Baked Caramel-Banana French Toast

I first saw this recipe in an All You magazine. I can't remember where the magazine went, but I think I remembered most of how to make it. Doesn't matter. This turned out spectacular and I would make it again...and again.
Don't be afraid of the lengthy description, I just feel like yapping today, it's really not hard. My seven year old did most of the prep work so that shows how easy it must be, (or how incredibly talented he is), or both.
Anyway, keep in mind that you'll want to make this before you go to bed and cook it the next morning for breakfast.
Here goes...

What you'll need:A loaf of bread. I think the recipe called for Challa bread which a slightly sweet braided bread. They don't sell that at the suckish store that I shop at and I don't bake...so I was actually going to use regular bread and then I thought of King's Hawaiian and went to grab some of their dinner rolls. That's when I came across these babies!

King's Hawaiian Hot Dog Buns! Are you kidding me? (haha Can you tell I've had too much caffeine today?) These buns were actually perfect because of the way they were already cut. All I had to do was cut the bun in half again lengthwise and then cut into 3/4 inch squares. If you can't find anything, just use regular old bread. You'll be fine.
You'll also need a stick or 8 tbsp (or 1/2 cup) unsalted butter. As you can see in the ingredients pic, Land O Lakes came out with a new Cinnamon/Sugar butter. I used 4 tbsp of that and 4 tbsp of regular.
Heat that butter up in a pan and add about 3/4 to 1 cup dark brown sugar, packed. You can also add 2 tbsp. dark rum if you feel inclined to do so. I chose not to because a bottle of rum with 2 tbsp missing out of it would quickly turn into a bottle of rum with less then 2 tbsp left in it!
Moving on...

Stir over med/low until smooth, remove from heat, add 3 sliced bananas to the mixture. Stir to coat, set aside.

Add half of the bread squares to a 9x13 baking pan, pour banana mixture over the top evenly.

Top with remaining bread.

Set aside. In a large bowl, whisk together 8 eggs, 2 cups 1/2 & 1/2, 1 tbsp vanilla, dash of salt. Pour mixture over the bread and use a large spoon to push down the bread into the egg mixture. You want to make sure that every piece of every bread is soaked...or at least moistened. Now, cover the pan with foil, put it in the fridge, and leave it alone until you are ready to make breakfast or brunch.
Here's what it will look like the next morning.

Take the pan out of the fridge and leave out at room temperature for about 15 minutes. Preheat the over to 350. Remove foil and bake until the bread is puffy and golden brown. About 40-60 minutes. You want to check the middle with a toothpick just like you would check a cake for doneness.

For some reason my pic makes it look burned but I assure you it is not burned. I really need a new camera.

Now you have this delicious dish almost like stuffed french toast.

Add some whipped cream to the top, but it's just as good without it.
Be careful, it's hot!

Fried Calamari with Aioli

Fried calamari from a restaurant is really hit or miss for me. It's either great, or it's yucky. It's not that easy to overcook calamari in the deep fryer so I just don't understand how some restaurants can get it so rubbery. I've had some excellent calamari at Carrabba's, but the Rain Forest Cafe was pretty decent also. Remember, I don't live near the ocean. :)

What you'll need to make it at home:

1 package calamari. I bought the Private Selection Brand (Kroger) and they come whole with tentacles separated. About a pound?

Oil for deep frying. If you have a deep fryer, even better. If not, you'll need about 3 cups vegetable oil.

1/2 cup or so of flour

salt

dried oregano, parsley

seasoned salt to taste

pepper

garlic and onion powder

any other seasoning that you'd like to add to the batter to make it more tasty :)

Mix all of the dry ingredients together in a big bowl or baking dish to make it easy to dredge several pieces at a time. Set aside.

Take the squid to the sink and thoroughly rinse each one and cut into rings.

I used kitchen scissors, it is SO much easier. Keep the tentacles if you're going to eat them. Some do, some don't. My boys like to pretend they're eating spiders! haha.

