Baked French Toast with Blueberries

I won't be home for dinner tonight and I saw some odds and ends around the kitchen that needed to be consumed. Eggs. Bread. Yogurt. We have fresh berries and those need eatin' quick.

So I prepped baked French toast. This will sit in the fridge and be baked uncovered at 350 for 40 minutes. This is a small portion. Serves 3 but the portions are not large.

I hope my family saves me some. I'm not sure how the yogurt will work out.

In a bread loaf pan, that I heartily greased with butter, I layered two slices of cinnamon raisin bread and then blueberries and a bit of brown sugar. Maybe two tablespoons. I had three layers of bread and two layers of blueberries.

Now the "sauce" I added to every layer as well. It went something like this:

- four eggs

- nutmeg

- ground cloves

- an ounce or two of half and half 

- about a cup very vanilla soy milk

- about 1/3 cup plain yogurt

Whisk. The yogurt may be a mistake. We'll see.

My husband baked it for 40 minutes at 350 and it turned out delightful. Though the child did not care for it. But she ate hers.

Special delivery pancakes

My mother-in-law called as I was drinking the first sip of my coffee. My father-in-law was going for gas so she made blueberry pancakes, put them in a thermal bag and had him drive them the 12 miles to our house.

She even included a bottle of real maple syrup.

Yes, they were still warm.

Last night we had dinner of chicken noodle soup at her house.

Blueberry Cream Cheese Lemon Poppy Muffins

I experimented with some muffins that started life as blueberry, morphed into blueberry cream cheese and twisted into some lemon poppyseed.

All together.

Dry ingredients:
- 3/4 tsp salt
- 1 tablespoon baking powder
- 3 tablespoons sugar
- 3 cups flour
- 1 pinch cinnamon
- about 1/4 cup poppyseeds
- 1/4 fresh squeezed lemon juice

Wet ingredients:
- 2 eggs
- 1/2 cup whipped cream cheese
- 1 1/4 cup soy milk
- 1/8 cup local honey
- 1/8 cup blackstrap molasses
- 1/4 cup canola oil
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla

2 cups blueberries

I got 20 small muffins

Bake at 375, for 20 minutes

Chicken salad on pretzel rolls

I bought Gabby's Pretzel Dinner Rolls at Target. These are scrumptious little things.

I make many varieties of chicken salad, and the label 'chicken' salad will take you to them. I liked this one, despite the low volume of crunchy bits.

- one can, 12-ounce, canned white meat chicken, diced
- about 2 teaspoons mayonnaise (I often use vegan mayonnaise, but today I used regular)
- one teaspoon country herb seasoning
- 1/4 cup mandarin oranges (I use a sharp knife to cut the oranges into thirds)
- 1/4 cup chopped apple (leftover from the orchard)
- 1/4 cup blueberries (I let frozen blueberries thaw inside the mix)
- shredded carrots and red cabbage picked out of a Fresh Express Veggie Lover's Salad

Blueberry Pancake Sundae

A few weeks ago, my daughter and a friend had breakfast at her Grammy's and we got to bring home the leftovers: sausage, blueberry pancakes and wild blueberry sauce. I froze it all and took it out of the freezer yesterday so my husband and daughter could have it for dinner tonight.

Last night I got homemade pesto sauce with sunflower seeds out of the freezer and told my husband to make noodles, use the pesto, and top with diced tomato (the ONE of the three tomatoes my garden produced this year). That was really yummy.

When I got home from work tonight, I took one blueberry pancake, heated it, topped with vanilla bean ice cream (also a gift from the inlaws) and topped THAT with hot blueberry sauce.

Miam!

Yogurt parfaits

At Target café, we make a pretty yummy yogurt parfait with mixed berries, Land O Lakes vanilla yogurt and granola. I had a craving, but can't see spending $2.50 a serving. So after work last night, I ran through the store and got the ingredients. (well, that and some chicken for a surprise party Sunday and a bag of Veggie Lovers Salad.)

I think all in all I got 5 pounds of Perdue chicken thighs, about three pounds of drumsticks, Bear Naked granola (on sale for $3.29), Market Pantry frozen berries ($3.19), the big bottle of apple cider vinegar ($1.19) and the salad ($1.99) for $18.25.

For the café, we take frozen berries, put them in the bottom of a cup, add a scoop of yogurt, then top with more berries. The granola goes in the lid and we put the whole thing in the cooler to let the berries thaw before we sell them.

