Category: Food

Roast Your Own Pumpkin Seeds

Leave a Comment on Roast Your Own Pumpkin Seeds
Roast Your Own Pumpkin Seeds

One of my favorite memories of fall is scooping out the insides of pumpkins, cleaning the seeds, roasting them and enjoying the salty, crunchy treat. While we don’t often do this anymore, I started wondering why.

Pumpkin seeds are one of those healthy treats that fill you up quickly. You can use the rest of the pumpkin for other recipes from scratch as well, or simply carve out the pumpkin and turn it into a fun jack-o-lantern to grace your porch.

If you’ve been looking for a new fall tradition to start with your family, give this one a try.

Print
Roast Your Own Pumpkin Seeds
Author: Crabby Housewife
Ingredients
  • 1 large ripe pumpkin
  • Knife to cut top off
  • Large spoon to scoop inside out
  • Colander
  • Olive oil
  • Salt
  • Water
  • Sheet of parchment paper
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit
  2. Cut the top off the pumpkin, where the stem is.
  3. Scoop out insides with a big spoon. Metal seems to work best.
  4. Place the guts inside a colander and run water over it until the seeds are free of the pulp. I find that a mesh strainer works best for this.
  5. Set a pot of water to boil on the stove with about four cups of water. *Note below
  6. Add 2-3 Tablespoons of salt.
  7. Bring to a boil and then reduce to a simmer for about 8-10 minutes.
  8. Drain the water from the seeds
  9. Toss the seeds in about 1 Tablespoon of olive oil (can sub Canola, which I think tastes better).
  10. Place parchment paper on a large baking sheet and spread the seeds out in a single layer.
  11. Salt the seeds and place on upper rack.
  12. Bake for about 8-10 minutes or until seeds turn a golden brown.
  13. Allow to cool completely.
Recipe Notes

*If you have more than about a cup of pumpkin seeds, you'll want to use more water and salt when boiling and more salt when roasting.

 

Facebooktwitterredditpinterestlinkedinmail

Old Fashioned Scones Recipe

Leave a Comment on Old Fashioned Scones Recipe
Old Fashioned Scones Recipe

When I was about 12, I decided that every woman needed to know how to bake. Don’t ask me why this thought entered my head. Perhaps I was inspired by Nancy Drew’s Hannah, but more than likely I read about scones in some romance novel. Whatever the reason, I set out to learn how to bake scones from scratch.

Throughout my preteen years, I refined and reworked a recipe I’d found in a very old book my great-grandmother had owned. Over time, I perfected the art of making scones. Even though I don’t make them often any more, the process is ingrained in me and is almost muscle memory at this point.

These scones are absolutely perfect if you’re having a few friends over and want a small but substantial treat to feed them. They go perfect with sweet wine and cheese.

Note that most people make scones more like a biscuit, but I prefer them to be very very small. Use a shooter glass or small round cookie cutter to cut these out and they’ll be the size I make. You can also try to make them larger, but you may need to adjust cooking time.

Print
Old Fashioned Scones Recipe
Author: Crabby Housewife
Ingredients
  • 5 cups of all purpose flour
  • 2 1/2 Tablespoons of baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1 stick 8 tablespoons cold butter cut into pats and pats cut into fourths
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 1/2 teaspoon sugar
  • 1 1/3 cups milk
  • 2 Tablespoons butter
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.
  2. Combine flour, salt and baking powder. Sift together until fully mixed.
  3. Make a small hollow in the center of the flour mixture. Pour in milk.
  4. Get your hands into it and mix completely. You may need to add more milk.
  5. Turn the dough out onto a floured cutting board and knead for a few minutes until the dough is smooth.
  6. Roll out dough to about one inch thick and cut into small circles.
  7. Place the circles on parchment paper
  8. Bake for 12 minutes or until golden brown.
  9. Remove from oven and immediately brush with melted butter (2 Tablespoons)
  10. Sprinkle with sugar. You can also add some ground cinnamon if you prefer.
  11. Best served warm.

 

Facebooktwitterredditpinterestlinkedinmail

Perfect Fall Dinner Recipe Roundup

Leave a Comment on Perfect Fall Dinner Recipe Roundup
Perfect Fall Dinner Recipe Roundup

With fall finally in the air, you’re probably craving some delicious autumn comfort foods. Here are my favorite recipes I’ve tried recently. Put together, they make the perfect fall dinner. Enjoy!

