Chicken Pot Pie

I love pot pies. I love to make them and eat them and serve them.


4 T unsalted butter (1/2 stick)
1 med. onion (diced)
1/2 C. flour
1/2 tsp. salt  (may want to omit this if broth is already salty)
pepper to taste
4 C. chicken broth (32oz)
3 C. cut up chicken   (I used 5 chicken breasts, but you can use whatever you have.)
1 small bag frozen mixed veggies
2 cans croissants
1 lg egg yolk
1 tsp water

Preheat oven to 375*
- Melt butter; add onions & cook until tender and onions are clear.
- Add flour, salt & pepper. Stir constantly until pale yellow & thick like oatmeal
- Add broth, continue stirring while bringing it to a boil and thickening. Reduce heat and simmer 10 minutes.
- Remove from heat.  Stir in chicken & frozen veggies, season again if needed.
- Lay out croissants on top to cover mixture.  (I had 7 left to roll and bake seperately)
- Beat egg yolk & water, brush on croissants.
Bake 25-35 minutes.

Grandma D's Bread Pudding

When I was little I used to spend a lot of time at my grandparents. I was Grandpa's little buddy. We'd make chocolate ice cream with vanilla ice cream and Hershey's syrup.  We'd sit and watch t.v. while cracking walnuts. He'd make me a scrambled egg in a small Pyrex dish and microwave it to cook.  And we'd devour a casserole dish of Grandma's bread pudding.

4-6 slices white bread cut into cubes (texas toast bread is great for this, and I use kitchen scissor to cut it)
2 T. butter/ margarine, melted  (I forget it sometimes, still tastes the same)
1/3 C. packed brown sugar
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/3 C.  sweet raisins  ( I really don't measure them out, just dump 2-3 little "snack" boxes in)
3 eggs - beaten
1/3 C. sugar
1 tsp vanilla
dash of salt
2 1/2 C scalded milk

Preheat oven to 350* F.
-Set milk in small sauce pan over lowest heat possible. Scald during next prep.
-Cut bread into cubes and place in casserole dish.
-Drizzle with butter.
-Sprinkle with brown sugar & cinnamon.
-Add raisins
-Mix in eggs, sugar, vanilla, & salt
-Alternate adding a little scalded milk and gently stirring it all together.
-Place casserole dish in cake pan with 1" hot water in pan.
Bake 60-70 mins.

This is great served warm or cold as dessert or breakfast!  Or if you're like me, an anytime snack.

Cocoa Indians

I have fond memories of my mom making these for us.  They're kind of like a brownie, only not as sweet and the consistency is more cake like.

Doesn't take much to make them!

1 C. flour                           1/2 C. shortening                          1/4 C. milk
1/4 C. cocoa powder         1 tsp. vanilla                                 1/2 tsp. salt
2 eggs                                1/4 tsp baking soda                      1 C. sugar

Dump it all in a bowl and mix together.  Grease or spray 9x13 cake pan (or use smaller if you want them thicker. 9x13 will yield approx. 1/2 thickness).  Spread batter into pan  and bake for 25 minutes at 350* F.  Let set for 10-15 minutes before cutting (I use a pizza cutter, so easy and doesn't damage my pans).

Microwave Monkey Bread

My oven crapped out and all I want to do is bake. So I went scouring the web for some tasty recipes for either my microwave or my crock pot.

I came across several ways of making monkey bread in the microwave.  Next time I will double the "sauce" ingredients, but this is what I ended up doing for one can of biscuits.

1/3 C. brown sugar  
1/3 C. butter  ( I used stick and cut it into smaller chunks)
1 T. water
1/2 tsp cinnamon

(c) Keytee 2011

Dump the above into a microwave safe dish, cover with paper towel and nuke for 1 1/2 minutes. Cut biscuits into fourths.  Remove "sauce" from microwave and stir it up.  I dipped the biscuit pieces into the bowl of "sauce" then placed them into a round casserole dish with a mug in the center.  Nuked for 6 minutes.

Yes, I devoured the section missing shortly after removing it from the microwave.  It was not super sweet, but not tasteless either. However, as I said, I will double the sauce because I like sweet.

