All posts by Ruth Wendel

About Ruth Wendel

I'm a musician, Registered Dietitian, cook, and baker. I love food, and want to share my delight for it with the world. I hope you enjoy my recipes and, if you haven't developed a love for baking already, I hope you will! View all posts by Ruth Wendel →

Basil Flower Pesto

July 20, 2018Lunch and Dinnerbasil, pasta, pestoRuth Wendel

Hi all! Hard to believe that we’re already about half way through summer! My garden is in full bloom and my plants are growing like crazy in the summer sun. I have a bunch of flowers and a few vegetable plants, and lots of herbs. My basil plant has started to go to seed, so I had to prune it back to keep it producing basil leaves. I ended up with a whole bunch of basil flower cuttings, and wondered if they were usable as more than just a pretty centerpiece. Turns out, they are!

Usually the flowers of herbs/vegetables have a milder taste than the adult version of the plant, but still have a yummy hint of the traditional flavor. I decided to try making a pesto out of the basil flowers, and it worked amazingly well! But don’t worry, if you don’t have basil flowers, you can just use basil leaves and will have a wonderful traditional pesto. Here’s the recipe:

Ingredients:

3/4 cup pine nuts
3 1/2 cups basil flowers (off the stem)
4 cloves garlic, peeled and roughly chopped
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
1/4 cup Parmesan cheese

First, toast the pine nuts by placing them on a paper-lined baking sheet in a single layer and roasting them in a 350° oven for 5-8 minutes, or until they’re golden brown and smelling good.

Add the pine nuts, garlic, basil, and salt to a food processor.

Pulse them in the processor until they become well chopped and mixed. Then, turn the processor to low and pour in olive oil and Parmesan cheese while the processor is running. Continue to process until all ingredients are mixed.

And now, eat it! This recipe goes well with a lot of things- bruschetta, flatbreads, pasta, pizza… the list goes on! I used it to make a pesto pasta and loved it.

To make the pasta recipe, cook 12 oz pasta of your choosing according to the box instructions. While the pasta cooks, sautée 1/2 chopped onion in 2 tbsp olive oil until onions are soft. Mix in 2 tbsp pesto and salt and pepper to taste. Stir and cook until heated through. Stir in the pasta and top with Parmesan cheese. I sprinkled some extra basil flowers on the top as a garnish!

I hope you enjoy this summer recipe! Happy cooking!

The Best Chicken and Waffles

April 24, 2018Lunch and Dinnerfried chicken, maple, wafflesRuth Wendel

Hi all! I have SUCH a good recipe to share today. It’s the ultimate comfort food that my husband and I crave: chicken and waffles. The mixture of crunchy, spicy chicken with the sweet and fluffy waffles is to die for. There’s this popular waffle house near our house that makes awesome chicken and waffles. The downside is that the wait is usually about 30-40 minutes and the food is fairly expensive for what it is. After a couple trips to the waffle house, I decided to try my hand at making this delicious meal, and was very pleasantly surprised. Here’s the recipe:

Ingredients:

1-2 lbs chicken tenders (depending on how many people you want to feed)
2 cups buttermilk, divided (you can also use 1 cup regular milk and add 2 tsp lemon juice or vinegar)
1 tsp salt, divided
1 tsp black pepper, divided
hot sauce to taste
1 1/4 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup yellow cornmeal
1 tsp paprika
cayenne pepper to taste (I used ~1/4 tsp)
chili powder to taste (~1/8 tsp)
canola oil for frying
Belgian waffle mix, prepared according to box directions

First, get started on the marinade. Mix up 1 cup of buttermilk, 1/2 tsp salt, 1/2 tsp pepper, and hot sauce. Pour into a food storage bag with the chicken. Let the air out before sealing the bag, and massage the bag to get the marinade all over the chicken. Refrigerate the marinating chicken for at least 4 hours.

After the chicken is done marinating, it’s time to prep. Preheat the oven to 250°F. Whisk together the flour, cornmeal, chili powder, cayenne, 1/2 tsp salt, and 1/2 tsp pepper on a plate or in a large shallow bowl. Pour remaining 1 cup buttermilk into a separate bowl.

Now, get your frying station ready. Have the oil heated to about 350°F, with the marinated chicken, dry mixture, and buttermilk close by. This is also a good time to get started on making waffles (it does involve some multitasking).

Dip the chicken into the buttermilk, then into the dry mix- then back into the buttermilk, and back into the dry mixture. This double dipping ensures a good thick crust around the chicken for perfect crunch.