Potato Soup

Fall is the perfect time for a warming bowl of soup. This potato soup recipe from the Budget Savvy Diva is absolutely delicious. It is very similar to O’Charley’s. She suggests serving in bread bowls, but I like it with the hatch chile cheesebread recipe below.

Hatch Chile Cheese Bread

My friend Marye Audet recently posted a recipe over at Restless Chipotle that I am in love with. This is a very unique type of bread but one I think you’ll be as addicted to as I am. It is also great for sandwiches, so if you’d like to make sandwiches to go with your soup, this bread is your go-to.

Marye has lots of tips for making great bread and has even written a complete book about it. The only drawback to this bread is that hatch chiles have a short season. If you must, you can sub in a different type of chile and Marye has some suggestions, but try your best to use what the recipe calls for. You won’t regret it.

Cinnamon Roasted Butternut Squash

Squash is in season. This recipe for roasted butternut squash is perfect as a side dish or even on its own. The cinnamon lends an air of fall to the food.

Chew Out Loud offers tons of tips for the best way to cook the squash, how to not overcook it, and then offers some additional fall recipes you’ll want to check out.

Pumpkin Snickerdoodles

If you love snickerdoodles, then you’ll adore these snickerdoodle style cookies with pumpkin and white chocolate. They are chewy and each bite gives a burst of fall flavor that will have people raving about this simple dessert.

The recipe is from Sally’s Baking Addiction. You’ll want to stock up on cinnamon sugar (or make you own) before baking these tasty treats.

If you put this dinner on the table, I promise that your family will gobble it up – especially the cookies.

Facebooktwitterredditpinterestlinkedinmail

Cheap Pork Loin and BBQ

Leave a Comment on Cheap Pork Loin and BBQ
Cheap Pork Loin and BBQ

Dear readers,

Just a very quick note today. Kroger (at least in my area) has pork chops and loin on sale this week. I managed to snag a HUGE pork loin that was normally almost $20 for only $7.50.

There are so many different things you could do with these huge pork loins.

  1. Go ahead and slice into thick wedges and bake as you need.
  2. Split in half and cook half for dinner and half for BBQ.

I meant to split mine in half, since most nights it is just my husband and I. Our oldest daughter is away at college and our youngest is busy with classes and work (she’s staying home and going to school). However, I forgot, so here is my plan:

Night # 1

Slow cook the pork loin in my Pampered Chef Deep Dish Baker. I will salt and pepper it, but that is about all I’ll do. I want to keep it fairly simple, because I want to utilize the leftovers rather than wasting a huge portion of this big pork loin.

Night # 2

I’ll slice up some of the tenderloin into smaller pieces and serve on a bed of homemade cabbage. I actually have a recipe I plan to create and which I will share if it is as tasty as I think it will be.

We recently visited Jamaica and they created this amazing chicken, rice and beans, and Jamaican cole slaw for us at lunch one day. I plan to recreate this meal, only with pork. I’ll keep you posted on how it turns out.

Night # 3

I’m going to shred any remaining pork and turn it into BBQ. Leftover slaw can be placed on top and the whole thing served with or without buns (for low carbers in our house).

So, this one pork loin is going to give us at least three meals, but I suspect we’ll have a ton of BBQ left that I can freeze and use for meals at other times. Also, I almost always have enough food left for our lunches the next day.

For $7.50, this was a great deal. Go ahead and go pick one up at your local store. You can freeze it and unthaw when you’re ready to use it.

Here are some of the best recipes for pork tenderloin I’ve come across recently:

Facebooktwitterredditpinterestlinkedinmail

Packaged At Home Pizza Experiment

Leave a Comment on Packaged At Home Pizza Experiment
Packaged At Home Pizza Experiment

So, you might remember a week or two ago that I said I was going to start experimenting with making my own pizza at home. I have not found one pizza place in southern Indiana that I love – well, I did, but they went out of business.

While my ultimate goal is to come up with a recipe for homemade crust, sauce, and cheese mixture, today was Friday and I’ve not had time to gather the ingredients.

I knew I wanted to experiment with making it at home, but would have to buy some packaged crust mix and sauce. I popped into Kroger and picked up a jar of their store brand sauce for $0.89 and their pizza crust mix for $0.59 (with a Kroger Plus Card).

