An army!

You guys happened to pick one of my favorite dessert flavors for the poll last week. It’s a rare day that what I want to win actually wins. I got lucky this time around!

Besides using something with almond, I also wanted to make something super-easy to make.

In fact, these guys are so easy to make you don’t even have to turn on your oven!

This was my first attempt at making truffles and while they didn’t turn out perfectly shaped and I would probably need a few professional lessons before getting hired by See’s candy, I was completely happy with the result.

Almond Truffles

Yield: Makes about 40.

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

1 tablespoon butter
2 ounces cream cheese
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
2 cups powdered sugar
1 cup unsweetened coconut, toasted
4 ounces almonds, about a cup, ground
1/4 cup cocoa powder, for coating

Helpful Equipment:
Stand Mixer or Hand Mixer

Food Processor

Directions:

1) Cream together butter and cream cheese using a hand mixer or stand mixer until it is fluffy and smooth.

2) Toast coconut in a dry skillet over medium-low heat until it's a light brown color, about 4-5 minutes. Be careful not to burn the coconut.

3) Process almonds in a food processor until they are a rough meal.

4) With cream cheese/butter mixture, add in extracts and powdered sugar. Then stir in coconut and almond meal.

5) Make teaspoon sized balls of the dough and roll them into a tight ball with your hands. Toss them in cocoa powder until completely coated.

6) Chill for storage or serve immediately. These are best served at room temperature.

Adapted from a Food52 recipe.

Truffle Basics

I had never made truffles before and the first thing that shocked me was how little material actually goes into the balls. To make about 40 truffles, I only used 1 tablespoon of butter and 2 ounces of cream cheese.

Sure, there are a lot of add-ins and stuff, but the actual binder for the truffles is just a very tiny amount of these two ingredients.

The basics.

Add the butter and cream cheese to a mixing bowl and beat it until it is a light and smooth texture. I used my stand mixer for this, but you could just as easily use a hand mixer.

After a few minutes of beating you should be all set.

This actually makes a lot of truffles.

After this, mix in your extracts (vanilla and almond) and also the powdered sugar.

The Add-ins

Now for the fun stuff. This is where all the flavor and texture comes from for these truffles.

No need to peel.

For the almonds, just measure out 4 ounces (about a cup) and quickly process them in a mini-food processor. If you don’t have a food processor, I would just put my almonds in a plastic bag and crush them with a mallet or something.

Your goal is to get a really nice almond meal.

Easy breazy.

Besides the almonds, there’s also coconut in this recipe. I’m not always a huge coconut fan, but I really liked it in this recipe.

The key to coconut is to make sure you toast it lightly before using it. I just toasted mine in a dry skillet for a few minutes over medium-low heat. Be sure to keep an eye on the coconut and stir it frequently.

It can go from toasted to burned in about 30 seconds.

This is what you’re shooting for!

Don't burn it!

Add in the almond meal and coconut to the butter, cream cheese, and powdered sugar.

Stir this all together and your truffle mixture is done!

Try to not eat this with a spoon.

Making the Truffles

Keep in mind that truffles are supposed to be bite-sized treats. This stuff is pretty rich and nobody wants a candy bar sized truffle.

I literally used a teaspoon to measure out my truffles. To make one, scoop out a heaping teaspoon of the mixture and then lightly roll it into a ball using your hands.

See how small it is?

Small is good.

Toss the ball into a bowl of cocoa powder and shake it around to coat it completely.

You can do more than one at a time.

Once you get the hang of it, you can do 5 or 6 at a time and then just toss them all with the cocoa powder at the same time.

It took me maybe 10 minutes to pop out about 40 of these bite-sized goodies.

As I finished them, I just set them out on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. The paper just makes it a bit easier to clean up. There’s really no danger of the truffles sticking to anything.

Not bad for my first truffle.

While these are supposed to be one bite treats, I bit one in half so you can see the story.

Pretty delicious stuff. The cocoa powder is sharp and intense and then then the whole thing just melts in your mouth.

Chomp!

Store these in the fridge, but they are best served at room temperature. So, if you can, take them out of the fridge 10 minutes before eating them.

I find this next to impossible because when I open my fridge, there they are, and I just pop one in my mouth.

So, that serving method works too.

These are really unique and they look and taste way harder than they actually are. Give them a shot if you’re a truffle fan, an almond fan, or a fan of good stuff that requires very little work!

Hello delicous salad!

I can only think of two possible explanations why orzo exists:

1) Elaborate joke. ”Look at this huge rice! But wait… joke’s on you. It’s not rice. It’s pasta. I just blew your mind!”

2) Elaborate mistake. Something went horribly wrong with the spaghetti machine and orzo happened.

Anyway, I’m glad that this joke and/or mistake happened at some point in history because orzo is one of my favorite ways to make pasta salad. This was one of my most recent versions of the dish that went over really well. It’s very fresh and reasonably healthy for a pasta salad.

Greek Orzo Salad

Yield: Serves 6-8.

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 50 minutes

Ingredients:

1 pound orzo pasta
1 cucumber, seeded, peeled, and diced
1 red pepper
1/2 red onion, diced
6 ounces feta cheese
1/2 cup slivered almonds
1 avocado, diced
Salt and pepper

Quick Lemon Dressing:
1 clove garlic
1 lemon, juice only
1/4 cup olive oil
Salt

Directions:

1) For dressing, dice garlic clove and mash it together with salt in a small bowl to form a rough paste. Then whisk in lemon juice and olive oil and season with salt. You might not need all of the dressing.

2) Cook orzo according to package.

3) Dice all the veggies finely. Take your time to make sure they are even-sized. For the cucumber, be sure to scoop out the seeds and peel it.

4) Mix orzo with veggies and crumble in feta cheese.

