Category — Recipes

A Korean friend of mine shared this recipe with me. It is perfect for summertime when you are overrun with zucchini.

Hamburger Zucchini Stir-fry

Cooked rice
1 lb. hamburger
2 c. diced zucchini
2 tbsp. oil (sesame oil is best but olive is fine too)
1/2 c. diced onion
1/2 c. diced green pepper (optional)
1 tbsp. soy sauce
2 cloves garlic
chow mein noodles (optional)

Start a pot of rice cooking. (If you own a rice cooker, it is so much easier!) Dice zucchini and toss in a bowl with a teaspoon of salt. In a few minute’s time the salt will draw some of the water out of the zucchini. Dice onion and green pepper. Fry hamburger with garlic, onion and green pepper. Once hamburger is brown, drain off excess oil. Drain any water that has collected in bowl with the zucchini. Add zucchini and soy sauce into skillet with hamburger. Cook over medium heat for 5 minutes or so, stirring occasionally. Salt and pepper to taste (but remember, zucchini will have taken up some of the salt as it released water in the bowl before cooking, so taste before salting). Serve over rice and sprinkle with chow mein noodles if desired.

This meal cooks up in 30 minutes or less and will serve 4-6 people.

This salad was tossed together at the last minute, but my family loved it so much that I knew I had to share it with you. I’ve had similar salads made with strawberrries and spinach, but I’ve never seen one with apricots and cabbage. I was delighted to discover that they were such a tasty combination, especially since I happen to have a lot of both right now. This salad is loaded with nutrition, color and taste.

Summer Confetti Salad

Salad
3 cups of thinly shredded cabbage (any kind)
1 cup of other greens (I used turnip greens–spinach or chard would work well too)
1 cup strawberries, chopped fairly small
1 cup fresh apricots, chopped fairly small

Dressing
Juice from 2 limes
3 T. sugar
3 T. oil

Chop fruit and vegetables and mix in a bowl. Whisk together the dressing until sugar is dissolved. (If you don’t wait til sugar is dissolved, a family member may feel the grit between his teeth and accuse you of not washing the greens. Just sayin’.) When dressing is mixed, pour quickly over salad and toss to coat evenly. Grab your portion of this salad immediately or you may not get any. Especially if you have a 12 year old daughter who goes back for more four seven times.

Today amid driver’s ed and housecleaning and dealing with kid ‘tudes and hosting an afternoon swim attended by 15 cousins, I also managed to can 24 pints of apricot jam. I say this not to brag, but to encourage those of you who are thinking about trying canning.

Canning is NOT hard. It so isn’t.

I got my apricots for free from a relative– gotta love that. This time of year many people with apricot trees find themselves swimming in apricots. If you ask around, you may score some for free too.

Mary’s Truly Easy Apricot Jam

4-1/2 cups apricot puree (use food processer)
1/2 cup lemon juice (or vinegar, which is what I used– this keeps the apricots a good safe acidity)
1 box Sure-Jell pectin (or similar brand)
6 cups sugar

Wash and sort the apricots. It is OK to use apricots with small soft spots as long as they aren’t discolored or (duh) moldy. My 3 and 6 year old daughters helped me sort, and did a good job at it. Tear the apricots in halves to remove the pits. My 10 year old sons did this for me. Fill food processer with apricot chunks and puree for a minute or so. Repeat until you have enough puree.

Wash 5 pint sized canning jars and rings. Fill a boiling water canner half full of water and bring to a boil on the stove. Dip each jar in and out of the boiling water. If you do not have a canner, you can use a very large pot, something tall enough that your jars can be fully submerged in water during processing.

Measure your puree carefully and pour into a big pot on the stove. Immediately mix in the pectin using a wire whisk. Heat mixture to a full rolling boil, first stirring occasionally and then more frequently as mixture heats up.

Once the mixture has reached a full rolling boiling, add sugar a couple cups at a time, stirring continuously. When all sugar is added and mixture has returned to a full rolling boiling, cook for one minute.

Pour mixture quickly into jars leaving 1/4 inch of ‘headspace’, or airspace at the top of the jar. Wipe edges of jars clean. Set on lids and screw rings on tightly. Process in boiling water water bath for 15 minutes. Remove jars carefully and set on a towel on the counter to cool overnight.

Once cool, lids should seal down tightly so that you cannot push them further down when you press the center of the cap. If any of your jars do not seal, simply set them in the fridge and use within a couple weeks.