Fry the chicken in the hot oil, turning a few times, until a food thermometer inserted into the thickest part of the tender reads 165°. Tip: put only a few tenders in the fryer at the same time to prevent cooling down the oil and making the crust soggy.

When the tenders are done, transfer to a paper towel lined baking sheet and keep warm in the preheated oven.

Once all your tenders are done, pop a few on top of a golden brown waffle and drizzle with syrup! You could definitely mix your syrup with some red pepper flakes or cayenne for an extra kick of spice, or you could keep it traditional (my personal favorite).

Shout out to the waffle making king, my husband!

Enjoy making, and eating, this awesome comfort food!

Homemade Girl Scout Cookies

April 2, 2018Cookies and Browniescookies, Girl Scout, peanut butter, TagalongsRuth Wendel

Hello everyone! I hope you all had a wonderful Easter! I stayed off of social media for Lent this year, so the blog also had to wait until after Easter. It’s good to be back! I have a couple recipes ready to share, the first being homemade Girl Scout Cookies. My hubby’s favorite ones are the Tagalongs, those shortbread cookies with peanut butter on top and then covered in chocolate. I bought him a box a little while ago and he ate all of the cookies in about two days (I honestly don’t think that’s an exaggeration), so I decided it was time to learn how to make my own since the boxed cookies come only once a year. They turned out really well! Here’s the recipe:

Ingredients:

2 cups flour
1 cup (2 sticks) softened butter
1/2 cup granulated sugar
2 tbsp milk
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
3/4 cup confectioner’s sugar
1 bag semisweet chocolate chips or melting chocolate

Preheat the oven to 350°F and line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Cream the butter and sugar together, and then add in the flour and salt and mix. Add the vanilla and milk and mix until thoroughly incorporated. (Hint: it helped me to mix with my hands since the dough was a bit crumbly at first).

Roll out the cookie dough onto a floured surface, about 1/4″ thick. You don’t have to measure, just try and make sure that the cookies are all the same thickness so that they bake evenly! Using a small circular cookie cutter, cut out dough rounds and place them on the lined baking sheet.

Bake for 12-15 minutes or until the cookies are light golden. Pro tip: mine stayed pretty pale, so I just went for 15 minutes and then called it a day. You could probably bake them a bit longer, but keep a close eye on them to prevent burning! Leave the cookies on the sheet for a few minutes because they’re very fragile when they’re hot. After a few minutes, remove them from the cookie sheet and transfer to a cooling rack to cool completely.

While the cookies are cooling, get started on your confectioner’s peanut butter. Mix the peanut butter and powdered sugar together, using either a hand mixer or your elbow grease. I used the hand mixer.

Dollop some of the peanut butter mixture onto each cookie and spread it out to form an even layer on each cookie. The peanut butter mix recipe makes a lot of mix, so there should be plenty of mixture to make a thick layer on each cookie!

Put the cookies in the freezer for about 10 minutes to set the mixture. This will ensure you don’t lose all of your peanut butter when the cookie is dipped in the chocolate! Meanwhile, line a baking sheet with parchment paper, or re-use the one you used to bake the cookies.

When the freezing time is almost done, melt the chocolate. To do so, pour the chips into a bowl and microwave on high for ~30 seconds. Remove the chips from the microwave and stir. Repeat this process until the chocolate chips are melted and smooth.

When the cookies are out of the freezer, dip them in the melted chocolate to cover. It will be messy, but so worth it!! Another technique I used when I was running out of chocolate was to scoop up the chocolate with a spoon and pour it over the top of a cookie, letting the chocolate run down the sides to cover.

These cookies are easily good enough to take the place of store bought Girl Scout cookies. And now we don’t have to wait for Girl Scout cookie time every year-hooray! Happy baking!

Game Day Sopapillas

February 5, 2018Miscellaneoustortilla; cinnamon; honey; friedRuth Wendel

Hi all! Hope you all enjoyed your SuperBowl Sunday- or at least enjoyed spending time with friends and family, regardless of the outcome of the game! My husband and I invited my family over to watch the game together, and I decided to try out an old recipe that my Mom had from when we lived in Papua New Guinea: homemade sopapillas. Super simple and delicious! Here’s the recipe:

Ingredients:

Tortillas:

2 cups flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
2 tbsp butter or margarine (keep it cold!)
2/3-3/4 cup cold water
lots of vegetable oil for frying

Toppings:

1/4 cup granulated sugar mixed with 2 tsp cinnamon
Honey
Powdered sugar

In a large bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, and salt. Cut in the butter using a pastry cutter until the mixture resembles coarse meal.