Don't worry if the rings stay very flat after you cut them. They will open up when you fry them.
Now that you've rinsed them, strain them to get off most of the liquid. Prepare your deep fryer to 360 degrees or add your 3 cups of oil to a deep pot and heat until a drop of water sizzles.
Dredge your squid in the flour mixture making sure that each piece has a nice thin coat and is thoroughly coated.
Add to oil a few at a time, I did 10-15 pieces at a time, and deep fry for about 3 minutes.
They float so you'll have to carefully try to flip them over about halfway through that time.
Use a slotted metal spoon to remove and set on a dish layered with two or three paper towels to catch the excess oil. Continue until all are cooked.

For the Aioli Sauce(which is basically a flavored mayo):

3/4 cup mayonnaise

tsp garlic (diced)

bout 1 tsp or more lemon juice

fresh parsley

salt

Mix all ingredients together. Voila!

Serve with aioli, marinara, and lemon wedges for a delicious appetizer.

Garden Chicken Alfredo

You know those days when you don't have anything planned for dinner and you don't want (or have time) to go to the store?
Sometimes you have to just cook as you go. I started dinner by pulling a bunch of stuff out of my pantry and fridge that I thought would taste good together and here's what I came up with.

I also used olive oil, fresh thyme and basil.
This dish cooks up really quickly and I would say you could get it done from start to finish in less than 30 minutes for sure!
The 1st thing you want to do is to get a pot of water on the stove on high for the noodles. Keep an eye on it while you're making the sauce and when it starts to boil, cook the noodles to al dente, strain, rinse, and set aside until sauce is done.

Cut your chicken into bite sized squares. I used about a pound of tenders, (don't forget to cut that nasty little cord out as shown here.)
Heat about a tbsp of olive oil in a pan over med. Once hot, add 1/2 sliced onion, tbsp diced garlic, and a pkg of sliced mushrooms (always optional).
Saute for 2-3 minutes then add chicken and salt & pepper to taste. Brown chicken bringing heat up to med/high as needed. Add a small amount of sliced sun dried tomatoes like maybe 1/4 cup at the most. These can be overpowering so be careful.
Add fresh spinach to taste. I used 3 big handfuls, remember, spinach shrinks significantly while cooking.

Once spinach starts to wilt add a jar of alfredo sauce and reduce heat to low. Add three seeded, sliced roma tomatoes. Let simmer for around 2 minutes.

Stir in cooking cream and add fresh thyme, basil, and green onions to taste.

Stir in noodles and serve with garlic bread or breadsticks.

Fast, easy, and excellent for leftovers!

Frozen Yogurt Dots

Lots of preparing for Summer to do today so I'll make this one quick. I originally saw a post on Pinterest about frozen yogurt dots and had to try it. All you need to do is put a container of (smooth) yogurt in a baggie,

cut a small hole in the corner, and squirt these onto a wax paper lined cookie sheet.

Pop them into the freezer for at least an hour and peel off the paper. Store in a container with a lid in the freezer.

As you can see, I experimented with different sizes. Actually, it seemed that everyone like the bigger ones better. About the size of a nickel or so. That way you can pop one in your mouth and suck on it for a while. Such a refreshing Summer treat!

Pulled Pork Sandwiches

My grocery store had boneless pork loin on sale for $1.97 this week so I decided it was a great day to make pulled pork and coleslaw sandwiches.

To serve 6 with lots of leftovers you'll need around 2 1/2 lbs of pork loin, (you can actually use several different types of pork roast or even beef). Go with what's on sale because everything comes out of the crockpot tender.

The good thing about this loin is that it has a nice little layer of fat on one side that will really add flavor to your meat.

Put your meat in the crockpot and turn to "low". You'll need to season the meat to get the best flavor. Use any smoke based seasoning or even a bit of "liquid smoke". This time, I used Grill Mates: Mesquite but you could also use hickory or whatever. I also added some garlic and onion powder like I usually do, haha. There are plenty of different combinations of spices that you can add to the meat as long as you have that smoky flavor in there somewhere.

Once it looks something like this, put the lid on and leave it alone for about 2 hours.

