FOOD FOR FALL

My favorite season is finally here... FALL! 

And one of my favorite things about cold weather is eating a hot bowl of soup.

The only thing is...I suck at making soup. It should be one of the easiest

things to make, but I always seem to screw it up. 

This soup recipe (is a bisque considered a soup?) is not exact. It is a rendition 

from a local restaurant here in KC, and I know the ingredients they use. I will have to figure out how much of what to put in.

And what goes better with soup than a yummy grilled cheese sandwich? 

"Tomato Bisque & Bacon Basil Tomato Grilled Cheese"

Part One:

Tomato Bisque

Ingredients:

Half an onion ( white or yellow)

4 garlic cloves

2 tablespoons of butter

28oz can of crushed tomatoes

1/2 cup of chicken stock

1/4 2% milk (try and use local)

1/2 cup of heavy cream

1 teaspoon of sugar

couple of pinches of salt

a few dashes of tabasco (depending on how spicy you want it)

1/4 cup of blue cheese

1/2 teaspoon of cornstarch

Directions:

• Chop the garlic & onions into small pieces.
• Cook the chopped veggies in the 2 tablespoons of butter in a large sauce pan
• Add the full can of the crushed tomatoes and stir
• Add the chicken stock, heavy cream & milk.
• Stir like a crazy person.
• Add in the sugar, salt, cornstarch
• Stir again.
• Add the Tabasco... you can add as much or as little depending on how spicy you would like it. I would suggest starting with a small amount and taste as you go. A little goes a long way.
• Then the final step is to add the Blue Cheese.
• Stir and keep on simmer for about 45 until you are ready to eat it.

Part Two:

Grilled Cheese

(If you click on the picture it will pull up the the source of the recipe)

Ingredients:

2 Slices of bread

Unsalted butter for the pan

A couple of tablespoons crumbled blue cheese ( you can use leftovers from the bisque)

Caramelized Onions

applewood bacon, cooked and crumbled

Basil leaves

Slices of tomatoes (I used Roma)

A couple of tablespoons of mozzarella cheese

Slices of Avocado 

Directions:

• Spread butter on one side of the sliced bread, and place on a pan over medium-heat.
• In the following order add the ingredients to the bread: blue cheese, caramelized onions, bacon, basil, tomatoes & mozzarella.
• Now place the second slice of bread on top. Use a flat-bottomed, metal spatula to press down on the sandwich to adhere the ingredients.
• Use the spatula to lift the sandwich in the air for a moment & add a slice of butter to the pan. Then flip the sandwich and return to the pan. Press the sandwich down again until you get the desired brown on the bread & the cheese is melted.
• After you take the sandwich off the pan place slices of avocado on the sandwich.

I thought making a grilled cheese would be a super simple task... nope. The first batch I made, I burnt the bread to a lovely charred black color. So I had to start over again.
2nd time was a little easier.

Taste Tester Tastebuds:

ME: Love this soup, but can't eat too much of it. Its a bit rich, but so yummy. The sandwich was a bitch to make, it kept falling apart...but once it was made it tasted pretty good. The original recipe did not include avocados but I think they make everything better.

CJ:  Love this soup, make it everyday. Great texture and lots of subtle flavors despite the potential to overdo the blue cheese and tabasco.  The grilled cheese was really great, especially with the soup.  However, all of the grilled cheese ingredients seemed to overpower the mozzarella.

MARY: We need to work on size portions. The bowl of soup was huge and I ate it all. Also, I don't like tomatoes on sandwiches , but this was okay with tomatoes. Good flavor all the way around.

4 out of 5 stars

✭✭✭✭☆

T.G.I.F PASTA

It's Friday today, so I am going to take it easy tonight. 

After a FULL week at work, running Printosaurus & the CRAZY storms last

night that knocked down my trees & power lines,

I want/need something carb heavy for the end of the week.

I will also probably buy a pint of ice cream and eat it ALLLLLL.

J/K, my friend Mary and my husband wouldn't let that happen since they are ice cream 

whores.

Here we go. 

"CREAMY CHICKEN MARSALA PASTA"

(If you click on the picture it will pull up the the source of the recipe)

Ingredients:

2 large boneless, skinless chicken breasts; cut into bite sized pieces

10-12 ounces sliced mushrooms ( I used portobello & shiitake)

1 small onion diced

3 cloves garlic minced (I used a whole bulb because I LOVE garlic)

3/4 cup Marsala cooking wine

1/2 cup chicken broth

1/2 cup heavy cream

1 pound dry pasta + water for cooking (I used penne, rigatoni is also good)

1 cup Parmesan cheese + more for serving

5 tablespoons of unsalted butter

salt & pepper to taste

chopped fresh parsley for garnish 

Directions:

Season chicken with salt and pepper. 