Sprinkle in the water a little at a time, tossing with a fork until the dough is just moistened and still crumbly.

Turn the dough out onto a floured surface (I kneaded it in the bowl a bit first so it made less of a mess).

Knead the dough until it’s smooth. You don’t want to feel lumps of butter or flour.

Form the dough into a ball and set it aside for 10 minutes. Meanwhile, in a large saucepan, heat 3 inches of oil over medium heat (I heated mine to about 300° before I started frying). Roll the dough out into a 1/4″ thick rectangle (or rectangle-ish thing) and cut it into 2″ squares.

Drop one square into the oil to test the temperature. The square should float to the top and the oil should start bubbling right away. When the oil is the right temperature, drop 5-6 squares into the oil and fry, gently turning them with a slotted spoon to brown evenly until they’re puffed and golden, about 2-4 minutes. Continue frying in small batches.

Drain the sopapillas on a paper towel to remove any excess oil.

While they’re still hot, dredge them in the cinnamon and sugar mixture, or top with honey, cinnamon and sugar, and powdered sugar to taste.

Enjoy, everyone!

Easiest Cheesecake Ever

November 18, 2017Cakes and Cupcakescheesecake; raspberry; sauce; graham crackerRuth Wendel

Hi, all! Happy holidays! I’m sure you’re all gearing up for a week of prepping and cooking food for Thanksgiving- and then it’s time to do Christmas shopping! This year, I decided to give some of our family members homemade food and recipes, including raspberry sauce to drizzle over their favorite desserts or ice cream. Of course, before I can give these foods as gifts, I need to try them out!

This past week presented the perfect opportunity for me to test the raspberry sauce recipe- I was invited to dinner with friends and was in charge of dessert. My sister gave me a springform pan for my birthday, so I decided to try my hand at making cheesecake with the raspberry sauce for topping.

I have to give credit to KingArthurFlour.com and Allrecipes.com for the recipes- if you’re in need of recipes, these two websites are great resources. While I don’t normally blog about food if I didn’t come up with the recipe, the cheesecake and sauce were WAY too good not to share with you all. Here are the ingredients:

Cheesecake Crust:

1 1/2 cups graham cracker crumbs (I ended up using 1 3/4 cups)
1/4 cup confectioner’s sugar
1/3 cup melted butter (I used an extra tablespoon)
1/8 tsp salt

Cheesecake Filling

2, 8-oz packages of cream cheese, softened at room temperature
2 large eggs
2/3 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract

Raspberry Sauce

12-oz package of fresh or frozen raspberries (I used frozen and it worked great)
1/8 cup granulated sugar
1 tsp lemon juice

First, the cheesecake. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Mix the graham cracker crumbs, sugar, butter, and salt together until everything is well combined. Side note: Honey Maid started making boxes of graham cracker crumbs, so it saves a ton of time with crushing the graham crackers and in clean-up!!

Now, here’s the only tough part of the whole process: forming the crust. Press the crust down in a 9″ pie pan (must have sides at least 1 1/4″ high) or a springform pan, covering the bottom and sides of the pan. Try to make the crust on the bottom thicker than the crust on the sides. Shameless tip here: I spent a few minutes trying to do this and decided it wasn’t worth the trouble, so I combined another 1/4 cup graham cracker crumbs and 1 tbsp melted butter and added it to the pan for extra crust everywhere. I’ve never met anyone who gets tired of graham cracker crust, and it saved me a lot of annoyance!

Next, combine the softened cream cheese with the granulated sugar. Mix with a hand mixer on medium speed until it is completely mixed and smooth. If you have any lumps in your mixture, it’ll make for an unpleasant texture to the cheesecake. When in doubt, mix a little longer!

When that’s fully mixed, add in the eggs and vanilla and mix on medium speed. Again, mix until it is completely smooth!!

Pour the filling into the crust and bake for 20 minutes at 350°F. It’s helpful to put the pan on a baking sheet for ease of transferring in and out of the oven.

After 20 minutes, put a crust shield around the edge of the pan, or cover the edges with aluminum foil. This will prevent the crust from burning while the cheesecake continues to cook.

Continue baking the cheesecake for 10 more minutes. When it’s done, a thermometer inserted about 1″ from the crust should read 165-170°F. The filling won’t look totally set in the middle.

Set the pan on a cooling rack until the cheesecake is completely cooled. Then, refrigerate until you’re ready to serve it.

