The Un-Broccoli Broccoli Slaw

This is one of my mom’s favorites.  Bring this to your next get-together or picnic or go ahead & eat it all yourself ;o)  It’s fabulously tasty in the extreme and easy as sin!  And if you’re not a broccoli lover, keep your panties on…you can’t taste the broccoli.

The Stuff

1 bag of pre-shredded broccoli slaw

1 jar  Coleslaw dressing (I like Marie’s - in the produce section of your grocery store)

1 Cup dried cranberries

1 cup walnut pieces

Making it Work

Ummm, this one’s a no brainer.  Dump everything in to a large mixing bowl & stir well (or save yourself a dirty wooden spoon & put the lid on & shake it around ;o)

Variations

To make this a complete meal, add chopped, cooked chicken or shrimp (I prefer chicken because I think the shrimp kind of gets lost in there)

If you don’t like creamy dressings, try raspberry vinaigrette instead

Shhhh….Don’t Tell the Vermicelli!

The Stuff

• 1 LB cooked Vermicelli or Angel Hair Pasta
• 8 good sized Garlic Cloves, minced (If you’re not a fan of huge garlic flavor, you can thinly slice the garlic which will give you a milder flavor)
• ¼ Cup Extra Virgin Olive Oil
• 1 tsp Butter or Margarine (to help keep the oil from burning)
• 4 or 5 Anchovies, super finely minced

HEY!  Shhhh!  Stop freaking out already!!  Anchovies aren’t as scary as you think.  When you chop them up & sauté them in oil, they kind of just melt away & leave a wonderfully, rich, salty flavor that has absolutely NO fish taste at all.  Trust me on this one, my teenager & his friends love this (I didn’t tell them until after they ate it what was in it ;o)  Don’t fear the anchovy…embrace his flavor magic.  You’ll be glad you did.

Making it Work

• Heat up a large sauté pan.  Once it’s heated, turn the temperature down to medium
• Pour  in the olive oil & the butter or margarine
• Dump in the anchovies, stirring constantly.  They’ll melt…no, really ;o)
• Once the  anchovies have melted, add the garlic.  Sauté until the garlic is cooked through (about 8 minutes or so).
• Toss with cooked Vermicelli or Angel Hair Pasta

Now go have yourself a nice glass of red wine and congratulate yourself on overcoming your fear & loathing of the little fishies.  Oh, and since your breath reeks of garlic now, you might as well be useful & go slay some evil vampires ;o)

Faerie GothMother’s pearls of wisdom:

Next time the cashier asks you if you want "Paper or Plastic" Just say - "Doesn't matter to me, I'm bi-sacksual."

See Slaw

The Stuff

• 1 Medium Red Cabbage, shredded
• 2 Stalks of Celery, diced small
• 1 Medium Onion, diced small
• 1 Green Pepper, diced small (optional)
• ½ Cup Sugar
• ½ Cup vegetable oil
• ½ Cup vinegar (White or Apple Cider)
• 1 TBSP Salt
• 1TSP Sugar

Making it Work

• Dump the veggies into a large mixing bowl. 
• Add ½ Cup of sugar to the veggies and toss well. 
• In a 1 quart sauce pan, add oil, vinegar, the 1 TBSP Sugar & salt.
• Bring to a boil, stirring constantly.
• Pour over the cabbage mixture & mix well.
• Chill in the refrigerator at least overnight before serving.

 This slaw has been a family favorite and will stay crisp for at least nine days in the fridge.  You can substitute green cabbage if you like, but the red/purple cabbage looks & tastes awesome!  I like to put a blob of it on a roast beef sandwich…mmmmmm.

Faerie GothMother says...

My generation's zombies didn't run. They walked. Uphill. In the snow. They ate what brains they could find and they liked it.

Lazy Chicken Cacciatore

Here is one of the easiest recipes EVER!  This works great as a pot-luck dish, too & no one has to know just how easy it really was. 

The Stuff

• 3 boneless, skinless chicken breasts or 6-8 boneless, skinless chicken thighs
• 1 jar of your favorite spaghetti sauce
• 1 large can diced tomatoes
• 1 LB cooked pasta of your choice (we like angel hair) or rice

Making it Work

• Plunk the chicken in the bottom of your crock pot
• Pour in the sauce & tomatoes & stir
• Turn the crock pot on the “Low” setting & cook for 8-10 hours
• Take a bubble bath & read a nice, steamy romance novel…you deserve it!
• Before serving shred (or chunk) the chicken & stir back into the sauce
• Serve over pasta or rice with a nice salad…YUMMM

To make this even lazier, use a crock pot liner…just lift it out of the crock pot when you’re done & throw in the trash…easy clean up!  *sigh*

Herbs…and no not the funny kind

One of the things I’m frequently asked is to share my shortcuts.  I have Fibromyalgia and find that I need to make cooking easier for myself.  I also like to buy fresh items when they are on sale but I’m not always ready to use them before they break my heart & go bad.  So, I’ll pepper (pun intended ;o) my posts with some of my little tips, tricks & shortcuts.

