Freezer Cole Slaw

When I was in my early twenties, I made cole slaw for the first time for a family gathering. I am not sure what I did but the cole slaw was a BIG disaster and I haven't made slaw since. A few weeks ago my CSA included the biggest head of cabbage I'd ever seen and I decided to give cole slaw another try. After all, it's been 30 years, surely I can make a good slaw? I decide to make Tim's mom's Freezer Cole Slaw. Besides Snicker Salad, most holiday gatherings at Tim's moms include this slaw.

Tim said my salad wasn't quite as good as his mother's but it was good. Hey, I can live with that, it was so much better my first try years ago.



Freezer Cole Slaw

1 medium head cabbage (about 2 pounds), shredded
1 teaspoon salt
2 cups sugar
1 cup cider vinegar
1/4 cup water
1 teaspoon celery seed
1 teaspoon mustard seed
1 large carrot, shredded
1/2 cup finely chopped green pepper

Directions

In a large bowl, combine cabbage and salt; let stand for 1 hour.
In a large saucepan, combine the sugar, vinegar, water, celery seed and mustard seed. Bring to a boil; boil for 1 minute. Remove from the heat; cool.
Add the carrot, green pepper and vinegar mixture to the cabbage mixture; stir to combine. Transfer to large freezer bags; seal and freeze for up to 2 months.
Remove from the freezer 2 hours before serving. Serve with a slotted spoon. Yield: 10 servings.

I am linking this to Foodie Friday and Full Plate Thursday.

Chocolate Rice Pudding - Chocolate With Francois

I've never made rice pudding. Chocolate Rice Pudding seemed like a great first time! As far as Payard's recipes go, this is one of the easier ones. Most of the time is spent with the rice in the oven. The recipe calls for an hour's baking time, stirring every 20 minutes. Mine was beautiful after the first and second 20 minutes. I should have checked it again after 50 minutes instead of letting it go the full hour. Mine ended up over done and a little dry. The orange and chocolate flavors of this recipe are delicious and leave your kitchen with a wonderful fragrance.




Chocolate Rice Pudding was the recipe choice of Peggy of Pantry Revisited. You'll find the recipe over at her blog! Her pudding looks beautiful, just as Payard describes.

In My Garden

Wild Blueberry Oat Muffins - Secret Recipe Club

This is my third month participating in Secret Recipe Club. Secret Recipe Club is the brainchild of Amanda of Amanda's Cooking. You're assigned a blog, you choose a recipe and keep it a secret until reveal day. How fun is that? Secret Recipe Club has become so popular, we've been divided into three groups. This month I am posting in Group B. Our host is Tina of Mom's Crazy Cooking.

My blog for this month is The Wednesday Baker. Andi has a lovely blog with lots of delicious recipes. After browsing on her blog several times, I settled on the Wild Blueberry Oat Muffins. I happened to have a pint of blueberries in the fridge and needed to make something for food day at hubby's work. Perfect!

I had some leftover crumb topping in the fridge. Instead of topping with sugar after baking, I decided to top with the crumb topping before baking.

The batter for these muffins is the most liquid batter I've ever seen. Usually, at least for me, muffin batter is thick. After putting these in the muffin tins, I read the recipe again, thinking maybe I'd read it wrong. That does happen to me quite a bit. No I read the recipe correctly. My muffins baked just shy of 20 minutes and were perfect. This is by far the best blueberry muffin I've ever eaten. They're moist with a nice soft crumb. The crumb topping added a beautiful finishing touch. I can't wait to experiment with this recipe with other fruits. Thanks Andi for a fabulous recipe!



Wild Blueberry-Oat Muffins
Paula Deen magazine July-August 2011
Courtesy of The Wednesday Baker

1 cup old-fashioned oatmeal
1 cup milk
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1 tbsp orange zest
1 egg
1 cup flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 cup chopped pecans
1 1/2 cup fresh or frozen blueberries*
*keeping out 1/2 cup of the blueberries to sprinkle on top of the batter before baking
confectioners' sugar to sprinkle on top after baking

Place the milk and the old-fashioned oatmeal in a bowl, stir to combine and allow to set for 10 minutes.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Line 12 muffin cups with papers or spray muffins pan well with pam spray.

Add to the oatmeal the sugar, oil, orange zest, and egg and mix well. Mix together the flour, baking soda, baking powder and cinnamon and the nuts then add to the wet mixture. Stir just long enough to combine. Carefully stir in the one cup of blueberries and mix gently. Spoon into the baking cups, sprinkle the tops with the remaining blueberries. Bake at 425 degree for about 20 minutes or until golden brown. Remove from oven and allow to cool on a cooling rack. After they are cool sprinkle with the confectioners' sugar and serve.