One batch of jam will probably take you an hour–more if you have an infant, and less if you have a kid or two over the age of 5 who is willing to give you a hand. And it is so darned pretty to look at when you’re done. One of the things I love about canning is that it is one of the few jobs that it doesn’t get UNdone immediately. Unlike laundry or vacuuming or dishes!

I’d love to hear if you decide to try your hand at this– it truly isn’t hard.

This week Shannon’s Works for Me is featuring easy recipes. Actually, recipes that take 5 ingredients or less. This recipe can have more than that, but it is a fun way to get kids to eat their greens and so I am sharing it anyway.

Thai Chard Wraps
Prep time: 20 minutes
Serves:6 or more

Ingredients
a big bunch of chard (or spinach, or lettuce)- probably a pound or so
2 carrots
1 onion
3 cloves garlic
2 lb lean ground beef (or ground turkey)
Slosh of fish sauce (or soy sauce is OK if you don’t have fish sauce)
salt and pepper to taste
Optional: any other veggie, minced
Can also add a cup or two of rice, which is how I made it in the above picture.

Preparation
Wash chard or lettuce leaves, shake off, and set aside in a bowl. Shred carrot, onion, garlic, and any other veggie that you desire using a food processor. Cook ground meat in a large skillet with a little slosh of sesame oil, if you have it. If you are using ground turkey, you will probably need a tablespoon or two of oil as you cook it.

Once meat is cooked, remove from pan and cook chopped veggies in the remaining oil until soft. Return hamburger to pan and mix with veggies and a good slosh of fish sauce or soy sauce (probably around 1/4 cup). Add a cup or two of cooked rice, if desired. Salt and pepper to taste. Cook over medium heat for a few more minutes, til ingredients are well mixed and heated.

Serve by wrapping leaves of chard or lettuce around several tablespoons of meat. Let people take their own lettuce and their own serving of meat/veggies and wrap right on their plate. If your family is like mine, you will be amazed at the amount of chard/spinach/lettuce they will consume at one meal.

Usually by this time of year we are DONE planting. But the other day I bought half a dozen more seed packets and this morning the big boys and I were moving compost while my husband set up new sprinkler lines in preparation for just a bit more garden space.

The seeds I bought? Parsnips. Turnips. Kohlrabi. Salsify. I’ll be honest: we’ve never even tried some of these foods. But this summer I happened upon a book called Root Cellaring and got inspired. For years John has talked about digging a root cellar to store some of our garden produce a little longer. I wasn’t sold on the idea til I bought the book. Now he and I are both looking at various areas of our property with a critical eye, trying to figure out where the best place would be for a nice cool hole in the ground.

We may not love every veggie we try. But I figure I can use most of it in a nice winter soup, and with a little experimentation we can find other ways to do different veggies too. We are really hoping to discover some good new veggies that will be happy in a root cellar for a couple months, thus decreasing our dependence on grocery store food.

In the book ‘Farmer Boy’ there’s some great description of their family’s root cellar. It was quite inspirational to read how the family with careful management was able to save all sorts of food through the winter using only the natural cooling powers of underground storage.

We could definitely use more ‘fridge’ space. In good years we harvest 12-15 bushels of apples. We routinely get bushels of onions for free. The cabbage tends to come on all at once, leaving us trying to use it all up fast, to regain fridge space. We always have lots of pumpkins. And there are lots of other winter-keeper type veggies that we haven’t even tried.

The other day I grabbed a couple of unusual things from the grocery store to try: a long white daikon radish and 3 ‘bulbs’ (??) of kohlrabi. When I grabbed the radish, a lady next to me asked me what I was going to do with it. “I dunno,” I said. “I’m experimenting. I’ll probably put it in a stirfry.”

“Me too,” she said, holding up her bag of kohlrabi with a smile. “I’m growing this for the first time in my garden and I wanted to taste it.”

At home with my vegetable bounty, I contemplated what to do. Google a recipe? Nah, too easy. Besides, I was starting to envision some kind of veggie/skewer/beef recipe on the grill. I peeled and cubed the radish. Then I chopped the long leafy ‘legs’ (tops?) off the kohlrabi. (My hubby looked suspicious and said it looked like Martian vegetables.) While trimming the kohlrabi, I discovered that the outside of it seemed woody. I trimmed all the skin off which revealed a greenish white interior that seemed much more tender. I cubed it like the radish, and then got out some brussel sprouts and cubed some carrots and potatoes so my brave food explorers poor children would have something familiar at dinner. I already had some cubed stew beef that I cut into fairly small pieces just in case it was tough.

