Loaded Baked Potato Soup

Another version of a classic, I know, but listen up...this one is really good and, if you have leftover baked potatoes, is really fast to throw together!!  Creamy, potato-ie, and completely satisfying...dare I say better than a loaded baked potato?

Loaded Baked Potato Soup

4 strips of thick cut bacon
1 large onion, diced
6 cups chicken broth
4 baked potatoes, peeled and diced
2 cups broccoli florets
salt and pepper
3 tbsp. flour
1 cup heavy cream
1 cup whole milk
2 cloves of pressed garlic
1 cup grated swiss cheese
1 cup sharp cheddar cheese
chives
sour cream
cheddar cheese for toppings

In a large skillet cook bacon until crisp.  Remove to a paper toweled plate and allow to cool.  Pour bacon fat in a bowl and reserve for later.  Fry onion in the pan that you cooked the bacon in until onion is translucent.  In a separate large pot add chicken broth, potato, broccoli, and onion.  Bring to a boil and simmer until broccoli is tender.  Add salt and pepper.  Back in the bacon skillet, add reserved bacon fat. Whisk in flour and add heavy cream and milk all at once.  Add garlic and whisk until thickened.  Remove from heat and add cheeses.  Stir until cheeses are melted.  Add creamed mixture to the potato soup.  Add more salt and pepper if necessary.

Top with cheddar cheese, a dollop of sour cream, bacon crumbles, and chives.  Enjoy!!

Raspberry Fudge Brownie Trifle

The fudge sauce/raspberry preserve layer alone could bring about world peace in this amazing trifle concoction...no lie!!

*sorry for the lame picture! 

Raspberry Fudge Brownie Trifle

9x13 Pan of brownies, cut into 1 inch squares

2 small boxes vanilla pudding

2 cups milk

2 cups heavy whipping cream

4 tbsp. powdered sugar

2 teas. Vanilla

1/2 cup vanilla yogurt (optional)

2 cups fudge sauce (good quality or home made)

1/2 to 3/4 cup raspberry preserves 

36 oz. fresh raspberries

Whisk pudding and milk together in a medium bowl. Set aside. Whip heavy cream until soft peaks form. Add powdered sugar and vanilla. Reserve one cup for topping.  Fold remaining whipped cream into the pudding.  Add the yogurt if desired.  (It just adds a little tang...I like it).  Mix the fudge sauce and raspberry preserves in a separate bowl. In trifle bowl layer brownie, fudge sauce, pudding mix, then raspberries. Repeat one more time. Then another layer of brownie, then fudge sauce. If you are coming to the top finish with whipped cream you set aside in the middle, line the outside with raspberries, and drizzle with fudge sauce.

New addition as of 3/28/14...but with chocolate pudding instead of vanilla.

Chicken Alfredo Casserole

So normally the word casserole brings to mind a bland rice, chicken, cream of something combo topped with crunched up potato chips. No thank you!

The only problem…the rest of my family loves a good casserole! So I sometimes need to find a compromise.  Tonight I came up with a pretty good one! 

Chicken Alfredo Casserole 

1/2 box bow tie pasta cooked

2 chicken breasts cooked and cubed

10 cherry tomatoes halved*

2 cups broccoli*

1 jar Alfredo sauce

2 tbsp prepared pesto

1 teas. Fresh ground pepper

1 1/2 cup grated mozzarella 

1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese 

2 slices white bread cubed and crumbled

1/4 cup butter melted

2 teas. Italian seasoning

1 teas. Garlic powder

Preheat oven to 350. Combine first seven ingredients in a bowl.  Spread into a 9x13 pan.  Top with cheeses.  In a bowl combine last four ingredients until bread is covered with butter and spices are well integrated.  Spread over top of the cheese. Cover with foil and bake for 20 minutes.  Remove foil and continue baking for 10 minutes or until bread crumbs are browned. 

*use any vegetables you want!

