Pittsburgh Girlie

Wedding Soup

I love this soup. I will order whenever I can, especially when the weather is chilly like this. Yum! I’ve only ever made it once before and I royally messed it up with way too much acini di pepe, this time I was sure to just follow the directions. Also, this time I cheated and bought frozen mini meatballs.

Ingredients:

1 12 oz bag frozen mini meatballs, thawed
1 chicken breast, thawed, cubed, cooked (I used frozen halves.)
8 C chicken broth
1 C carrots, diced or chopped (I used 4 smallish carrots because that’s what I had left.)
1 C celery, diced or chopped (Again, I cheated and bought an 8 oz container of diced celery)
1 package (8 oz. size) chopped spinach
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
Salt and pepper to taste
1/2 C romano cheese (Well, technically just under 1/2 C.)
1/4 C acini di pepe pasta (or other small pasta)

Directions:

1. Combine all ingredients, except pasta.
2. Cook on low for 8-10 hours.
3. Add pasta in the last hour.

The meat was pre-cooked so I cooked it on high for ~5 hours.

I seriously have a freezer full of this soup now. Even after giving some to my mom ’cause she was feeling sick. I’m going to be eating this for a while.

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NaBloPoMohmy Indeed

The first two weeks of NaBloPoMo exhausted pretty much all the drafts I had half-written and sitting around. I blogged about baking, cooking, food, and even my sister! I’m all tapped out right now, unless you want another food/cooking post. I think I’m overloaded with those right now though, so tough.

I’m sure I’ll have a ton more to write about after this weekend though. I’m really excited for BrewFest and the Cookie Swap.

So, since I don’t have anything else to say and I’m sure you’ve got some annoying loose change in those pockets, why don’t you head over here and put a dollar in the bucket for the kids.

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Baked Mac & Cheese

I should start out by warning you that I don’t like Mac & Cheese all that much. I’m pretty sure it was the use of Velveeta that threw me off this one. However, the word bake is in there and I get to use my trusty crock-pot.

Is Velveeta even a cheese? My argument is that it’s plastic. A really nasty plastic.

I bought a bunch of blocks of cheese that I know I like. I shredded the lot. Some I’ll use for this and the rest gets bagged and frozed.

So here goes;

Ingredients:

8 ounces macaroni, cooked and drained (6 cups cooked)
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 cups sharp processed cheese, shredded
2 tablespoons oil
1/4 cup butter, melted
13 ounces evaporated milk, canned
2 tablespoons onion, minced
1 1/2 cups milk
1 sleeve Ritz Crackers, crushed

Directions:

1. Toss cooked macaroni in 2 tablespoons oil.
2. Add all remaining ingredients. Pour into lightly greased stoneware (aka crock-pot). Stir well.
3. Cover and cook on LOW 3 to 4 hours. Stir occasionally.
4. Spread crackers over the mac n cheese for the last 10-20 minutes.

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Meal Planning: Week 1 Recap

After a week of planning out meals and cooking things I’ve realized that using the crock-pot more than once or twice a week is INSANE. In my freezer I have this and some of this plus more Wedding Soup (which I have not posted about yet) than I know what to do with.

The good things is that most of it’s frozen and I can slowly work through it without over doing it on eating the same thing over and over.

Last night I made a fancy mac n cheese. I wasn’t impressed, it was yummy, but I’m not a huge fan of mac n cheese. The Boy said I should have used Velveeta. UM NO. That’s not even cheese! He said he adds in a couple slices of American cheese too. ALSO NO. Also not cheese. I used to like mac n cheese and I think Velveeta made me sick and completely turned me off of it.

Next week I want to make lasagna and I know that I’ll add about half of it to the freezer. I’ll also be eating a lot of wedding soup, and that’s okay. I got a lot of suggestions for cooking and I’m slowly working my way through  them.

And lastly but definitely not leastly: Go Donate, please.

