Trent's Frank Stroganoff

When Trent and I were dating, he kept saying he wanted to make me dinner and make Frank's Stroganoff. I saw a steak in the fridge at his house so I kept thinking the stroganoff was made traditionally, with the steak. Then he made it for me and I was shocked, I won't lie. It is not Frank's Stroganoff, it's Frank Stroganoff, and not named after my brother-in-law. It's actually made with hot dogs. Now wait a minute! Before you judge a book by it's cover...or a recipe by it's strange choice of proteins...believe me, this stuff is really good.

1 large onion, chopped

16 oz. package sliced fresh mushrooms, rough chopped

olive oil for sauteeing

1 full package hot dogs (best are beef hot dogs), sliced. Trent slices them pretty, all diagonal and fancy!

3 cans cream of mushroom soup (the normal size small cans)

Large tub sour cream (24 oz)

1 Package of wide or extra wide Egg Noodles

Saute onion, mushrooms, and hot dogs until the onions are soft. Add cream of mushroom soup and stir until soup is warm. Add half the sour cream and stir to combine, heating through. Add more sour cream to taste, Trent uses the whole thing. Warm through, keep on a low simmer while you boil your egg noodles. Serve sauce on top of the noodles.

If you want the sauce more thick, use Trent's mom's trick and add a brick of cream cheese, it thickens this nicely. And, you know, a little more fat thrown in there never hurts.

You can serve this over rice as well...it's good that way too.

Trent is making this for us tonight, it will make three full meals for us...serves at least 6.

If someone is so inclined, try it with beef strips, like a tenderized round steak sliced very very thinly across the grain. I would saute the steak first until just barely browned, remove, then saute the onion and mushroom, add the beef back in and continue with the recipe. Sounds so good, let me know if you try it.

Antipasti Salad

Good salad to take to parties. ..this was enough for 20 people. Makes a lot, can be halved for smaller groups. I took this to a picnic and served it with bruschetta and baguette bread, with slices of honeydew and cantaloupe melon.

Salads with pasta will soak up dressing fast, so I always put the dressing on it just before serving. Lesson learned this time: I mixed the dressing the night before and put it in a jar in the fridge, it was fine, BUT do not put it in a cooler with ice...the olive oil will solidify (did it.) But remember you can run the jar under hot water and get the oil to 'melt' back to it's correct consistency. Whew.

6 cups dry pasta. I used mini raviolis I found at Winco in bulk food. It is stuffed with parmesan cheese and it's good!

2 cans medium olives (drained)

2 jars marinated artichoke hearts (drained)

2 jars sun dried tomatoes (I used the dry packaged kind at Winco and chopped them then soaked in a little olive oil...way cheaper and very delicious)

Sliced banana peppers to taste (I used about 3/4 cup, drained)

3 cans sliced mushrooms or 1pkg fresh sliced mushrooms

1 each red, yellow, green bell pepper, chopped

3 cups chopped or sliced meat...pepperoni, salami, ham, whatever. I used these cute little mini pepperonis from Winco

Cook pasta, rinse and cool. You can toss in a little olive oil to keep it from sticking. Toss with all the salad ingredients except the dressing and the meat and refrigerate until ready to serve.

Dressing:

1 1/2 cups olive oil

3/4 cup red wine vinegar

3 tbsp dried basil

3 tbsp dried parsley

3 tbsp dried rosemary

1 tbsp fresh minced garlic or 1 teaspoon garlic powder

3 tbsp parmesan cheese

1 tsp salt

red pepper flakes to taste (I used 3 packages of the dominoes kind lol!)

Mix and shake all together in a quart jar or bowl. Best if made a few hours in advance or the night before. To Serve, add the meat to the salad then shake the dressing very very well and toss into the salad. I kinda winged this for our picnic trip...it turned out great and everyone liked it. Looked impressive and was filling enough for lunch. Enjoy!