INGREDIENTS
- Market Pantry frozen mixed berries (blackberries, blueberries, raspberries and strawberries)
- Chobani vanilla yogurt (the 32 ounce container that I got in a previous trip to Target on clearance for $4.18)
- Bear Naked Fruit & Nut granola (which hurts my teeth. Sadness.)

Rhubarb crumble

The finished product

The rhubarb

We made a rhubarb brown sugar crumble based on this recipe from cooks.com:

the filling

http://www.cooks.com/rec/view/0,1813,150175-250200,00.html

We greased my Le Creuset skillet and I chopped about 3.5 cups of rhubarb.

Daughter made crumbs with the following:
- 1 stick melted butter
- 1 cup unbleached flour
- 1 cup brown sugar
- 3/4+ a little oats
- cinnamon to taste

Adding the sauce

We put half the crumbs in the skillet.

I mixed about 1/2 cup fresh strawberries and frozen blueberries into the rhubarb. Then I sprinkled some brown sugar on the fruit. (I don't have any granulated sugar in the house)

We put the fruit/rhubarb over the crumbs and I drizzled honey over it.

In a saucepan we made a thickened sauce of:
- one cup water

final crumbs

- 3/4 cup brown sugar
- 2 tablespoons corn starch
- 3 tablespoons honey
- 1 teaspoon vanilla

(gradually heat to almost boiling stirring constantly until it gels)

We poured that over the rhubarb filling, covered with remaining crumbs and more cinnamon and baked in the oven at 350 for one hour.

A Special Tea Party

Today we had some friends to our home for a tea party, though the tea was iced. We wanted to thank our friends Bart and Phyllis for being one of my sets of friends who made soup for me when I couldn’t eat.

The menu was planned by my daughter. I made the iced teas. The first tea was decaffeinated organic green tea with rose (the Tazo rest I adore). Two bags of Tazo Rest to three bags of Bigelow organic decaffeinated green. The second pitcher was Archer Farms Earl Grey with berry and chocolate. Good stuff.

I didn’t take many photos, because in the thrill of entertaining I forgot.

My daughter wanted peanut butter crackers and so she selected Market Pantry sandwich crackers, the Ritz style, and a box of Keebler Club multigrain crackers. We saw spinach artichoke dip in Target and got inspired to make our hot spinach dip.

We bought some Market Pantry bagged frozen cut spinach (and it had a lot of big stems with no greens, a bit of a turn off).

We ended up making a platter of sandwich crackers, club crackers and rye crackers with sides of peanut butter, almond butter and cashew butter on the side. We had a big bowl of whole strawberries. A dish of unsalted almonds and cashews.

Then we made spinach dip in the crock pot and scones. Phyllis made heart shaped cupcakes with chocolate icing and my daughter made some cake in her Easy Bake Oven.

TODAY’S SPINACH HERB DIP:

In the crockpot
drizzle some cold pressed extra virgin olive oil
add garden fresh herbs. In my case, today, I used about
        2 teaspoons oregano
        5 large stalks of chives, chopped
        2 teaspoons parsley
        3 large leaves French sorrel, shredded
        3 leaves basil, shredded
        1 teaspoon dill
add 1/4 cup minced garlic

Cook about twenty minutes.
Cook spinach until thawed in microwave. Does not have to be hot. Reserve 3/4 cup of the liquid. Add spinach and liquid to crockpot. Cook at least one hour on high. Preferably 1.5 hours (more is fine, though you may have to reduce heat.)

Thirty minutes before serving, add cheese. Today I used about 4-5 ounces mozzarella, 4 ounces sharp cheddar, and 2 ounces pepper jack. It tasted sweet, so I added a tablespoon of garlic powder.

SCONES

We made two kinds of scones, adapted from the Betty Crocker 25th Anniversary Cookbook. One was honey walnut. One was blueberry.

From memory:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Mix together 4 tablespoons butter and 3.5 cups unbleached white flour, 4 tablespoons sugar, 3 tablespoons honey, 5 teaspoons baking powder, 1/2 teaspoon (?) salt. Use a pastry blender to make it the consistency of crumbs. Then add one beaten egg and four tablespoons applesauce. Add milk by the tablespoon until the dough becomes soft and dough like. I used one tablespoon vanilla silk, then 4 tablespoons heavy whipping cream, then about 3 tablespoons unsweetened soy milk and one tablespoon water.