The next part you can either do after the two hours or when you first start cooking the roast, (or you can omit this step completely). But I poured in about 10 oz of rootbeer. I read this somewhere and it sounded like a good idea so I tried it.

Cook for another 4-6 hours or turn the crockpot to "high" to reduce cooking time. Once the meat is tender, shred it with two forks, or however you personally shred meat. :) After you shred it mix it up with the juices in the pot and put the lid on for about another 20 minutes so that the meat can soak up all of that goodness.

At this point the meat is so flavorful that you can serve it just like this and get rave reviews or you can add about 3/4 bottle of BBQ sauce, (I used Sweet Baby Rays), and let it cook just long enough to heat up. Maybe 10 minutes.

This time, probably because I added the extra liquid from the root beer, I had to strain the meat somewhat before I added to the buns so that they didn't get soggy. Normally I don't have to do this, but normally I don't add root beer so, yeah, strain the meat of excess liquid. Just use a slotted spoon.
Serve on buns or Hawaiian rolls, top with coleslaw. I make these all the time for family gatherings or parties because you can make a ton with hardly any work.
Let me know how it turns out.

If you want to make your own coleslaw, that's your business. I bought mine from the deli.

Baked Fish Fillets

Here's a quick and easy way to make a delicious fish dinner in the oven.

What you'll need:

1 1/2-2lbs white fish fillets (I used frozen/thawed cod fillets)
1 lime
mayonnaise or light mayonnaise
onion powder
garlic powder
black pepper
around 1/2 c seasoned breadcrumbs
1 1/2 tbsp butter(melted)
fresh parsley

Preheat your oven to 425 degrees. Spray a glass baking dish with cooking spray and lay your fish in a single layer in the dish. It's ok if they overlap a little as long as they're mostly single layer.
In a medium bowl mix lime juice from 1 lime (about a tbsp), 2 tbsp or so of mayo, a couple of shakes of onion & garlic powder to taste, and some black pepper.

Spread this mixture all over the top of your fish...Trust me.

Evenly pour the breadcrumbs over the top and then the melted butter over that, like so.

Now just pop this baby into the preheated oven for 20-25 minutes or until the fish easily flakes with a fork. Top with some fresh parsley.

All in all, this dish shouldn't take you more than 35 minutes from start to finish. Before I started, I threw some rice in the rice cooker and everything was done at the same time. Great weeknight meal!

Glazed Baby Carrots

Here's a delicious, sweet, easy way to prepare baby carrots.
Click on the pic to see how yum these look close up.

What you'll need:

big bag of baby carrots (1 or 2 lbs)
salt
butter
honey
brown sugar
lemon juice
black pepper

First you'll need to cook the carrots. Just cover with water in a pot, add some salt and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to med-low and cook for about 12-15 minutes. Drain.
In a saucepan large enough to accommodate the amount of carrots you've chosen (in a single layer) melt about 4 tbsp butter on med-low. Once melted, add around 2-3 tbsp of honey and 4 tbsp brown sugar (packed). Stir and heat until the mixture becomes nice and syrupy and the sugar is dissolved. Add the juice of half a lemon or more depending on taste. Add carrots and mix well to coat.

I like to let the carrots sit for a few minutes on each side so that they get that nice char mark on them. You have to be careful though because if you raise the heat too high, the sugar will start to burn and immediately turn bitter and inedible. Don't be hasty or impatient. Once done, add some ground pepper and serve. So good and the kids LOVE them!

Chunky Homemade Spaghetti Sauce

I received a ton of tomatoes from a co-op deal that I did a few weeks ago and I had no idea what to do with all of them. I literally got a produce box full of romas and another one full of hothouse. I decided to prep and freeze some of these tomatoes to save for making spaghetti sauce, (which I've never done in my life!). You can find the directions for prepping fresh tomatoes here Basically you just blanch the tomatoes, peel off the skins, cut in half, squeeze, and freeze. Or you can just use canned whole tomatoes. Drained, cut in half, and squeezed.

Either way you want to add your squeezed drained tomatoes to a food processor or blender. If you're using canned, probably around 2 big cans depending on how much sauce you need, or 10 to 20 fresh. Set aside about a cup or so of the tomatoes and then puree the rest of those babies up til they look like this...