Halloween Witch Fingers

Hilarious! Great Halloween Party Food.
**I get all these ingredients except the peanut butter and gel in the bulk food at Winco. Much cheaper than buying packaged**

Peanut Butter Clay:
1 cup creamy peanut butter
Up to 2 cups powdered milk (will use probably 1 cup to start then more if needed)
1/2 cup honey

Look at the powdered milk first. It it looks like crumbs or if it is a little "chunky", break it up in the bowl first and get it nice and powdery. Mix in the peanut butter and honey. Mix all to a play-dough like consistency adding more powdered milk if too sticky, more honey if too dry.

Fingers:
About 40 regular sized pretzel sticks (bones)
Slivered Almonds (fingernails)
2 Tubes Red Gel (blood)

Make the fingers by rolling the clay with your fingers into little cylinder shapes of dough and pressing it around a pretzel stick, covering the pretzel completely. Use a spoon and make little rounded cuts to look like knuckles. Place a slivered almond on it for a fingernail. Continue and make all the fingers you can until you run out of peanut butter clay. I can usually get 35-40 if I make them a little skinny! Place the fingers on a tray or cutting board, or whatever you are serving them from. Dab red gel on the "stub" of each finger to look like they've been chopped off.

This is great served on a big platter along with a meat cleaver or big knife that has some red gel on it, looks like the fingers are freshly severed. When your guests eat these, it's like chomping into a finger bone, it's really funny.

Chicken and Noodles

4-6 Chicken Breasts (or leftover chicken)
1/4 to 1/2 Cup Chicken Soup Base (Winco, Bulk Food)
4-6 Stalks Celery (finely chopped)
One Meduim to Large Onion (finely chopped)
About 3-4 cups Sliced Carrots
1/2 to 1 tsp Thyme
1/2 to 1 tsp Poultry Seasoning
1/8 tsp Cayenne (optional)
Frozen egg noodles or fresh pasta egg noodles (I don't recommend dried pasta for this.)

Boil chicken breasts to cook them (I use broth or soup base to cook them in, but I discard it after and use fresh to start the soup, there's too many chicken floaties in it). You can also use leftover chicken, canned chicken, any kind of chicken you have on hand. Just make sure it's cooked and shred it into large chunks, set aside.

Saute the onion and celery in a little oil in a large pot. When they are soft, add the thyme, poultry seasoning, cayenne and the Chicken Soup Base powder (it's more like a dry paste) and a little water. Stir that all into a mixture so the base is incorporated then add a few cups of water at a time until you have the pot about 3/4 full. Add in the chicken and the carrots. Boil this until the carrots are almost done. Add more water if it's too salty, more base if it needs more chicken flavor.

Add the noodles, either fresh or frozen, and cook until the noodles are your desired tenderness. Keep in mind that there's a lot of stuff in this, so it's not very "soupy"...more like a stew.

** I like homemade pasta for this, but sometimes it's not feasible. The best noodles for this are in the frozen food section. My favorite are "Grandma's" at Albertsons. There's also a package at Winco, it's in a green bag package. They are ok too. Thaw them a little and break them up before adding to the pot.

Ham

HAM! Love ham. I had four calls from family members this Easter.."How do I cook my ham? The same way I cook a turkey?" The answer is Nooooo!
Just remember that ham is waaaay different than turkey because ham is pre-cooked and cured. Whether it is smoke cured or honey/sugar cured, it can be eaten directly from the package cold. Therefore, all you want to do with a ham is heat it through. My family hates an overdone ham!

I always buy a spiral sliced honey ham with a glaze packet. I heat the ham through at 325 degrees for 2 hours, check it, and usually go another hour. Then I glaze it.

I have tried a few different glazes and always come back to one that I made up. Take the glaze packet and empty into a bowl. Add up to a cup of brown sugar, a pinch of cloves, maybe a little allspice, and about a quarter cup of pineapple juice. Mix up to make a sort of paste. Baste your ham with the juices in the bottom of the pan, then remove most of the "ham juice". (Reserve it for your gravy OR freeze it in ice cube trays to use later in recipes as ham broth).

