Creamy Lemon Rice

  Out of all the things to make in a slow cooker, rice is just one of those things that does NOT cross my mind.  I was flipping through one of my notebooks and I saw I had jotted down Creamy Lemon Rice in one of my random moments and tagged which of my cookbooks in was in.  Good thing, or I'd never figured out which book it was in, because the last place I'd look would be my slow cooker books.    But there on page 144 of Carlean Johnson's Six Ingredients of Less: Slow Cooker, it was.  And I'm glad I tried it - easy, frees up the stove, and really tasty.  I have found just like any other recipe, the newer slow cookers cook (surprise!) much faster.  I've noted my time in the recipe (the time for newer cookers), along with her original times (for older cookers).  I made this in 4 quart pot, but you could easily make this in one smaller than that.

Creamy Lemon Rice

Serves 6

Ingredients

1 cup uncooked long-grain white rice
2 cups chicken broth
1/2 cup heavy cream
1/4 cup melted butter
2 teaspoons finely grated fresh lemon zest

Spray your slow cooker with no-stick cooking spray.  Add all the ingredients - yes, even the cream - at once and stir.  Cover and cook the rice on LOW 2 1/2 - 3 hours in newer slow cookers, 4-5 hours in an older cooker.  The rice is ready when the liquid is absorbed and the rice is nice and tender. Mine was ready at the 2 1/2 hour mark.

Note - Ms. Johnson says you can skip the cream for a lighter rice dish.  I'll just take her word on it, and stick with the cream.

Herb Butter

  Yesterday, it was a nice dinner treat.  We grilled out steaks, and I tried my hand at herb butter.  It was the first time I put something other than steak sauce on a hunk of beef like that, and I have to say it was delish.  I found a recipe on the net, and it's a keeper.  I'm looking forward to tossing some of the leftovers on hot noodles or chicken.

Herb Butter

Yields 1 cup

2 sticks (8 oz. total) butter, softened
5 teaspoons fresh chives, chopped fine (or 1 1/2 tsp of dried chives, crushed between your fingers - which was what I used)
4 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
1 tablespoon fresh parsley, chopped fine
1 teaspoon salt
pinch of cayenne pepper

  In a medium mixing bowl, add in all the ingredients.  With an electric mixer on low, mix until everything is smooth and well combined.  Take a sheet of plastic wrap and lay it out.  Spoon the butter into a log shape on the plastic wrap.  Roll up the butter and continue to roll the butter a bit to make the log uniform.  Twist up the ends and stash in the freezer.  It will only take about 20 minutes to firm back up.  Slice off what you need and enjoy!

Lemon Glazed Carrots

  I love carrots.  I have since I was a little tyke; so much so, Mom had to take me to the hospital as a baby.  She panicked when she woke up to an orange kid.  Turns out, when you eat a lot of your favorite carrot and squash baby food, you end up with carotenosis.

  I've branched out since then, but I still love carrots.  Recently, I found a recipe for glazed carrots that has one of my other favorite flavors - lemon.  Just in time for lighter spring meals!

Lemon Glazed Carrots

Serves 6

9 medium carrots
4 tablespoons butter, cubed
1 to 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons brown sugar

  Start by peeling the carrots, and slicing them in half lengthwise.  Boil the carrot slices in salted water, just until tender, and drain well.

  In a heavy skillet, melt the butter.  Add the lemon juice and brown sugar.  Stir the mixture until it thickens.  Add in the carrots and cook until they are well glazed and heated through.

Captain Russell's Jambalaya

  Laissez les bons temps rouler, mes amis!  Down in N'awlins, the parades are rolling down the streets, and folks are living it up before Lent.  Tonight, we dug into this recipe - Captain Russell's Jambalaya, in the March 2011 issue of Taste of Home magazine.  Definitely a keeper.

Captain Russell's Jambalaya

Serves 6

Ingredients

1 can (10.5 oz) condensed French onion soup, undiluted
1 1/4 cups reduced-sodium beef broth
1 can (8 oz) tomato sauce
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, cubed
1 small green bell pepper, chopped
1 small onion, chopped
1 1/2 teaspoon Creole seasoning
1 teaspoon hot sauce
1 pound raw shrimp, peeled and deveined
1/2 pound andouille sausage, fully cooked, sliced into 1/2 inch rounds
2 cups uncooked long grain rice

  Preheat your oven to 375°F.  Spray a 13 by 9 inch baking dish with cooking spray and set aside.

  In a large saucepan, add in the French onion soup, beef broth, tomato sauce, butter, bell pepper, onion, Creole seasoning, and hot sauce.  Stir and bring it to a boil.  Take it off the heat and add in the shrimp, sausage, and rice.  Stir it up and pour it into the baking dish and cover with foil.  Bake it in the oven for 30 minutes.  Remove the foil and bake it for an additional 10 to 15 minutes, or until the rice is cooked all the way through.  

