Burnin' Up the Kitchen

this recipe came from my godfather's mom. i'm sure it's been around for forever though. the really great thing is that you can keep the batter in the fridge for almost forever and it almost seems to improve with time! my mom used to make this all of the time when we were kids and then she'd only make a few muffins at a time- that way they were always fresh. toss in a few dried cranberries and it gets even better.

1 cup margarine
1.5 cups honey
4 eggs, beaten
1 quart buttermilk
4 cups All Bran/ Bran Buds
2 cups loose, real bran
1 cups boiling water
5 cups flour
5 tsp. soda
1 tsp. salt
a half a box of raisins or dry cranberries

pour water over the real bran. cream margarine and honey. add the beaten eggs, buttermilk, and bran cereal to the shortening mixture. add flour, salt, and soda. add the dry fruit and fold until moist.

bake at 400 for 15-20 in greased muffin tins.

Labels: muffins

what's in the raspberry vinaigrette you guys make at work? i love, love a good brewers salad and am itching to know how to make the dressing. it's okay if you can't tell... we can still be friends.

-rae

Labels: dressing

Banana Bread
Yield: 4- 7x3 in loaves

Prep time: 10 min
Cook time: 1 hour

* The secret to a REALLY good banana bread is very ripe (black) bananas.
Always in search of the perfect banana bread recipe, I found this one through my sister-in-law. This recipe makes a super dense, moist bread that you won't be able to get enough of!

Ingredients

3/4 c butter
3 c white sugar
3 eggs
6 very ripe banana's mashed
1 (16 oz) container sour cream
2 tsp vinalla extract
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
3 tsp baking soda
4 1/2 c all-purpose flour
1 c chopped walnuts (optional)

Directions

Preheat oven to 300 degrees F (150 degrees C)
Grease four 7x3 in loaf pans

In a large bowl, cream butter and 3 c sugar.
Mix in eggs, mashed banana's, sour cream, vanilla and cinnamon.
Mix in salt, baking soda and flour.
Stir in nuts.

Divide into prepared pans.

Bake for 1 hour, until a toothepick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Polenta is soooo easy and soooo yummy!

Creamy Polenta:5 parts liquid (milk, stock (chicken, veg, whatever), water) : 1 part polenta, by volume. (1/2 cup polenta and 2.5 cups liquid). Recently I've been doing 1 part polenta, 4 parts milk ; 1 part stock.Boil liquid. Slowly wisk in polenta. stirr occasionally until fully cooked (thickened) (I don't know how long. 10 mins? 20? 5?). Taste it to make sure it is cooked and no longer crunchy. Season w/ salt and pepper.(I sometimes have an extra bit of hot liquid around, in case I want it a little looser)Polenta Cakes:4 parts liquid : 1 part polenta. after cooking (it'll obviously be more stiff), put into a sheet pan, spread evenly, let cool. You can now cut it into shapes and sear it off in a pan.Addins to the polenta mix: cheeses, roasted peppers, green onions, cracked black pepper, sauteed mushrooms, nuts, herbs, spices, anything your heart desires. It's good plain, too!!!

-from Martha A.

charlotte was gracious enough to post on my bog her monkey bread recipe.... i love this stuff.

Anonymous said...
Monkey Bread is a hand-eaten, pull-apart bread, which my mother used to make savory style with italian-type suburbanized spices and loads of butter. Chris' family made it this way with lots of butter, cinnamon and sugar. Sometimes, when they didn't want to make a cake, this is what they would serve at birthdays. And everyone can pull off their own pieces. The outside ones are super ooey gooey and ultra yummy.

Monkey Bread
4 tubes Refrigerator biscuits
1 stick butter
1 1/3 cup sugar
2 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla

Cut biscuits into fourths. Mix together 2/3 cup sugar and 1 tsp cinnamon; roll each piece in mixture. Drop biscuits in greased 12-cup bundt pan. Combine remaining ingredients. Boil. pour over biscuits. bake in 350 degree oven for 40 minutes. Turn immediately out onto a plate and serve warm. Can be foil wrapped and reheated.

---charlotte

2 pieces of favorite bread
2Tbs butter
2 slices favorite cheese
1 thick slice (or 2/3 thin) of bologna (we like turkey bologna here)

In a preheated pan fry up the bologna to your liking. If you use the thin put a little slice in the middle so that it doesn't bubble up too much. Take out of pan and put on plate, cover with foil or another plate. Butter the bread as if making a grilled cheese sandwich. Place butter side down in pan. Put 1 slice of cheese on bread, then bologna, then cheese, and finally the other piece of bread butter side up. Fry up like a grilled cheese.

Plate and eat. Sometimes I'll squirt a little mustard on the bologna before the cheese. This is also an excellent sammy to put in a Panini press (I sure wish I had one). Enjoy!

I love this recipe. It so simple and probaply on the back of a can somewhere, but hey, it tastes yummers, the boys devour it, and the leftovers are pretty good. My girlfriend also puts rice on the bottom, or egg noodles, and lets them bake with the dish. I also throw in different kinds of veggies as well to mix it up a bit.

Chicken and Vegetables

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Use 4 pounds of chicken breasts or thighs. (Bone in and skin on)

Wash chicken and salt good on both sides. Place in large baking dish. One size larger than 9" X 13".
Cover with potatoes whole small or 1/2 medium, carrots whole small or 1/2 large and quartered onions 2-3.

Spoon Campbell's Cream of Mushroom soup over chicken pieces, cover and bake 1 1/2 - 2 hours. It's done when the gravy is bubbling and the soup has mostly cooked off the chicken and veggies are tender. You can really smell the aroma the last 1/2 hour.

With a fork you can peel the skin off in one piece and remove the meat from the bone easily for platting.

Prep time 10-15 minutes.

You can use bone in roast or 7 bone roast. It just needs to be a fatty flat roast. What ever is on sale. For the chicken it has to be bone in and skin on or it's really not very good.