And now we’re on to the raspberry sauce! Easiest sauce ever, seriously. Put all the ingredients in a saucepan over medium heat and stir occasionally until the raspberries break down and the sugar dissolves, and the sauce thickens slightly. You can test the thickness by dipping a spoon in the sauce- if the liquid runs quickly off the spoon, it’s too thin; if it drips slowly off the spoon, you’re in business.

Then, pour the sauce into a bowl through a fine mesh strainer to get rid of the raspberry seeds.

And that’s it! Now you have a wonderful raspberry sauce to top your cheesecake, and to give as gifts. Happy baking, and happy holidays!

Apple Everything

September 18, 2017Miscellaneousapple; cider; donuts; apple crispRuth Wendel

Hi all! Time for fall blogging part two. We covered pumpkin goodies last time, so today we’re talking about everything to do with apples. My sister was in town this weekend to run an inflatable 5k race with me (it was awesome, by the way!), and my nephew wanted to go apple picking with her, so it was a perfect excuse for me to share some new apple recipes.

We visited our local farm stand and walked through sunflower fields, some very sincere pumpkin patches (if you don’t get the reference, you should go watch “It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown”), and then headed for the apple trees. The farm somehow managed to trim the trees to grow straight up instead of out this year to discourage tree climbing… I guess they’re on to me. My family had to improvise to get the higher apples since we’re all on the shorter side, but we made it work!

Once we finished our apple picking, we got fresh apple cider at the farm stand and headed home to make some delicious food. First, we decided to make apple crisp, using my great-grandma’s recipe with a small change.

Apple Crisp Ingredients:

6-8 apples, cored and sliced
1/2 cup butter, chilled
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
3/4 cup flour
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 cup oats (not in Grammy’s original recipe, but I think the oats make it so much better)

Preheat the oven to 375°F. Slice the apples fairly thin and small, so that it’s easy to scoop them out of the dish when serving. You can also dice the apples if you prefer. We left the skins on because I think it gives the apple mixture a great color, but you can peel the apples if you like.

Arrange the apples in a baking dish. Depending on how many people you’re serving and how many apples you use, the size of the dish can vary. I usually use an 8×8″ dish, but this time we used an 8×10″ dish since we were feeding more people.

Using a pastry cutter, combine the rest of the ingredients to make the topping mixture. The pastry cutter will help ensure that you get small chunks of butter evenly mixed in with the topping, which will melt in the oven and create a delicious topping.

Sprinkle the topping over the apples, and bake for 45-60 minutes or until the topping is golden brown.

Serve the crisp with ice cream or whipped cream, and enjoy!

Next up, I tried my hand at making apple cider donuts. The farm stand where we go for apple picking always serves yummy apple cider donuts sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar, so it was a bit of a competition to see if I could make my donuts at least as good as the farm stand donuts. I’m happy to say they turned out to be delicious- I’m probably biased, but I actually preferred them over the farm stand donuts. Here’s the recipe:

Ingredients:

2 cups flour
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
3/4 tsp ground cinnamon
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1/4 tsp cardamom
ground ginger to taste (I used ~1/8 tsp)
1/2 cup apple cider
1/4 cup milk
2 eggs, beaten
1 tsp vanilla
1 tbsp butter, melted

Preheat the oven to 325°F and grease your donut pan. Combine the dry ingredients in a large bowl. Then, add the wet ingredients and mix with a hand mixer until fully combined.

I learned from my previous experience making donuts that it’s easier to pipe the batter into the donut pan to get more even-sized donuts, so my sister was in charge of piping batter into the donut pan.

She was also in charge of holding the bag of batter while the donuts cooked!

Bake for ~10 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the donut comes out clean. Hint: The donuts stayed a fairly pale color, so don’t wait for them to get brown or else they’ll probably be very overcooked. Let the donuts cool in the pan for 3-5 minutes, then turn them out onto a cooling rack to finish cooling. These donuts were so good, even without topping. You could taste the cinnamon right off the bat, but then the cardamom came through after a few seconds, and during the whole bite, you had the warm spice from the ginger- all complementing the tart flavor of the apple cider. So good.

Now for the toppings. We definitely had to make a cinnamon and sugar topping for some of them to copy the farm stand topping, and I also decided to make an apple cider glaze for some, just because I thought it sounded delicious.

Apple Cider Glaze:

1 cup cider
1 cup confectioner’s sugar

Boil the cider in a small saucepan until it’s reduced down to 1/4 cup. Hint: it doesn’t really thicken, so don’t be looking for a specific consistency- if you think it’s done, just pour it into a small measuring cup to confirm that it’s down to 1/4 cup.

