Pork Dinners

Here is a pic of the peameal bacon on the BBQ from the other night. I brushed it with a mixture of honey and whole grain mustard. It turned out great! It's more like ham than anything. 

And here is tonight's dinner. I baked sweet potato fries and BBQed London Broils. I am hooked on the London Broils from our grocery store. It's ground pork shaped into a patty and then wrapped in a strip of tenderized flank steak, and then, I'm guessing, sprinkled with paprika and a pinch of chopped parsley. I don't do anything to it, but cook it. So delicious. Apparently, this version of London Broil is very Canadian. :D

I also made marinated tomatoes. I de-seeded and sliced tomatoes, then sprinkled with chopped basil, minced garlic, a pinch of pepper, olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and feta cheese.

Walnut Fudge Brownies

Dinners have been fairly simple the last few days. The other day I made a roast chicken. Chickens are on sale for $5 (for 2-4lbs), so I put a couple in the freezer too. Yesterday we had stuffed chicken breasts with a marinated salad. I made fries for the kids because my oldest and my youngest haven't been feeling well, and I wanted to make sure they ate something. My husband and I had rice with it.

I did make one treat! I made a huge batch of Walnut Fudge Brownies on Saturday.

I took out peameal bacon for dinner tonight. If you don't know what that is, it's a pork loin roast that has been sweet pickle-cured and then rolled in fine cornmeal. It's similar to back bacon ("Canadian Bacon"), but back bacon is smoked and does not have cornmeal. Also, back bacon is usually sliced for you, and peameal bacon is usually a whole roast. I think I will slice it thin and grill it with a honey mustard sauce.

Pasta Salad

The warm weather has me craving cold veggies. I decided to make 2 kinds of pasta salads.

The first one is closer to a classic pasta salad, but I didn't use mayo for the sauce.

This one is a peanut noodle salad. I liked this one a whole lot!

Empanadas

Here are the empanadas I made the other day.

 Busting open!

Torn in half to show more of the insides.

The last few days haven't been very exciting. We've been eating leftovers. lol I am craving vegetables and salads of various kinds, so I to have something new to post soon.

Day 023 - Turnover Dough 3 Ways

Or rather, that was my intent! But time is a hot commodity and I simply did not have enough of it today. My husband mentioned how he misses my empanadas, so I was going to make some for him. But I wanted to make them spicy, so I also wanted to make a kid-friendly version for our picky eaters. And then I thought, why I don't I make a dessert too.

I made pizza pockets for the kids. They loved them. Serenity helped fill them. They were kept simple with just pizza sauce, pepperoni, and a big chunk of mozzarella. I had to chill them in the fridge for the kids. These ones were already cooled off when I took the pics so the mozza isn't oozing out.

I also got the dessert made. Apple Turnovers! Holy NOM NOM NOM. I did not get a pic of the inside, so you will just have to trust that they are amazing. Like a yummy apple pie in your hand.

Tomorrow I will make the beef empanadas for the grown ups.

Day 022

We had an uneven number of steaks of left, so I turned one into sandwiches for lunch. I sauteed onions till they were caramelized, then added some red pepper and cooked until it was crisp tender. Then I tossed in the sliced up steak, added a little more barbeque sauce to everything, laid it on toasted homemade bread, topped with mozza, and set under the broiler to melt the cheese.

Day 021

We had to pick up a couple groceries and saw a sale on strip loin steaks. There was a limit of 2 per customer and I can see why these were so popular! They were incredibly tender and very trim.

I sliced sweet potatoes into disks and seasoned them and set them straight on the grill. The smaller pieces on the left are regular potatoes that I made for the kids. The potatoes were seasoned with salt and pepper and parmesan cheese. We also had a salad with our meal.

