Oatmeal Muffins

I'm on a total muffin kick right now. This one is from the white recipe book.

1 1/2 cups flour
3/4 white sugar
3/4 brown sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp baking soda

1 cup oatmeal
1 cup hot water

3/4 cup butter or margarine
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp salt
2 eggs

Mix dry ingredients. In a separate bowl, mix oatmeal and hot water; let stand for 5 minutes. Add the remaining ingredients. Mix everything together and fill muffin tins. Bake at 350 degrees for 35 to 40 minutes.

Notes:
This gave me a dozen average sized muffins and a dozen tiny muffins (the bite sized ones).

3/4 cup of two kinds of sugar??? Yikes! I cut it down to 1/2 cup of each and they're still more than sweet enough! I'd even cut it down a bit more.

I didn't want to use up the last of my butter, so I split the 3/4 cup of butter: half was melted butter, half was oil. Worked out well.

Chocolate chips could be added to this recipe too.

This recipe can be changed to Chocolate Chocolate Chip Oatmeal muffins with these basic changes:
1) reduce flour to 1 1/4 cups
2) add 1/4 cup cocoa
3) omit brown sugar
4) use 3/4 cup white sugar
5) add 1/2 cup of chocolate chips
6) omit cinnamon

My oven bakes very hot so I baked it for closer to 20 minutes. Actually it was 18. So adjust your baking temperature and time according to what you know is best for yourself.

Dumplings

I made beef stew for supper and it looked like it might not quite be enough. It was too late to make potatoes or rice, and I've been thinking of making dumplings for a while. Here was my chance. I found this on allrecipes.com

1 cup all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon white sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon margarine
1/2 cup milk

Stir together flour, baking powder, sugar, and salt in medium size bowl. Cut in butter until crumbly. Stir in milk to make a soft dough.

Drop by spoonfuls into boiling stew. Cover and simmer 15 minutes without lifting lid. Serve.

To make parsley dumplings, add 1 tablespoon parsley flakes to the dry ingredients.

Notes:

The reviews on the recipe suggest stirring the dough only until the dry ingredients are incorporated, much like if you make biscuits or muffins. Don't overmix.

I put in the butter softened, not melted. It worked well.

I turned the stew down to minimum to allow it to simmer, dropped in the dumplings, covered the pot, and allowed it to simmer for the entire 15 minutes. The dumplings were cooked through completely.

Makes me want to play around with the recipe... like making cheese dumplings in taco soup. Mmm.

Cream Cheese Sheet Cake

I can't believe I haven't shared this recipe yet! Well, no time like the present! This is absolutely perfect for summer! It's from the white recipe book, contributed by my friend Daphne Thiessen. It's officially a pineapple cake, but I like to play around with recipes. I'll write the original and then check out the notes section for changes. Daphne noted: This cake freezes well and is, in fact, great served frozen on a hot summer day.

Cake:
1 box vanilla cake mix
1 small box instant vanilla pudding
1/2 cup oil
4 eggs, separated
1 cup water

Topping:
1/2 cup butter, melted
8 oz cream cheese, softened
1 1/2 cups icing sugar
1 cup whipping cream, whipped
1 tin crushed pineapple, drained well

For cake:
Beat egg whites until stiff peaks form. Set aside. Combine all other ingredients, including egg yolks. Mix well. Fold in egg whites and spread in greased jelly roll pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes. Cool completely.

For topping:
Beat butter and cream cheese until smooth. Beat in icing sugar. Fold in whipped cream and pineapple. Spread on cake and keep chilled, or freeze, until serving.

Notes:
This is where I love to have fun. I generally don't do the pineapple. Mostly I've left out all fruit and put fresh raspberries on top.

The variation I did today was to add the zest of a lemon in the cake batter and replaced 1/2 cup of the water with 1/2 cup of lemon juice. Then I put the zest of a second lemon in the topping. It's not very lemony; I could handle a little more lemon, but it's still good! It'll be great frozen!

What I've wanted to try, but haven't yet, is to make this as a chocolate cake. How great would that be! I'd like to try a chocolate cake mix with chocolate pudding, and then possibly adding a little cocoa into the topping. Personally, I wouldn't prefer to include any type of fruit, but that's me.