My skewered-food-on-the-grill idea went out the window when I discovered I only had one skewer and it had last been used to unclog a bathroom sink drain. Hmm… Since it was hot outside and I wasn’t anxious to heat my house, I still wanted to try the grill. But i wasn’t sure if I could get the veggies to cook evenly. I put a pot of water on to boil and added the veggies in gradually. First the hardest veggies: radish and carrots, then kohlrabi and brussel sprouts, and finally the potatoes. Ten minutes for the firmer stuff and only 5 for the potatoes. I just wanted them to be partly cooked. The grill would finish the rest.

I tossed the meat with a little steak sauce and garlic salt, then spread it on an oiled cookie sheet which covered half my grill. Then I tossed the remaining veggies with a bit more steak sauce and salt and put it on a second oiled cookie sheet on the other side of the grill. The oil on this sheet was fairly generous– about 1/4 a cup, since I didn’t want the veggies to stick.

The veggie pan was very full– I’d put too many veggies on to cook well, and I had to stir gingerly so as not to lose anything into the fire (medium heat, btw). But the 2-1/2 lbs of beef was spread in single layer on the pan, and was soon cooking merrily. I stirred it a couple times. It browned nicely, smelled great, and was cooked through in 10 minutes. At that point I took it off with a slotted spoon into a bowl, leaving some good meat juice and a little oil on the pan. Then I was able to put half my cooking veggies onto the cookie sheet from which I’d just removed the meat.

The veggies cooked my more efficiently spread out like that, and soon all the veggies had some nicely browned surfaces. Once everything was cooked, I mixed the meat and vegetables together and served it all over rice.

The radish turned out to be rather sharp-tasting; none of us liked it that much and I don’t think we’ll be growing radishes any time soon. The familiar veggies: potatoes, carrots, and brussel sprouts were happily eaten, though next time I’ll add the brussel sprouts to the boiling water sooner. They would have benefitted from a bit more cooking. The surprise hit was the kohlrabi. It had a mild sweet flavor that reminded me somewhat of a squash, but with a firmer texture than squash. It was very nice and we are definitely adding it to our garden line-up.

The whole meal was gobbled quite happily with people coming back for more. My hubby said, “I would never have guessed that kohlrabi is that good.”

Hmmm….what to try next? Anyone know what to do with salsify?

Today’s NYT article Putting Meat in its Place captured my philosophy on meat perfectly. We don’t NEED huge slabs of meat on our dinner plates every day!

In that spirit, here’s a recipe several people have requested. We only make this a couple times a month– it is NOT low fat– but everyone loves it when we do!

Affordable Hamburger Stroganoff

Serves 6

INGREDIENTS
1 (16 ounce) package egg noodles
3/4 pound lean ground beef
2 cups milk
2 T. flour
2 T. butter
1 clove garlic
1/4 cup ketchup
1/2 of an 8 oz package of cream cheese
1/2 of an 8 ounce container of sour cream
1 cup fresh sliced mushrooms, optional (or canned, if you must)

DIRECTIONS
Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Add egg noodles and cook for 8 to 10 minutes or until al dente; drain.

In a skillet over medium heat, brown the ground beef until no pink shows; drain and set aside. If you are using fresh mushrooms, fry for 1-2 min in same skillet that you used for the hamburger. Set aside.

Again in the same skillet, melt butter on medium high heat. Add minced garlic and cook for a minute. Then add flour. Whisk well to break up any clumps of flour. Add milk and heat till bubbly and starting to thicken.

Add cream cheese, ketchup, and sour cream. Whisk til smooth and heated through. Add hamburger and mushrooms back into skillet. Blend hamburger mixture with pasta. Salt and pepper to taste.

Once you’ve made this recipe a few times, you’ll probably be able to get the whole thing on the table in 30 minutes. It is a quick, easy and very delicious meal. We serve the mushrooms on the side, since not all our kids like mushrooms.

(Note that this recipe does not call for canned soup, which helps make the recipe more affordable. If you want to save a few calories and even more money, you can also delete the cream cheese. It is not essential, but it sure is yummy.)

Our strawberries are in full swing and we have a pretty decent patch of them== probably about 50 plants. But we’ve been eating them so quickly (and happily) that I was starting to wonder if I’d ever have enough to make jam. So this morning I made a pre-emptive strike (meaning I got there before any kids did) and picked as many as I could. Then I picked some rhubarb and by combining the two items, I was able to get 9 jars of jam. Here’s the recipe in case you are interested.

