Quiche

Julia Child's book has a great section on Quiche. I have made a variation of the basic recipe 4 or 5 times now. I made two different versions on Sunday to take over to Uncle Richie's birthday brunch. One was Jalapeno, Sweet Red Pepper, Homemade Sausage and Cheddar and the other was Baby Zucchini, Jarlsberg cheese and Homemade Sausage. (Sorry no pictures, there was an Incident Regarding The Number Of Eggs In The House which took up all my photo taking time. You can blame Chris :P) The Jalapeno version was SO good. We will definitely be making that one again.

I had some left over pie dough from Sunday so last night for dinner we made little quiche cups. I cut dough rounds to fit the bottom of my ramekins, pricked them with a fork and baked them in the ramekins for about 7 or 8 minutes. We added crispy bacon bits on top of that and pressed them into the crust (Julia suggests doing it this way). Then we added the egg mixture on top (eggs, cream, milk, salt, pepper, nutmeg) which had some Jarlsberg and sweet yellow and orange peppers. They baked for about 25 minutes. I did forget to dot the tops with butter the way Julia says to (which in all honesty might not be necessary but it sure does make it taste goooood). They came out great. It was a quick and delicious dinner for Chris and me. We made six and each ate two.

I really recommend making a quiche using Julia's recipe. Especially if you have friends coming over for brunch. You can put it in the oven and let it bake and serve it with some toast or bagels, maybe a pastry or two and you don't have to stand over the stove cooking while your company waits for you (because really you can't cook eggs early, they get cold and gross or dried out and gross if you try to keep them hot). You really can put whatever you think sounds good in there too. My only tip would be that if you are going to use something that is a little wet (like my shredded baby zucchini), you want to dry it out or drain it in a paper towel before adding it, or your egg mixture might become too watery. MMMmmmMMM! Yum!

Who Needs McDonalds?

You may already know that Mom got us a KA mixer for Christmas this year. Chris' company gave him a $50.00 Amex gift card for Christmas. KA mixer + $50.00 =

YAY! We got the food grinder! We have been so excited at the prospect of making our own sausages that its not even funny. We decided to grind up a roast beef that we had in the freezer to make some hamburgers. I have to say, the grinder is quite disgusting. The meat looks really gross coming out and every once in a while it spits meat juice across the kitchen (or in my case, right onto my face). Luckily, I could get over it enough to really enjoy the process. Here is the final ground up meat:

So into the mixer it goes with all of Chris' special burger making stuff (I really don't know what he puts in there or I would tell you)

I know there are sauteed garlic and onions in there.

MMMmmmMMM! That is damn good! We even bought Ore Ida 'fast food fries' that go in the oven. They were pretty good!

Wanna bite?

Holiday Cookies!

(NOTE: BIGGER slideshow on dannyburbol.com)

We're going to a cookie exchange party, so we baked lots of surgar and peanutbutter holiday cookies!

Our Favs are:

• #7: that G-Bread man got hit in the head by a peanut butter cup flining ninja!
  
• #8: just simple and classic
  
• #13: cute star!
  
• #14: Tiff was going for height!
  be sure to check out #19 :)
  
• #15: Yeah Baby!
  
• #19: of course, this one is our top pick :)
  

Stuffed Pork Loin

Mom came over for dinner. Chris decided to make stuffed pork loin. We have made this before and it is so easy and yummy.

First take your pork loin and cut it so that it is flat. You kind of have to go in a reverse spiral.

Next season with salt and pepper and place your fillings on. We used fresh mozzarella, fresh basil and roasted red peppers.

Roll it up and bake in a 350° oven for 45 min to 1 hr. We use our stoneware bread pan because it helps keep the shape without skewers. We served it with butternut squash puree and roasted potatoes.

Beef Provencale

When I was a kid, my mom was always getting these 'join our recipe club!' packages in the mail. With the invitations they would include a sample of the recipe cards. Mom never joined the clubs, but always kept the free cards. I have mostly inherited these cards since Mom doesn't really cook that much anymore. This recipe was from one of these sets. The set is called 'Simply Delicious'.

We decided to make this recipe during Thanksgiving week, since Chris and I both had off. We were going to go out on a 'date' but decided that we would probably have more fun and have better food if we just stayed home and cooked together. We also spent about half of what we would have for dinner.

The recipe is easy, but a little pricey. You take a beef tenderloin (go to the butcher, not the supermarket!), brown it in some butter on all sides and season with salt and pepper. Cover and let it cook over low heat for about 10 minutes. Remove it from the pan, cover it with foil and let it rest for about 30 minutes. Slice it into 1/2 inches slices, put it in a dish and spread with some garlic butter (6 Tbl softened butter, 2 cloves minced garlic, 3 Tbls finely chopped flat leaf parsley, mix together until smooth) and put into a 425° oven for 8 minutes.

Now you may notice the potatoes in the picture above. You should ignore them. They were part of the recipe that was annoying and should have been called 'Simply Bland'. I would serve this with a good gratin or mashed potato and some steamed veggies.

Now, this dinner (minus potatoes) was delicious. This is a very, very good cut of meat (1 1/2 lbs filet tenderloin cost us $35.00). It was tender and practically melted in your mouth.

The next day we decided to make lunch with the leftovers. Now dinner was good. We had fun making it. What Chris did with the leftovers was just simply the best sandwich I have ever eaten in my whole life.