When fresh basil and/or parsley is on sale, I buy bunches of it.  I make it into a slurry that can easily be added to soups, stews, stir frys or whatever else I'm cooking.  Here’s what I do…

• Rinse the herbs (you can mix them or do each one separately.  I stick ‘em all in together) and dry well.
• Dump the herbs (minus the stems) in a blender or food processer
• Add 3 or 4 garlic cloves (depends on how much you luuuuuvvvv garlic)
• Add a fist-full of parmesean cheese (optional)
• 1/4 tsp of Salt
• 1/8 tsp of Pepper
• Pour in ¼  to ½ cup of Extra Virgin Olive Oil
• Pulse the ingredients…ummmmm wait, let’s discuss pulsing.  Pulsing in a blender or food processor means to hit the power button in short, quick intervals. 
• Ok, back to our regularly scheduled program…pulse the ingredients until the herbs & garlic are finely chopped.  You may need to drizzle some additional olive oil as you do this depending on how much moisture your herbs have.  You’ll know if you need more because the blade will spin, but nothing happens.  Don’t overdo the pulsing…you don’t want herb soup.
• Using a tablespoon, spoon mixture into ice cube trays (I have a couple that are dedicated for this purpose) and freeze.  When the cubes are frozen, pop them into a zip lock freezer bag & wallah! You have fresh herbs whenever you want them.

These can also be used as a great topping for baking chicken.  Just place a cube on top of your chicken pieces (or in the cavity if you’re doing a whole bird) & bake.  Delish!!

Easy, Cheezy, Mac & Cheese

This is my son’s #1, hands-down, favorite!  Don’t be shocked by a few of the ingredients, it all works & OMG it’s yummy!

The Stuff

• 1 LB cubed American Cheese (tell the deli to cut it as thick as possible, you should get about 4 or 5 fat slices & buy the one on sale)
• 1 LB box of Elbow Macaroni
• 1 ½ TBSP Mayonnaise
•  1 ½ TBSP Ketchup
•  1 TBSP Brown or Country Dijon Mustard
•  ¾ Cups of Milk (I use 1%)
•  1 Cup Seasoned Breadcrumbs or crushed Ritz crackers
• Butter or Margarine

Making it Work

• Boil the macaroni for about 7 minutes in your dutch oven. 
• Drain macaroni & return to dutch oven.
• Dump in the cheese & stir it around a bit
• Add the Mayonnaise, Ketchup, Mustard & Milk
• Stir well.
•  Cover the top of the macaroni mixture with the breadcrumbs
• Plop nice, yummy blobs of butter or margarine randomly over the breadcrumbs
• Place in a pre-heated 350^* oven for about 25 minutes or until nice & bubbly.

I've modified this recipe several times and keep going back to the original.  There's just something wonderfully yummy about the simplicity of this dish!  You can add diced cooked chicken or ham & some well-drained frozen broccoli to make it a complete meal if you like.

Things every good, little faerie & sprite should have in their kitchen…

I'm sure I'll think of more over time, but this is a good start ;o)

Garlic Press

I usually don’t recommend single-function kitchen tools, but I make an exception for the garlic press.  With this magical tool, you can easily mince garlic directly over your cooking apparatus and get all the juicy, garlicky goodness…all without peeling a garlic clove.  I like the self-cleaning ones (see the picture below of the one with the red prickly things).  I would also suggest choosing one that has a nice grip as you’ll be using quite a bit of pressure and small, narrow handles will hurt your hands after a while.

Cooking Knife

My favorite type of knife is the Santoku design.  This type of knife is characterized by a flat bottom and has little grooves at the base of the blade to prevent food from creating suction (we’ve all had the stupid potato that just wants to stick to the knife ;o)  Before you purchase, hold the knife and make sure the grip is secure and comfortable in your hand.  Also, you don’t need to spend a lot of money on a good knife.  I think mine cost me 10.99 at a local discount store.

Paring Knife

A good paring knife is essential!  With this little gem, you can peel potatoes, fruit & carrots, easily cut out the heart of an artichoke or core an apple.  The possibilities are endless.

Microplane Grater

You’ll love this tool!  It’s great for zesting citrus fruit, nutmeg, and cinnamon.  Microplane graters work wonders for grating wedges of hard cheeses like Parmesean or Romano.

Metal Meat Mallet

Take out your aggression with this nifty tool.  You can flatten meat & poultry as thin as a sheet of paper.  I recommend the metal mallots because they are much more sanitary than the wooden ones.  This is a particularly satisfying kitchen tool when you’ve had a bad day.

10 or 12 inch Sauté Pan with a thick bottom

You’ll use this pan for almost everything.  Great for pancakes, frittatas, frying cutlet type meats.  It also makes a handy weapon should anyone break in & try to steal your treasured garlic press ;o) 

Heavy bottomed Dutch Oven or Stock Pot

Sauce, soup, stew, chili, fried chicken, pasta…there’s not much you can’t cook in one of these babies!

Wooden Spoons

Invest in a set of cheap wooden spoons.  Believe me, I can’t count how many I’ve gone through.  And the more expensive ones don’t make your food taste any better.

Glass Measuring Cup

Need I say more?  Useful for, oh, so many things…cracking eggs, measuring wet or dry ingredients, fishing out wayward bay leafs from your soup.  The list goes on & on & on.

Colander

What a great little number!  Use as a strainer to drain pasta or potatoes.  Works wonders for rinsing fruits & veggies.  It even doubles as a helmet in the event of an alien attack and is much more stylish than wrapping your head in tinfoil! 

Whisk

This strange looking thingamajig whips up whipped cream in a flash, is a perfect utensil for scrambling those eggs, mixing cake batter.  And who among us hasn’t used one as a microphone, belting out the tunes when we think no one’s watching??

Aloe Vera Plant

You’ll be glad you have one the first time that bacon fat sizzles up at you.  Just break a piece off & rub the goo over the burn…ahhhhh, sweet relief (make sure you’re not allergic to the plant before you go rubbing it all over yourself).