Buffalo Chicken Pizza

  It's Super Bowl Sunday!  And you better believe I'm flingin' a Terrible Towel today.  (I'd rather be pulling for the Saints, but alas, it wasn't meant to be this year.  Next year, boys, next year.)  But this Sunday is all about the pigskin, commercials, and the munchies.  So I'm sharing a great pizza I found awhile back on recipezaar.com (now food.com) by Mini R. - and it is simple and scratches that itch when you can't decide between wings and pizza.

Buffalo Chicken Pizza

Ingredients

1 portion of pizza dough *
1/2 pound (8 oz) boneless, skinless chicken breasts or tenders, grilled
4 tablespoons butter, melted
1/4 cup hot sauce
1/3 cup ranch salad dressing
2 cups shredded mozzarella (8 oz by weight)


  Start off by preheating your oven to 400°F. Cut up the grilled chicken into bite-sized chunks.  In a bowl, stir together the melted butter and hot sauce.  Toss in the chicken chunks and make sure all the pieces are coated.

  Press your pizza dough into the pizza pan.  Spread the ranch dressing onto the pizza dough.  Layer the chicken over the dressing, and sprinkle evenly with the mozzarella.  Bake for 10-12 minutes, or until the crust is done, and the cheese is melted and lightly browned.

Notes - Let's discuss the pizza dough for a minute.  The original recipe called for dough to cover a 12 inch pizza pan.  You can, of course, make your own dough - or - buy it at the store.  Some stores sell dough balls in the refrigerated section.  If you're like me and not lucky enough for that, check over with the canned biscuits.  There are some pretty decent canned pizza doughs out there that you just unroll and press into your pan.  If you find the middle of your dough isn't getting baked all the way through, but the crust is done, you may want to try doing a partial bake.  (If we were making a pie, we'd call this a blind bake.)  Put your dough in your pan and bake for about 5-8 minutes before adding any toppings- depending on the size of your pizza.  Pull it out and add toppings, and pop it back in until the pizza is done.

Garlic Cheese Rolls (ABM)

  I hope everyone has enjoyed their holidays.  I've been lucky to get some lovely gifts in the culinary vein, so you know, I've been busy in the kitchen.  Right now, in my neck of the south, life's in slow motion, due to snow, ice, and more ice.  So it's time to update my dear blog - as we all know, I'm overdue. 

  I received a bread machine as an early Christmas gift.  I swear enabling a carboholic should be illegal.  Oh wait, my sweet hubby gave it to me, and he's a carboholic, too.  Never mind.  I have this love-hate relationship with bread - I love to eat bread, bread hates for me to make it.  Whenever I've tried to make kneaded breads in the past, my kitchen, my clothes, my cat all seem to be covered in flour.  Yeast pizza crust in the stand mixer...yeah, uh, I won't be doing that again.  My kitchen smelled like fermenting yeast for two days.  Quick breads have been my one saving grace, until now.  Ladies and gentlemen, I have made homemade rolls, with minimal flour clean up.

 See!  Look!  Soft, tasty, edible rolls that I made.

 

   You may have noticed the acronym in the post title - if you aren't familiar with it, ABM stands for Automatic Bread Machine.  Today's bread machines have many options and cycles on board.  My machine has a dough cycle which is perfect for people like me, people who can't knead a loaf of bread correctly to save their hides, or busy people, take your pick.  This particular recipe takes advantage of the dough cycle.  It comes from Bread Machine Magic, Revised Edition by Linda Rehberg and Lois Conway.  I have an old copy of the first edition of this book I picked up for 50 cents at McKay.  For 50 cents, I figured it was good research to see if I really wanted a bread machine.  The great thing about this book is it gives you options to make 1 lb, 1.5 lb, or 2 lb sized loaves.  (The first edition featured only 1 and 1.5 lb sizes and focused on several brands of bread machines that aren't prevalent on the market any longer.)  I chose to make the 1.5 lb size, which yields 24 rolls.  You will also need 2 pie plates or baking dishes for this recipe.  As you can see, I only own 1 pie plate and a baking dish works pretty well for these rolls.

Garlic Cheese Rolls

Yields 24 rolls

Ingredients

Dough

1 cup water (about 80°F)
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 1/2 tablespoons butter or margarine
3 tablespoons sugar
3 cups all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons nonfat dry milk powder
1 1/2 teaspoons bread machine yeast

Topping

1/4 cup melted butter
1 clove garlic, crushed
2 tablespoons freshly grated Parmesan cheese

  Every machine has its own order for adding ingredients to the bread pan.  The order for my model goes liquids, dry, flour, and yeast.  Pick the dough setting and start.