Smear the glaze paste all over the ham and return to the oven for at least 10 minutes. It will heat up and melt and will ooze down into the spiral slices.

If anyone has figured out a crunchy glaze, let me know. This paste glaze is what I came up with while trying to make a crunchy glaze that stays crunchy on the ham surface, but I haven't been successful.......YET. :) Happy hamming.

Sausage Dip

No one has ever accused me of being a healthy cook. Probably ain't gonna happen so...on that note, here is an artery clogger. Great party dip.

2 "chub" packages Jimmy Dean Hot Sausage

3-4 brick packages cream cheese (8 oz).....I use 4, because this is usually for a football party and I need a lot of dip.

One red pepper, chopped very fine

One regular sized container sour cream


Cook the sausage and crumble it, drain off the fat. Put it back in the skillet and add the red pepper and cook just until the pepper starts to soften a little.

Put all that in a crock pot set to low, add the cream cheese bricks and about a half cup sour cream to start. Stir together when the cream cheese starts to soften up. Cover and check every little bit and add more sour cream until it's a "dippable" consistency. I usually use the whole container of sour cream, to "cut" the thickness of the cream cheese. Takes an hour or so to heat all the way through, so start it a bit early for your party.

Serve with tortilla chips. Tostitos scoops are the best.

Crock Pot Tips

Easy Easy Easy Crock Pot recipes, my favorite kind of dinner...the one that cooks itself while I am at work! Tips for "crock potting"...

•USE THE LINERS. I cannot stress this enough. The cleanup involves peeling the liner out of the pot and chucking it and wiping out the pot. Available at grocery stores, probably near the foil packets or the saran wrap and tin foil displays.

•If you're in the kitchen anyway, like cooking tacos or spaghetti or something...make TOMORROW's dinner in the crock pot (like a pot roast or pork roast) and put it in the fridge overnight. I mean, you're in the kitchen anyway, so why not? Take it out in the morning and turn it on and it cooks all day. Two meals handled at once, your husband will think you're a freaking genius.
•I've found that it's okay to use either frozen or thawed meat in most of the crock pot recipes I will post (like pot roast and pulled pork and green chile chicken tacos). I often start with frozen solid meats, turns out great as long as you have ALL DAY to cook it on low. I start mine at about 7:30 am.

•Just expanding on the last tip, and this is a "take it or leave it" tip (meaning you should take it or leave it but I've been doing it for years)...I leave the frozen solid meats out all night inside the crock. I put all the ingredients together in the crock pot, including the frozen meat, onions, seasonings, whatever, and leave it on the counter! OH HORRORS!!! But the frozen meat keeps the other ingredients cold enough as it thaws and never once have I made anyone sick. Yes, it's okay to cook from frozen solid (above tip) but I prefer the meat to be at least somewhat thawed and this does the trick. If your meats are already thawed, put the ingredients together the night before and put the removable crock part of the pot in the fridge overnight if you've made-ahead for tomorrow.

•Crock Pot setting Low is always preferable if you have all day, unless of course the recipe tells you different. General rule of thumb: If you don't have 8 - 10 hours....use high for 6 hours and then go to low. Less than 6 hours is usually not enough time to cook meats to the proper tenderness that I like.

•Resist the urge to constantly lift the lid on the crock pot. I read somewhere that it takes 30 minutes to re-capture the lost heat/steam/cooking ability for each time you lift that lid. So, stir the meal every once in a while but otherwise, let it cook without lifting the lid.
Anyone else have any other tips they'd like to share?

Pulled Pork

Pulled Pork

Could this be any easier or yummier? Uh....nope. (and pretty dang cheap too, to feed a crowd). I'll write this recipe for a crock pot, but you can also do this in a dutch oven when camping. I've also supersized this and made it for 50 people in a catering setting, I used a big portable turkey oven. Makes a great casual meal served with baked beans, chips, and potato salad.


