Fried Dough (Pizza Frita)

Our cooking club theme this month was “Recipes from your Grandmother”. I decided to tackle a brand new recipe, my grandmother’s fried dough. This is not your typically local fair fried dough which is often flat, and perhaps even topped with tomato sauce. These are sticks of slightly sweetened bread dough, which you must dip in cinnamon and sugar.

It’s never easy to work with yeast, but I was happy that the dough rose fairly well. The dough was a little sticky as I tried to shape it, but I did my best, and dropped them into a pan filled with about 1″ of oil. Because I wasn’t using a true deep fryer, they got flat on the bottom, but that’s OK.

These were great fresh out of the pan, but almost stale 12 hours later so you need to serve them right away. If you’re having a party and decide to give them a try, this shouldn’t be a problem.

Pizza Frita

1 1/2 T oil, plus more for frying
1 T sugar
2 egg, beaten
3/4 c. milk
1 package yeast, dissolved in 2 T warm water
3-4 c. flour
1/2 c. raisins

Mix oil, sugar, eggs, and milk in a medium bowl. Add yeast, and 1 cup flour, and beat until smooth. Add another 2 c. flour and raisins, and mix and knead until smooth. Add more flour as necessary if dough is too sticky.

Let rise in a warm place for 1 hour, or until doubled. Shape into sticks, and fry in deep oil.

Pork Chops with Apples and Onions

My return to cooking started with a sale on pork chops. With apples in season, I decided to make Martha Stewart’s Pork Chops with Apples and Onions. You sear the pork chops first, and then saute a mixture of apples and onions. I stirred in some white wine, and then returned the pork chops to the pan to finish cooking.

Pork chops can dry out so easily, but this recipe helps prevent that. The dish also offered a nice blend of savory and sweet. I served the pork with sauteed spinach and whole wheat pasta. It was a delicious fall meal, and also made great leftovers. But just one tip: bring a steak knife in your lunch bag!

Goodbye Summer, Hello Fall

This blogging lapse was truly a cooking lapse. I am lucky to have a family that kept giving me food like homemade tomato sauce and green beans from the garden. When that ran out, I cobbled together meals with scrambled eggs, frozen veggie burgers, baked potatoes, and Greek yogurt.

So while I don’t have any new recipes to share with you today, I can share some ~~old~~ classic recipes. First, in what I am calling a “goodbye to summer” my Mom roasted red and yellow peppers and used them to wrap fresh mozzarella. I’ve documented the best method for roasting peppers already, so fire up the grill and get going.

Once the peppers are roasted and sliced, season them with a bit of salt and pepper, then wrap the balls of mozzarella and secure with a toothpick. Drizzle them with balsamic vinegar and fresh basil, and you’ve got yourself a delicious appetizer.

But we can’t deny that fall is in the air, and apple season has arrived. I’ve shared this Apple Cake recipe with countless friends, and just about everyone loves it. A friend of mine took the recipe and made cupcakes, and even added some buttercream frosting to take things up a notch.

Most of the ingredients in the recipe are pantry staples, so you can go apple picking all day and enjoy this cake (or cupcakes!) by the evening.

Enjoy! I’ll be back with new recipes soon, promise!

Chickpea, Spinach, and Delicata Squash with Gnocchi

My sister went to the Farmer’s Market, picked up a few delicata squash, and gave one to me. She had no idea what would happen next….

It all began with this recipe from Eating Well, one of my favorite sites. I started by pouring balsamic vinegar in a saucepan, to make the balsamic reduction for a garnish. Meanwhile, my Mom had leftover mashed potatoes in the freezer, so we decided to make our own gnocchi. It’s pretty simple with just potato, egg, and flour, except the dough required about twice as much flour as usual. With flour just about everywhere and dough on our hands, we smelled something burning, and realized the balsamic was in fact reduced to a smoking mess on bottom of the saucepan.

Things got a little easier from there. I took out a big frying pan, and sauteed the sliced delicata squash with onion and garlic. Then I added vegetable broth and covered the pan until the squash was softened. I added the gnocchi, spinach, chickpeas, and some sliced tomato, and cooked it until everything was done. We had a little balsamic left for drizzling, and some Parmesan cheese for the top. Finally, dinner was served.