Strawberry Rhubarb Jam

Ingredients:
4 cups rhubarb, thinly sliced
2 T. lemon juice
4 cups of fresh strawberries, sliced
10 cups of sugar
2 packages of fruit pectin
1/2 t. butter (keeps jam from getting too foamy)

In large kettle combine all ingredients except sugar. Bring mixture to a full boil. Add sugar and keep stirring till sugar is fully dissolved. Return to boil and boil for one minute. Keep stirring. Remove from the burner and skim off the foam with a spoon.

Spoon the hot jam into hot pint or half-pint canning jars. I like to pour the jam into a glass 4-cup glass measuring cup first, then pour into jars, as this makes jam easier to pour into jars. Leave 1/4 inch of space at the top. Wipe jar rims clean and screw lids on firmly. Place the jars in boiling-water canner on high. When water begins to boil, set timer and boil for 5 minutes. Remove the jars from canner and cool on racks. Try not to disturb jam til it is cool. It may take several hours to set.

This should make about 12 half-pint jars.

Because I am about to fall over from exhaustion, I’m linking instead of writing tonight.
Yummy-looking green bean recipe
Adorable EASY market bags
Marian finally started a blog! You go, Girl!
To my surprise a CNN story quoting me. (Thanks to Melanie and others for the heads up!)
And for any new readers who’ve strolled over from CNN- some of my frugal recipes

Oh, and a question. I’m planning to move my blog to my own domain one of these days, and am looking for a webbie person who can do that for me. I’ll be using the installed wordpress, and would like someone able to do a few tweaks to customize my site. Any recommendations?

Here’s another of the meals that I featured on my Frugal Cooking Carnival

Beef Dumpling Stew

Serves 8

Stew
2 lbs hamburger or sausage
2 T. oil (olive or vegetable)
2 c. sliced carrots
2 c. minced onion
4 T. flour
8 c. beef broth (make this with beef bouillon if you don’t have beef broth on hand)
4 c. pureed tomatoes (or 3 c. tomato sauce and 1 c. water)
1/2 c. milk
1 c. corn
1 c. slivered cabbage
3 c. potatoes, cubed
Salt and pepper to taste

Dumplings
3 c. flour
2 T. baking powder
1-1/2 t. salt
1 T. paprika
1-1/2 c. milk
2 T. butter

Soup: Sautee hamburger or sausage in a deep heavy pot until browned. Remove from pan and pour rendered fat in a small bowl. Sautee carrots and onion in olive oil in same pot. Once the onion is translucent, mix in flour. Cook for a few minutes, then add beef broth. Scrape the pan to get any bits off the bottom of the pan. Add milk, water, tomato, cubed potatoes, cabbage, and meat. Let come to a simmer and cook for about 20-30 minutes, or until potatoes are tender.

Dumplings:
Mix flour, baking powder, paprika, and salt. Warm milk and butter in microwave. Pour the warm mixture over the flour and stir together.

Taste the soup and add salt and pepper to taste. Now spoon the dumpling mixture on top of the soup in little blobs (about 2 T. per dumpling). Cover with a lid, and let the dumplings simmer on medium-low for 7-8 minutes. Break a dumpling apart with a fork to make sure dumplings are cooked through. Serve.

Or breakfast. Or lunch.

This evening around midnight I was writing away, but getting increasingly sidetracked by hunger pangs. I kept telling myself that I just ought to go to bed, but the quiet of the night lured me to keep writing. And besides, there was that rumbling in my stomach. No wonder. Dinner had been at 5, on the way to soccer practice.

An egg, I thought. And toast?

Oops. No bread.

Pasta? But that would take so long….

I got out my trusty cast-iron skillet, dropped on a bit of butter, and thought. And peeked into the fridge.

I discovered an opened package of egg roll wrappers, and realized that one square would make a perfect single serving of pasta.

Onto the stove went a pot with an inch of water so it would boil quickly. I fried my egg, leaving it just a little yolky in the middle, then slid it onto a dessert plate. I sliced two mushrooms, and fried them too.

By then the water was boiling. My egg roll wrapper went in, just for a couple minutes. I pulled it out with a fork, draped it across my egg and topped it with mushrooms.

Now there’s a snack.

Or breakfast.

Or dinner.

I think now I’d better do some aerobic typing to make up for the calories.