One pork roast, however large you want, depending on how many people you are feeding

2-liter bottle of either root beer or dr pepper (store brands are ok)

One onion, quartered (optional...ok if you don't have one)

1-2 bottles of barbeque sauce (I use Famous Dave's or Sweet Baby Ray's. Kraft is ok too)


Place the pork roast in the crock pot along with the onion. Pour the pop in over the roast until it's well covered, about an inch over the roast. You may or may not use all the pop, depending on the roast size.

Put the lid on and cook on low for 8-12 hours...meaning, it will be cooked through and acceptable at 8 hours, fall apart delicious at 10 hours, and still good at 12 hours if you get delayed at work :)

Pull the meat out and discard the liquid (pop). You can keep the onions if you want, but I usually throw them out too. Pull the meat apart with a fork and shred it. Return to the still-warm crock pot. Add 1-2 bottles of barbecue sauce, to your desired consistency.

Cook on low until warmed through (30 mins to an hour), stirring occasionally.

Serve on warmed sandwich buns.


TIPS: Tips for this recipe...if you have a lower quality bbq sauce like Kraft, you can use things to season it up like cayenne, jalapenos, brown sugar, and honey to taste.

I fry the sandwich/hamburger buns for this recipe (and all hamburgers that I serve) with margarine and garlic. Spread margarine on the bread and sprinkle with garlic salt and fry buttered side down for a few minutes in a frying pan until toasted and golden.

Chicken Fried Steak

Chicken Fried Steak
Used Food Network's Alton Brown recipe and adjusted slightly....Really really really good...

4 1/2" thick round steaks
2 tsp kosher salt
1 tsp ground pepper
1 cup flour
4 eggs, beaten
1/4 c. vegetable oil
4 cups chicken broth
1 cup whole milk
1/4 tsp thyme (or more to taste)
1/4 tsp cayenne (or more to taste)
Hashbrowns or mashed potatoes to serve with steaks
Additional 1 Tbsp of vegetable oil for gravy and additional up to 3 Tbsp flour to thicken (below).

Get your potatoes on, whether they be frozen hash browns or mashed....get them going..unless they're instant mashed, you can do those last minute.

If the round steak is not in 1/2 inch cuts, fillet them to 1/2 inch steaks with the grain. Season both sides with kosher salt and black pepper. Place the 1 cup flour in a paper plate or pie pan. Dredge the meat into the flour on both sides. Then tenderize them with a fork/mallet combination (poke then beat the living crap outta them) or a needle tenderizer (which I wish I had.) After tenderizing, dredge the meat again in flour, then egg, then flour again. Do all the steaks and set aside, let them set up for at least 10 minutes (15 mins is better.)

Preheat your oven to 250. Warm the serving plates if you want at this time. Set up a wire rack over a cookie sheet to drain the cooked steaks on.

Heat the oil in a frying pan over medium heat until very warm (shimmering). Fry the meat in batches, two or three at a time without crowding them up. You will fry them between 3 and 4 minutes per side, getting the outside crispy and the inside cooked through. When they are done, transfer to the rack and place in the oven to keep warm until ready to serve.

Add another tablespoon of vegetable oil to the pan along with any fat and scraps left.  When all the meat is done. Over medium heat add additional flour, as needed. Whisk in, deglazing the pan. then add 2 cups chicken broth and whisk to combine the drippings/flour. whisk to smooth and add the other 2 cups chicken broth. Bring to a boil to thicken. Add milk and thyme and cayenne. Taste and season as neede with thyme, cayenne, black pepper, and salt. If the gravy is too thin, use a cold water/corn starch mix to thicken.

Serve gravy over the potatoes and the meat.

Apple Crisp

My weekly produce basket had waaaay too many apples for us to eat so I took some perfectly healthy apples and made them into a perfectly unhealthy (but delicious!) dessert. Got this recipe online and I rate it very high. We loved it.