I am linking this to Tasty Tuesday, Tempt My Tummy Tuesday , Tuesday's at the Table,.
Foodie Friday and Full Plate Thursday.

Squash Pudding

A couple of weeks ago my CSA contained quite a bit of yellow squash. Although we enjoy yellow squash, we always eat it grilled or in a stir fry. In searching for a different way to prepare yellow squash, I found this recipe for Squash Pudding.

If you've never had squash pudding, give this recipe a try. You'll think you're eating a vanilla custard or pudding. Or if you're looking for a great recipe to get your children to eat veggies, this one is perfect. You'll never know the main ingredient is yellow squash.



Aunt Bea's Squash Pudding
Adapted from Sustainable Table

Ingredients:
6 medium yellow squash
1 egg, beaten well
3/4 cup milk or half and half
3 heaping tablespoons flour
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup granulated sugar
Nutmeg

Directions:
Peel and cube squash and boil until soft. Puree in the blender. Add milk, vanilla, sugars, flour and egg. Sprinkle with nutmeg. Bake at 350 degrees 30-45 minutes until set.

I am linking this to Foodie Friday, Miz Helen's Full Plate Thursday and Sweet Tooth Friday.

From The Good Life - Nebraska Wine and Balloon Festival

After several consecutive weeks of heat and humidity, last weekend we were treated to almost Fall like temperatures. What do people do when they've been held hostage in their house by this heat for weeks, they celebrate by attending the Nebraska Wine and Balloon Festival.



Along with thousand's of other Nebraskan's we enjoyed a beautiful evening of balloons, wine and music. Many of our favorite Nebraska wineries were in attendance. We sampled a couple of old favorites and discovered a new wine or two. My favorite was Dryline White from Superior Estates in Superior Nebraska. The Dryline White is one of the wines in their Tornado Alley Series. A perfect name for a wine from a winery on the Kansas/Nebraska line, tornado alley for sure!



Wine seems to be the weekend theme in August. Next up this weekend, the Riverfront Wine Festival. Unfortunately, due to flooding it isn't being held on the riverfront.

Celebrity Cook Along - Rachael Ray

For the past several months I've been participating in the Celebrity Cook Along hosted by Lynn at Happier Than A Pig In Mud. When I read that this month's celebrity was Rachael Ray I was thrilled, I already had a Rachael Ray recipe in my que. Or so I thought! Last night when I went to finish the post and link up, I realized the recipe was NOT Rachael's but Giada's. OOPS!

Fortunately, though I'd posted a lovely Rosemary Potato Frittata almost two years ago when I was first blogging. No one, except my husband and occasionally my son, was reading my blog, so I am posting this one again today. Rosemary is my favorite herb and this makes a delicious Sunday brunch or even weeknight meal.

Rosemary Potato Frittata
Adapted from Rachael Ray

1/4 cup olive oil
1 clove of garlic, chopped.
3 medium to large yukon gold potatoes
3 to 4 sprigs rosemary, finely chopped
Salt and freshly ground pepper
8 eggs, beaten
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup parmesean cheese
1 tablespoon McCormick vegetable seasoning

Heat oven to 450 degrees.

Heat the olive oil in a cast iron skillet over medium low heat. Thinly slice the potatoes. Add the potatoes to the skillet and season the layers with rosemary, salt and pepper. Raise the heat and cook for 6 to 7 minutes. Carefully turn the mixture and cook for 5 minutes longer.

In a large bowl, wisk the eggs and milk together. Wisk in the parmesean and vegetable seasoning. Pour the egg mixture over the potatoes and lift the potatoes to allow the egg mixture to settle under them. Bake in the oven for 10 - 12 minutes. For the last couple of minutes, turn on the broiler to brown the top of the frittata. Watch carefully, so it does not burn. Remove from the oven and cut into slices and serve.



My notes on this recipe: The original recipe called for onion along with the potatoes, I am not a big fan of raw onions, so I omitted these. Next time, I think I will use them but saute them first. I added the vegetable seasoning to the eggs to give them a little more flavor. I put the Parmesan in with the egg mixture, the original recipe had it sprinkled on top for the last couple of minutes in the oven. I would like to try this recipe with another type of cheese, just to make it a little cheesier. Not sure what cheese will compliment the rosemary and potatoes, I think some type of savory cheese would be so good.

The recipe was a hit with my husband, although he couldn't resist telling me how good it would be with some MEAT in it, possibly some spicy sausage.

I am linking this to Celebrity Cook Along, Tasty Tuesday's, Tuesday's at the Table, Tempt My Tummy Tuesday.