Crockpot Hutspot

I am so excited! Last night, I successfully converted one of my husband's favorite (time-consuming!) recipes into a crockpot recipe. Hello, crockpot hutspot! If you don't have a crockpot, you can still make this traditional Dutch dish the old-fashioned way).

I've written about hutspot before, but I'm so happy to be able to make it without standing in the kitchen for an hour and a half.

Ingredients:

• 6 onions (3 cups)
• 6 carrots (2 cups)
• 8 potatoes (5 cups)
• 1/2 cup evaporated milk
• 1/4 cup butter
• salt to taste (I actually like to use garlic salt)
• pepper to taste

Instructions:

1. Dice onions, carrots and potatoes and place in crockpot. This is still the most time-consuming part. If you really like this recipe, you could chop twice the amount and freeze the extra in a bag for the future.

2. Add butter, condensed milk, salt and pepper.

3. Cook on low for 3.5 - 4 hours.

 4. Vegetables should be very soft, and mashable with a fork when done.

 5. Use a potato masher to mash the vegetables. If you have an immersion blender, that would give your hutspot a smoother texture. 

6. Serve in bowl.

Many people like to enjoy hutspot with sausage. The Hubs doesn't care for it as much, so we often eat it plain. If you do want to include sausage, just puncture it with a fork and then place it on top of the vegetables before starting the crockpot.

Eet smakelijk!

Zucchini Chips

Meal planning has gotten to be even more fun now that Pinterest allows me to have basically a visual cookbook. This is one of the first recipes I tried: zucchini chips.

Ingredients:

• 4 small zucchini or 1-2 large zucchini
• olive oil/cooking spray
• salt (or garlic salt, or dill weed, however you want to season your chips)

Instructions:

1. Clean and trim the zucchini.

2. Use a food processor (or very steady hand) to slice zucchini in thin even slices. I'd definitely recommend the smaller zucchini so you don't have to worry about seeds or trimming the sides to fit your food processor.

 3. Brush olive oil on parchment paper (spray with cooking spray. Then place the zucchini slices very close together. They should touch, but not overlap.

 4. Spray or brush with oil again and then lightly season with the flavor of your choice. I liked dill week the best. Hubs like the garlic ones. Season lightly because the flavor will intensify as the chips dehydrate.

5. Cook at 170 degrees F (as low as my oven goes) for 3-3.5 hours. The chips should be crunchy when ready. If they are still a little soft, keep checking them every 15 minutes.

 6. Enjoy!

Garlic zucchini chips

Dill zucchini chips.

This week's menu in pictures

Life is finally settling down. We're still trying to sell our house, but we've got showing-readiness down to a science. We're still building our new house, but now that we're under roof, things have slowed down quite a bit. Best of all, I seem to be on an upswing with my health, so I'm going to attempt to start up this blog again. I'll do another post of the fabulous-ness of Pinterest, but for now, I'll use the lovely pictures from there to show what's on the menu this week.

Sunday: Broccoli Salad with Bacon, Red Onions, Cranberries and Cashews (We're getting together with our small group, so I volunteered to bring my favorite salad.

Source: meetthedubiens.blogspot.com via Sheryl on Pinterest

Monday: Hutspot, specially requested by the Hubs. Mine isn't nearly as pretty, so I'm using this picture from Kayotic Kitchen, who has taught me to make all sorts of yummy Dutch dishes.

Source: kayotic.nl via Nicole on Pinterest

Tuesday: Cilantro Limo Pesto Chicken Tacos

Source: joelens.blogspot.com via Jen on Pinterest

Wednesday: Crock Pot Orange Chicken

Source: team-t-adventures.blogspot.com via Jen on Pinterest

Thursday: In honor of my fiesty 90-years-young Gramma, who is struggling a bit after heart surgery, I'm going to attempt my first Shepherd's Pie. 