APPLE CRISP:

10 cups all-purpose apples, peeled, cored and sliced
1 cup white sugar
1 tablespoon flour
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 cup water
1 cup rolled oats
1 cup flour
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup butter, melted

Directions
1.Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2.Place the sliced apples in a 9x13 inch pan. Mix the white sugar, 1 tablespoon flour and ground cinnamon together, and sprinkle over apples. Pour water evenly over all.
3.Combine the oats, 1 cup flour, brown sugar, baking powder, baking soda and melted butter together to form a crumb mixture. Crumble evenly over the apple mixture.
4.Bake at 350 degrees for about 45 minutes.

Pork Ribs

I hit a great sale on country style boneless pork ribs a while ago. Found a fantastic recipe, made it for the family. Then I lost the recipe. Trent threatened divorce unless I found it again. Ahh, I feel the love. Glad I found it so my husband will stay with me now. *pssshhh! whatever!* Who would feed him :) Love you honey.

Boneless Pork Ribs (also works with bone in Spare Ribs)

6 - 9 lbs pork ribs, boneless
1 1/2 cups white sugar
1/4 cup salt
2 1/2 Tbsp black pepper
3 Tbsp paprika
1 tsp cayenne
2 Tbsp garlic powder

Combine these ingredients and rub liberally into ribs, place in roasting pan (do yourself a favor and use a disposable one). Cover and refrigerate at least 8 hours. Longer is ok too.

Preheat oven to 250. Bake ribs uncovered for 3-4 hours. Start the sauce (below), it has to simmer 1 hour.

Sauce:
5 Tbsp pan drippings
1/2 cup chopped onion
4 cups ketchup
3 cups hot water
4 Tbsp brown sugar
2-3 drops liquid smoke
1/2 tsp accent (optional)
2 Tbsp chili powder
To Taste, Add (what we add): Cayenne (1/2 tsp), salt (we don't add here), pepper (1/4 to 1/2 tsp) t

Remove drippings into saucepan, saute onion in pan drippings until brown and soft. Stir in ketchup, heat 3-4 minutes. Stirring constantly, mix in water and brown sugar. Season to taste with cayenne, salt pepper, liquid smoke, accent, and chili powder. Simmer one hour to reduce, add water if necessary to thin.

Grill ribs. This is the man's job, but what he tells me he does it heats the grill on high to dlean it and get it nice and hot, then scrapes it for anything left-over from last time, turns grill to LOW, sprays with Pam (careful here, we don't want any Micheal Jackson hair-flaming episodes here), puts the ribs on, bastes with lots of the sauce, cooks for 5-7 minutes, flips, resauce, 5-7 minutes. done....... Sticky, spicy, sweet ribs.

Alfredo Sauce

Pretty sure I just made my husband the happiest man ever tonight...no,not how you think...as usual, it was with food :) Long before Ragu came out with a bottled Alfredo sauce, his mom made it from scratch. He likes the bottled stuff okay for recipes, but really wanted the real stuff like his mom used to make. Of course, I did it. And, as testament, my husband says to me at dinner, "Well honey...as usual, you nailed it." Woot.

Alfredo Sauce:
1 pint heavy cream
1 stick butter
1-1/2 cups grated parmesan (yes, the bulk stuff at Winco worked GREAT)
Garlic (See Notes below!) **
Black pepper

Heat cream and butter on low until butter melts and mixture is getting warm. Add the garlic and pepper. Keep stirring with a whisk and slowly add a cup of parmesan cheese in increments. (Sprinkle about a quarter cup at a time on the cream mixture and whisk it in. Add more when it's incorporated.) Add cheese up to the 1-1/2 cups, you may not use it all, the cheese provides the thickness for the sauce, use the entire cup and a half if you want it nice and thick. The sauce will thicken slightly as it cools, but I used the whole cup and a half....(Have you met me? lol) Season to taste with more garlic or pepper if you wish.

You should NOT boil this sauce, it will scorch. But keeping it at a low-med temperature and whisking while the cheese melts is good. Serve over pasta.

