Baked Meatballs

I've never baked my meatballs before. I usually put them raw into my sauce and simmer for the day, or add them to the sauce to cook in the crockpot all day, or if in a hurry, I'll pan fry them in a little bit of olive oil.

On a whim last week I decided to bake them.  I really don't have a recipe to share because my meatballs are different every single time depending on what I'm in the mood to add or what I have in stock.

I start with 4 eggs to 2 pounds of ground beef.

A couple cups of bread crumbs.

Grate up some cheese.  I usually use at least 1/2 a block, if not more.

 Sometimes I'll add in mozzarella, too, if I have some.  

Then I chop up some garlic cloves and onion. 

My cutting tool was a flea market find. I love it and it's surprisingly sharp. 

Add in some spices, like oregano, basil or if you house is like ours that loves garlic, a good healthy sprinkling of garlic powder, in addition to the garlic cloves! 

My sister got me this dish in Mexico. I love the colors of it in my kitchen. 

Next remove your rings, roll up your sleeves and get your hands into the beef, to mix it all together. 

Shape into meatballs and place on a foil lined baking sheet. 

Bake for 30 minutes at 350°.  

We then mixed ours with a bit of sauce and had meatball subs. 

Dinner the next night was spaghetti and meatballs. 

This are much bigger than they look.
Hubby said these were about the size of billard balls. 

Most of the time I also add ketchup and mustard to my mixture but opted not to this batch. 

I think I liked them a bit better this way.

 I believe that baking meatballs has become my preferred way to cook them.  

What do you add to your meatballs and how do you cook them? 

Homemade Granola Cereal

We've battled illness, mine, Tink's and Hubby's for almost two weeks now and thankfully the boys have avoided it. I haven't been that sick but with taking care of a high energy child who is just sick enough not to take to her activities, has left me drained of energy or ambition for blogging or anything else. Please don't look too closely at the dusk piling up here!

We are all feeling better now and I had some desire to get back into the kitchen.

The boys bug me to make them more granola as soon as the last batch is gone. They have been less than happy that they have been without for about 3 weeks now.

I have a base formula from Prepared Pantry that I've adapted to my own use.

I always make a double batch because I have monster cookie sheets that came from a friends restaurant, so I have the room to bake that much granola. I'll share my single batch recipe with you.


Granola:

4 cups old fashioned oats
1/4 cup oat flour*
1/2 cup maple syrup or I make a syrup from 1/2 cup brown sugar and 2-3 tablespoons water
1/4 cup oil (I use melted coconut oil)
1 teaspoon vanilla
shredded coconut

I add in:
1/2 cup 7 grain cereal
1/4 cup wheat bran
1/8 cup flax seed meal

These are optional and you can add in whatever quantity suits you.

 This what how I make it for Hubby who shouldn't be eating nuts.

For the rest of us I add in:
1/2 cup almond slivers
1/2 cup chopped up walnuts


Preheat your oven to 300°

• Mix the dry ingredient together with nuts but not shredded coconut. 
• Mix together syrup, oil and vanilla in separate bowl. 
• Add the liquid into the dry and mix well. 
• Spread out on cookie sheet that is lined with parchment paper. You don't have to use parchment paper, I just prefer it because it keeps the cookie sheet clean.
• Bake for 25 minutes.
• Mix in the shredded coconut. This is also where I swap the cookie sheets in the oven.
• Bake another 12 minutes.
• Cool.
• Store in air tight container.

When I eat this as cereal, I add a couple handfuls of raisins. We have found that raisins don't taste as good after being cooked for so long. 

I love this on yogurt with a little bit of honey. YUM! 

What do you like to add to your granola?

*Oat flour can be made by just putting old fashioned oats into your mixer or food processor and blending to fine dust.  Did you know it's the same stuff those oatmeal bath soothing treatments are made of? I now dump oat flour into our baths to soothe our dried winter skin. 

Soups and Sickness

Tink has been sick this week. Nothing major. Fever and cold symptoms. My way of combating the germs is essential oils around the home and soup. Lots of soup.

This week I roasted a chicken and made my roast chicken soup.

I also made, for the first time, homemade tomato soup. Did you know there's high fructose corn syrup in tomato soup and 480 mg of sodium in one 1/2 cup serving?? If you read my What Motivates Me page, you'll know because of my hubbies health issues, we are low to no sodium in our home now.

My biggest problem with sharing what I create is that I have an issue with recipes.  I rarely follow them.  I throw in some of this and some of that.

This is about a teaspoon

Last night while having left over tomato soup, Hubby says, "This is really delicious." I'm so glad he liked it and I really hope I can recreate it!

I got the base recipe from Taste of Home but didn't follow what they said.

I love my cast iron trivets 

Here's what I did.


Herbed Tomato Soup (my version)

1 15 oz can crushed tomatoes
small can of tomato paste
a palm full of:
onion powder
garlic powder
basil (I think I added 2 palm fulls)
parsley
a dash of cayenne powder
2 cups of milk
4 tbsp flour

Combine tomatoes, onion and garlic powder, basil, parsley and cayenne powder.  Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes. Stir occasionally to avoid sticking to pan.

Stir in paste. Mix milk and flour well.  Slowly stir into soup. Stir until thickened.

I served it with grilled cheese the first night and with chicken sandwiches for our leftovers night.

This is a very rich version of tomato soup and large bowls of it are extremely filling.

If you make this, I'd love to hear what changes you make. I'm always looking for new ideas.

More Summer Cravings

Strawberry Soup.

My aunt served this at a lunch once. It was delicious and I've not been able to duplicate it as well.

I almost made it this weekend but then Tink got sick and I got nothing done.

Another page from my cookbook

Strawberry Soup

2 c. hulled and sliced fresh or frozen strawberries
1 c. orange juice
1 c. vanilla yogurt
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
Whipped cream

Blend all ingredients till smooth and top with a spoonful of whipped cream.

I have frozen raspberries and blueberries in the freezer. I just may have to try it with those instead of strawberries.

Do you make a fruit soup? What kind?

Caving Summer Food

I believe the 60 degree day we had this week, after sub-zero temps, left me craving for summer foods. I had a hard time planning the next two weeks' menu because I wanted grilled chicken or steak, corn on teh cob and some potato salad. Its all I could think about.

My Mema made the best salad and it's such a simple recipe. I guess her's tasted so good because it was flavored with the love she poured into it!

notes I took on her recipe years ago

Mema's Potato Salad

1/2 a sweet onion

6 eggs

5 lbs pototoes

3 stalks of celery

mayo - Mema swore it had to be Helman's Mayo

salt

pepper

paprika on top as garnish

Cut everything up and mix together. I usually add in whatever spices I feel inclined to when I make it, like a bit of celery salt or a pinch of garlic powder.  It's different every time I make it.