Pulled Pork Poutine

Have you ever had Poutine?  It's not something you see a lot on the menu in Nebraska but it's a favorite of my husband, Tim.   Poutine is a Canadian dish, originating in the province of Quebec, made with French fries and cheese curds topped with a light brown gravy. 

I'm always looking for creative ways to use leftover pulled pork.  This take on poutine combines  French fries, juicy pulled pork, creamy cheese curds, and a beer barbecue gravy. This gravy is delicious!!  The leftover pork and gravy makes a great sandwich, too. 

 

Pulled Pork Poutine

Ingredients

2 pound pork shoulder

12 ounces bottled barbecue sauce

12 ounces beer

20 ounces frozen French fries

2 tablespoons butter

2 tablespoons flour

1/2 cup cheese curds

2 tablespoons chopped chives

Directions

• Add the pork shoulder to a slow cooker. Pour in the barbecue sauce and beer. Cover and cook on low for 8 hours.
• When the pork is done cooking, scoop out 1 cup of the liquid from the slow cooker and set aside.
• Remove any large chunks of fat from the pork and discard. Shred the meat with two forks.
• Prepare the French fries according to package directions.
• While the fries are cooking, prepare the gravy. In a small sauce pan, melt the butter over medium heat. Whisk in the flour and cook for 1 minute.
• While whisking, slowly pour in the reserved liquid. Continue cooking and whisking until the gravy has reached the desired consistency. The longer it cooks, the thicker it will get.
• Top the fries with as much of the pulled pork as you'd like. Sprinkle on the cheese curds and pour on as much gravy as you'd like.Top with chives before serving.
• Store any leftover gravy in a sealed container in the fridge for up to 3 days. To reheat, heat in a small saucepan over low heat while whisking. Store leftover pulled pork in the fridge for up to 5 days.

Banana Blueberry Pancake Squares

Despite Monday being my least favorite day of the week, I love months that have five Monday's.  Five Monday's means a bonus Secret Recipe Club reveal!  The SRC bonus reveals always have a theme.  What better theme for August than back to school?

My assigned blogger for the August themed reveal is Our Eating Habits.  Jamie, the blogger behind Our Eating Habits says her two favorite things are Christmas and Disney!  For sure, who doesn't love Christmas and Disney.  She home schools her children, has a mug collection and lots of great recipes on her blog. 

For the first day of school, I always tried to make Justin a special breakfast.  Although today, he's not a sweet breakfast eater, I think when he was in grade school Jamie's recipe for Banana Blueberry Pancakes would have been a hit!!  Pancakes without having to trying to keep them all warm while the rest cook makes this a perfect recipe for a school day.  Prepare the batter and bake for about 25 minutes, doesn't really get much easier than that!  Plus pretty sure this would work fine with pancake mix with the fruit added, to really cut down on time needed!!

Banana Blueberry Pancake Squares

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 3 Tbsp. granulated sugar
• 1 Tbsp. baking powder
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1 over-ripe banana
• about 1 cup milk, maybe a bit more
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 tsp. vanilla
• 1/4 cup vegetable oil
• 1 cup blueberries – frozen works great
• Butter and Syrup for serving

1. Grease a 13×9 inch baking dish. Pre heat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Mix dry ingredients together in mixing bowl.
3. Mash banana in bottom of large 4 cup measuring cup. Add enough milk to equal 1 2/3 cups. Stir to combine. add eggs, vanilla and oil. Stir to combine. Pour over dry ingredients and mix until just combined. Stir in blueberries.
4. Pour into prepared baking pan. Bake for 25 minutes. Test with toothpick to insure it has cooked in the middle. Serve with butter and syrup.

An InLinkz Link-up

Watermelon Yogurt Popsicles

If you ask any member of my family, they'll tell you I own every kitchen gadget known to man.  After recently purchasing the Instant Pot, that might be true ... almost.  Also, I suppose if you ask them, they will tell you I don't always use all of them.  A couple of years (or more) ago the wonderful associates that work for me, gave me a gift card to a local kitchen store.  Intrigued by the Zoku and knowing this was a splurge, I decided to purchase it.  Of course, like anything, I used it a lot when I first got it.  Since, then it's been sitting ready to go on a shelf in the freezer.

I'm all about having a sweet treat in the evening.  Truth is, I have a horrible sweet tooth.  The reason or at least the person I am going to blame is my Dad.  I'm guessing there's a malt shop in heaven and my Dad is the number one "soda jerk" as they used to call them.  When I was kid, every night, I'm remembering pretty much without fail, I had a dish of ice cream or a malt.  My Dad made the best malts, the kind that used the malted milk powder and lots of ice cream and syrup.  So you get the picture? You see why I have a sweet tooth!!