** A note about the garlic: I did not use fresh garlic in this. If you DO use fresh, crush it and sautee it a little in butter first, it's a little too powerful when fresh. What I did use was the minced garlic in a bottle, you know the stuff, it looks like paste. I love that stuff. If you don't have that around, substitute 1/4 teaspoon garlic powder.


Okay! The cool thing about this is you can do anything with this sauce. I doubled the recipe and added two cans of minced clams and a can of shrimp. Fantastic. You can add sauteed vegetables for a vegetable alfredo. Add a grilled chicken breast (or really cheat and add a can of cooked chicken meat) for chicken alfredo. Add some crab meat and a couple of steamed asparagus spears for Crab Oscar. Grill a London Broil and slice thinly, and you got steak alfredo. Yummo.


I will be trying this with sun dried tomatoes and roasted red peppers for a sauce to rival Craigo's...tune in for results in a couple weeks! This stuff is just too rich to eat more than a couple times a month!

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FREE ONLINE COOKING CLASSES! I will be checking these OUT! Nice!

Sauteeing, Braising, even Bartending 101.

Corn and Cream

This is my sister Rae's famous recipe for a delicious corn side dish. It's Corn with Cream. NOT to be confused with creamed corn, which is disgusting in my opinion! This is yummy yummy yummy, I get requests for the recipe every time I make it.

A Thanksgiving/Christmas staple dish at my house! This makes a very full 13x9 dish, can be halved if you don’t need that much.

48 ounces frozen baby kernel white corn or equivalent (three 16 oz pkgs)
1 Pint Whipping Cream
1 Pint Half and Half
2 Teaspoons Salt
½ Teaspoon Accent (optional)
4 Teaspoons Sugar
½ Teaspoon White Pepper or Cayenne
4 Tbsp melted Butter
4 Tbsp Flour or tapioca flour
About ½ Cup Parmesan cheese for topping

Thaw corn in the package in warm water before beginning or you end up with a frozen lumpy corn-sicle!

Mix Corn, Cream, Half and Half, Salt, Accent, Sugar, and Pepper together in a large pan. Mix Thoroughly and bring to a boil and simmer 5 minutes.

While simmering corn mixture, mix together the melted butter and flour. Add to corn and cook until the mixture is thick. Be careful not to scorch it.

Fold finished corn into a 13x9 casserole dish. Cover the top with a layer of parmesan cheese, as light or as thick as you like. I use an even layer that covers the corn about 1/8” thick.

Broil the dish under the broiler in your oven, watching it carefully. Broil until the cheese will browns a little but doesn’t burn!

Trout Two Ways

Caught a trout this weekend! Here's how to cook it, two ways. For both recipes, start with a cleaned, washed fish that's either been filleted or split open to lay flat. Keep in mind you can do this on the bbq grill in a disposable foil pan.

Sweet Trout (our favorite!)

Lay trout skin side down in a sprayed baking dish or tin foil disposable pan.

Slice an orange into circle or half circle slices and lay the slices over the meat of the fish. Coat the whole thing with brown sugar. The guy who told me how to do this said, "So, just when you think you have enough brown sugar, put a little more on there." So, I'd say for an average fish I put on probably 3/4 cup of brown sugar.

Bake until fish is done. We like our fish DONE, so I bake it at least a half hour until it dries a little and flakes. I like this served with rice.



Savory Trout (also good!)

Lay trout skin side down in a sprayed baking dish or tin foil disposable pan. Coat fish with a light layer of olive oil. Make a rub of garlic salt, parsely flakes, pepper, paprika, rosemary and rub it into the fish and lay onion slices over it.

Bake until fish is done. We like our fish DONE, so it bakes at least a half hour until it dries a little, and flakes. I like this served with au gratin potatoes.

Breaded Pork Chops in Gravy

This is one of my family's favorite meals. I usually make this the night before and put it in the crock pot, keep it in the fridge, then take it out and start it before I leave for work. When I get home, all I have to do is peel and mash potatoes to go with it, make a salad, and done.

