Layered One Dish Supper, Green Salad with Homemade Ranch Salad Dressing and Dinner Rolls

This was a great dinner because all I had to do was get it in the oven and let it do it's own thing. I wanted to help my husband set up a new fish tank so we spent the 2 hours this took to cook working together.

Layered One Dish Supper

This was just a layered beef stew. It was really, really good....everything turned out to be so tender. My husband loved this because he's such a meat and potatoes kind of guy.

2 lbs beef, cubed
3 celery stalks, chopped
6 potatoes, peeled and chopped
1 lg onion, chopped
4 carrots, chopped
2 (10 oz) cans of tomato soup
1 (10 oz) can cream of mushroom soup
2 C water
salt and pepper to taste

Layer meat in a large casserole dish then layer in the following order on top of the meat - onion, celery, potatoes, and carrots. In a bowl combine soups, water and season with salt and pepper, pour in casserole evenly over contents. Cover and bake at 350 degrees for 2 hours.

Green Salad

I love very simple salads usually I just make them out of whatever lettuce and extra vegetables I have hanging out in the fridge that need to be used. I got a little bit fancy with this one and threw some chopped pecans on top that I had left over from Christmas. One of the things I love about salad is the dressing. I took a cooking class last year and I watched the chef make his own dressing, then I got to taste it. Before that I didn't really care to make my own because I always figured I could just go to the 99 cent store and buy a bottle. How naive I was, I haven't been able to go back to buying it at the store since. This Ranch dressing is one of my staples. I just make it in a Mason jar. I even serve it out of the same jar, you can see it in the picture above, we are very high class around here.

Ranch Dressing

1 C buttermilk

1 ½ C mayonnaise

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 small shallot, minced

2 Tbsp chives

1 Tbsp onion powder

1 Tbsp garlic powder

½ Tbsp celery seed

Pepper to taste

Combine everything and mix well.

Dinner Rolls

These are leftover from the holidays....I sometimes have problems resisting a sale on Hawaiian Sweet Bread rolls so we have a ton of them.




Cooking dinner in the oven gave me time to do this, our new fish tank all set up- minus the fish, the water needs to cycle before we can safely add any.

Ham, Cheese Grits and Collard Greens

This was going to be my New Year's Day dinner but I decided I wanted to go with Cabbage Rolls and a Cabbage Salad instead. I also needed to use the ham because I took it out of the freezer and didn't use it when we had company in town.

Ham

I didn't do anything special to the ham other than heating it because my main point in cooking it was to package it up in 2 cup portions for the freezer for using in future dishes.

The way I heat a ham is to place it in a roasting pan with about 2 cups of water, cover it tightly with foil and place in the oven at 350 degrees for about 10 minutes per pound or until the meat reaches a temperature of 160 degrees. This was a big ham so it took about 2 hours to get done.

Cheese Grits

I am not posting the recipe for these because they turned out very runny and I was very sad about it. My sister in law gave me a gift basket with REAL grits in it and I was so excited. Where I live you cannot walk into a grocery store and just buy old fashioned grits like you can in the south. I have looked for years....no luck, so I have lived a grit deprived life. If anyone does have a cheese grits recipe they could pass my way I would love to have it. I have a 5 pound sack of grits waiting for me. I am also not fully blaming my lack of grits knowledge because it may have been the jar of processed cheese food I was supposed to add. I have never bought any before and the grocery store where I shop had one jar left and I grabbed it. The recipe said a small jar but this jar looked a little bit on the large size.

Collard Greens

My experience with collard greens has been limited to making soup out of them and cooking them like I cook all greens.; sautee with a bit of oil and garlic until they are tender. Having only 2 ways to cook any greens has become beyond boring for me so I decided to branch out a bit and use an old recipe I found in a recipe tin I bought at an antique store. They were beyond excellent and I will be making these again in the future.

1 Tbsp. oil or more as needed
3 slices bacon
1 lg. onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
salt and pepper to taste
3 C. chicken broth
1 lb. collard greens, cut into bite sized pieces

Heat oil in a large pot over medium heat. Add bacon and cook until crisp. Remove bacon, chop and return to pan. Add onion, cook until soft, about 5 minutes. Add garlic and cook about 3 more minutes. Add collard greens and saute until they start to wilt. Pour in chicken broth and season to taste. Bring to a boil then reduce heat to low, cover, and allow to simmer for 45 minutes or until greens are tender.

A new year ....a new blog and some Salmon Chowder

I've been doing a lot of thinking about what I want for the new year. I want simple things, to spend more time with my family, to save money, to eat healthier, to expand my cooking skills.  I can do all of that by making dinner for my family every day.  It seems a bit daunting right now....365 days....all in the kitchen. I'll forgive myself if I miss a day here and there. If anyone starts reading  this blog the fear of public humliation will help keep me in the kitchen anyway.

I am sure the days will fly by and I'll have a really neat blog cookbook to look back on at the end of next year.

Happy 2011!

I made this chowder the other day. We have been having a lot of wet, cold weather. Being from California I just don't know how to deal with it, other than to stay inside and make soup.

Salmon Chowder

1 (15 oz.) can salmon, drained and any bones/skin removed

1 lg. onion, chopped

2 stalks celery, chopped

1 green pepper, chopped

1 clove garlic, minced

6 medium potatoes, peeled and cubed

4 carrots, sliced

2 (15 oz) cans creamed corn

Seasoning salt to taste

Black pepper to taste

1 (15 oz) can chicken broth, divided

½ tsp dill weed

1 (12 oz) can evaporated milk

In a pot over low heat, mix together ½ C. broth with the onion, celery, green pepper, and garlic. Cook until vegetables are tender. Add remaining broth, potatoes, carrots, seasoning salt and dill. Cook over med. Heat 20-30 minutes or until the potatoes and carrots are tender. Add evaporated milk, creamed corn and salmon, gently stir. Season with pepper to taste. Serve when heated through.