Fresh Blueberry Fuffins

When she was a toddler... my daughter called muffins "fuffins". Happiness is a warm home-made muffin with eggs, bacon and French roast coffee on a winter weekend. Or any weekend. The only problem is, home-made "fuffin" recipes almost always turn out a little too tough and too flour-y for my taste. Give me a wonderful store-bought muffin any day over those! But this recipe is different. I think my sister Sarah first found these... they melt in your mouth! And so easy to whip up for a lazy weekend breakfast! From "San Francisco A La Carte Junior League Cookbook" Yield: 12 muffins 

Ingredients:

1 1/2 C flour--unsifted
2 t baking powder
1/2 t salt
1/2 C sugar
1 egg, lightly beaten
1/2 C milk
4 T melted butter
1C fresh or frozen blueberries (frozen works really well!)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Sift together flour, baking powder, salt, sugar into mixing bowl.
In separate bowl or in a liquid measuring cup, measure and thoroughly combine milk, egg and butter. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and pour in milk mixture, stirring with a fork until just moistened. Fold in berries, folding no more than 5 times (otherwise you will have blue muffins). Spoon into 8 buttered muffin tins all the way full. Bake 20 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean. Serve warm or cool. May be frozen and microwaved for 30 seconds any day!

Company's Coming Mashed Potatoes

The "For Goodness Taste" cookbook of the Junior League of Rochester NY says," This special potato dish can be refrigerated for 4-5 days and baked as needed or cooked all at once and reheated for delicious leftovers." A great side dish...this goes with any meat or poultry (see Earthquake Steak or Pork Medallions with Kalamata Olives and Capers). I believe anything that can be made ahead a couple of days is a blessing to the (harried) cook.

Snobby-Sounding Note: This is wonderful with Julia Child's Boeuf Bourguignon or Coq Au Vin featured in the classic cookbook "Mastering the Art of French Cooking".

Ingredients:

5 lbs medium potatoes
1 pkg. (8 oz.) cream cheese, softened
2 C sour cream
1/2 C (1 stick) butter
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
Paprika (optional) and/or chopped chives

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Scrub, peel, and boil potatoes until tender. Beat cream cheese and sour cream together with butter (anything with all of these HAS to be good). Add potatoes and smash until semi-smooth. Stir in salt and pepper. Pour into a well-oiled 2-qt. casserole. If you choose, you can sprinkle the top with paprika or some chopped chives for color. Potatoes can be warmed in the oven, refrigerated or frozen at this point. Bake (defrosted) 30 minutes before you serve, 8-10 servings. If you love garlic and can't do without it, add a couple of tablespoons minced garlic, be sure and sauté it in butter first and mix it in just before baking the casserole.

Herbed Spinach/Rice Casserole for a Buffet

Growing up, I remember Mom having lots of dinner parties. About one a month. She would be sitting at one end of the table, with my father seated on the opposite end. She was so charming and gracious; you'd never know she had been cooking for two days. Heavenly fragrances wafted in from the kitchen where large pots were simmering and not-to-touch chocolate desserts cooled. The table would be beautiful, with a white tablecloth, candlelight and whatever silver we, her children, hadn't played with in the sandbox. "The secret to a good party is the people", she'd say, "and great food." Here's one of her stand-by recipes for buffets...originally from the Junior League of San Francisco's "San Francisco A La Carte". Bring it to the next Potluck!

10-oz pkg. frozen chopped spinach (defrosted)

1 C cooked quinoa (Mom used rice)

2 eggs, slightly beaten

1/3 C milk or almond or coconut milk (Mom used regular milk)

1 t salt

2 T chopped onion

1 C grated Asiago or cheddar cheese (sharp is best)

1/2 t Worcestershire sauce

1/4 t rosemary

Note: The thing about using sharp cheddar is that you get more flavor for less cheese. So, it ends up being less expensive and tastier by far.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Combine all ingredients. Pour into a buttered 9X9 baking dish and bake for 20-25 minutes or until a knife inserted int the center comes out clean. If you are serving this to a crowd, I highly recommend doubling or tripling the recipe.

Earthquake Steak or Ribs

Want a recipe that will fill your mouth with an EARTHQUAKE of flavor? This is it. Found originally in the Junior League cookbook called "For Goodness Taste" from Rochester, New York, it's almost too good to be true. If you have the cookbook, you'll find it under "Baked Steak" which I thought was boring, so I renamed it. Hint: if you like BBQed spareribs, you'll like this. I used large sirloin steaks from Costco that were not the highest quality, and it was still wonderful. Especially the second day...oohhh the caramelization! Serve with either baked potatoes or "Company Mashed Potatoes' which will be posted in the next blog.

Ingredients:

2-3-inch-thick boneless sirloin steaks (3-5 pounds)
3 T melted butter
1 cup Chili sauce
3 T Worcestershire sauce
1/4 chopped onion

Directions:

Sear steak on all sides under broiler, then put in a greased 9 X 12 baking dish. Combine butter, chili sauce, Worcestershire, and onion. Pour over steak; bake 45 minutes for rare. The sauce should carmelize a bit before you serve it. Let the steaks stand for two minutes before slicing and serving. I serve it to my family this way, or for company you can make a sauce to go with it:

Mushroom Sauce Ingredients:

2 T butter
1 lb. sliced mushrooms
1 T Worcestershire sauce
1/4 C Chili sauce
1 C heavy cream

Directions:

While steaks are baking, saute mushrooms in butter; add remaining ingredients and cook over med. heat until slightly thickened (about 15 minutes). Serve over steak.