Day 020

For dinner tonight I BBQed tornados (chicken wrapped in bacon). There are 2 on my plate because the meat was small (3/4s the size of a deck of cards), but I ended up putting one back. The small bowl in the bottom left corner is filled with avocado for the salad. And the white stuff next to the tornado is parmesan shells (from a package). The kids had hot dogs instead of tornado, and they didn't finish their plates either. haha

I let Serenity top her bun with condiments by herself. She couldn't figure out how to eat the hot dog because it turned out so big. lol She ended up eating the wiener by itself and then eating half the bun alone. Dessert was a choice of pudding or banana muffin. My husband and I will have a muffin with coffee once the kids go to bed.

Day 019

A good use of leftovers made up my lunch yesterday: the vegetable sticks got chopped up, along with the rest of the rotisserie chicken, and some stale homemade bread got seasoned and baked into croutons, all piled onto a bed of mixed greens for a yummy salad.

Dinner was leftover hamburgers, but I also made French Fries (from real potatoes) and Sweet Potato Fries with Serenity. And in the evening I whipped together some Banana Crumb Muffins.

Day 018

My bread machine is dying. The motor is going and it struggles to knead. :( I rarely use it, but it's very handy when I want to be able to walk away from my dough and not worry about it.

Somehow, my dough did turn out today!

I made 10 hamburger buns and 4 hot dog buns. We have enough burgers for leftovers, and the hot dog buns will go in the freezer.

Serenity helped me make the burgers. These ones are mine! I used my mom's homemade relishes amongst a pile of other condiments. :)

Day 017

Yesterday was an easy meal, though it did require a bit of prepping. We bought groceries and saw hot rotisserie chickens on for $5. Now that is a deal! Raw chickens or cooked chickens from the deli are the same price, and usually go for $8 - $10. Sometimes you can find them on sale for $5, or in a 2 for 1 deal. That's the best it gets. So we grabbed that and loaded up on veggies, and served it with dip, 2 kinds of hummus, tzatziki, and Greek pitas. Fresh, fast, and pretty healthy.

Day 015 & 016

Not an overly adventurous couple of days. We had leftovers! lol I did make some homemade garlic cheese toast. And this afternoon I made a loaf of Cinnamon Swirl Bread. I ventured off the recipe a little, and it turned out beautifully. I think I want to play with this recipe more. :) Serenity liked it. Charisma didn't try it (I gave her a piece of bread with ice cream and she only ate the ice cream). Astra *loved* it. I chose this bread because I have no yeast. I have no chocolate chips. I have only a little bit of icing sugar. And cinnamon is just something I adore and always have, along with flour, sugar, oil, eggs, baking soda, and baking powder. So cheap and easy.

Day 014

Tonight Serenity and I made spaghetti and meatballs together. We made the pasta and sauce from scratch. There are leftovers for tomorrow.

Serenity is mixing the ground beef for our meatballs. She actually did 90% of the work on them.

Day 013 Caramel Corn!

We had leftover Chicken Pot Pie for dinner tonight, and I was kinda bored since I didn't have to cook. I decided to make my mom's Oven Caramel Corn. I ended up making everyone buttered popcorn and then doing some tidying up before I got started on the caramel. It wasn't ready until well after the girls were all in bed, so they will get to try some tomorrow.

EDITED to include the recipe!

Oven Caramel Corn

15 cups popped corn                                                   

1 cup brown sugar, packed                                           

1/2 cup butter or margarine

1/4 cup light corn syrup 

1/2 tsp. salt

1/2 tsp. baking soda

Heat oven to 200^o F. Divide popped corn between 2 ungreased baking pans, 13X9 inches.

In saucepan, heat sugar, butter, corn syrup and salt, stirring occasionally, until bubbly around the edges.  Continue cooking over medium heat 5 minutes.

Remove from heat; stir in soda until foamy.  Pour on popped corn, stirring until corn is well coated.  Bake one hour, stirring every 15 minutes.

You can add unsalted peanuts or other nuts to the popped corn if desired, before adding the caramel sauce.

Days 011 & 012

I didn't photograph yesterday's dinner. Serenity and I made a bacon and green pepper frittata. It turned out fantastic. The 2 oldest just kinda poked at it. Serenity eventually picked out all the green pepper and ate most of it. Charisma picked off all the cheese and left everything else. Astra ate almost everything I gave her. I just have to keep giving the kids eggs because we don't eat them too often and when we do they fuss.