Caramel Apple Trifle

Caramel Apple Triffle*

2 sm. packages vanilla pudding

1 cup vanilla Greek yogurt

1 1/2 cup cold milk

1 1/2 cups heavy cream

1/4 c. Sugar

1 teas. Vanilla

Salted Caramel Sauce (home made or from the store...Trader Joes has the best)

Toffee Chips

2 Sara Lee pound cakes, cut in 1" cubes

6 to 8 apples cored and diced**

1/2 cup sugar

2 teas. cinnamon

1 tbsp. lemon juice

Toss apples with cinnamon, sugar and lemon juice and set aside.

Beat heavy cream until whipped.  Add sugar and vanilla.  Beat in milk, yogurt, and pudding mixes.

Heat caramel to easily spreadable consistency.

In a trifle dish layer pound cake, pudding mixture, apples, caramel and toffee.  The caramel layer can be thin. Continue with another round of layers.  Finish off by mounding pound cake in the center of the trifle and piping remaining pudding on  top. Decorate with apples, caramel, and toffee.

*i have a really bad cold while writing this recipe up so please excuse vagueness for now.  I will come back when I am feeling better and add more detail!!

**If you are feeling lazy you could by a couple cans of good quality apple pie filling to substitute for the fresh apple layer.  

Mini Spiced Pumpkin Cupcakes with Salted Caramel Frosting

I LOVE FALL!!  The breeze is so cool, the sun is so warm and low in the sky.  Second to none, however, is fall food.  We made our first batch of chili a week ago...it was delicious!!  Last year I made these little gems quite a bit (see here), but with a different caramel frosting recipe.  The frosting wasn't my favorite...it would get hard and crumby after a couple hours. Bummer. So this year I took it upon myself to figure out a yummier way to make a caramel frosting...better yet, a SALTED caramel frosting.  My inspiration came from a recipe I found on pinterest, however, they had you MAKE the salted caramel before you added it to the frosting.  Now, I am all for making caramels!  I make and wrap at least 200 each Christmas season, but making the caramel from scratch in this case defeats the ease of making the cupcakes (note the ingredients list for the cupcakes below)!  Luckily I have a trusty little friend up my short-cut sleeve and his name is Joe.  (He is a trader of some sort...haven't figured that one out yet.)  He carries a wonderful little jar of salted caramel sauce that did the trick!  When the substitution was made and a little more tweaking was done the result is sweet and salty perfection!  Go ahead...take a lick...wait for it...wait for it...BAM!  That rich, salty caramel sneaks up on you huh?!  Do you want another?

Cupcakes:

1 box spice cake
1 small can pumpkin (not pumpkin pie filling)

Preheat oven to 350. Mix the two together and fill mini cupcake (or mini muffin) pans. Bake for about 15 minutes. This will make about 40 mini cupcakes.

Frosting:

8 oz. salted butter, softened
4 oz. cream cheese, softened
2-3 tbsp. heavy cream or whole milk
4-5 cups powdered sugar
10 oz. jar Trader Joes Salted Caramel Sauce

Mix the butter and cream cheese together.  Alternate adding 1 cup of powdered sugar and 1 tbsp. of cream until desired consistency.  Add the whole jar of caramel sauce and mix until incorporated.  Spread on cupcakes and enjoy!

Lemon Blueberry Muffin Trifle

      Brunch with lady friends calls for something special. Since I am on a huge trifle kick I decided to figure out how to make a breakfast worthy trifle...not too sweet and hopefully with some granola for crunch!  After looking around on the trusty internet for ideas I came up with this beautiful concoction of brunch-worthiness...the Lemon Blueberry Muffin trifle!