Ok, set aside for now and add a thinly sliced vidalia onion, a jar of mushrooms (always optional), about a tbsp of garlic, and 1 each green and yellow bell peppers to a large pan heated with olive oil.
NOTE: Did you know that bell peppers can also be frozen for later use? Just seed, slice into rings or dice and pop in a freezer bag. So nice to have on hand.
Saute around 2-3 minutes until veggies start to soften.

Then you add a pound of ground pork and a pound of ground chicken. You can add half of each if you want to make less sauce. You can also use ground beef, ground veal, basically any ground meat but I suggest doing half and half of any two that you choose. Cook on medium until meat has browned.

Drain well and add to a large pot. Add the tomatoes you set aside earlier (diced), fresh chopped basil, about a half a small can of tomato paste, a big can of tomato sauce, (I cheated and used a jar of Ragu because I didn't have the sauce on hand lol), a few splashes of soy sauce (trust me), a couple of splashes of Worcestershire sauce, and maybe a tbsp Italian seasoning. Mix together and add two bay leaves on top. Cover and simmer on low for as long as you want. As long as you get it to a simmering boil, that is the key.

Remove bay leaves and serve over noodles for a thick and chunky homemade sauce to die for! As you can see, we serve our spaghetti over bite sized pieces of green leaf or romaine lettuce, mint leaves, and peeled cut cucumbers. It sounds strange but is a refreshing delicious twist on spaghetti. Try it, you'll be surprised!

Chicken and Crescent Dumplings

You know those recipes that sound too quick easy to be good? Yeah, this is one of those. My sister shared this with me a couple of years back and I'm not sure where she got it, but it is delish! It's one of those meals where everyone at my table is finishing and asking for 2nds. It's even great cold the next day! Now my husband cannot stand traditional dumplings but he love this twist on them. So here goes, try it tonight!

What you'll need:

1 whole chicken (see more below)

3 packages crescent rolls

1 small can each; cream of mushroom, cream of potato, cream of chicken

a little milk

salt & pepper

Let's start with the chicken. My sister uses a rotisserie chicken for this recipe which makes it even quicker and easier. However, when shopping for this recipe, I checked out the rotisseries and they were tiny, shriveled and $5.99! I marched my frugal behind straight back to the meat dept. to see if I could get a better deal. Luckily the whole chickens were buy 1 get 1 free and I got two whole chickens for around 5 bucks! So first I will show you how to quickly cook a whole chicken to use for shredding. (This method is courtesy of yet another sister.)

Clean and remove giblets from your chicken. Put chicken in a pot large enough for it to sit in and season however you'd like. I used some poultry seasoning and sage. It doesn't really matter too much because we'll be removing most of the skin anyway.

Put a lid on that sucker and cook on medium for about an hour to an hour and a half. My sister swears it will cook in it's own juices but I added about 2 cups of water. About 1 1/2 hours later, here's what I've got.

Ok, so remove it from the pot, let it cool, (I actually put mine in the fridge overnight because I was making it the next day.) When you're ready, remove the skin and bones and shred, as so:

Ok, so back to the fun part. Preheat oven to 350 F. Unwrap your crescent triangles, divide along perforations and roll the shredded chicken up in each on. Place in a glass baking dish. I have a larger family so I wrapped 16 crescent rolls, or the equivalent of two cans.

In a bowl, combine the soups, salt & pepper, and around a cup of milk. I may have added more milk after to make a creamier sauce. Pour the mixture over the top and around the sides of the crescent wraps. Take your last can of crescents and roll out on top of the dish. My sister likes to make it all fancy on top but I literally just unroll it and throw it on top.

Bake in the oven until top is very brown and crescents are cooked. Around 20-25 min? Could be longer. Go by the pic, lol.

And there you have it! I can't say enough about this dish! The crescents cook perfectly and the chicken wrapped inside is delicious. Serve with some veggies on the side, or you could probably even get away with adding a can of veggies to the soups before cooking. Enjoy!