10 April, 2012 | 2 Comments

Helen Jane’s Deviled Eggs

You have extra hard boiled eggs about now, I can tell.

Helen Jane’s Deviled Egg Recipe

Ingredients
6 hard boiled eggs
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1 tablespoon dijon mustard
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 slices bacon
1 tablespoon minced parsley

Directions
Cut the 4 slices of bacon into tiny, bacon bit sized pieces and brown in a pan. When cooked through and crispy, drain on paper towels. Taste three bacon bits because you deserve it.

Peel hard boiled eggs and slice them the long way, narrow top to bottom.

Pop the yellow yolks into a medium bowl and mash firmly until the consistency of damp yellow sulphury sand. Add mayonnaise, mustard and salt and stir through.

Also to your bowl, add 3/4 of your bacon bits and 3/4 of your minced parsley. Stir through.

Put mixture into a large plastic bag and snip off a corner, piping the mixture back into the empty holes of the hard boiled egg where the yolks used to be.

Sprinkle the tops with parsley and a few bacon bits. Serve amongst friends in a cool, airy brunch situation. We don’t want to end up in in a pickle like Pamie did earlier this year.

Grin.

9 April, 2012 | 4 Comments

Lessons in Practice. And Eggy Pie.

Keep trying, we’ll figure it out together.
BUT I CAN’T! IT’S TOO HARD.

Try cracking another egg. Let’s practice together!
NO, YOU DO IT FOR ME.

Remember, tap it on the side of the bowl, make a little dent. Put both thumbs in the little dent and open it into the bowl.
THIS IS TOO HARD.

Almost there, on the next egg, try tapping a little harder.
You’re on your way. You’re almost there.
JUST LET ME ADD THE OTHER STUFF.

Not quite yet, we’re almost done with the eggs.
Ha! See what you did there? That’s two perfectly cracked eggs! No egg shells in the bowl, and no egg on your hands! Well done! You kept trying and you figured it out!
I DID.
I DID FIGURE IT OUT.

And darned if she didn’t.

Easter Weekend Eggy Pie Brunch Recipe

Ingredients
2 red potatoes
1 leek
1/2 sweet onion
1/4 pound ground italian sausage
12 eggs
1/4 cup heavy cream
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
6 sage leaves, stems removed, minced
12 Piacci parmesan cheese nuggets, chopped fine or 3/4 cup shredded Parmesan cheese or 1 cup of shredded Havarti cheese.

Directions
Preheat oven to 325°.
Scrub, then microwave red potatoes for 5 minutes. Remove from microwave and cool.

While potatoes are cooking, prepare a springform pan. I do this by oiling the inside liberally. Then I cover the outside of the pan with aluminum foil. Then I set the prepared pan on a baking sheet.

Brown and drain bulk sausage. Chop leek and onion fine and sauté in sausage fat over medium heat for 5 minutes or until translucent. Let cool in pan.

Crack all 12 eggs into a bowl. Add cream to the bowl and whisk until mixed.

Cut potatoes into small, bite sized cubes. Add potatoes, leeks and onions, drained sausage, salt, pepper, minced sage leaves and cheese to the egg mixture.

Stir through until it’s one glorious gloppy mess.

Add the mixture to the prepared pan.
Put the pan into the oven and bake for 45-60 minutes, peeking in at 45 minutes to make sure the eggy pie is baked all the way through.

Cool for 15-20 minutes before releasing from the pan and serving with something sweet or savory.

It’s good to plan ahead on this one.

We like to make this the night before and then warm it in the oven. Or, wake up on toddler time, very early in the morning, so it’s ready when your guests awake.

3 April, 2012 | 4 Comments

Banana cake. Duh dah duh dah da.

So maybe, while hungry for banana bread, I bought one of those bulk bags of bananas.
Fifty cents for three giant pounds of bananafruit.

It’s like I thought I didn’t have a day job, and 30 pounds to lose. Instead, I’m a pampered wife of leisure with calories for miles!

So, after making banana rum sauce, banana bread, banana chocolate chip bundt cake, the fruit flies started in. And then it was time to really get creative.

Enter: banana cake with cream cheese frosting.

Tasty for dessert,
tastier for breakfast,
let’s get that potassium up.