Ham and Cheese Breakfast Bake

This is an approximate recipe of what I made for the Women of Worth brunch back in April. It's my version of a recipe we made at a Pampered Chef party a few weeks earlier.

Hashbrown patties, thawed

1 cup of ham, cut into small cubes

1 cup of sour cream

12 eggs

2 cups of shredded cheese

1 cup of Cheese Whiz

salt and pepper

tomatoes

green onions

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Place a layer of hashbrown patties in a greased baking sheet or baking stone. Chop up the patties until crumbly. Sprinkle ham over the hashbrowns. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes.

In the meantime, mix the eggs, sour cream, Cheez Whiz, and shredded cheese. (I have to admit, I haven't bought Cheeze Whiz in years, I think it's fake food, so you can substitute Velveeta or omit it all together.) Add a little salt and pepper to taste.

Pour the egg mixture over the baked hashbrowns, return to oven, and bake for another 15 minutes, or until eggs are cooked through.

Cut up the tomatoes and green onions.

Remove from the oven, sprinkle with the tomatoes and green onions.

Ruehrei (Scrambled Eggs)

This recipe is a classic from as far back as I can remember. It's from the Mennonite Treasury and can also be found in the white recipe book.

3 eggs
1/2 cup milk
4 Tbsp cream
1/2 cup flour
1/2 tsp salt

Mix all ingredients into a smooth dough, except eggs, which you beat well, and fold into first mixture. Put 2 Tbsp butter in frying pan and heat, put in egg mixture, brown on both sides, cutting and turning while browning. Some like the reuhrei in larger chunks, others finer, depends on how you are used to it. Serves 2.

Notes:
I don't think I've ever done the two-part mixing process as written above. Sheesh. Chuck it all into the Kitchen Aid and whisk the tar out of it!

If you are making more than one batch of this stuff, divide it between two frying pans, or like I tried today for the first time, I poured it into my baking stone pan and baked it for about 20 minutes. I did the cutting and turning as suggested in the recipe. It worked great!

Here's my favorite thing! I've revised this recipe a handful of times. I've fried a little bit of onion and meat before adding the eggs and continuing to fry it. Today I fried half a pound of bacon, scattered it over the eggs in the baking stone pan and then after it was done baking, I sprinkled the top with diced tomatoes and a little green onion. Makes for a full meal.

These eggs (the plain version) are a perfect side for watermelon. MMM!

Actually Delicious Turkey Burgers

I found this one on allrecipes.com. They're not kidding when they say "Actually Delicious"!

Ingredients
* 3 pounds ground turkey
* 1/4 cup seasoned bread crumbs
* 1/4 cup finely diced onion
* 2 egg whites, lightly beaten (I just used one egg instead of 2 separated)
* 1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley
* 1 clove garlic, peeled and minced
* 1 teaspoon salt
* 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

Directions
In a large bowl, mix ground turkey, seasoned bread crumbs, onion, egg whites, parsley, garlic, salt, and pepper. Form into 12 patties.

Cook the patties in a medium skillet over medium heat, turning once, to an internal temperature of 180 degrees F (85 degrees C).

Creamy Macaroni and Cheese

While my husband was in Nicaragua, a friend blessed us with a delicious dinner of macaroni and cheese. It was yummy for Mommy and the kids loved it too! Since I don't have the recipe, I thought I'd try my own version.

Ingredients:
2 cups uncooked elbow macaroni

1/2 cup onion, finely chopped
1/4 cup butter
1/4 cup flour
1 1/2 cups milk
1 cup Velveeta
2 cups shredded old cheddar
1/2 cup Kraft Parmesan/Asiago
salt and pepper

ham

Directions:
Cook the macaroni in a large pot of water. Generally I like them cooked for 7 minutes, but since this recipe will be baked, I undercooked them and drained them at 6 minutes.

In the meantime, in a second large pot, melt the butter and cook onions until soft. Add the flour and milk. Mix until smooth and allow to simmer until thickened. Over low heat, add Velveeta and stir until combined. Throw in salt and pepper to taste.

Remove cheese mixture from heat, then add shredded old cheddar and Parm/Asiago. Stir until combined.

Add your desired amount of ham into the cheese mixture. Dump the macaroni into the cheese, stir until it's coated. Pour into a baking dish.

Bake for 30 minutes (or until heated through) at 350 degrees.