Batter-Splattered

Wrapping up

No recipe tonight. Just me and my glass of wine sitting in a quiet empty house -- a brief respite before the puppy returns home with the husband and she resumes her favorite game of gnawing on my ankle and playing tug-of-war with the cuff of the stretchy black yoga pants I pull on as soon as I come home from work.

It's the last day of November and I successfully completed Nablopomo -- a post for every day of the month. I managed Nablopomo's requirements but not quite my own goal of posting a favorite recipe every day. I came close but I did stray from the path here and there (like tonight) . But hey, I think I deserve extra credit because mid-month I packed up everything I own and moved it to a new house.

And did I mention the gnawing puppy?

I'll be back soon with new and interesting recipes!

Photos Thursday

Photos taken recently that haven't made their way into a recipe post yet...

 

 

Balsamic Blueberries and Peaches

If I had to describe this recipe in one word it would be divine! These people think so too.

It's number 24 in my collection of favorites for Nablopomo and the month of November.

Balsamic Blueberries and Peaches

Serves four

3 T sugar, or to taste

2 T balsamic vinegar

3 c blueberries (about 1 lb)

1 lb peaches or nectarines, sliced

1/2 t black pepper (optional)

Ice cream

Boil 3 tablespoons sugar with vinegar, and 1 cup blueberries in a 1- to 1 1/2-quart heavy saucepan, stirring, 1 minute. Remove from heat.

Combine remaining 2 cups blueberries with peach slices in a large bowl. Toss with hot blueberry syrup and black pepper, then add sugar to taste. Let stand, tossing occasionally, 30 minutes.

Serve over ice cream.

Tortilla Soup with Chicken and Lime

I recently went on a really beautiful cross-country ski trek in Hatcher Pass. The groomed ski trails meander hither and thither amongst old gold mining camp buildings at the Independence Mine State Historical Park, so pretty with their white-washed walls and bright red trim. It was a winter wonderland. Everyone was flitting this way and that on their skis, big smiles plastered on their faces. Yay, winter!

A big bowl of this tortilla soup is the perfect thing to come home to after such an outing. Warm and filling but still light and healthy enough not to ruin all that hard work you did burning all those calories on the trail. It's number 18 in my collection of favorite recipes, one a day for each day of November and Nablopomo.

Tortilla Soup with Chicken and Lime

Serves four

4 corn tortillas

2 t olive oil

4 c low-salt chicken broth

3/4 c canned Mexican-style stewed tomatoes with juices

1 bay leaf

1 garlic clove, pressed

1/4 t ground cumin

1/8 t dried chili powder

12 oz skinless boneless chicken breast halves, cut into 1/2-inch-wide strips

2 green onions, sliced

1/4 c chopped fresh cilantro

2 T fresh lime juice

Preheat oven to 350°F. Brush one side of tortillas with oil. Cut tortillas in half, then stack the  halves and cut crosswise into 1/4-inch-wide strips. Spread strips on a baking sheet. Bake until light golden, about 15 minutes. Cool on baking sheet.

Combine broth, tomatoes, bay leaf, garlic, cumin and chili powder in a big pot and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 5 minutes. Add chicken and simmer until just cooked through, about 5 minutes. Stir in green onions, cilantro and lime juice. Season with salt and pepper.

Ladle soup into bowls. Sprinkle with tortilla strips and serve.

Old-Fashioned Chicken Noodle Soup

When it looks like this outside your front door:

You need to head right back inside, put on some slippers and some music, and make yourself a big pot of this soup. It's recipe no. 26 of my collection of favorites I'm trotting out this month for nablopomo.

This is one of the first things I ever cooked for my husband. I'm pretty sure it's one of the key things that made him decide I was a keeper.