5) Drizzle on dressing and stir well. Start with half the dressing and add more if you want. It should be very lightly dressed.

6) Stir in chopped avocado and sliced almonds and season with salt and pepper.

7) Serve room temperature or chilled!

Orzo. What are you?

I like to imagine that at some point in history there was an old Italian mother who learned how to make orzo by hand. She then promptly relegated the task to her children.

Whatever your job is, be thankful that it’s not making orzo by hand.

I do not know how you are made.

Luckily, orzo is much easier to cook than to make. Just boil it like you would any pasta, in a large pot of salted water. Check your orzo directions for cooking times, but you’ll probably want to cook it for around 8 minutes.

Be sure not to overcook the orzo or it will get really mushy. Mushy pasta is no good.

The Salad Ingredients

Besides the orzo, just a few simple vegetables and some feta cheese is all it really takes to make a great salad here.

Basic veggies.

I’ve given onion cutting lessons a few times on Macheesmo, but to review: The best way to cut an onion is to slice it in half down the root. Then lay it flat on a cutting board and cut off the stem end.

Remove the skin and slice the onion horizontally and vertically to form a grid.

Then you can easily turn the onion and dice it up.

Get it?

Spend some time with the veggies in this recipe to make sure they are all chopped up evenly.

For the cucumber, be sure to scoop out the seeds and peel it.

Take your time with these.

Once your pasta is cooked and drained, toss it in with the veggies and stir everything together.

This is a good start, but it would taste a bit bland if you left it like this.

All mixed up.

The Dressing

I recommend using a very light lemon and oil dressing for this salad. To start it, use the garlic technique from my ranch dressing recipe. Dice up the garlic finely and then mash it with the salt to form a rough paste.

A quick dressing.

Then just whisk in your lemon juice and olive oil and season it well with salt. You might not need all of the dressing for your salad. I recommend starting with half of the dressing and taste it. You can always add more, but it’s pretty hard to get dressing out of a pasta salad once it’s in there.

So go slow on it.

Some Good Add-ins

Besides the veggies, pasta, and dressing, I recommend tossing in some extra add-ins just to give the salad a bit more flavor.

First, feta cheese is a logical choice. It goes well with all the flavors and will give the salad some saltiness and creaminess.

Second, avocado. Who doesn’t love avocado?

Third, slivered almonds. They give the salad an awesome crunchy texture.

The almond toss.

Stir this all together and serve it in a big old bowl.

Such a good salad.

You can serve this bad boy at room temperature or chill it.

It’s perfect as a side for a dinner party or you can make it and eat it for lunch during the week.

If you wanted to make a meal of it, you could grill some chicken or tofu and serve it on top of the salad. I think it’s a pretty filling salad as is though.

Give those orzo makers some business and give this a shot!

Squash for dessert? Why not!

This one’s for those who are innovative and adventurous in the kitchen. That’s what I come to Macheesmo for—new and interesting ways to challenge myself in the kitchen, although I’m pretty challenged as it is. So when I ran across a pudding-stuffed chayote dessert recipe while looking for reasons to do a guest post on Macheesmo, I said “Yeehaw, let’s git ‘er done!”

I only recently discovered chayote, an amazing squash native to Central America. Is it odd I didn’t find it until I moved to Saudi Arabia? You’d think I’d be more focused on learning how to cook traditional Middle Eastern cuisine, but this baby is a delicious addition to soups, stews, and other squash and root vegetable concoctions. And, of course, to desserts, as well!

Pudding-Stuffed Chayote

Yield: Serves 3-6.

Prep Time: 45 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour 15 minutes

Ingredients:

3 chayotes
½ cup almonds
3 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 tablespoons cream
1 tablespoon cinnamon
2 cups crumbled pound cake (set some aside for final topping)
½ cup raisins
Fresh-whipped cream

Directions:

1) Slice chayote in half and steam for 45 minutes or until tender.

2) Scoop out seeds and some inside flesh. Leave about 1/2 inch of flesh on chayotes.

3) Mix other ingredients except whipped cream together for a filling. Leave some pound cake for a topping.

4) Scoop filling into steamed chayotes and bake for 30 minutes at 375 degrees.

5) Serve with fresh whipped cream. Can be served warm or cool.

Basic stuff plus a weird squash thing.

The ingredients: Pound cake, chayote, cinnamon, vanilla, egg, whipping cream, almonds, sugar (I used Sugar in the Raw someone gave me), raisins (any kind will do).

The recipe calls for a teaspoon of nutmeg and a teaspoon of brandy in the pudding filling, as well as sliced almonds as garnish. I haven’t found nutmeg in Saudi Arabia yet, and liquor of all kinds is illegal, so those two were out. I switched cinnamon for nutmeg and just ignored the brandy. I didn’t want to buy extra almonds, so I just nixed the sliced almond garnishes also. I’m not sure whether the cake I bought was a pound cake or what, because it was all in Arabic, but it tasted yummy and crumbled well!

Generally, I think if you use enough sugar, delicious spices, and cakey goodness, the dessert will turn out pretty frikkin’ tasty!

Sliced open.

First order of business: slice the chayote in half lengthwise (keep the skin on!) and place them in a steaming contraption. The recipe I mostly followed says to steam for 35 minutes, but I went about 45, and the chayote was still probably too firm. The skins on these were pretty sturdy, so they can probably be steamed until the insides are super-soft and easy to scoop out.

Scooped!

Which is the next step! Remove the seeds and scoop the chayote innards into a bowl. The recipe says to leave half an inch of squash to ensure it all holds together when you bake them, but I think I should have scooped them out a little bit more—the squash is fine, but I couldn’t fit as much pudding mix as I would have liked into these, and that filling was scrumptious.