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Meal Planning Attempt

I have no idea if I’ll be able to keep this up. I’m going to try planning each week of meals, shop for just what we need, and hope to avoid eating out this month.The goal is to see how much money we will save. We have a tendency to get lazy and eat out. The exception to this rule is when The Kid is with us, he eats so much! We usually take him to breakfast somewhere ’cause it’s a treat on his day with dad.

In chatting with other people I’ve realized our diet in this house is probably weird. We don’t have food restrictions really, though I don’t care for pork. He’s allergic to mushrooms and some nut, that isn’t me (thank goodness)! Usually The Boyfriend cooks and it’s very bachelor style cooking, one pot, etc. I am not complaining because most times I don’t have the time or desire. Generally we have a pasta & red sauce with ground beef, pasta & alfredo sauce with chicken, rice or egg noodles & green beans or corn with ground beef, or we’ll eat out. Whatever I do end up choosing I will have to run by him because it’s no use if he won’t eat it. I’m hoping that if I can keep up with this I might branch out and try some new things. In other news he’s told me he doesn’t care about this week because he’s working. *sigh* Fine, then I’m making what I want to eat. So.There.

We’ve got lots of stuff in the freezer; chili from a couple weeks back, pot roast from last week, chicken, meatballs, etc. I’ve gotten lots of suggestions and hints from people, it’s great, and feel free to leave more for me here. I’m not a great cook, hence the “not a foodie” category. But I’m trying, very trying, whomp whomp.

I’ve been in a soup mood the last few weeks. I only just realized this today though. I have been hungry and then I don’t want to eat what’s in front of me. Picky much! Seriously I’d eat grilled cheese and tomato soup all the time if I could. (Okay, maybe not *all* the time…)

Monday:

Leftover pot roast in fridge … some kind of dinner rolls
Prep: wedding soup in crock-pot
Prep: move chili from freezer to fridge to thaw

Tuesday:

Wedding soup … not sure what to serve with this though
Prep: move ground beef from freezer to fridge

Wednesday:

Chili … cornbread muffins

Thursday:

Mac & Cheese Bake (either crock-pot or casserole style) or Tacos

Friday:

Tacos or Mac & Cheese Bake

Saturday:

Leftover Mac & Cheese/Taco Casserole

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Pot Roast – A Classic

Pot roast is sort of a fall/winter food staple. The Boy doesn’t ever seem to be quite as excited about it as I am. In fact I’m not really sure why I get all excited about it. This may have been the first thing my mom taught me how to make or maybe it was the first thing I figured out how easy it was to make. Who knows. Whatever. I make it at least once a season and I’m generally disappointed in it. The verdict is still out on this one. I don’t hate it. I’m not in love with it either. I think I’m going to have to research some more tastier recipes for this.

Ingredients:

meat (…pot roast, chuck roast, whatever you prefer. Big enough to feed you.)
3 carrots, chopped
3 celery, chopped
1 medium sweet onion, shopped (I only use sweet onion, cause well not crying.)
6-8 medium potatoes, peeled and cut up
1.5 bell peppers (cause they were left over from the chili)
4 cloves garlic
5ish cups chicken stock (enough to cover)
salt and pepper to taste (we like a lot of salt, not so much pepper)

You can add in any other spices you may like. I usually put in oregano, marjoram, etc. I cheated on the chicken broth because I forgot to buy it, so I just put in cubes. Whatever. I’m lazy.

Veggies

Cookin'

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Chili Time

The weather is starting to turn chilly and I love making stuff in the crock-pot. Mainly because The Boy claimed I would never use it. I’ll make a few things in it over the wintery months, but he generally does the cooking. I only cook when I’m feeling adventurous, and then it usually takes me 4 hours to make a 30 minute meal.

I stole and modified the recipe that Katrina has up on her blog. I went for less spicy options of chili beans in sauce and I got sweet italian sausage instead of spicy. The beer was also omitted as neither of us likes the taste. Her pictures are way better than mine, but mine did pretty much almost resemble what she made.

My cornbread muffins were only regular muffin shapes as I don’t have the fancy shaped muffin pans. And I’m okay with that because nothing more can possibly fit in my kitchen anyway.

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