Breaded Pork Chops in Gravy

4-6 pork chops or cutlets (bone in or boneless, doesn't matter). Not frozen, they have to be thawed.

Milk

Seasoned bread crumbs

2 family size cans or 6 regular size cans of cream of mushroom soup**

Rinse pork chops with water and pat dry. Place a small amount of milk on a plate or bowl, and some bread crumbs on another plate. Dip the chops first in the milk then dredge in bread crumbs. Heat some oil in a frying pan and lightly fry the chops on both sides so the bread crumbs are golden brown, this only takes about a minute or so on each side. Set aside.

In the crock pot, mix the soup with enough milk to make a gravy-like consistency, and mix well with a wire whisk. The more chops you make, the more gravy you'd want, so make enough gravy to coat and cover the chops in the crock pot.

Place the chops into the soup mixture and spoon it over to cover the chops completely. Cook all day on low. When serving, just "fish out" the chops, they fall apart, and serve it with mashed potatoes.

** If you love mushrooms, throw in a can of mushroom stems and pieces. If you hate mushrooms, you could do this recipe with any cream soup, cream of chicken makes a good gravy and so does cream of celery.

Trent's Favorite Baked Chicken

Trent does not generally enjoy chicken. At all. But he likes this, thank goodness!

All you need is a McCormick Bag n' Season Chicken foil seasoning mix.

Take a whole chicken and clean it, take out the giblets and cut off the tail and any fatty parts. Rub salt in the inside cavity. Place the chicken inside the cooking bag that comes with the seasoning mix. Pour the seasoning onto the chicken and rub it around so it coats the whole chicken. Put about a half cup of water in the bottom of the bag, seal it with the black closure thing that comes with the bag. Place the whole bag in your crock pot. Poke a 1/4 inch small slit in the top of the bag as a vent hole. Put the lid on your crock pot and cook on low for 6-8 hours.

This isn't necessarily a beautiful thing when it's done because it's fall off the bone tender, so I take all the meat off the bones transfer it to a platter to serve it. Great with stove top stuffing or something like that.

Chicken Broth

When cooking anything that's savory and boiled, it tastes better if you cook with chicken broth rather than water. I go through a lot of chicken broth because I use it in place of water for rice, boiled or steamed vegetables, and homemade stuffings. Also, you can substitute chicken broth for other liquids that you don't have like cooking wines (use a chicken broth with a half teaspoon of vinegar added) . I was buying chicken broth by the case three or four times a year!

Then, I learned how to make chicken broth from Ina Garten on the Barefoot Contessa. It's so easy, and I like having free chicken broth when I need it. It takes 5 minutes to set up, then you just cook it all day (or night) in the crock pot and then you need some ice cube trays to freeze the broth in.

Start with a chicken "carcass", the bones and stuff from a chicken you've had for dinner. You can use a carcass from a rotisserie chicken from the grocery store too. Put the whole thing in the crock pot and cover with water. Throw in two onions, quartered. Add three or so garlic cloves that are peeled and split (I just peel them then bang them with a knife to split the surface open). You can add some celery stalks if you have them. Add a teaspoon of salt and a half teaspoon of poultry seasoning if you have it, maybe more salt to taste if you prefer.

Boil all night in the crock pot. The next morning, remove the bones, vegetables, and everything from the broth, with a slotted spoon or seive. Ladle the broth into ice cube trays, set the trays on a cookie sheet, and freeze. When they're frozen through, pop the cubes out and store in freezer bags in the freezer. One cube is roughly 1/4 cup...but you can also nuke a few cubes in the microwave and measure if you need a more exact amount.

Yes...it's sort of a pain to do, but worth it to me!

It's also nice to have ice cube trays lying around in case you open a bottle of cooking wine and don't use the whole thing...pour into the trays and freeze to use later for sauces and recipes. Also, fresh herbs can be frozen the same way if you have some leftover and you know you're not going to use them. Cut or tear them into large pieces, place in ice cube trays, cover with water and freeze...use them later in cooked recipes.