Set aside the chayote innards. Take the almonds and sugar and chop them in a food processor or blender until they’re nice and finely ground. Then add the eggs and chayote innards and pulse until nice and well-mixed. Add vanilla and cream and pulse a little, then pour into a bowl with the crumbled cake, cinnamon, and raisins. Set aside a few tablespoons of crumbled cake to top the confection before baking.

A simple pudding filling.

My pudding filling looked like this, but I didn’t exactly measure the amount of cake, chayote, or anything else—I just eyeballed.

Grease a baking pan, place your steamed, scooped chayote in, and fill with the pudding filling stuff. Then sprinkle cake crumbs on top. If you’d like, add slivers of almonds as well.

Bake at 375 Fahrenheit for 30 minutes (for me, it took a little longer before the cake crumbs turned a little brownish). The recipe says to serve warm, but it also tastes good after being refrigerated overnight in tupperware. It’s almost like pizza and Chinese food in that way.

Stuffed and baked!

These look okay naked, but are better with fresh-whipped cream, which only took a few minutes of beating (I used what I think was heavy whipping cream—the only English was on the stuck-on label on the back and just said “whipping cream,” which was good enough for me—with some powdered sugar and a dash of vanilla to sweeten it).

All dressed up!

Okay, so it doesn’t look like the most delicious dessert. But if you want to try something new and interesting, or you’re going for a green-themed dinner party, pudding-stuffed chayote is the way to go!

As you can see from the first picture, the layers are awesome. Vanilla ice cream would totally rock this dessert!

If you follow the recipe, you will have a little bit of leftover pudding filling that won’t fit into the chayote shells. The recipe says to stick it in a bread pan and bake at 375 Fahrenheit for 25 minutes. And heck, that stuff is sinful! I had it for breakfast, I had it for lunch, and I had it for dinner. I’ve been on a sugar high all day!

Thanks Kenneth for the super-interesting recipe. I’ve never used chayote before and definitely wouldn’t think to stuff it with pudding! If you liked this post, be sure to check out The Expat Garden(er) and also follow Kenneth on Twitter!

There are some figs in there somewhere.

I have to say that I really like it when you guys email me recipes to try. There’s two reasons for this.

First, most of you are pretty good cooks (or on your way to becoming good cooks) and you have at least a few awesome recipes hidden away that are usually very unique and different from what I would normally do.

Second, you may not know this, but I’m actually fairly lazy and the idea of new, awesome recipes from readers just appearing in my Inbox always makes me happy.

So when reader Rachel (Hi Rachel!) emailed me this lovely Bircher Muesli recipe, I just had to try it out.

Bircher Muesli

Yield: Serves 2.

Prep Time: 5 minutes + overnight soak

Total Time: 15 minutes

Ingredients:

100 g. (about 1 1/4 cups) rolled oats, not the instant kind
250ml (1 Cup) milk
50ml (1/4 Cup) cream
50g (1/2 Cup) raisins (I subbed dried figs for these guys)
1 apple, peeled and grated
1 banana, diced
1 orange, cut into segments
1/2 lemon, juice only
Sliced almonds (or other nut)
Honey, brown sugar, or agave syrup (some sort of sweetener)
Yogurt

Directions:

1) Mix oats, raisins (or figs), milk, and cream in a bowl, cover, and store in the fridge overnight.

2) The next morning, prep the fruit. Dice the banana, peel the orange and dice the segments, peel the apple and grate it.

3) Mix the fruit with lemon juice.

4) Serve muesli with fruit topping, yogurt, chopped nuts, and some sort of sweetener.

Planning is Important

This recipe is far from hard. Actually, it’s very easy. Maybe easier than making actual oatmeal because there’s nothing to cook!

But it does require a bit of planning. For the muesli to really work well, you need to prep it the night before.

It takes all of 2 minutes. I think you can handle it.

Just the basics.

Rachel’s original recipe called for raisins, but I used some dried figs because my loving wife isn’t a huge raisin fan.

Just pour everything into a bowl, stir it together, cover it and stick it in the fridge!

If you’re using figs, chop them up a bit.

Soupy!

The Next Day

The next day, when you wake up, you’ll see that the oats have completely absorbed all the liquid.

It’s like a magic trick.

All soaked up!

Now you can prep the fruit part of the dish.

You’ll need these things.

A fruit assortment

For the banana, just peel it, cut it in half long-wise, then dice it up.

For the orange, peel it and cut the segments into chunks. Nothing fancy.

For the apple, peel it and then grate it. The grated apple adds an awesome texture to the final dish. It’s a great touch.

Mix all these things together and squeeze in some lemon juice to stop the fruit from browning.

NOT Cheese.

Other Add ins

Besides all that fruit, you can add in almost any nut in the world and any sweetener you can think of. I went with some sliced almonds and agave syrup.

Very tasty.

Any nut and any sweetener will do.

You can either mix the fruit into the muesli or just serve it on top. I liked it on top with the almonds and agave and a good dollop of yogurt.

A great breakfast.

This is a really great summer breakfast if you like oatmeal. It’s cold obviously which is nice and refreshing on a hot summer morning. And you don’t need to ever turn the stove on!

If you’re eating this by yourself, this will feed you for a few days and it keeps just fine in the fridge for that long.

Give this a shot if you’re in a breakfast rut!

Potatoes are my favorite.

I was a bit shocked that fingerling potatoes won the poll last week. It was a very close race though. Tomatillo salsa took a very close second and I might just make it anyway since it’s what I wanted to win.

I wasn’t so impressed by this recipe when I read it. I mean you just roast some potatoes, spin some chives in a food processor and you’re done.

I was skeptical.

