Better than Mashed Potatoes

Squash Casserole

1 stalk of celery, chopped

1/2 a medium onion, diced

1 carrot, chopped

1 butternut squash, peeled and cubed

~1/4 C Olive oil

1/2 Tbsp. Thyme

2 bay leaves

2 Tbsp minced garlic

Salt & Pepper to Taste

1 egg plus 1 egg white

1/4 cup heavy cream

1/4 cup parmesan cheese, freshly grated

In a large bowl toss together vegetables, oil and spices together to coat evenly. Roast on a greased cookie sheet (one with a lip helps) in a 400 degree oven for 30-40 minutes until the mixtures is fork tender. Mash these ingredients together with the cream and eggs. Pour into a 9x9 glass dish, top with parmesan cheese. Bake in a 325 degree oven for 30 more minutes.

This dish is just soooo perfectly wintery. I adore butternut squash and the mixture of a little cream and the sharp cheese brings out it’s sweet flavor. When I was mashing, I left a few of the chunks in for texture and depth and it just feels like someone made a heavenly bisque without all the cream and butter. I served this along side a roast beef, but I immediately stored it in my brain for Thanksgiving next year. It’s a great take along dish, I made everything in the morning up until I had to bake it and then just finished it off in the oven. Highly recommend this dish to anyone who needs something other than the boring mashed potato to take to a potluck, it’s a definite crowd pleaser!

Julia Child is Genius

Julia Child's Potato Cake Recipe

Ingredients:

• 4 pounds boiling potatoes, thinly sliced (food processor works well)
• 2 sticks butter, melted
• Salt/pepper to taste

Directions:

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Clarify the butter (melt and let the white pieces move to the top). Using a basting bulb, squeeze the end of it in the clear butter -- use only this -- otherwise the potatoes will stick.

In a 10-inch cast iron skillet or other very heavy pan, put in 1/4 cup clarified butter, arrange potato slices around the pan, covering the bottom in a design. Salt and pepper the potato layers, pouring on a bit more butter, then salt/pepper and arrange two other layers. Continue layering the potatoes, butter, salt/pepper, until the potatoes are all used. Take a smaller pan with a flat bottom and press down to compress the potatoes into a cake.

Put in the oven for 20 minutes. (As a safety precaution, put something under the potatoes to catch any butter that may spatter.) Remove from the oven and press down on the potatoes again. Return to the oven for 25 more minutes. Remove to compess the layers again. You can return for 5 more minutes or, if you need to bake something in the oven, finish the potatoes over the burner on low, until the main dish is cooked. Invert onto plate and cut into wedges.
(From Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume Two, Julia Child)

Jeff and I took on an entire menu from Mastering the Art of French Cooking (MAoFC) this past weekend. It was AMBITIOUS….as an understatement of the year. I’m posting what recipes I can find online, because I simply cannot type 12 pages of how to make French Bread….but trust me pick up copies of MAoFC..1 & 2….it’s a bible, and highly worth it!

Picnic Fare

Mom’s Macaroni Salad
Mix Together:

16 oz macaroni, cooked
6 boiled eggs, sliced
4 T diced onion
1 T red vinegar
1 T white vinegar
1 T relsih
1 ½ t mustard
¼ C green pepper
½ C celery
½ pickle spear, chopped
1 T pickle jiuice
2 T oil

I know this isn’t your basic set of ingredients, and some of them seem to overlap a little. Trust me, this stuff is macaroni salad at it’s vintage best. For a twist, peel and boil 6 large baking potatoes, forget the mac – you’ve got my mom’s potato salad now too!

A Cracking Recipe

Yorkshire pudding

3/4 c. flour
1/2 tsp salt
2 eggs
1 c whole milk
4 Tbsp oil

Beat flour, salt, eggs and milk until they are very smooth.Refrigerate 2 hours or longer.

Heat oven to 450 degrees. Transfer batter into freezer for the next 15 minutes.

Add oil to a 8x8 pyrex dish, put in oven until spitting hot (2 minutes)

Take out COLD batter and immediately pour into hot pan. Bake for 20-30 minutes.

This is supposed to be "ugly"...it's irregular, and puffy and rises all funny and browns unevenly. If it looks like a big loaf of bread gone wrong, you did it!

You can do anything with this, it's the white paper of english cooking. Serve chili in it, alongside pot roast, at breakfast with sausage in it. Onion gravy with it (1 Tbsp butter, 1 Tbsp olive oil, some red onions chopped and minced garlic sauteed, 4 sage leaves, a little marsala wine and dijon mustard, salt, pepper MMM!)