  Grease your pie plates or baking dishes and set aside.

  Once the dough cycle is complete, turn the dough out onto a lightly-floured work surface - a  clean counter works well. Roll out the dough into a 24 inch rope.  With a sharp knife or dough scraper, cut the dough into 24 pieces.  Roll each piece into a ball in your hands and place into the greased pans.  Leave a little room between each ball because they will go through a rise session before baking.

  In a small bowl, combine the melted butter and crushed garlic.  Pour or spoon the butter over the rolls, and sprinkle with the Parmesan cheese. Cover the rolls and prepare for the dough to rise.

  Rising: This is a neat trick I've picked up and also given in the book - if you don't have a warm spot, use a slightly warm oven to rise.  Flip the oven to Warm (or low temperature if your oven doesn't have a Warm setting) for 1 minute.  Cut it off, and put the dough in to rise 30 to 45 minutes, or until doubled in size. 

  Remove the dough from the oven and then preheat the oven to 375°F.  Uncover the rolls and return them to the oven for 15 minutes, or until golden brown.

Notes - Here are some tips for using a bread machine.  The water temperature is important - too hot and it will kill the yeast before it gets a chance to work.  75-85°F is a common temperature range in ABM recipes.  It will feel cool to your skin, since our body temperatures are much warmer than this temp range.  Bread machine yeast is sold in jars near the envelopes of yeast.  Once opened, store the jar in the refrigerator.

Baked Meatballs

  With the cold weather of this time of year, hearty appetites are brought to the table.  One of the favorite recipes around our house is meatballs.  But honey, before you get the idea these are run of the mill balls o' meat, let me fill you in on a couple of things.  This is a slight tweaking of Alton Brown's recipe, and I got to say, these are a step up from the norm.  First thing that's different - they are baked.  To elevate them a bit more, they are baked in a mini muffin pan.  Why?  It keeps the meatballs from sitting in grease as they cook.  And then to ratchet it up a bit more, they are rolled in bread crumbs before they are baked.  When all these factors come together, you get a nice meatball with a slightly crisp exterior that is just wonderful to sink your teeth into.

Baked Meatballs

Approximately 20 meatballs; 5 servings

Ingredients

1 pound ground round (80/20 ground beef)
1/2 pound ground pork or pork sausage
10 oz package frozen chopped spinach, thawed and drained
1/2 cup finely grated Parmesan cheese
1 large egg
1 1/2 teaspoons dried basil
1 1/2 teaspoons dried parsley
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1/2 cup bread crumbs, divided (may need more)

  Here's a quick starter note - you can prep the meatball mixture up to 24 hours before you plan on baking them.  When you get ready to make these, preheat the oven to 400°F.

  In a large mixing bowl, add in the ground round, pork, spinach, Parmesan, egg, basil, parsley, garlic, salt, red pepper and 1/4 cup of the bread crumbs.  With clean hands, combine everything thoroughly.  (If you are making the meatballs later, cover with plastic wrap and stash in the refrigerator at this point.)   

  At this point, we are ready to form the meatballs.  Pour the remaining 1/4 cup of bread crumbs in a shallow bowl, and set aside.  Keep the bread crumbs out, because you may need a little more.

  I'm going to give you two ways of divvying up the meat to get even-sized meatballs.  Method 1 - Pat and Cut: On a clean surface, pat out the meat mixture into a rectangle that's about 1 inch thick.  Cut lengthwise across the middle, making 2 equal halves.  Repeat this cut on each half so that you have 4 even rows.  Then make 4 cuts width-wise, creating 5 equal columns.  You should now have 20 squares ready to be rolled into meatballs.  Method 2 - Scoop and Weigh:  With a spoon, scoop out some meat and weigh it on a kitchen scale.  You are shooting to make the meatballs 1 1/2 (1.5) ounces.  I wrap the removable top of my scale with plastic wrap before weighing out the meat to keep it from sticking, and well, to keep raw meat off the scale.

  Once the meat is portioned to the right size, roll the mixture into balls.  Then roll the meatball in the bread crumbs. Place the meatball in a cup of a miniature muffin tin.  Repeat until all the meatballs have been rolled and coated in bread crumbs.  Place the pan in the oven and bake for 20 minutes, or until they are cooked through.  Serve with your favorite marinara and spaghetti noodles or slap them on your favorite hoagie buns and make meatball subs.

Helpful Hint - If you have a potato ricer laying around, it makes quick work of draining the thawed spinach.  Just load up the ricer and squeeze; you'll end up with nice, dry spinach that won't water down what you are making.