You will need:
1/4 c. room temperature butter
3/4 c. lemon cake mix
2/3 c. oatmeal
1 c. plain granola
one dozen mini blueberry muffins*
three large blueberry muffins*
1-32 oz. container Greek vanilla flavored yogurt
1-16 oz. container Greek vanilla flavored yogurt
2-10.5 oz jars lemon curd (reserve about 2 tbsp. to drizzle on top)
zest of one lemon
1 lb. blueberries

              Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.  In a bowl, cut the butter into the lemon cake mix until crumbly.  Lightly toss in the oatmeal and granola.  Spread on a cookie sheet and place in oven for about 10 minutes or until the mixture is brown and cake mix crumbles are firm.  Remove from oven and allow to cool on counter (make sure it is totally cool before adding it to the trifle). Cut the tops off of the three large muffins and save for later.  Cut the bottoms of large muffins and the mini muffins into bite size pieces and set aside. Mix both yogurts, the unreserved lemon curd and the lemon zest in a large bowl.
            Now you can layer!  Muffins, yogurt mixture, blueberries, crumb topping.  It depends on how big your trifle is as to how many layers you can do.  My second to last layer was the yogurt and then I arranged the muffin tops for the final layer.  I filled in the cracks between the muffins with blueberries and crumb mixture and then drizzled the reserved lemon curd on top of it all! 

*I bought mine from Target...Archer Farms brand.  Very much approved of by my boys! If you do buy them just make sure the large muffins have pretty tops!

Just a quick note.  I had one friend who couldn't attend so I made her a mini trifle in a small wide mouth mason jar!  I had a fourth muffin top I used for the "lid".  It was so cute!  I wish I would have taken a picture!!

Just another chicken salad recipe

I have been making chicken salad in the spring/summer since...well, forever.  After making it for the moms at Jasper's birthday party and receiving rave reviews, I thought I would add it to my blog.  I have to warn you, however, this recipe is one of those "make it up as I go" ones.  If you need precise measurements, I am sorry to disappoint!  I have many variations on the basic recipe so keep reading for further chicken salad enlightenment.

2 medium whole chickens*
salt and pepper
3-4 stalks of celery finely diced
1 red onion finely diced
Mayonnaise (I use Hellmans Light)
Ranch Dressing (I use Litehouse Ranch found in the produce section...it is peppery loveliness)
Salt, Pepper and Garlic seasoning to taste

Salt and pepper raw chickens. Place in roaster breast side down to keep breast moist and cover with foil.  Roast according to directions (usually 350 degrees for up to 2 hours) basting as needed and removing foil for last half hour.  Reserve any pan juices.

Allow chicken to cool completely (place in refrigerator overnight).  Shred chicken removing skin, bones, and all other yucky stuff.  Place in large mixing bowl with a little bit of the reserved pan juices to re-moisten chicken if dry.  Add about 2-3 large spoonfuls of mayo and 1-2 large spoonfuls of ranch dressing.  Start small because you can always add more.  Add celery and onion as desired (again, start small because you can always add more).  Salt, pepper and garlic to taste. 

*the key to good chicken salad is a mix of light and dark meat...it will not taste as good if you use only chicken breasts or canned chicken.  Use rotisserie chickens if you are short of time or afraid to roast a chicken

Okay, here is your enlightenment:

Balsamic Rosemary Chicken Salad
Omit ranch dressing (add more mayo)
Add 1-2 tbsp. balsamic vinegar to mayonnaise before mixing in with chicken.
Add crushed rosemary to your seasoning.
Serve on croissant with Swiss cheese and tomato (toast if desired)

Curried Chicken Salad with Grapes
Omit ranch dressing, celery, and red onion
Add curry powder to taste along more mayo than you would normally use to accommodate for the noodles and cashews.
Slice about one cup of green grapes in half
Finely chop 3-4 green onions
Just before serving add about one cup of La Choy fried noodles and 1/2 cup rough chopped cashews

Craisin Wild Rice Chicken Salad
Omit ranch dressing
Add 1 to 1 1/2 cups of cooked wild rice and increase mayo to accommodate for the rice
Add 1/2 to 1 cup of Craisin (Trader Joes's has the best sweetened, dried cranberries.  Use them if you can get your hands on them)
Add 1/2 cup of chopped walnuts or pecans just before serving
Add crushed rosemary with the salt, pepper, and garlic
Serve on croissant with provolone cheese (toast if desired)

Chicken Salad on a cracker
Make as above
spread on large crackers (pictured is Wheat Thins Tuscan Herb Flatbread)