This is the original recipe which I've since modified after having made it a hundred times or more. I've gotten to the point where I don't really measure ingredients anymore but I'll do my best to approximate the ingredients and measurements. The original is really good too -- it calls for simmering pieces of chicken still on the bone to make a super-rich-tasting broth. I used to make it that way until I got tired of burning my fingers removing the hot chicken from the bone. And sure, the recipe tells you to wait for it to cool off but I'm too impatient for that. It really. really. really. hurt.

I don't think I have to tell you that this is the soup to cure a cold -- add a big pinch of cayenne pepper to really bitch-slap those germs into submission. Follow it up with a couple of shots of whiskey. Because really now -- how can germs possibly live through whiskey?

Dr. Molly's orders.

Old-Fashioned Chicken Noodle Soup

4 cups canned low-salt chicken broth, maybe more depending on how brothy you like it

4 boneless skinless chicken thighs, chopped into bite-sized pieces 

1/2 cup chopped onion

2 carrots, peeled, thinly sliced

2 celery stalks, sliced

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 c frozen peas

2 T butter

1 c sliced mushrooms

1 T fresh lemon juice

A handful or two of egg noodles

1/2 cup finely chopped fresh parsley

Good with freshly-grated parmesan on top and lots of freshly-ground pepper

Pour broth into a big pot and bring to a simmer. Add chicken, onion, carrots, celery, and garlic. Simmer until vegetables soften, 8 to 10 mintues.

Melt butter in a skillet over medium-high heat and add mushrooms, sauteing until a little brown. Stir in lemon juice. Add mushrooms to soup along with noodles, peas, and parsley and continue to simmer until chicken is cooked through and noodles are soft.

Jiffy Cake

This cake recipe has been around all my life. I think my grandmother may have found it originally and she passed it on to everyone else. It's a chocolate cake recipe that's ready in a jiffy -- the name says it all -- and it can be mixed up in one bowl. It's number 25 of my collection of favorites recipes for this 25th day of November and Nablopomo.

I still remember the day way back in high school when I whipped up a jiffy cake while a friend watched from a tall stool across the kitchen counter. Her rarely-there mom wasn't much of a cook and so they'd been eating out of boxes and cans and restaurants all her life. I only spent the night at her house once in high school. Only once. Because that night she and I had the house to ourselves and we were jonesing for dessert and she thought there might be some ice cream in the chest freezer they kept out in the communal garage of their apartment building. That carton of ice cream had been in there so long it was hard as a rock and mostly crystallized, and what wasn't crystallized was gummy. I politely demured when she offered me a bowl then watched with a shudder as she ate a heaping helping.

Later when I asked her where she kept the bath towels, she looked in the linen closet (no clean towels), under the bathroom sink (still no clean towels), and then bent over and picked a slightly damp one up off the bathroom floor, sniffed it, and handed it to me.

And don't even get me started on the ONE time we went to her house to get something to eat on our school lunch break and she tried to serve me butter and sugar sandwiches on somewhat moldy Wonder bread.

That's no way to live.

Well, her eyes were wide as saucers as she saw that chocolate cake emerge from the oven.

"I can't believe you just put that together totally from scratch JUST LIKE THAT," she cried out. "It's like a miracle!"

I think she may have even clasped her hands over her heart. Oh yeah. It was a defining moment for me.

This recipe should really be scrawled in messy handwriting on the back of a receipt - that's what everyone's copy looks like in my family -- but I'll type it out for you here. As for a frosting recipe, I think we always just use the one on the back of the Hershey's chocolate baking powder container.

Jiffy Cake

1 1/2 c all-purpose flour

3 T cocoa powder

1 t baking soda

1 c sugar

1/2 t salt

5 T vegetable oil

1 T vinegar

1 t vanilla

1 c cold water

Combine dry ingredients in a big bowl. Make a hole in the center. Pour in the remaining ingredients. Mix well. Pour into a greased square baking pan and bake in a 350 degree oven until it passes the toothpick test. I don't have a baking time noted. Just eyeball it and stab it with a toothpick when it's looking good and smelling even better.