But I can tell you this. Betsy went back for seconds. That may not seem like a big deal to you, but trust me. It is. She’s not really a “seconds” person. She’ll usually save dishes for leftovers the next day, but will very rarely hit up the same dish right away.

Not the case here. As soon as she finished serving one she said, “I need more of those potatoes.” I was right behind her!

Roasted Fingerlings with Chive Pesto

Yield: Serves 4.

Prep Time: 10 minutes

Total Time: 45 minutes

Ingredients:

1 1/2 pounds fingerling potatoes (that's the size of bag they normally come in)
2 Tablespoons olive oil
Big pinch of salt and pepper

Chive Pesto:
1/2 Cup fresh chives
1/2 Cup fresh flat leaf parsley
2 Tablespoons almonds or pine nuts
1 large garlic clove
1/2 Cup olive oil
1 Tablespoon lemon juice
Pinch of salt

Helpful Equipment:
Food processor (mini one works well also)

Directions:

1) Slice potatoes in half and toss with olive oil, salt and pepper.

2) Lay potatoes out onto a baking sheet in an even layer.

3) Bake potatoes at 425 degrees for 35-40 minutes, turning every 10 minutes or so.

4) Meanwhile, add all pesto ingredients except olive oil and lemon juice to a food processor. Pulse a few times to combine.

5) Drizzle in olive oil and continue to pulse until it's a coarse paste.

6) Stir in lemon juice and set aside.

7) When potatoes come out of the oven, add to a bowl and toss with a few tablespoons of pesto.

8) Serve with extra pesto on the side!

Roasting the Fingerlings

If you aren’t familiar with fingerlings, they are just a varietal of potato that seems to be very popular these days. They are long and skinny and really perfect for roasting. They cook quicker than normal potatoes and get really nice and crispy since they have more surface area.

They are more common in the Fall actually, but are pretty much available throughout the year.

To prep the potatoes, just slice them down the middle and toss them with some olive oil and salt and pepper.

Oil. Salt. Pepper. Done.

Lay these out on a baking sheet and bake them at 425 degrees for about 35 minutes. Give them a turn every 10 minutes to make sure they are cooking evenly.

Chive Pesto

Normally pesto uses basil, but chives work equally well. This is the first time I’ve made a chive pesto, but it won’t be the last. The flavors were really good.

Seriously Chivin'

Once you have all your ingredients, add everything but the lemon juice to a food processor and pulse them a few times. Then drizzle in the olive oil and continue to process until the pesto is a coarse paste.

Once you’re done processing the pesto, stir in the lemon juice and you’re all set.

This still will smell bright and fresh.

All mixed up.

Finishing the Dish

When the potatoes come out of the oven the should be really nicely browned all over. Honestly, these are good just like this!

Perfect!

Transfer the potatoes to a large bowl and toss them with about two tablespoons of the pesto. You’ll probably want to add more, but its’ a good idea to start light with the pesto.

People can always add more later.

Go light to start.

Serve these up in a nice big bowl!

Here’s a good close up shot. Man these hit the spot!

So good.

These were very crispy and delicious and the chive pesto was very light and tasty.

I’ll be honest, Betsy and I almost finished off a pound and a half of these by ourselves!

Good stuff!

I ran a test on Twitter last week that pretty much confirmed what I thought was true. I sent out a quick Tweet asking for people to send me their favorite granola ingredients. Here’s a quick sampling of the dozen or so responses I got:

- @jessicabair: Honey & Blueberries
– @lowrha: Maple syrup, walnuts, cinnamon, nutmeg, and dried strawberries.
– @gardenvarieties: coconut, dried fig & apricot, pecans.
– @outlawdiva: Sesame seeds, oats, flax seeds, walnuts, cashews, raisins (all colors), currants, honey, maple syrup.
– @onmaggiesfarm: Maple syrup, almonds, unsweetened coconut. I mix up the flavor with spices: cardamom, nutmeg, ginger.
– @melissamauk: Applesauce, pepitas, brown rice syrup and oats.

Honestly, it was probably my most responded to tweet ever. People have opinions about granola and all their opinions are different!

So I called my theory confirmed… my theory, of course, being that you can put almost anything in granola.

Because of this, it’s the perfect way to clean out your pantry and use up extra nuts, spices, and fruits. So let’s make some!

Kitchen Sink Granola

Yield: 9-10 Cups

Prep Time: 20 minutes

Total Time: 50 minutes

Ingredients:

6 Cups rolled oats
2 Cups of any nuts that you have on hand (I used peanuts, almonds, and pecans)
1 Cup Sweetener (maple syrup, honey, agave, rice syrup, etc)
1-2 Cups dried fruit (raisins, cranberries, cherries, etc)
1 Teaspoon cinnamon (always a good idea)
1 Teaspoon salt (necessary)
Up two 2 Teaspoons of other spices (cardamom, ginger, allspice, nutmeg, etc.)
Various seeds (poppy seeds, sesame seeds, flax seeds...)
Up to 2 Teaspoons vanilla extract

Directions:

1) Grind any whole spices you are using and roughly chop nuts.

2) Add spices, seeds, and nuts to oats and mix well to combine.

3) Add sweetener to mixture and stir well.

4) Spread granola out onto two baking sheets. Make sure there is an even layer on both sheets.

5) Bake granola at 300 degrees for 20-30 minutes, stirring every 3-5 minutes. Keep a really close eye on it.

6) Remove granola once it's golden brown and let it cool for a few minutes.

7) Add dried fruit to granola and let it cool completely.

8) Stir in a large plastic bag and serve with yogurt or milk.

Cleaning house

This might surprise you, but I have a pretty ridiculous pantry on any given day. Because I make a very wide range of dishes here on Macheesmo, I have a drawer full of almost any spice you could want, a full inventory of nuts and seeds, various dried fruits, and a ton of other random stuff.