Melt 1 tablespoon butter in a large skillet until foaming. Cook chicken until lightly browned. 

Transfer to plate when done. 

Boil water and cook pasta according to the directions. 

Melt additional 1 tablespoon of butter in skillet, add garlic, mushrooms and onion and cook for about 6 minutes. 

Add cooked chicken back into the skillet. 

Add the Marsala, chicken broth and cream and bring to a boil. Simmer until sauce is is slightly thickened. 

Drain pasta and reserve 1/2 cup cooking water. 

Return the pasta  to the pot with the remaining 3 tablespoons of butter. Add the mushrooms and chicken mixture and 1/2 cup of Parmesan cheese and cook until the pasta has absorbed some of the sauce, about 1 minute, adding the reserved cooking water as needed. 

Season with salt and pepper and serve with additional Parmesan cheese and a garnish of chopped parsley. 

Taste Testing Time:

• ME: I think this would have been better without the chicken. Or I would have cooked the chicken differently. The pasta was super flavorful & I LOVE that it had lots of mushrooms, onions & garlic.
• CJ: The sauce is delicious & the mushrooms soaked up great flavor. Chicken was kind of dry.

4 out of 5 stars

✭✭✭✭☆

COOOOOKIES

Guys, I LOVE COOKIES.

It is a bit of a problem. I have trouble saying no to almost any kind of cookie.

Especially ones fresh out of the oven. 

I found this recipe on Pinterest and thought 

"This seems easy enough to start this blog off with"

Last time I made cookies from scratch they were super fluffy and had almost no flavor.

Not sure what I did wrong... but ever since it has been "break and bake" store-

bought cookie dough.

"CAKE BATTER CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES"

(If you click on the picture it will pull up the the source of the recipe)

Ingredients:

1 and 1/4 cup all-purpose flour

1 and 1/4 cup yellow boxed cake mix

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

3/4 cup (1.5 sticks) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1/2 cup light brown sugar

1 egg, at room temperature

1.5 teaspoons vanilla

1 cup chocolate chips (I used mini semi-sweet chocolate chips)

1/2 cup sprinkles

Directions:

In a medium bowl, sift together flour, cake mix, & baking soda. Set aside. In a separate large bowl, mix together the butter & sugars on medium speed. Mix in the egg and vanilla until creamy.

(Do not eat the sugar and butter mixture like I did...it looks yummy but TRUST me it is not)

Add the flour mixture to the wet ingredients and mix. Do not OVERMIX the dough. Fold in the chocolate chips and sprinkles.

Cover & refrigerate dough for at least 1 hour. This step is mandatory.  Chilling the dough is required in order to avoid the cookie from spreading too much.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Scoop rounded tablespoons of the cold dough onto an ungreased baking sheet. Shape your cookie dough balls to be "taller" than they are wide. Make sure to keep dough chilled when working in batches. Bake for 10-12 minutes until edges are slightly browned. The centers will still appear very soft, but the cookies will set as they cool.

Allow the cookies to cool on the baking sheet for 4 minutes and transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

This recipe made 20 cookies. Although I probably could have got 2 more cookies out of it, but I ate a few bites of the cookie dough. It's REAL good.

Now for the taste testers:

• ME: I actually preferred the cookie dough. I feel like these guys have the potential to be great, but there is something missing. They lost a little flavor after being baked.
• CJ: They are good, however the cake batter flavor wasn't very noticeable.
• MARY: No... it doesnt taste like cake batter. As far as chocolate chip cookies go, they are top notch.

3 out of 5 stars

✭✭✭☆☆

IM JUST LIKE YOU...RIGHT?

Hey friends!!!!!

Today marks the day of me trying to become a domesticated lady.

If you're anything like me, your life revolves around take out, pizza, Yodles, bottles of wine
& other stuff us Lazy Gals need in our Busy Worlds.
This has been my life for the past 29 years, a world of gluttony and lazy weekends... well it
stops today.
I can change... right?

My dream is to become a full time stay at home wife/mom and a part time artist.

Ive got the wife & artist part down, but now I need to get knocked up  and to learn how to cook,

bake and be a cool crafty woman. 

Within this blog I plan to try and replicate recipes, learn how to keep plants alive, learn how to sew

& a lot more based on posts found on Pinterest.

I hope you're ready to take this crazy journey into womanhood with me.


Here goes nothing!!!