The possibilities are endless - have fun!!

A Lil Bit of Irish

Colcannon

1 medium cabbage, quartered and cored
2 pounds of potatoes, cleaned, skins on
2 leeks, diced
1 cup of whole milk
1/2 tsp mace
2 cloves of garlic, minced
1 stick of butter
Salt and pepper to taste

Boil cabbage in water for about 15 minutes. Drain and set cabbage aside. In a new pot of water, boil the potatoes until tender and drain off water.

In a sauce pan, sauté leeks in milk, bring to an almost boil and then simmer until tender.

Add mace, salt and pepper, garlic and butter to the potatoes and mash well (use a hand masher), no add the leeks and milk to the mix. Stir tenderly, you don't want to break this into a mush. Add cabbage, continue to stir until it's smooth with nice toothy bits of cabbage.

Transfer this to a 10x13 Pyrex dish, put under the broiler. Score a cool design in the top with a fork (serves no purpose other than the "ooh ahh!" factor) and broil until browned on top.

This dish is FANTASTIC. If you are tired of mashed potatoes, or even mac and cheese (gasp!) this could be your next comfort food. It goes fantastically during the holidays with a rib roast just as much as you can do meatloaf on Thursday. Enjoy!

I brought the....

Green Bean Casserole

2 tablespoons plus 1 teaspoon kosher salt, divided
1 large bag of frozen green beans
1 - 1 1/2 C of half and half
Cornstarch
1 medium onion, chopped
2 Tbsp butter
1 can of mushrooms
1/2 t nutmeg
Salt & pepper to taste
1 can of french fried onions

Cook green beans in a large bowl in the microwave according to package directions. In a large skillet, saute onion until it is soft. Add mushrooms, cooked green beans, nutmeg, salt and pepper. Push vegetables to one side of the pan and add half and half. With a whisk, add cornstarch in small amounts until half and half thickens up and creates a gravy. Adding any additional half and half if it gets too thick. Stir veggies into this mixture. Add 1 cup of french fried onions to this mix, stirring gently to not pulverize. Pour into a greased casserole dish, sprinkle more french fried onions on top. Bake for 20 minutes in a 350 degree oven.

Best green bean casserole EVER. I'm not kidding. This is not the mush that you remember from your days of canned cream of MUSHroom soup. This is really fantastic. I'm no food snob, but I'm not a fan of the "traditional nostalgia" known as green bean casserole. Try this. You'll change your mind!

He's Choppin' Broccoleeee...Broccoliiiieeee

Broccoli Cheese Rice

2 boxes of frozen broccoli, defrosted
2 C of instant rice, cooked
3/4 C celery, chopped
16 oz Cheese Whiz
1 C shredded cheese
1 C Milk
3/4 C onion, chopped
1 can of cream of chicken
1 can of cream of mushroom
1 stick of butter
1 can of mushrooms

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Combine all ingredients except shredded cheese and pour into a greased 10x13 dish. Bake for 25 minutes, remove, add shredded cheese to top, bake until cheese has melted.

The possibilities are endless here for creativity. Throw some leftover turkey easily into this one for a good leftover casserole. Also just add chicken for an easy dinner during the week. Add a little jalapeno for spice. It's a fantastic base for alot of ways to make an easy dinner!

Potaytoh..Potahtoh

Hashbrown Casserole

1 bag of cubed frozen hashbrowns, defrosted
1 1/2 C. Cheddar cheese, shredded
1/2 C chopped onion
1 can cream of chicken
1/2 C of bread crumbs
1 stick of Butter

Cook hashbrowns and onion in a little butter. Mix with cheese and soup. Pour into greasted 10x13 Pyrex dish. Melt remaining butter and mix with bread crumbs, sprinkle on top. Cook for 30 minutes @ 350 degrees.

This dish is fantastic at the table with everything mixed in. Consider it your base for making everything taste good. It's not a spicy or overly seasoned dish, but it adds that bit of warmth to the plate. Outside of the turkey arena, I trade out the cubed hashbrowns for the shredded variety (O'Brien style if they're available) and omit the breadcrumbs, slide it along with your eggs at brunch and you're all set!

Thanks Martha

Roasted Parsnip Bread Pudding

1 pound of parsnips cut into 1/2 inch pieces
5 T of butter, separated into 2 T and 3 T Olive oil
Salt *
Pepper
large leeks, white and pale green only, halved lengthwise and then sliced.
~3 C. 1/2 C dry white whine
2 T chopped fresh thyme
2 C heavy cream
5 large eggs
1 C parmesan
1 loaf of brioche, crust removed and cubed

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Drizzle parsnips with oil. Season with salt and pepper. Roast in oven until tender - 25 minutes.