And sometimes, I need to clean house. This is the perfect recipe for such a task. Out of all the things in my kitchen sink granola, I only bought two items: Oats and agave syrup. I had honey and maple syrup in my pantry also, but I wanted to try agave so I picked some up.

So I encourage you to use what you have for this recipe and not copy me exactly. It’ll be good. Trust me.

Go crazy.

The Method

While it isn’t really all that important what you put in your granola, it is important how you make it. You’re shooting for a nice crunchy granola that’s toasted, but not burned. It’s a very fine line.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. First, I needed to grind up some whole spices. If you have them, use them, otherwise don’t. I wouldn’t buy new spices just for this recipe frankly.

All are pretty optional.

Mix your oats with all the spices and seeds very well. I had a spice attack for this version!

Get it?

The Agave

I’ve never used agave syrup before and it’s becoming the talk of the town so I figured I’d jump on the bandwagon.

Since agave is the same stuff that Tequila is made from, I was pretty sure this syrup would make me puke and blackout, but it did nothing of the sort. Probably because it doesn’t have alcohol in it, but still. I was worried.

Really the only purchase I made...

In actuality, it’s a really good syrup. It has a very unique flavor and it isn’t quite as sweet as honey. I think it worked great for granola.

Once I had all my spices, nuts, and seeds mixed in with my oats, I added my agave and stirred it all together!

The sweet stuff.

Baking the granola

Ok. The tricky part is baking this stuff. Spoon out the granola mixture onto two baking sheets and try to make sure the granola is in a pretty even layer over the sheets. This will make sure it cooks evenly.

Nice and even.

Bake this stuff at 300 degrees for 20-30 minutes. Stir it every few minutes, five at the most. This is really important because the edges will cook slightly faster than the center and if you don’t stir it often, you’ll end up with burned edges.

As it gets closer to being done, check it very frequently, every three minutes or so. You definitely don’t want to burn the stuff, but you do want it to be golden brown. It’s a bit tricky, but as long as you keep an eye on it, you should be okay.

In short, this is not a recipe where you can walk away from the kitchen and do something else for 30 minutes and expect to come back to anything edible.

But if you keep an eye on it and stir it frequently, you’ll be well rewarded with some beautiful granola.

Careful not to burn it!

The Fruits

Once your granola comes out of the oven, let it cool for 5-10 minutes and then toss in any dried fruit that you want to add to it. Again, I added some dried cherries and cranberries because that’s what I had on hand.

Some dried fruit.

Once the granola is cooled completely you can store it in a large freezer bag.

This stuff will keep for weeks without a problem.

It blends in pretty well actually!

I like to eat mine with milk, but Betsy likes hers with yogurt.

It also happens that I made granola that almost exactly matches the counters in my kitchen.

Am I right or what?

I like it as a cereal.

If your pantries are looking slightly overrun these days or if you’re just sick of your normal breakfasts, this is a really good way to use stuff up and change stuff up!

So, I have to ask. What’s your favorite granola ingredients? Leave a comment!

Fresh colors and flavors!

It’s always important to remember that there’s a world of difference between irreplaceable and The Best. Something can be irreplaceable to you without necessarily being all that great of a thing. Like your raggedy childhood teddy bear or that special grungy T-Shirt that you refuse to let your spouse throw away. If you’re me, you have at least two dozen such T-Shirts.

Green bean casserole, to me, is irreplaceable. Something about the flavors that those strange canned products create when smashed together just reminds me of my childhood.

BUT.

That doesn’t mean that I can’t make an objectively better version and leave it up to you whether or not you stray from the traditional Campbell’s path this Thanksgiving.

So this is a green bean casserole made from scratch. And I must say that even if the traditional variety is irreplaceable to me, this variation is damn good.

Green Bean Casserole from Scratch

Yield: Serves 4-5.

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour

Ingredients:

1 pound fresh green beans, washed, trimmed, cut in half.
2 Cups (1/2 pound) sliced cremini mushrooms (Baby bella)
1/2 Cup pearl onions, frozen work fine
4 Tablespoons butter
4 Tablespoons all-purpose flour
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 Teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 Teaspoon chopped fresh oregano (and/or thyme)
2 Cups chicken stock, homemade is best, but make sure to get low-sodium if you use store bought.
1/2 Cup shredded Parmesan Cheese
1/2 Cup breadcrumbs, I like Panko
1/4 Cup slivered almonds
Salt and pepper

Directions:

1) Wash your green beans, trim off the ends, and chop them in half.

2) Dunk the green beans in a pot of boiling, salted water for about 90 seconds. They should turn bright green and be slightly tender. Drain the beans and immediately dunk them in a bowl of salted ice water to stop them from cooking.

3) Slice up mushrooms, de-thaw your pearl onions, mince the garlic and herbs.

4) In a large pot over medium-high heat, melt the butter and then add the mushrooms and a pinch of salt.

5) Cook for about 5 minutes until the mushrooms start to break down and release their liquid. Then add garlic, pepper flakes, and herbs. Stir and cook for 30 seconds.

6) Add flour to the pot, stir, and cook for another minute to cook out the flour flavor.

7) Stir in the chicken stock in small batches. Don't just add it all at once. Stir it constantly as you add the stock so it stays creamy and doesn't get lumpy. If it's too thick, add more stock or water. If it's too thin, just simmer for a few minutes until it thickens.

8) Add green beans and pearl onions and stir to combine.

9) Pour mixture into a buttered casserole dish and top with Parm, breadcrumbs, and slivered almonds.

10) Bake at 400 degrees for about 20 minutes until the top is nicely browned.

11) Let cool for a few minutes and serve immediately.