In an effort to try and manage the calories in those sweet treats, I dusted the ice crystals of the Zoku and made Popsicles.  If you're not familiar with how the Zoku works, you pour in the liquid and in 5 - 9 minutes, you have Popsicles.  Easy!!  The directions say you can make a second batch without refreezing but I never had very good luck with making a second batch.   These make a perfect summertime treat and a super nutritious snack kids will love to eat.

Watermelon Creamsicle Pops

1 cup watermelon chunks
1 container of greek yogurt (I used coconut)
1 T. honey
Pinch of Salt

1. In a blender, add a heaping cup of watermelon.
2. Add the yogurt, honey, and salt. Blend for another 15 seconds to mix.
3. Pour the blended mixture into the ice pop molds and freeze.
4. After filling the Zoku maker, I poured the remaining in regular freezer pops mold.

White Bean Caprese Salad

We've had interesting weather these past few months.  We had an almost nonexistent spring, felt like we went straight from chilly into a hot and humid summer, with lots of rain.  I'm not crazy about this weather but our garden sure is.  We've had the largest and best tomato crop in the five years we've been in this house.

What I wouldn't give to live somewhere we could enjoy this type of produce year round but since that's not in the cards in Nebraska, we'll make the most of what we have!  Cherry tomatoes are the best and the variety we have this year is so sweet.  You can just pop them in your mouth and eat them.   We enjoy lots of Caprese Salads. I love this take on Caprese Salad.  It's filling, easy and delicious!

White Bean Caprese Salad

Recipe Courtesy of Skinny Taste

Servings: 6

Ingredients:

• 1 (15-oz) can Great Northern (or White Kidney) beans, drained and rinsed
• 2 cups quartered cherry tomatoes
• 2 1/2 oz fresh mozzarella, cut into 1-inch cubes
• 1 garlic clove, finely minced
• 1/4 tsp kosher salt
• freshly ground black pepper
• 10 fresh basil leaves, chopped
• 2 tsp olive oil
• 2 tsp balsamic glaze

Directions:
Combine beans, tomatoes, basil, mozzarella, garlic, salt and pepper. Drizzle with olive oil and finish with balsamic glaze.

Perfect Peach Cobbler - Secret Recipe Club

August?!!  Am I the only who can't believe it's August already?  Where did this summer go?  Despite being bummed it's already August, I am thrilled to share my August Secret Recipe Club post with you!  This month I was assigned the hard working leader of the Secret Recipe Club group I belong to, Camilla, the blogger behind Culinary Adventures with Cam.  When describing herself, Camilla says "I've crammed a lot of different things into four decades: florist, waitress, SCUBA divemaster, stock photo agency manager, stroller fitness teacher, writer, editor, and au pair. I lived and worked in Rome for 13 months. That's where I learned to cook, visiting the markets, talking to farmers and fishmongers, and pestering them on how to prepare this and that."  Wow, what a fun life!!

A couple of Saturday night's ago Tim and I were driving back into the neighborhood from dinner and we noticed one of our neighbors had picked all of the peaches off their tree and set them in the driveway with a sign FREE PEACHES.  Free?  Yes, please.  What do you think of when you think peaches?  I think cobbler or jam.  Cobbler lead me to Camilla's Perfect Peach Cobbler.  

Camilla added rhubarb to her cobbler and just so happened I had a bit left in the freezer.  The peaches I used were fairly small and didn't yield as much as I would have liked, so I added a few blueberries.  I was intrigued by the use of olive oil in the topping!  After having used butter for years and taking the time to work it into the flour, I may be using olive oil from now on, so much easier!!  We really enjoyed this cobbler, a perfect way to showcase summer fruits!  Thanks, Camilla!

 
Perfect Peach Cobbler

Filling Ingredients

• 4 C sliced organic peaches
• 1 C sliced organic rhubarb
• 1 T ground cinnamon
• 1/2 C packed organic brown sugar
• 2 T flour
• 1 t ground nutmeg
• 1 T ground cinnamon
• dash of ground cardamom
• 2 T butter

Topping Ingredients

• 1 C white whole wheat flour
• 1/2 C packed organic brown sugar
• 3/4 t baking powder
• 3 to 4 T olive oil
• 1 T pure vanilla extract
• 1 egg
• 1 t ground nutmeg
• 1 T ground cinnamon
• dash of ground cardamom

Procedure

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F and butter a baking dish.