Source: marthastewart.com via JaNae on Pinterest

Friday: Chicken Avocado Pizza

Source: None via Jen on Pinterest

Saturday: Crockpot Pineapple Chicken

Source: sixsistersstuff.blogspot.com via Chelsea on Pinterest

***Just for fun, I had to add this fish bowl I made for a friend's housewarming party today.***

Greek Tacos

Still here, but testing out new recipes has taken a back seat to making decisions on our new house, which we broke ground on three weeks ago. Between that and lasting vision issues from my latest thunk o' the head, it's been pretty quiet around here.

I do want to share this new favorite, Greek Tacos. I found the recipe at one of my favorite recipe sites, Taste of Home. The only changes I made were to use soft shells, because that's what we had on hand, and sun dried tomatoes instead of diced, because my toddler loves them.

Eet Smakelijk!

Technical Difficulties...

As you may have noticed, I haven't been blogging much lately. I hope it's a temporary break. Between the showings on the house (usually during dinner time), a bit of travel, and an ongoing relapse of some brain injury symptoms (extreme fatigue, vertigo, blurry vision, fogginess, and a killer headache), our meals have been pretty simple as of late.

Since my "good brain" time is pretty limited these days, I've been spending them with my family and medical team. Hopefully I'll be back in the kitchen soon!

Menu Monday: Week of April 11, 2011

So, it's actually more like Menu Wednesday. It's been that kind of week!

The construction in our kitchen will be completed tomorrow! Our new hood is in, the drywall has been replaced and smoothed, and tomorrow the ceiling will be repainted. It will be so nice to have that done...especially because we listed our house for sale on Monday, and we have our third showing tonight (Tuesday), with another to be scheduled on Friday or Saturday, and an open house on Sunday! It's hard enough to keep a house in show condition with a toddler, let alone daily construction dust! God help me!

In case things weren't crazy enough, The Hubs is having his wisdom taken out tomorrow (Thursday), so I've been trying to make lots of soup this week.

So here's what's cooking this week, soup edition.

Sunday:

Cream of Peanut Soup. We had our first taste of spring on Sunday. It's was almost 80 out. Gorgeous and sunny. So what was I doing? Slaving over a hot stove making soup for The Hubs. Yep, I love him.

I found this recipe on the Colonial Williamsburg website, after reading about it in The Frugal Gourmet Cooks American by Jeff Smith. (Yes, I'm now the kind of person who reads cookbooks). This particular book is both cookbook and a history of American cuisine, so I highly recommend it. You can read a bit about the history of the soup here. Peanut soup sounds a bit unusual, but it was really, really good, especially with crushed roasted peanuts as garnish!

I also decided to finally make the rest of our Spinach Lasagna Roll Ups since I've had the noodles thawing in the frig for a few days and didn't want to waste the ingredients. I'll have to play with the ratios a bit so I can make one batch that uses all the ingredients. I did add some Italian sausage this time around, and it was a really addition! The only challenge I had was that the noodles were a little wily after been heated, then frozen, then thawed, then warmed up in a pot of hot water. They had a tendency to tear, so I used the good ones for roll-ups, and used the rest of a more traditional lasagna. Still tasted great!

Monday:

Spicy Tomato Soup. I discovered this recipe when I was getting ready for my surgery last year. I love the rosemary, basil, and dill. The Hubs loves the chili flakes I add in, along with the chili powder. Everyone's happy. After learning how to chop herbs at my knife skills last week, I bought fresh rosemary for this week. It smells SO good. I'm already dreaming of a little herb garden in my new house!

Whole Wheat Snickerdoodles. I was quite pleasantly surprised when we got a call for our first showing just 33 minutes after our listing went live. My mom, a former realtor, suggested I make snickerdoodles just before the showing so the kitchen smells all cinnamony...and the potential buyers would have a warm snack. Snickerdoodles were the cookie of choice in our home growing up, and I had JUST packed my old Betty Crocker cook book a few hours earlier. I looked up the recipe online and realized I didn't have any shortening, so I started searching for plan B. The recipe I made instead has no shortening and used whole wheat flour so I can try to convince myself that they are healthy. I wish they were because I had about six...and of course, some dough!

Tuesday:

Chicken Stew with Dumplings. Well, that was the idea anyway. Our first showing got moved up an hour, and then another showing was added. We ended up using an old Applebee's gift card instead.