Prepping the ingredients

So even though this dish is from scratch, it’s actually really easy to make. Something that I’m sure the Campbell’s and French’s people don’t want you to know. There’s only two mildly tricky parts.

The first is the green beans. You need to blanch them which should not scare you away. Basically just wash the beans and chop off the tips. I like to use a pair of kitchen shears so I can chop off 5-6 at a time. Then chop all the beans in half.

Dunk them all in salted boiling water for about 90 seconds. They will turn bright green which is what you want. Then immediately drain them and dunk them in some salted ice water.

The boiling water will tender them up a bit and the ice water will shock them and stop the cooking so they are still slightly crunchy.

Shocking!

It’s not hard, but is kind of annoying. It’s worth it though in my opinion.

You’ll also need to slice up some mushrooms and get some pearl onions. I wasn’t sure if the pearl onions would work out but they were maybe my favorite part of the dish!

I just used frozen and defrosted them in the microwave for a minute.

Simple stuff.

Also mince up a few cloves of garlic and some fresh oregano and/or thyme. Again, this is pretty easy stuff.

You could use a variety of herbs here.

The Second Mildly Tricky Part

The next step is making the mushroom gravy base for the dish. Of course, this is the part that you usually get by using a big ass can of cream of mushroom soup.

Like I said, those flavors to me are irreplaceable, but it doesn’t mean that we can’t make something that tastes better.

If that makes sense…

Start by letting your butter melt in a medium-large pot (depending on how much casserole you’re making). Once the butter is melted add the mushrooms along with a pinch of salt.

Let this cook for 5 minutes over medium-high heat until the mushrooms start to soften and release their liquid. When that happens, add the garlic, red pepper flakes, and fresh herbs.

Cook this for a minute or two and then add your flour to the pan. It will look pretty dry, but just stir it together and you should end up with a mushroom-paste situation. Cook this for about a minute just to cook out some of the flour taste. If it’s really dry, like you can still see flour, then add a bit more butter or a drizzle of olive oil.

You just made a roux.

Or, as I like to call it, a mush-rouxm.

Mush-rouxm.

Once you have this roux ready, start slowing adding your chicken stock to the pot, stirring the whole time. Add in in a few batches and stir stir stir.

Two cups should be about right but if it looks too thick, add more obviously. If it looks too thin, that’s not a problem. Just let it simmer for a few minutes and it will thicken up.

Eventually, you’ll end up with this wonderful mushroom gravy that smells amazing.

Pretty much gravy.

Ok. That’s the only hard part of the whole deal. And I have full faith that you can do it.

Next, just dump in your onions and green beans and season with salt and pepper. Look how fresh and colorful this is?

Nice colors right?!

Assembling the casserole

Lightly butter a casserole dish and then pile in your green bean mixture. Top it with some Parmesan cheese, breadcrumbs, and slivered almonds.

If you’re addicted to the French’s onions, you can also use those, but I wanted to branch out a bit on the toppings.

The almonds are a good idea.

Bake this at 400 degrees for 20-25 minutes. The crust should be nice and crispy and you might notice some of the gravy bubbling up.

It’s pretty much done when the crust is lightly browned though.

Creamy and delicious.

I was nervous when this won the poll last week because I know that green bean casserole is a serious deal. But I can honestly say that I think I did it justice.

If you’re looking for a from scratch version of the classic then I think this is about as good as it gets!

Smart food!

Betsy heads off to Colorado today to take The Bar Exam and she asked me to make some energy bars that she could take into the test with her. As an aside, the people that administer the bar appear to be the most paranoid people in the world. A few of the things you can’t bring into the bar…

• Neckties
• Garments with hoods, pockets, or linings
• Digital watches
• Costume Jewelry

What’s funny about this list is that I’m sure the items on there are on there for a reason. Some genius student probably tried to cheat somehow by using costume jewelry and got caught. Given the ridiculous amount of information that you have to know for this test, I’m not even sure how you would cheat on it though.

I guess rather than actually study there might be people out there that will use the two months leading up to the bar to figure out how to print 1000 pages of material on the back of a Dr. Pepper label.

Anyway, so I decided to make these no-bake energy bars that are packed with peanut butter, nuts, coconut, and oats. For people that aren’t cheating, you’ll need some good brain food!

Bar Bars

Yield: 8x8 dish of bars.

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 30 minutes + chill time

Ingredients:

1 Cup pecans, chopped
1 Cup almonds, slivered or chopped
2/3 Cup shredded coconut (unsweetened)
1 1/4 Cups rolled oats
1 1/2 Cups unsweetened crispy brown rice cereal (you could use rice krispies in a pinch)
1 Cup semi-sweet chocolate chips (optional)
1 Cup peanut butter
1 1/2 Cups water
1/2 Cup sugar
2 Tablespoons finely ground coffee
1 Teaspoon vanilla
Pinch of salt

Directions:

1) Roughly chop the pecans and almonds and toast them, along with the coconut, in a 350 degree oven for about 8 minutes. Toss the mixture a few times throughout just to make sure they aren't burning. The coconut should be a light tan color when it's done.

2) Once all of that is toasted, mix it with the oats, cereal, and chocolate if you're using it.

3) Meanwhile, in a small saucepan, mix the peanut butter, water, coffee, vanilla, sugar, and salt and stir over low heat until the sugar is melted and everything is combined, about 3 minutes.

4) Let the peanut butter mixture cool for a second and then pour it over the dry stuff. Stir everything together.

5) Pour the bar mix into a lightly greased (I used a non-stick spray) or lightly buttered 9x9 baking dish. You could use a 9x13 pan if you want thinner bars. Press them down to an even layer and let them chill in the fridge for a few hours.

6) Cut them up and serve!