With a wooden spoon mix all of the filling ingredients until thoroughly combined and the peaches and rhubarb are all coated with the other ingredients. Spoon the filling into the prepared pan and dot with 2 T butter that's been cubed.

For the topping...stir until all the ingredients are combined. The consistency will be like a crumble top. Spoon the topping over the fruit and use a spatula to spread it over the fruit. 

Bake the cobbler for 40-50 minutes, until the topping is golden brown and the filling is bubbly. Let cool for 5 minutes before serving. Serve hot.

An InLinkz Link-up

My New Best Friend!

For the past several years, I've been debating whether or not to purchase a pressure cooker.  I would see recipe posts using a pressure cooker and say maybe I should get one?  Then I would think I have no more room in the kitchen and most recipes seemed to be ones I could make in my crock pot.

Before, I start let me say this isn't a sponsored post, just my own thoughts.  If you're an Amazon Prime member, you're familiar with the Prime Day sales from a couple of weeks ago.  One of the items on sale was the Instant Pot, prior to Prime Day, I had never seen an Instant Pot.  The Instant Pot is touted as Pressure Cooker, Slow Cooker, Rice Cooker, Yogurt Maker and more.  On Prime Day, the cooker was on sale for $69.99.  Okay so now I was thinking, if this pot really can be my rice cooker and my slow cooker, maybe I do have room for this in the kitchen??  I did some reading and everything I read was this was the best gadget since sliced bread.  I was hooked and ordered one.

Two days later when the Instant Pot arrived, Tim and I unpacked it and attempted to steam some carrots for dinner.  It was quite intimidating at first, lots of steps and buttons and in the back of my mind, all I could think of was the old pressure cookers that would blow up.  Really I don't want to have this blow up in my kitchen?!!!  Our first attempt at the steamed carrots was a bit of a bust because I didn't realize time had to be based on the cooker coming up to pressure, so 4 minutes is really 14+ minutes, allowing for the 10 or so minutes for the unit to come up to pressure.

Once I became familiar with the ins and outs of the Instant Pot, I was over the fear of it blowing up and ready to experiment with what I could make.  Ten days or so later, the Instant Pot is my new best friend.  I've made pasta and meatballs, chicken breasts for chicken curry, chicken broth from a carcass (which finishes in 30 minutes!), lentils, corn on the cob and hard boiled eggs.

Hard boiled eggs are just one of many things  Instant Pot users rave about! Thinking I would make egg salad for lunch this week, I decided to give them a try! The reviews are correct, if you've ever struggled with peeling eggs, you'll agree.  These eggs peeled perfectly and were beautifully cooked!  Yep ... I'm on the bandwagon (albeit a little late, the Instant Pot has been available for a while),  I love the Instant Pot!!!

Instant Pot Hard Boiled Eggs

Ingredients

• Eggs (as many as you like to fill the bottom of the pot rack or a steamer basket)
• 1 cup water
• Instant Pot electric pressure cooker

Instructions

1. Pour the water into the pot, and place the eggs in a steamer basket if you have one. If you don't, just use the rack that came with your pot.
2. Close the lid, set for 5 minutes at high pressure.
3. It will take the cooker approximately 5 minutes to build to pressure and then 5 minutes to cook. Let the pressure naturally reduce for an additional 5 minutes after the cooking cycle completed, and then do a quick pressure release. That's around 15 minutes, total.
4. Place the hot eggs into cool water to halt the cooking process. You can peel immediately, or wait.

Bacon Cheeseburger Pie

If you're looking for a dinner for the kiddos or the grandkids, give this one a try. I took the easy way out and used a store bought pie crust. Tastes just like a cheeseburger without the grill.

Bacon Cheeseburger Pie
Recipe Adapted from Spend with Pennies

1 uncooked pie crust (store bought or prepared)
1 pound lean ground beef
1 onion, chopped
5 slices raw bacon, chopped
⅓ cup panko bread crumbs
1 teaspoon yellow mustard
3 tablespoons barbecue sauce
1 tablespoon ketchup
2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce
½ teaspoon black pepper
2 cups shredded cheddar cheese
1 egg
¼ cup milk

Instructions

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
Brown ground beef, onion and bacon until no pink remains. Drain well. Remove from heat and stir in bread crumbs, mustard, barbecue sauce, ketchup, Worcestershire and pepper. Place mixture in prepared pie crust.
In a small bowl, combine cheese, milk and egg. Spread over meat mixture.
Cover the edges of the pie crust with foil or a pie shield to prevent over browning. Bake 15 minutes, remove foil and bake an additional 15 minutes.