Silver Palate Banana Cake Recipe

Ingredients
1 stick unsalted butter
3 eggs, separated, yolks in one small bowl, whites in a big bowl
3 ripe bananas, all mashed up
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup buttermilk (I used yogurt and the cake was still darn fine.)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Optional ingredients
2 bananas, sliced
1/2 cup of crushed walnuts

Ingredients for cream cheese frosting
8 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, room temperature
3 cups powdered sugar/confectioner’s sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
juice of 1/2 lemon

Directions
Way before anything, a few hours before anything, put out the cream cheese and butter to come to room temperature.

Preheat the oven to 350°. Grease and flour two 9 inch layer cake pans

Cream butter and sugar together with an electric mixer. Add the egg yolks and let ‘er rip. Add the mashed bananas, mixing all the way through. Sift dry ingredients and add to butter mixtrue. Stir until just combined. Add buttermilk and vanilla. Dump into a larger bowl and wash your mixer bowl. Or use a different bowl and wash your beaters.

Add egg whites to the bowl of your mixer or add your clean beaters back to your mixer. Beat egg whites to soft peaks. Scoop out of the bowl with a spatula and fold gently into the batter until incorporated.

Put batter into the pans, set on the middle rack and bake for 20-30 minutes or until the cake is done (and your cake testing poker comes out clean).

Cool the cake in the pans for 10 minutes, I put the pans on my cool burners. Then unmold the cakes and cool on a rack for 2 hours.

Make the frosting
Cream sugar and butter with a mixer. Add powdered sugar 1/2 cupful at a time. Stir vanilla and lemon juice through.

When the cake is cooled, place one layer on a serving plate and frost. Arrange slices of banana over frosting. Then cover with the other layer. Frost the top and sides of the whole dang cake and sprinkle the walnuts on top.

1 April, 2012 | Comment

Meal plan, this week

30 March, 2012 | 10 Comments

Helen Jane’s Minestrone Soup Recipe

Eat this with grilled cheeses and grapes

Other than their minimal “no thank you” helpings, and vats of ranch dressing, this soup is the number one to get good veggies into our children.

You probably see it on the meal plan, seven, ten times a month. We eat this soup a lot.

Minestrone Soup is good for your ass and ass.

We always make sure the soup is cool enough for kids to eat. To quadruple check for temperature, kids get lots of bread and dippers and we take our time.

(Tonight, we sat by the fire to watch Ratatouille while eating our soup and sandwiches.)

Helen Jane’s Minestrone Soup Recipe

Ingredients
3 tablespoons olive oil
6 pieces bacon, chopped fine
1 large onion
3 stalks celery
3 carrots, peeled
3 cloves garlic
1/2 green cabbage
1/2 bunch kale, washed
1 32 ounce can of chopped tomatoes
2 quarts chicken broth
1 teaspoon pepper
2 teaspoons kosher salt
1 bay leaf
2 cups water
1 16 ounce can white beans, drained and rinsed
3 tablespoons Stella shaped pasta or 1/3 cup Ditalini pasta.
A block of parmesan cheese and a fine grater

Directions
Chop the onion, celery and carrots fine. You want them small, especially if small mouths are consuming. Mince garlic. Slice the cabbage fine. Remove ribs from kale and slice fine. Open your can of tomatoes.

Your veggies are ready.

Warm olive oil over medium heat in a large dutch oven or soup pot. Add the chopped bacon and stir until cooked through and fat has melted down.

Remove the bacon from the oil to drain on paper towels. Add onions, celery, carrots, salt, pepper and bay leaf to the pot. Since I had a half red pepper left over, I chopped it wee and added that too. If you have one, join in! If not, that’s okay too!

Stir and cook for 5 minutes.
Add garlic, cabbage and kale and stir frequently until mixed through and limp.
Add can of tomatoes, chicken broth and water.

Stir through until everything is mixed. Turn heat to high, bring the soup to a boil and then turn to low and simmer. If I have a random Parmesan cheese rind, this is when I add it. If you have no Parmesan cheese rind, I promise I won’t hold it against you.

After 15 minutes, add the white beans. Cook for another 20 minutes, add the pasta (if you’re using) and cook until the pasta is tender (7-10 minutes, depending on the size). Remove bay leaves, taste and adjust salt and pepper.

Leave the bacon out and swap the chicken broth for vegetable broth and you’re looking a little Vegan around the edges.

Serve with sprinkled reserved bacon (this keeps it crunchy) and a healthy scattering of grated Parmesan cheese.
(Sometimes, when lilygilding, I drizzle olive oil over the whole thing.)

If the soup’s not enough, I like to serve this soup with grilled cheese or panini.

Healthy comfort on, my friends.
Healthy comfort on.