So, I am always trying out things like this and trying to ramp up the flavor by adding to the mixes, etc. Here is what I did:

Pizza Crust

I mixed the crust as directed, and preheated the oven to 475 degrees Fahrenheit. The package said to let rise for 5 minutes, but I let it rise 15, because I like a lighter crust.

The package said to coat with oil, so I took olive oil, garlic powder and oregano and used that to coat the crust.

I then spread the pizza crust out on parchment paper and used my hands to stretch it as thin as possible but left a little bubble of crust on the edges.

Finally, I nuked 1 Tablespoon of butter with 1 crushed clove of garlic and brushed that over the entire surface of the crust for some added flavor. Next time, I think I’m going to use powdered garlic as it has a stronger flavor.

Sauce

I used the sauce as it was after tasting it. For $0.89, I was pretty impressed. It had a good flavor without being overwhelming.

I do think using homemade sauce would take the pizza to the next level, but this night was about homemade pizza in a flash.

Toppings

I used what I had on hand, which was:

  • Pork sausage
  • Pepperoni
  • Onions
  • Mushrooms (actually borrowed these from my parents)

I browned the sausage and onions together along with three cloves of garlic for flavoring. I crushed them a bit but left them whole so I could pick them back out easily.

I then added the pepperonis and mushrooms to warm them slightly.

I spread all this on top of the sauce and then added some dry Parmesan cheese.

Finally, I placed bits of torn up Provolone all around the pizza and topped the entire thing with shredded Mozzarella.

Back and Bottom Cooking

One trick to getting great crust for an at-home pizza is to put the pizza on the bottom rack and toward the back (rotate once halfway through). I was glad to see the instructions on the Kroger pizza crust mix called for this technique.

I’m going to be experimenting with some different techniques to get the crust just so.

Cost Comparison

So, this made a huge pizza. I’d say close to an XL from Papa John’s as a comparison. So, I went over to the Papa John’s website and I put in the same toppings for an XL, a three-cheese blend and extra cheese. The sample pizza in their little app looks surprisinging like the one I made.

Their cost? $25.49 (plus I’d have to pay tax here in Indiana for purchasing food from a restaurant, but I don’t pay tax for groceries I buy from the store).

Now, I’m going to assume I could find a coupon and get this pizza for around $20.00. I can almost always find a coupon when ordering pizza.

Just to compare, here is what I used for my pizza and the cost of each item:

  • Kroger pizza crust mix – 2 packages at $0.59 each = $1.18
  • Kroger pizza sauce – $0.89, but I only used half the jar, so going to count as = $0.45
  • Pepperoni – I paid $2.99 for the package of pepperoni I had here. I used half of it. = $1.50
  • Sausage – I paid $2.50 for Kroger brand mild pork sausage. used half. = $1.25
  • Onion – I had a bag here but don’t remember what I paid. I’m going to guess for the half onion I used. = $0.25
  • Mushrooms – My dad brought these over because I was out. I’m going to allow the amount for full price on this item, but you can probably get it much cheaper than this if you shop sales and stock up. = $0.75
  • Parmesan cheese – I had this on hand, too, and only used a very small amount. The entire jar was $2.00 after coupons, so = $0.25
  • Provolone cheese – I used two slices out of a package of Kroger brand sliced provolone. I paid $1.99 when the cheese was on sale. It has 8 slices total. = $0.50
  • Mozzarella cheese – I used half the package of shredded Moz, which I paid $1.99 for as well (Kroger brand). = $1.00Total cost = $7.13

So, it is less than half the take out pizza. Plus, we had two huge slices left that I took over to my parents, but we could have used for leftovers if we’d wanted to.

My Verdict

Overall, this pizza turned out really tasty and filling. We enjoyed it and it was definitely better than any place around here where you can buy a pizza.

It was very filling. I was stuffed after one slice, but ate two. I think it was because I added way more toppings than the typical chain does.

The crust didn’t have a ton of flavor, but tweaking it helped. It was still better than the chain restaurant pizzas, though, and very easy to make.

I don’t think it would have heated up very well the next day, which is why I decided to share it instead of keeping it. You can just kind of tell when a pizza will be tasty cold or reheated and when it won’t.

Stay tuned. I’ll be experimenting with making my own crust next time.

 

Facebooktwitterredditpinterestlinkedinmail