Adapted from a 101 Cookbooks recipe.

Making the Bars

These are no-bake bars, so there’s not a huge amount of prep to them honestly. Even though they are no-bake, you still want to toast the nuts and coconut though. It’ll add a lot of flavor to the final product.

Just roughly chop the pecans and almonds and spread them and the coconut out on a baking sheet.

Ready to roast!

Bake this sheet of deliciousness at 350 degrees for 7-10 minutes. Stir it up once or twice during that time just to make sure the coconut isn’t burning. You’re looking for a lightly tan color on the coconut. When your coconut is done, everything is done.

This was my finished sheet.

After 10 minutes and a few mixes.

The Crispy Rice Cereal

The recipe I was sort of going off of, although I changed a lot of stuff, called for crispy brown rice cereal. I’d never even heard of this.

But I found some! At least I think this is the right stuff. After inspecting it closely, I’m fairly certain that you could use Rice Krispies, but these are somewhat healthier for you. The texture seemed to be about the same to me though.

Any rice cereal will do the trick.

Once your nuts and coconut are done toasting, mix the oats, cereal, chocolate, and toasted things in a large bowl!

All the dry stuff!

The Wet Stuff

The only thing that Betsy requested in these energy bars was peanut butter so I made sure to include a lot of that. I’ve been on a homemade peanut butter kick lately so I just whipped up a batch. Obviously, you can use anything you can buy in the store also.

I'm an overachiever.

In a small saucepan, mix your peanut butter, water, coffee, vanilla, salt, and sugar and bring it to a simmer. It turns into a kind of peanut, coffee, vanilla, syrup situation that is pretty out of this world.

This will only need to simmer for a minute or two. You just want to make sure everything is well-combined and the sugar is melted.

This will smell awesome.

Then pour the peanut butter mixture over the dry ingredients and stir everything together really well. Lightly grease a 9×9 baking pan (I used non-stick spray) and pour all the bar mixture into the pan and press it down to an even layer. They should be pretty thick. If you wanted them thinner, you could use a 9×13 inch pan.

In the pan!

If you don’t mind room temperature bars, these are good to go now! They’ll be best if you let them chill for a few hours in the fridge. The nice thing about these is that they don’t need to be refrigerated really. There’s not anything perishable in them so they can sit out for a few days without a problem. They might get a bit gooey, but gooey can be delicious.

But the most important thing about these energy bars is that they’re packed with lots of stuff that’ll help your brain recover from hard multiple choice questions and essays!

Of course, I cheated a bit because it is a coffee cake recipe so it’s best with, well, coffee which most people drink prior to noon.

But if you need further evidence that this is a solid coffee cake, it also passed the “Get it out of the house” test. If Betsy instructs me to get it out of the house, then it’s also probably pretty decent because she’s afraid she’ll eat it all.

Ok. I’ll stop with the various tests I’ve created. But really, this was very tasty stuff.

Really delicious.

The recipe for this coffee cake is very straightforward and you can adjust it with all kinds of fun stuff. For this version I added some almond extract and fresh cherries. You could add real almonds of course if you want, but I just did the extract.

Cherry Almond Coffee Cake

Yield: 8x8 pan

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Total Time: hour

Ingredients:

2 Cups all-purpose flour
1/2 Cup sugar
2 Teaspoons baking powder
1/2 Teaspoon salt
5 Tablespoons unsalted butter
1 Teaspoon almond extract
1 egg
3/4 Cup milk (I had to add an extra Tablespoon or two due to a heavy hand with the flour I think)
1 Cup fresh cherries, pitted and diced

Streusel:
3 Tablespoons unsalted butter
3/4 Cups sugar
3 Tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 Teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 Cup chopped almonds (optional)

Directions:

1) Mix Streusel ingredients together in a small bowl and set aside for later.

2) Remove pit from cherries and dice them (about 15-20 cherries should be enough).

3) Mix wet batter ingredients together and set aside for later.

4) Mix dry ingredients in a large bowl and cut in butter with your fingers. Just mix it in roughly until the butter resembles pea-sized pieces. Then add the cherries.

5) Stir in the wet ingredients and mix until combined.

6) Add half of your batter to a buttered 8x8 baking dish. Top with half of the streusel topping. Then the remaining batter and finally a streusel topping.

7) Bake at 350 degrees for about 35 minutes. Let cool for 15 minutes before serving.

Adapted from How to Cook Everything.

Making the streusel

The streusel isn’t rocket science people, but it’s very important to the recipe. A coffee cake is just a cake without this. Making it is as simple as adding all your streusel ingredients to a bowl and mixing them up with a fork until they are well combined.

Butter is hiding in there.

Prepping the batter

The only annoying part about this batter is getting the cherries ready. They are kind of a pain to pit and then chop. The way I get the pits out is to put the cherry down on a cutting board and slice it down the middle until your knife hits the pit of the cherry. Then roll the knife forward. The cherry should roll all the way around.

The pit should dislodge pretty easily once the cherry is cut all the way around. Then you can just roughly dice both halves! Luckily you only have to do like 15-20 of these for the whole coffee cake to get the cup of cherries you need.

I was a bit worried here.

Also, I like to get all my wet ingredients (milk, egg, extract) together so I can just add them all at once.

The almond extract is key.

To prep the batter just mix the dry ingredients together and then add your butter. Use your fingers or a fork to roughly mix in the butter to the dry ingredients. Then add your diced cherries to the dry mix and mix everything together.

Finally, just pour in your wet mixture and stir stir stir! I had to add a few extra tablespoons of milk to my batter because I added a bit too much flour.

This was my finished batter.

It's good like this honestly.

Pre-heat your oven to 350 degrees and butter a 9×9 baking pan. It’s pretty important to butter the pan if you ever want to actually be able to remove your coffee cake from the pan.