He cut up the beef, mixed it with the garlic butter and basically made a grilled muenster cheese and beef sandwich out of it. The kicker? He toasted garlic in the pan before adding the bread. I know it sounds so simple but really it could not have been better. There was not one thing that either of us said 'oh next time we should....'

Yum!

Chicken Soup - Grandma Katie Style

Growing up, Mom always made chicken soup. She says the smell reminds her of her Grandma Katie. I don't remember Grandma Katie, so the smell of chicken soup reminds me of Mom. I feel like I've known how to make this my whole life. I remember watching Mom boil the chicken and then letting it cool overnight, skimming the fat, cleaning the chicken off the bones and then heating everything up again.

Recently, Chris and I made Roasted Chicken. I decided (before we even cooked it) that we would make chicken soup out of the leftovers. So on Thursday night, after work, we set out to make chicken soup. A lot of the work was done for us already. I had saved the gibblies from the chicken, along with the juice that collected in the bottom of my roasting pan, the bones of the chicken and some of the pieces that we didn't eat (wings, some breast meat).


First, we started a pot with water and the juices that were saved, which I skimmed the fat off of before adding to the pot. I cleaned all of the meat that I could off of the bones, separating the good meat, the bones and the sinew. The sinew goes in the trash, the meat goes in the pot and the bones get tied up in cheese cloth and then go in the pot. Gibblies get tied up in a separate cheesecloth and thrown in too.

We added about a half of a large bag of baby carrots, an entire package of celery, chopped, and an onion, also choppped.

Next are the spices. We added some oregano, thyme, sage, salt, pepper and 6 cloves of garlic, minced. I used these spices because that was what I made my chicken rub with.


We simmered it for about an hour, until the veggies were tender and the gibblies were cooked through. Just lift out the cheesecloth bundles, let them drain, and throw them out.

I don't like to put rice or pasta into my soup and let it sit there. I like it much better if you make the rice or pasta separately and then add it to each individual bowl before adding the soup. That way it doesn't break down too much and get soggy. We made rice this time.

We served the soup with a crusty bread and some apple cider (thanks for the idea, Vina!).

It was so delicious. Perfect for a cool night and worth the time we put into it on a work night (we didn't get to eat until almost 9pm since I got home from work around 7:30ish).

The best part was lunch on Friday. If possible (Chris and I agree 100% that it is), it was even better the next day.

Our pot was big enough for us to make dinner, lunch the next day and put a huge container in the freezer for another day.

Renée's Roasted Chicken and Potatoes

Whole chicken was on sale and I was sick so I decided to make a roasted chicken and then turn the leftovers into chicken soup. This is the roasted chicken part of the plan. Unfortunately, my camera battery was dead from the French Toast Experiment so there are not too many pictures for you here. I will narrate to the best of my storytelling abilities.

First you unwrap your lovely lady (the chicken, not your girlfriend) and give her a lukewarm shower in the sink (make sure your sink is clean on the bottom). Rinse out all cavities and crevices, also remove the bag that has the gibblies in it and put it in the fridge for later use in chicken soup making. (I call them gibblies, you got a problem with that?)

Now this part is a little bit hard but you can do it. Put your girl on a cutting board and get a small, sharp knife. Starting by the neck end, you are going to pull the skin up in one solid piece, cutting underneath at the stringy parts that make it stick to the chicken until you have a big skin flap that you can see the whole naked lady under (if you are really good you should be able to get the legs uncovered too, but that takes practice and if you can't do it the first time, its ok). Do not cut it completely free of the chicken! it should still be attached at the opposite side.

Now wash your hands. If you are smart you have made your spice rub ahead of time and can just start applying, but I always forget and have to make it after the de-skinning step. I just mix whatever I feel like in a little bowl. This time I used about a tablespoon of each of the following: sea salt, pepper, thyme, oregano, rosemary and sage. Mix them together well.

If you want at this step you can use your meat tenderizer or a fork to poke some holes in your chicken. I recommend NOT going through the skin, but hold it up instead and work underneath it.

Now the fun part. You are going to give your lovely chicky a nice rub down. Get some of that yummy spice rub and rub it under the skin of the chicken. Make a nice coating under there. Now you are going to stretch the skin back in place (don't worry it will stay). If you have left over spice rub, put it on the outside of the skin.

I baked my chicken in a clay baker (with lid on!) at 350° for 20 min/lb. You will be tempted to take the lid off and look - DON'T! Just let it bake and all the juices and steam will collect on the bottom. After its done you can take the lid off for a few minutes and let the skin get crispy if you want to. You want to keep that juice and bones and leftover meat for the chicken soup.

On to potatoes!

This part is super easy. Wash and quarter about 2lbs of baby potatoes (I prefer red, but white is good too, this time I used both). Put them in a large bowl, season with salt and pepper and sprinkle on some dried rosemary. Enough so that every potato will get some. Add about 1/4c of Olive Oil and toss until evenly coated. Then turn out onto a baking sheet.
Make sure that one of the cut sides is facing down. Bake at 400° for about 35-45 min. (If you want you can bake them with the chicken at 350°, but they will take around an hour or so)

Sorry for the bad plate picture but the lighting was bad and the flash reflected off the plate and then the camera died and I was hungry and didn't want to wait until it charged to eat. Yum! Perfect moist chicken and yummy crisp but tender potatoes. Don't mind the icky pile of green stuff. That was our adventure in frozen artichoke hearts. All I can say is, 'DON'T.'