Tonight Serenity and I made a chicken pot pie. It was a lot of work. And there was only so much she could help with. I'm not so sure if this was a great kids cooking recipe. I'll have to think on it, since part of my problem was that I refused to boil my chicken and roasting it separately was another step and one that Serenity couldn't really help with. And, it added time. But the end result was fantastic. Charisma and Astra pretty much cleaned their plates. Serenity didn't even want to try it, but eventually tried about one bite of each veggie and all the meat. *sigh* She can be so picky sometimes. My crust turned out perfectly. It was buttery and rich. I kinda wanted to pick it all off and just eat that. lol Now I'm craving apple pie. :P

Here are pics of tonight's meal:

 

Hot out of the oven.

One of the kids' plates. I gave them pineapple too.

A big slice. For some reason there are no carrots in view.

010 Pasta!

Serenity asked me the other day how noodles are made, so I promised we'd make some together. We were going to make it tomorrow when she was out of school, but I had to come up with something for dinner tonight, so we made it today.

I made the pasta dough just before she got home so that it would be ready to use right away.

 Once I got the dough worked through on the largest setting, it was a breeze for her. She thinned it all out and then ran it through the cutter.

We ended up cooking all of it!

And eating all of it too! Serenity and I made the pasta sauce together - Creamy Garlic Pasta with Bacon and Peas. The 2 oldest ate everything but their peas. Astra had 4 or 5 helpings. I lost count. lol

009 Crescent Ring

Today Serenity and I made Banana Streusel Muffins and a Turkey Crescent Ring.

Turns out kids don't like cooked broccoli. Who knew? lol Back to the drawing board. I have another idea I want to play with for next time. Hubby and I enjoyed it, and I make this often. And the muffins were a hit.

008 Burritos!

Tonight I made Beef & Bean Burritos with Serenity. Actually, Charisma helped too! Charisma was so funny. I got them to take turns. Serenity would measure out one spice, and Charisma would do the next. She was so impatient for her turn. "Hey! I want to measure the chili powder!" She is only 2, so it was quite the sentence. You had to hear her. They also took turns adding everything to the skillet. Dinner was a total success. Charisma was falling asleep at the table again because she didn't want to nap today. lol Serenity ate her entire burrito. The whole thing. This kid doesn't care for beef and never would eat beans. And tonight, she ate it all. I rewarded her with peanut butter cookies. hehe

Here she is assembling hers and her sister's burritos. Both kids were a great help tonight!

Day 006 & 007

Yesterday I made a classic with Serenity. I think, the last time I made it I was a kid too! Foil Packet Chicken & Veggies. I want to play with it a bit before I share the recipe we made. I definitely think the chicken could have absorbed more flavour, but it was still very good. The kids had seconds.

Today was a leftovers day, but I did make peanut butter cookies with Serenity. Yesterday she drew me this adorable picture of a dream she had about us making cookies and cupcakes together, and we had decorated each of them with a heart. She didn't mind waiting until today to get baking.

I'll be making dinner with her again tomorrow. I'm not sure what yet, but I'm thinking chicken breasts again, and possibly use the tortillas my husband bought. Maybe I should soak some beans tonight.

I promised Serenity we'd make banana muffins another day too. Something with a streusel top, maybe. :)

Yesterday - Day 005

I have another project idea in mind and this is just the beginning. A hint: it combines all of my favourite things. Should I say what it is? Hmmm From here on out, everything I do in the kitchen will be research. :D

I was excited to make dinner last night. I create something new and Serenity helped me make it. I prepped the veggies and made ahead the rice while she was in school. Hamburger isn't something she's overly fond of, but after helping make the meal, she ate quite a bit of it. I was happy about that!

I am calling it Seasoned Beef and Cheddar Rice. I realize a sprig of parsley would make this dish look prettier, but I have none. lol


I'm looking forward to cooking with Serenity again tonight. She requested chicken, and I have another new idea in mind.