Putting all the mess aside, this actually turned out really well! Things were so hectic that I didn’t do a lot of measuring and timing, but I would still suggest the recipe. But maybe you should just buy the gnocchi….

Banana Split Bars (Nut Free, Egg Free)

Even if you’re not in the “back to school crowd”, September still presents an opportunity for a new start. New starts require new snacks, right? These Banana Split Bars were featured on Skinnytaste; with just a few changes, we made them nut free and egg free, so everyone in the family can dig in.

These bars are much softer than a traditional granola bar, but are still great as an afternoon snack. They would also be good crumbled over plain yogurt for breakfast. The original recipe indicates they can be frozen, but I have a feeling that won’t be necessary for this batch.

Banana Split Bars (Nut Free, Egg Free)

1/3 c. quinoa
1/2 c. water
2 c. quick rolled oats
1 t cinnamon
1/2 t baking soda
1 1/2 c. ripe mashed banana
1 “flax egg” (1 T ground flax+3 T water mixed well and refrigerated for 10 min)
1/4 c. honey
1 T canola oil
2 t vanilla
1/2 c. dried cranberries, soaked in hot water for 10 minutes and drained
1/3 c. mini-chocolate chips

Combine quinoa and water in a saucepan. Bring to a boil, cover, reduce heat, and simmer for 10 minutes. Remove from heat, and keep covered for 5 minutes. Remove lid, fluff with a fork, and place in a bowl in the refrigerator until completely cool.

Mix oats, cinnamon, and baking soda in a large bowl. In another large bowl, mix cooled quinoa, banana, “flax egg”, honey, oil, and vanilla. Add banana mixture to oats mixture, and stir just until blended. Stir in cranberries and chocolate chips.

Prepare a 13×9″ pan by placing foil or parchment paper in a criss-cross fashion. Coat with cooking spray. Spread batter evenly in pan.

Bake at 325F for 30-35 minutes. Remove from pan using the foil or parchment paper, and cool for 30 minutes on a wire rack. Place in the refrigerator, and slice when completely cooled.

-Lightly adapted from Skinnytaste

Firetruck Birthday Cake

I haven’t been cooking (and blogging) as much lately, but of course, birthday parties are special. For my younger nephew’s 2nd birthday, the cake team assembled again to make this firetruck. It was a much smaller project than the Great Train Cake, but still gave us a challenge. We got most of our inspiration from this video which really takes you through the process step by step.

While I have a great egg free recipe for chocolate cake, we have not found the best recipe for yellow cake yet. My Mom ended up making two cakes from different recipes. The first was this recipe from the UK version of the Food Network. The batter was much too thick so my Mom added some milk, but the cake was still a little dry. Then she made a marble cake from a box mix, using egg replacer. That one was very crumbly. In the end, we salvaged what we could to make the firetruck, but we’re still on the lookout for the best egg free cake recipe.

The video shows you how to slice and stack the cakes to make the shape of the firetruck. Two things really helped us out here; using generous amounts of frosting, and putting the cake in the freezer a few times to help the frosting harden. The frosting is just a basic butter/powdered sugar/milk mixture, tinted with all the red food coloring we could find. The decorations included a pretzel ladder, gum drop lights, Oreo wheels, Hershey’s miniatures as windows, and a licorice fire hose.

When my nephew saw the cake, he immediately made noises like a siren, so I do think he got the idea. Finally, the time came where he got to blow out the candle and actually eat some cake. I think our firetruck cake was a success.

Summer Vegetable Tian

The pop tarts were fun to make and eat, but my favorite recipe from last weekend was this Summer Vegetable Tian from Budget Bytes. It has all the best ingredients like zucchini, tomatoes, and cheese. It also has a pretty presentation, worthy of an elegant summer dinner party.

You start with a mixture of sauteed onions and garlic in the bottom of the dish. Then you slice all the vegetables thinly, and layer them in the dish standing up. We used fresh basil instead of thyme, which gave this dish a bit of Italian flair.