Heat 2 T of utter in a saute pan. Add leeks and cook, remove from heat, add wine. Simmer until this is reduced. Add thyme, stir in parsnips.

Whisk together butter, cream, eggs and 3/4 parmesan in a bowl. Add leeks and parsnips. Fold in bread cubes.

Grease a 2 quart baking dish. Pour mixture into dish. Cover with foil and bake for 50 minutes. Sprinkle with remaining 1/4 C of parmessan and bake uncovered for 10 minutes more.

Each year I take one recipe from the Martha Stewart Thanksgiving edition of Living Magazine. This year, this is it. Parsnips are a new ingredient to me, and I"m enjoying them - potato feel with carrot goodness. Plus, a casserole at Thanksgiving like bread pudding? Who's going to say no?

It's the Best Month Ever

Corn Casserole

1/2 C butter melted
8.5 oz of corn bread mix
1 can of corn
1 can of creamed corn
1 C Sour Cream
2 eggs

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9x9 dish. Mix all ingredients, pour into dish and bake for 45 minutes.

This is the start of my Thanksgiving recipes. Will do the entire table if Mom will give up her Twice Baked Potatoes recipe! This is my favorite holiday and I go out big style for it. Each year has a bit of the same, a bit of new. Hang on tight - it's my favorite!

Coincidentally, this dish also rocks with some bbq pork on top! :)

Saag Paneer

Haluski

1 package bacon
1 whole head of cabbage, chopped
1 onion, chopped
1 package of wide egg noodles, boiled and drained
1 stick of butter

Cut bacon into small pieces and fry in a large frying pan. Add butter and onion. Fry until onion is soft. Add cabbage and continue to cook until cooked through. Toss with noodles. Add salt and pepper to taste.

This is Polish food. My parents hail from a small town south of Pittsburgh, PA. My dad is Polish and my mom is Czech and this recipe, while not either sides family version, is a typical Polish food - starch plus fat and if you can, cabbage of some sort.

I truly like this dish next to a plate of fried or grilled chicken. It looks heavy at first (that's what bacon fat and butter will do to you) but it's really actually quite sweet and goes well with a lighter meat. Add some green beans or peas in on the side and it's quite a nice home style meal. Think macaroni and cheese for the Polish soul.

My Ultimate Comfort Food

Homemade Mac & Cheese

4 Cups Cheddar Cheese
1 Stick of Margarine or Butter
1 Can of Evaporated Milk
1 bag of pasta (small shells preferred)
Splash of Milk

Cook pasta according to package directions. Drain. Turn heat to simmer and add in butter, milk and then stir in cheese until it melts. Toss pasta on top and continue to stir and add milk to adjust until desired consistency is achieved.

That's it. You can read about 1,000 other recipes for macaroni and cheese. You can make bechamel sauce bases until your hearts content. You can stir and whisk and add breadcrumbs and make. Not for me, nope, nuh-uh, ain't gonna do it. This is the easiest version I have come up with entirely on my own, and it works.

This is my go-t0 food. Stressed? Here's comfort in a bowl. For those of you who follow me personally, after the apartment fire, we were at the table eating this and corn dogs. I add pepper to this and on a winter's day with a good movie and a puppy beside me, I can't ask for a better time to relax. It takes minutes and impresses every time.

As an FFG (Former Fat Girl), I used to consume this in quantities that I'm a bit embarrassed to admit to. On the cheat days that I do allow myself, this would be at the top of the list. It's far from dietetic, but it can be leaps and bounds above the blue box stuff.

It's also extremely flexible. I've added bacon, carmelized onions and blue cheese. I've put in artichokes and sundried tomatoes. You like swiss? Try it. I try to keep the cheddar to "other cheese" ratio to half and half, most cheeses just don't melt as nicely. Gruyere is good, a smack of brie, try it. You can't hurt it badly by adding, just make sure that you don't take away the other fats.

Unfortunately this doesn't keep as well. As with anything with this much "love" (known to non-foodies as butters, creams and cheeses) in it, it tends to congeal up into a mess. Will I eat it the next day ? Yes! It makes alot, so assemble a crowd. It's great for Thanksgiving with some of those "fancy breadcrumbs" thrown on top - no one will know you didn't take all day. Roux schmoo, this is easy stuff.