Pork Medallions with Olive-Caper Sauce

Category: Main Dishes
Difficulty: Easy
Fairly Healthy

I've decided this is my new "go-to" recipe.  It's really convenient, because jars of Kalamata olives and capers keep in the refrigerator for about a year, so they can just be on hand for this recipe whenever you need them. Common Sense Tip: you can also buy small 'picnic' sized bottles of wine that come in six-packs if you don't want to open a whole bottle. They're good to have on hand for other cooking too. I use a lot of wine when I cook-- but I hardly ever drink it. Alcohol makes me break out! It is, however, an irreplaceable element in my cooking.

8  thin boneless pork chops
1/2 t. salt
1/2 t black pepper
1/4 C flour
1 T olive oil
1/2 C dry white wine
1/2 C fat-free less-sodium chicken broth
1/2 C coarsely chopped pitted kalamata olives
2 T capers
2 T chopped fresh flat-leaf (Italian) parsley

Directions: If you can only find thick boneless chops--buy 4 and cut each one through the middle to make thin pork chops Place each pork piece between 2 sheets of heavy-duty plastic wrap and pound to 1/4-inch thickness, using a meat mallet or rolling pin. Sprinkle both sides of pork with salt and pepper. Place flour in a shallow bowl or pie pan. Dredge pork in flour, turning to coat, shake off excess flour. Heat 1 1/2 t olive oil in a non-stick skillet over medium-high heat. Add half of pork, cook 2 minutes on each side or until done. Remove pork mixture from pan; keep warm. Repeat procedure with remaining oil and pork. Return pork to pan. Add wine and broth, bring to a boil. Stir in olives and capers, cook 4 minutes. Sprinkle with parsley and serve.

Sombrero Salad from "Little Tampico" Restaurant

Catagory:Main Dishes
Difficulty: Medium-Hard
Healthy

Ole Ole! This is my favorite salad in the world. It is featured on the menu at 'Little Tampico' on Main Street in Soquel, California. Our family went there at least once a month in the 90's. I got the Sombrero every time as part of a Fajita. Lauren always got a taco plate. My hubby got whatever he felt like at the moment--usually a pork burrito the size of a French bread! Honestly, their burritos are big enough to eat Alan! And he's not a little guy! Alas, the restaurant has changed the "Sombrero' recipe a bit through the years--no more grapefruit in the salad the last time I was there! They use tomatoes instead now, which you can do too, if you can't find pink grapefruit. But here is is as I remember it... magnifico!

Note: This is best and very pretty, served as a 'salade compose' which means it isn't tossed. So get out your salad platter or your individual plates before proceeding... Serves 4 (this can be a vegetarian summer lunch or dinner if you add sliced grilled chicken.)

Ingredients:

1 head Romaine lettuce, washed, dried, ripped into pieces and crisped in the refrigerator
1 cup jicama, peeled and julienned (cut into sticks)
1 cup sliced mushrooms
2 oranges, peeled and sectioned
1 red bell pepper, cored and sliced
2 avocados, peeled and sliced
Optional Protein: grilled sliced chicken
1/2 C pine-nuts or toasted shelled sunflower seeds
2 large pink grapefruit , peeled, and sectioned

Salsa Vinaigrette:

1T fresh prepared salsa
2 T washed, minced, fresh cilantro leaves
4 T white wine vinegar
4 T olive oil
2 t dried oregano (this is the key ingredient)
Salt to taste

Mix cilantro and salsa with oregano with the rest of the Vinaigrette ingredients separately in a small mixing bowl. Salt to taste. If you choose to use grilled chicken, use half of the vinaigrette to marinate raw chicken breasts in a separate small bowl for at least 30 minutes.

Compose salad on platter or plates by layering on ingredients in order of size, going from largest to smallest. First on the plate should be the lettuce, then sliced red bell pepper, avocado, jicama, oranges, and finally the mushrooms . Arrange them in a "wagon wheel" shape. Generously spoon grapefruit pulp on the very top of the composition, kind of like pink snow on a mountain peak. Finally, sprinkle on some pine nuts. Put 2-3 large spoonfuls of Salsa Vinaigrette on top of it all. Serve to 4 grinning people. Note: Needless to say, if you compose this earlier in the day to eat later, be sure and dunk your avocados in grapefruit or lemon juice before you put them on the plate (to avoid browning, 'natch). If you are adding chicken, grill it then slice one breast on top of each small salad in the wagon wheel shape.

Note: When making this for a crowd, I cut down on costs by just using lettuce, orange sections, jicama, cilantro and pine nuts with dressing. Less money, still good!

Joe and Lauren's Sherried Tomato Soup

Catagory: Soups
Difficulty: Easy
Not Healthy

This soup tastes like...the way you feel when you are wrapped in a blanket on the couch in front of a fire on a rainy day. It is deep and rich and full of solace. A while back, Joe, my daughter's boyfriend, went on a cross-country trip to deliver a car to another state. On the way, he ate a lot of food at a lot of restaurants. Somewhere along the way he had a delectable tomato soup with a touch of sherry in it. So, with high hopes of it's duplication he brought the description of it back to Lauren. She, being very much in love with Joe, found it...on a very good blog site called "The Pioneer Woman".

Sherried Tomato Soup:

6 T melted butter
1 whole medium onion, diced
1 bottle, 46 oz., tomato juice
2 cans (14 oz.) diced tomatoes
1T (up to 3 T) powdered chicken bouillion
3 T (up to 6) sugar or Palm sugar (to taste)
1 pinch salt
black pepper to taste
1 C good sherry (do not use cooking sherry-blech!)
1 1/2 C heavy cream
chopped flat-leaf parsley
chopped fresh basil

Directions: Saute diced onions in butter until transluscent. Then add canned tomatoes, tomato juice, chicken boullion, sugar, salt, pepper and stir. Bring to a near boil, then turn off heat. Add sherry and cream and stir. Add parsley and basil to taste. Eat some, and save some for a rainy day (freezes well).