Catchup blogging…

These are all things that are either too specific or too small to deserve a post of their own.

As promised, 2blog catchup

And this time, I’m just going to drop them in here with no sorting:

Lemon Barbequed Meat Loaves

  • 1.5 lb ground beef
  • 4 slices dried bread, cubed
  • 1/4 cup lemon juice
  • 1/4 cup minced onion
  • 1 egg, slightly beaten
  • 2 teaspoons seasoned salt
  • 1/2 cup ketchup
  • 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
  • 1 tsp dry mustard
  • 1/2 tsp ground allspice
  • 1/2 tsp ground cloves
  • 6 thin lemon slices
  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F
  2. In a bowl, combine ground chuck, bread cubes, lemon juice, onion, egg, and salt.  Mix well and shape into 6 individual loaves.  Arrange on a greased 9×13-inch baking dish. Bake 15 minutes.
  3. Meanwhile, in a small bowl, combine the ketchup, mustard, brown sugar, allspice and cloves.
  4. Cover the loaves with the sauce, and top each with a lemon slice.
  5. Bake 30 minutes longer, occasionally basting with sauce from the pan.

Serves 6.

Serves 4 if Grace is eating!

Blog catchup, yet again

And a special collection of pumpkin seed roasting recipes

That 2blog bookmark folder fills up quickly…

Those Italian deer…

So, Grace had a birthday. She got lots of presents, including Sly Cooper 3 for her PS2.

Then, Cy had his Big Band thing again this year. Grace and I went to eat first, then we all went to eat afterwards, at the Y Bar and Grill.

Since G and I had already eaten, we only got some appetizers — some cheese bread, and some venison skewers. As long as the venison had not been in the spicy sauce they served it with, she loved it. We talked about how venison was deer meat, and she ate more still…

Then, the next day, she and Cy were playing Sly3. Where is Sly, in the world? Why, Venice, of course! So Grace demonstrated her mastery of word roots by asking

Is Sly inside a deer?

Yes, I’m bragging.

J’s Bread recipe (bread machine required)

Ingredient options are listed in order of preference:

For each loaf:
  • 1 cup 1% buttermilk, or regular milk (have extra ready)
  • 1/2 stick butter, sliced
  • 3 tablespoons honey or sugar
  • 3 cups unsifted flour (any combination of whole wheat and white works with at least 1 cup white flour)
  • 3/4 tsp salt
  • 1 tablespoon yeast (quick-rise works best)
  • pam with flour

You will also need at least one small batter bowl (or something equivalent), and one more bread pan than the number of loaves you plan to make (the extra one is used as a shaping pan).

  1. Combine milk, butter and honey, heat in microwave 30 seconds. Let sit in microwave for a few moments, then nuke it another 30 seconds. The small batter bowl from pampered chef is fantastic for this. Put into bread machine.
  2. Add half the flour, the salt, the rest of the flour, and the yeast.
  3. Start bread machine on the dough setting, wait for initial ingredient combination. It should be lumpy from too much flour.
  4. SLOWLY drizzle more milk, 1 teaspoon at a time, until the dough both has a smooth gluten coating AND sticks to and pulls away from the side of the bread machine. Wait at least one minute between the last two teaspoons of milk. Don’t wait if the dough is banging around the inside way above the mixing beater.
  5. On my machine, the initial (intermittent) stirring takes two minutes of the 20-minute kneading process. I try to be done drizzling in milk by the time 8 minutes are left before the first rise.

  6. Spray all bread pans with pam with flour
Single loaf instructions
  1. Check on the first rise after 30 minutes. It may need to be punched down by hand (usually if the weather is warm) to prevent overflow!
  2. When the machine’s punch-down is complete, immediately transfer the dough to bread pan, and punch it flat to the shape of the pan.
  3. Put the other pan over the top, and flip them both over so that the shaped loaf is now smooth top and bottom.
  4. Run a knife down the length of the dough, through to the bottom.
  5. Pre-heat oven to 350°F to 375° F
  6. Let the dough rise until the highest point just passes the top of the bread pan.
  7. Bake for 35-50 minutes, at least until browned and tapping on the bread makes a hollow sound.
  8. Immediately remove loaf from pan and put on a cooling rack, unless you want a soggy crust.
  9. Let cool at least 30 minutes before slicing.
Multiple loaf differences
  1. When the 20-minute mixing finishes, let the dough rise in a pampered chef classic batter bowl. Spray the bowl with pam with flour to make your life easier.
  2. While measuring the wet ingredients, measure out several copies into more small batter bowls. Do the same for the dry ingredients.
  3. You can re-use the same shaping pan — it rarely needs to be re-sprayed with pam.

You want a real treat? Take two slices immediately after slicing the still-warm loaf; toast them until just barely crisp on the outside. Butter and salt. Try not to do that for two more slices.

Sue’s chololate chip cookie recipe

The nice thing about this one is that the chips stay soft even when the cookies cool!

Sue thinks this one came from a jello recipe, but doesn’t recall for certain…

1/4 CUP SUGAR
2 sticks of butter
3/4 cup brown sugar, packed
small package instant vanilla pudding
1 tsp vanilla
beat the above until light and fluffy
add 2 eggs beat until well mixed
add 1 tsp baking soda and 2 1/4 cups flour; add flour one cup at a time, beat just until mixed
add 12 oz chocolate chips stir just until mixed
drop on a cookie sheet
bake at 375 degrees for 10-12 minutes