I divided the dough in two, and added blueberries to one half and lots of honey and walnuts to the other. Turn dough out on floured surface and press to 1/2 inch thick. Cut into diamonds. Bake 10-12 minutes. My honey walnuts started to burn on the bottom after 10.

Vegan Blueberry Steusel Muffins

This is based on the recipe from the Betty Crocker 25th anniversary cookbook.

I love muffins. They freeze easily, transport easily and feed an empty belly in a hurry. I normally add nuts for protein but this time I didn't because of my broken teeth.

Heat oven to 400.

Make streusel topping.

Streusel topping:
- 1/4 cup flour (I used a hair more)
- 2 tablespoons brown sugar (as if I measured)
- 2 tablespoons firm margarine
- 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon (I used more)
Mix in bowl until crumbly. Now, I always overmix my crumbs and they get soft so then I mix in oats to fix the texture.

For the muffins:

- I cup 'milk' (I used plain soy today. I would also use vanilla soy or almond or rice)
- 1/4 cup canola oil
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla (I didn't measure, and I always use real vanilla. You could also use lemon or almond extract to give the batter more flavor. Putting half lemon and half almond _if I remember correctly_ will replicate a coffee cake flavor)
- instead of 1 egg use 4 tablespoons applesauce. Normally I use natural, unsweetened. Those single serve packs = 1 egg (especially good if you bought a flavor for packed lunches and it was deemed gross) This time I used cinnamon.

Mix.

Dump in dry ingredients:
- 2 cups flour (normally I do half unbleached white and half whole wheat but I ran out of wheat)
- 1/3 cup sugar (I used 1/4)
- 3 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon salt

Stir.

Fold in blueberries. I used 1.25 cups frozen, not even thawed.

Scoop into tins. Top with crumbs. Bake 20 minutes.

I made 16 small muffins and could have doubled the crumb recipe.

Today's Zaatar Lunch

Yesterday's packed school lunch was a huge hit. Every scrap except for three spirals of pasta.

Today mimics yesterday's lunch. One of our new juice boxes, some cashews, some frozen blueberries and a slice of zaatar foccaccia.

Pasta and blueberry lunch

Devoured. Every scrap.

I love preparing leftovers for my kid's lunch. She loves the insulated bowl and the "hot food" from home. This month the school's normal two choices of hot lunch is reduced to one so it's lots of pizza, hot dogs and processed chicken products. The dairy factor knocks out many of them, and the alternate lunch is PB&J which she likes about once a week. She likes when the school serves tacos with lettuce and tomato, or chicken ranch wraps, or chicken salad, or even their garden salad (probably the days when a normal kid says "yuck.")

So, today I filled a bottle with some apple juice, a bowl with some frozen blueberries, and the thermal bowl with whole wheat rotini with broccoli and Morningstar breakfast patties (sausage) sautéed in olive oil, which Daddy prepared for me Sunday night.

Another no grocery, no dairy packed lunch

My daughter wanted to pack lunch again and not only have I still not gone to the store (trying to survive until payday which is an unrealistic endeavor) but we had tacos for dinner and had no leftovers. Sigh.

What's a mom to do?

Assess breakfast. Child ate heap of watermelon her grandparents brought, Graham crackers and unsalted cashews.

So... Lunch.

How does this sound?
- a thermos of plain soymilk
- a spoon
- cornflakes with dried blueberries from Forks Meditterranean  Deli
- green and red grapes
- the remaining mandarin oranges from yesterday
- sesame brittle from Forks Meditterranean Deli

Blueberry pancakes

The other day I thawed out the last of the bluberries I had in the freezer. I intended for them to be a snack, or topping for yogurt, but it didn't work that way.

Since daughter and I went for a bike ride with friends in Jim Thorpe. My husband made bluberry pancakes with real maple syrup and scrambled eggs! They were yummy!

We use the pancake recipe from Betty Crocker.

Cherry Yogurt

Today, we went with a red, white and blue breakfast.

Vanilla yogurt, chopped maraschino cherries ( yes, shame on me for not having fresh ones here at the tail end of cherry season. And I do so love cherries-- real ones not maraschino ) and a dollop of whipped cream.

Big pile of fresh blueberries and a side of cashews.