Then add about half of your batter to the pan and spread it out evenly. It’ll be pretty thick. Then sprinkle on half of your streusel topping.

Good stuff.

Next, add the second half of your batter to the top. This creates the signature layer of streusel that coffee cakes have. It might be kind of hard to spread the coffee cake over the streusel but just do your best.

Then sprinkle the remainder of your streusel mix on top.

Bake it at 350 degrees for about 30-35 minutes until a toothpick comes clean from the center.

Kind of crunchy on top.

The hard part

You really need to let this cool for 15 minutes before eating it. I know that sounds like a long time, but trust me. That gives time for the sugar crust to kind of develop on top.

Then serve it up!

It's good with um... coffee.

I was a bit worried about the fresh cherries in this version. I thought they might all sink to the bottom or just get really mushy but they held up great actually and added some nice flavor to the finished cake.

So there you have it. The coffee cake that pasted both the “Get it out of the house” test and the “By noon” test!

You see, revisiting things usually makes them awesome.

It'll add a year onto your life.

The salad is pretty simple really but there are a few things that I think are really important. For starters, the dressing is awesome. Rather than an intense mayonnaise dressing that the traditional version has, this version has a light buttermilk dressing (with just a touch of mayo). Second, the chicken needs to be spiced up nicely. It gives some great texture and protein to the dish. If I was doing a veg version I think I’d grill some mushrooms?

The Waldorf Revisited

Yield: Serves 4.

Prep Time: 20 minutes + marinating time

Total Time: 1 hour

Ingredients:

1 large head of bibb lettuce or butter lettuce
1 red pepper, diced
2 apples, peeled cored and diced
1 Cup of almonds, chopped
4 large ribs of celery, chopped
2 chicken breasts, I like the skin on
Olive oil
Salt and Pepper
Red Pepper Flakes

Buttermilk Dressing:
3/4 Cup buttermilk
1/4 Cup mayonnaise
1/2 lemon, juice only
2 Tablespoons chives, minced
2 Tablespoons parsley, minced
Salt and pepper

Directions:

1) For dressing, mince chives and parsley very finely. Then whisk together all ingredients to make dressing.

2) Let chicken marinate in olive oil, salt, pepper, and red pepper flakes for about 30 minutes before cooking.

3) Grill the chicken for about 10 minutes per side or until the breasts are cooked through. If you don't have a grill, cook the chicken in a cast iron skillet for about 5 minutes per side and then finish it in a 350 degree oven for 15-20 minutes.

4) Let chicken rest for a few minutes and then slice it up.

5) Slice up other salad ingredients and top over lettuce. Then drizzle on dressing and top with the sliced chicken.

6) Serve with extra dressing and crusty bread.

Adapted from May 2010 Body and Soul.

Making The Dressing

Betsy and I really liked this dressing and I think I might start rotating into my normal salad dressing rotation. It’s not too heavy but very flavorful. You’ll need these things.

Fantastic dressing.

The only things that you really need to chop is the chives and the parsley. Make sure to mince both pretty finely though. You don’t want a huge piece of parsley in the dressing.

Go heavy on the chives.

Then just whisk all the ingredients together. If you want it a bit thicker, add another Tablespoon or so of mayo. Also feel free to add more of the herbs and taste for salt and pepper obviously. It’s a kind of runny dressing, but it’s very flavorful actually. It even gets better on day two.

It'll be pretty runny.

Cooking the Chicken

This salad was flavorful enough that I didn’t feel the need to have a full chicken breast on mine. Betsy and I split a chicken breast and it was more than enough which is why the recipe says two breasts for four people. If you have big meat eaters though, then you could do a breast a person I guess.

I marinated mine in a few Tablespoons of olive oil and big pinches of salt, pepper, and red pepper flakes. I only let it marinate for about 30 minutes before cooking it.

Don't be afraid of skin people.

If you happen to have a grill, by all means throw this on the grill. I don’t have one unfortunately so I cooked mine on high heat in my cast iron skillet for about 5 minutes per side to get it nice and brown and then I finished it in the oven for about 20 minutes at 350 degrees.

Turned out perfect.

Grilled would be good also.

Putting the Salad together

While your chicken is cooking, you can prep all your other stuff which is pretty straightforward. If you can get your hands on some nice fresh butter lettuce or bibb lettuce, it’ll kick this salad up a notch. Otherwise you can use whatever you normally use for salads.

But seriously, if you’ve never tried butter lettuce, it’s kind of amazing.

Butter lettuce rocks.

Wash your lettuce and dice it up. The same goes for all the other veggies. You could definitely sub in your favorite nut for almonds if you wanted, but they worked great if you have some on hand. Just give them a rough chop and you’ll be all set. Then pile the veggies high and deep.

Almonds or some kind of nut are important.

Add your apple right before serving so it doesn’t turn brown and dress the salad immediately. Feel free to go pretty heavy on the dressing. You don’t want pools of dressing or anything, but using a heavy drizzle is just fine.

All dressed up.

Back to the chicken

If you aren’t used to grilling or cooking chicken, it’s very important to let the chicken rest for five minutes at least before slicing it up. That gives the juices a chance to redistribute throughout the meat. Then you can slice up your breast into nice strips.

Enough for 4 people.

Pile the chicken right on top of the salad and you have yourself a very healthy and delicious salad-based meal. If you were so inclined, you could also serve it with some hearty bread.

Yum.

Betsy and I liked this salad so much that we happily ate it two days in a row. It was very flavorful and just left me feeling healthy but still full.

Honestly, it was one of the best salads I’ve had in awhile. I mean just look at those colors!

I highly recommend you visit this revisited salad.