You could do this with a can of cinnamon rolls too and toss in a handful of raisins, pour a bit of milk over it while warm and it tastes just like bread pudding.

More Monkey Bread recipes using an oven!

Enchilada Egg Rolls

I got the idea after seeing a pin on Pinterest for southwestern egg rolls. It's a tweaked version of  my other enchilada recipe.

What's Needed:
1 lb ground beef (or any other ground meat you like to use)
1/2 C. chopped onion
1/2 C. sour cream (4 oz)
1 C. shredded cheese (I ended up using an entire standard block of Kraft sharp cheddar ran through my chopper)
1/4 tsp. pepper
2/3 C. water
1 T. chili powder
1 1/2 tsp. oregano
1/4 tsp. cumin
1 sm. can green chile peppers
15 oz tomato sauce (or 2 cups if you make your own)
1 pkg eggroll or spring roll wrappers. (I could not find these at Krogers, had to go to the local Da Zhong Market to find them)
couple shakes of garlic flakes or powder.

egg roll glue: 1 T. water & 1 T. flour.

(c) Keytee 2011

1. Brown ground meat with onion.
    * I did this step in a sauce pan, then used a slotted spoon to move the meat from pan to paper plate so I could pour off any grease into a jar, ran the meat through the chopper to make it fine before returning it to the sauce pan.

2. Stir in sour cream, shredded cheese and pepper.  Transfer mix to another container.
   * I dumped it in a mixing bowl.

3. In a sauce pan: Bring to boil water, chile powder, oregano, cumin, chile peppers, garlic and tomato sauce. Reduce to as low of heat as possible and just let it simmer.

4. Lay egg roll wrappers down so they are in triangle shape (with a corner pointing towards your belly). Place about 1/4 C. meat mixture in the center. Fold bottom tip over meat and roll slightly, fold each side tip toward center, Put a bit of "glue" on remaining tip and roll it over to seal egg roll.

5. Spray a cookie sheet with Pam (or off brand cooking spray), place egg roll on with sealed flap down.
Bake @ 425* for 7 mins, flip them over and bake additional 5-7 mins.

Serve with side of sauce to dip them in.

Mom's Potato Soup

Love, love, love the soups my mom used to make when we were kids. Even now as an adult, when I'm sick I wish my mom lived closer so she could make me some of her chicken noodle soup. I'll post that one another day.

What you need for this super yummy soup!

5 medium potatoes, cubed/diced/sliced (whatever style you like)
1 medium onion, diced.
2 tsp salt
------(the amounts below are doubled from the original recipe because I like a lot of left overs)
6 T. butter
2 C. water
3 1/3 milk
Pepper
-----------
1 lb chopped/cubed ham (I bought a good size ham "butt" and cut it up)
1 C. sliced carrots   (I cut up 3 good size carrots)

I cook it all in a standard 5 qt pot.

(c) Keytee 2011

Boil potatoes, onions & salt until tender, drain, set aside.
Melt butter in pot, add milk, water, pepper to taste.
Return potatoes to pot, add ham & carrots, simmer 1/2 hour.

*I omit the onion and boil the carrots for a while with the taters to soften them up a bit, moving them to a bowl with a slotted spoon until ready to add them back in.

Crock Pot Creamy Beef & Noodles

**5/8/13 - If you like your tongue to tingle use amount of pepper listed, otherwise cut it to 1/2 T.
I also used pre-cut fajita steak this time and liked it MUCH better!


What you need:
2 lbs stew meat  (I used some kind of roast and cut it up)
2 T. butter
1/4 C. milk
1 T. worcestshire sauce
1 T. pepper
2 T. dried minced onion
1 can beef broth  (1/2 C. to start, save rest to add as needed)
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 block (4 oz) cream cheese
what ever noodles you like or have hanging out. (I used thin egg noodles)

(c) Keytee 2011

In a one gallon size freezer bag: Put meat on bottom of bag then dump everything else in except the cream cheese. Toss in freezer.

When ready to prepare, take out of freezer and dump it in the crock  pot.  Set at low 8-10 hours.
About 10 mins prior to serving add in remaining broth and cream cheese. Boil noodles.

I mixed it all together and served on a paper plate!