We scheduled a third showing for Wednesday, so I made a big double patch of cookies. I now have a big container full of pre-rolled cookies for future showings.

Wednesday:

Rustic Tortellini Soup. Speaking of double batches, that's what I'm doing with this soup at naptime today and we'll have it after the showing tonight.

Thursday:

Slow Cooker Dill Potato Soup. We need to be at the dentist's office at 7am, so it seemed like a good day for a crockpot meal! My kitchen will also be a construction zone for the last time, so there's another good reason for the crockpot. The Hubs might not be up for a thicker soup like this, but he'll have plenty of other options, and I know he'll like it when he starts to feel his jaw again! (Thankfully, I put the kibosh on any potential showings for this day).

Friday:

Cauliflower Soup. Like any good Dutchie, The Hubs loves cauliflower. When I saw this recipe, I knew I had to try it. We found some really pretty purple cauliflower, so the soup will have some nice color, too.

Saturday:

Italian Wedding Soup. One last day of soup. This is another one The Hubs' raved about when I've made it in the past. Of course, as I type this, I realize that we have a second showing to one of the buyers from Monday night, so this one might not happen either.

I may need to research some meals that can be quickly packed and eaten in a car as we drive around. Any ideas?

Eet Smakelijk!

Week in Pictures: April 4, 2011

It's been a bit of a crazy week. We've had construction guys in my kitchen almost every day, which has made cooking a challenge at times. The good news is...my new hood is in!

Here's what I made this week:

Sunday:

We had a lazy day on Sunday and the boys slept most of the afternoon. So, I didn't make anything fancy for dinner. I did make Crockpot Apple Coffee Cake for our small group, although I forgot to add the sugar. It was that kind of day. There's no picture of that mistake!

We did snack on these yummy Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Truffles that I made last week instead.

Monday:

Crockpot Teriyaki Chicken. After a busy weekend with guests for dinner on Friday and Saturday, and company on Sunday, plus all the running around and staging, I knew I needed to keep it simple. Love this meal. It's something I've made many times, so...no picture again.

Tuesday:

Ovenschotel met gehaktballetjes en winterpeen. This is officially my new favorite Dutch recipe. WOW!!! So SO good. It translates to Casserole with Meatballs and Carrots, and the secret ingredient is Ketjap Manis, which is a sweet Indonesian soy sauce. You should be able to find it in an Asian or Dutch store. You can also make it yourself. YUM!

Wednesday:

Such a fun night! My Valentines Day gift from The Hubs was a knife skills class with a friend. We had a blast, and totally rocked our Greek Panzanella Salad. There was lots of cutting and lots of learning.

Thursday: I was wiped. We had leftovers.

Friday:

Crockpot Coconut Beef. This one was a total experiment, and The Hubs actually liked it more than I did. I forgot to start the rice, so I made couscous instead and added a big handful of flaked coconut (unsweetened). I thought it had a bite, but The Hubs thought it was just right.

Saturday:

BBQ Chicken Pizza. I was a little afraid, but I made my first homemade pizza dough to go with this recipe. It took a little time, because the dough needed to rise, but WOW, so, so good. I'll definitely make this again. Maybe next week because my dough recipe made enough for two pizzas.

I'll have to make a separate post about the dough because I found the recipe in a book, but here's a sneak peak: 4.5 cups flour (I used 1 c. whole wheat, the rest AP), 2 t. yeast, 2 t. salt, 2 T. sugar, 2 T olive oil and 1 3/4 cup COLD water (I thought it was odd that it wasn't warm, but it worked). Combine all dry ingredients. Add oil and water. Stir together until mixture becomes dough. Knead 10 minutes (a great workout if you don't have a mixer!). Form into 2 balls, place in lightly oiled bowls. Cover and let rise for 1-2 hours. When doubled in size, punch down. Let rest 20 min. Roll or pull dough to size of your pizza pan. Add toppings and bake. (Dough lasts in frig for 6 days).

Eet Smakelijk!