The dish is covered tightly with foil, which steams the vegetables in the oven. Then you add the cheese (we used a blend of mozzarella, provolone, and Parmesan), and bake the dish for a while longer. When it’s finally done, you have this beautiful tian. Everyone loved it, and it will be on the table again very soon!

Pop Tarts

I had bookmarked this homemade pop tart recipe from Smitten Kitchen two years ago, but never got around to making it. If I am going to bake something sweet for breakfast, I would rather make something like a muffin or scone. Plus, I am not that great with a rolling pin. But then my mom saw the recipe, and she is good with a rolling pin, and we had all the ingredients on hand. It was fate.

We followed the recipe from Smitten Kitchen very closely, but substituted 1 cup of whole wheat pastry flour for the all purpose flour. (Sorry to report, that does not make these a ‘healthy’ breakfast!) We made half of them with a cinnamon and sugar filling and half of them with a jam filling made from both blueberry and strawberry preserves.

Since it was a hot and humid summer morning, we had to put the dough in the freezer fairly frequently. Every time it got too soft to work with, we tossed the dough, dough mat, and all right into the freezer for about 15 minutes, and then started again. In other words, the next time we try this recipe will be in January!

The pastries came out of the oven lightly brown, with a tender and flaky crust. Is it possible for a pastry crust to be too flaky? Because these came close. I may look for other variations of the recipe which would be a little sturdier. Both the cinnamon and jam fillings were delicious, but someone suggested a Nutella filling which I think we have to try. And my sister suggested we work on an icing. While we’re not anywhere near to putting Kellogg’s out of business, this was a really fun project with a delicious end result.

One Pot Fettuccine

You may have seen the One-Pot Spaghetti recipe and pictures on Facebook, Pinterest, and various blogs. I’m not sure of the true origin, although many roads lead to Martha Stewart. I’ve seen a lot of references, but I chose the Italian Wonderpot recipe from Budget Bytes to guide me.

Most of the ingredients are pantry staples, and you can assemble the pot within just a few minutes. Some versions include red pepper flakes for a little extra heat. I kept thing simple with minced garlic and Penzey’s Pasta Sprinkle.

Although this doesn’t have the complexity of a gourmet pasta dish, it has a good taste and works well as an easy meal. There’s plenty leftover for lunches too. Double win!

One Pot Fettuccine

2 c. vegetable broth
2 c. water
1 (12 oz.) package whole wheat fettuccine
1 (28 oz.) can diced tomatoes in juice
1 onion, chopped
1 (8 oz.) package sliced mushrooms
1 (16 oz.) package frozen spinach
2 t minced garlic
1 T Penzey’s Pasta Sprinkle, or Italian seasoning

Place ingredients in a large pot, in the order written. Make sure that ingredients are covered by liquid. Cover pot, and bring to a rapid boil. Remove cover, and boil for 12-15 minutes, stirring every few minutes, until most of the liquid is absorbed. Garnish with freshly grated Parmesan cheese.

Eggplant, White Bean, and Basil Dip

Dips are the ultimate convenience food; you don’t even need utensils. This one inspired by the Food Network goes well with cucumber slices or chips, and it’s hearty enough that you might forget about cooking dinner altogether.

You can make this spicy with an extra shake of cayenne, or add more basil and lemon for a sharper flavor. Everyone around the (large) table seemed to like this dip, including the 3 year old. That’s success!

Eggplant, White Bean, and Basil Dip

1 large eggplant, peeled, and cut into 1″ chunks
Olive oil (1/4 c. plus more for drizzling)
1 can white beans, rinsed and drained
1/4 c. packed fresh basil leaves
Juice of 1 lemon
2 t minced garlic
Dash cayenne pepper

Place eggplant on a cookie sheet, drizzle with olive oil, and roast at 400F for 20-30 minutes. Allow to cool.

In a food processor, blend eggplant, 1/4 c. olive oil, beans, basil, lemon juice, and garlic. Season to taste with salt, pepper, and a dash of cayenne.