty"... I'm not sure what tasty cheese is called outside of Australia ... it's a white cheddar )
Pastry. You could use shortcrust but I use puff !!

If I have them on hand, I will also add carrots and sometimes broccoli and often times mushrooms.

Whatcha do :

Preheat oven.

Cut chicken into bite sized pieces and brown with garlic, til cooked through.

In the meantime, peal the potatoes and chop into small cubes ... do the other veggies too if you are using. Place potatoes in a large pot with water and stock cubes. Bring to a boil, cooking til potatoes are tender. I usually chuck the carrots in for the last 5/10 minutes just to soften a bit. Broccoli and mushrooms don't need it ...

Mix milk and flour. Add slowly to boiling water. Let thicken. ( don't let it burn .... keep stirring ! ) Add chicken, other veggies, salt and pepper and cheese. Stir until cheese is melted and contents are well combined.

Line casserole dish with pastry. I use a 13X9 or sometimes a big round deep casserole dish.

Dump mixture in pot into casserole dish. Cover with pastry. I usually make a nice think crust border around the top ... and maybe a few pretty things with the extra pastry bits on top ... With a sharp knife, cut slits into crust to allow steam to exit.

Bake 350F or 180C for 30 minutes of til crust is nicely browned.

This will be quite runny when you first cut into it. We find it is best to pull it out of the oven, and cut it open, well before you want to serve it. Even like 1/2 an hour before !!

Trin's Chicken Casserole

Ever wonder what to do with those leftover bits of roast chicken ? Ok ... so we don't normally have as much as you see on this chicken ... usually it's really just scraps. But for the sake of the chicken photo ... I'm keeping this one !!

Years ago, my friend Katrina gave me this recipe passed on to her by her mother in law (if I remember the story correctly.) It's simple and yummy. I've modified mine a bit ... because, well, because that's what I do !!
~
Preheat oven. 180C/375F

What do you need ? Chicken that you've picked off of the bones. A bit of bacon. A potato. 1/2 an onion. Some flour. A package of chicken noodle soup mix.

Cook the bacon in a frying pan til desired state of crunchy or non crunchy-ness. Add onion. Sautee til desired tenderness. Add chicken and sprinkle with flour.

Cook a couple minutes ... just to get it all mixed in with the flour. I think the flour acts as a thickener when you cook it in the oven.

Throw all of that from the frying pan into a casserole dish. Add uncooked, diced potatoes.

Sprinkle with chicken noodle soup mix.

Cover with water.

Cook in oven ... 30 minutes ? 45 minutes ?
If you cook it longer, it becomes less soupy.
Sometimes we want soupy.
Sometimes we want not so soupy.
We play it by ear.
Serve with lovely fresh crusty bread.
Or don't.

This week I served it with roasted cauliflower.