Whisk in the powdered sugar until it’s completely dissolved.

And now, it’s assembly line time. Much like the pumpkin donuts from the last blog, I set up my line so that there would be minimal dripping and overall messiness. Dunk the donuts in the glaze so that they’re covered, then remove them from the glaze with a fork or your fingers, letting excess glaze drip back into the pan, and lay them on a baking sheet covered with wax or parchment paper. This glaze recipe made enough to cover 12 donuts. It was absolutely delicious- it had a tart taste at first which really accented the flavor of the apples, but then had a sweet finish.

Cinnamon and Sugar Topping:

4 tbsp butter, melted
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 tsp cinnamon

Melt the butter in a small bowl. Combine the cinnamon and sugar in a different bowl. Dunk the donuts in the butter, making sure that the whole donut is covered, and then roll the donuts in the cinnamon and sugar mixture. This mixture made enough to cover 8 donuts, so if you’re planning to top more donuts with this, I would make 1.5 times more of this recipe, or even double it.

And now it’s time to eat! These donuts went really fast- there were no leftovers at all! I hope you guys give these recipes a try, since they were seriously delicious. Happy baking!

Homemade Pumpkin Donuts

September 10, 2017Breads, Miscellaneouspumpkin; donut; cream cheese; frostingRuth Wendel

Hi, friends! Happy September! Even though it’s still technically summer, I’m getting really excited about all of the fun that fall brings. Apple picking, pumpkin carving, corn mazes… the list goes on! Right around this time of year is when all the “pumpkin flavored ____” starts being offered, and I am not complaining even a little about it. I have my pumpkin spice coffee creamer in the fridge and my pumpkin Kleenex boxes sitting in the bathroom right now (no shame!). As my husband and I were thinking about what to do with our day, I suggested apple picking and getting some apple cider donuts, but he came up with a WAY better idea- making my own pumpkin donuts! I’ve never made my own donuts before, so that made the idea doubly exciting. Off we rushed to Target to pick up the last donut pan in stock, and then headed back home for me to try my hand at it. I’m pretty excited about how they turned out, so I had to share the recipe!

This recipe makes 12 donuts. The glaze recipe makes enough to cover about 8 donuts, and the sugar mixture recipe makes enough to cover all 12.

Ingredients:

2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup light brown sugar
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 tsp pumpkin pie spice
- (Hint: if you don’t have pumpkin pie spice in your pantry, as I don’t, use this conversion instead: for 1 tsp pumpkin pie spice, use 1/2 tsp cinnamon, 1/4 tsp ginger, 1/8 tsp nutmeg, 1/8 tsp allspice. For this recipe, since you need 1.5 tsp of the mix, I just put a little extra of each spice in).
1 cup (8oz) pureed pumpkin
2 large eggs
1/4 cup milk
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter, softened

Preheat the oven to 325°. Line a baking sheet with aluminum foil or parchment paper and set it aside (this will be for putting hot, freshly topped donuts on). In a large bowl, mix the flour, brown sugar, baking soda and baking powder, salt, and pumpkin pie spice until there are no clumps. Then, add in the pumpkin puree, eggs, milk, and butter. Mix with a hand mixer on low speed until it’s fully mixed. You’ll end up with a lovely orange colored batter.

NOTE: be warned that one can of pumpkin is usually 15 ounces, rather than the 8oz that you need. Don’t use the whole can or else you’ll have way too much pumpkin and a really wet dough!

Now, it’s time to fill the donut pan! On my first go with filling the pan, I think I filled them a little too full- you want the batter to be a little lower than level with the surface of the donut pan.

Bake 13-15 minutes, until the donuts spring back when you gently touch them, or until a toothpick inserted in the donut comes out clean.

These come out of the pan super easily, so while the donuts are still piping hot you can flip the pan upside down and turn the donuts out onto a cooling rack.

Now for the toppings! For both my glazed donuts and my sugared ones, I had an assembly line going: first the donuts, then the dips, and then the lined baking sheet so that I could dip and place the donuts without too much back-and-forth action. The glaze assembly line is shown below.

Cream Cheese Glaze ingredients:

4 oz cream cheese, softened
1 cup confectioner’s sugar
1 tsp milk

Mix all the ingredients together using a hand mixer, starting on low speed and increasing to high speed to incorporate air, until all ingredients are well mixed. If you want the glaze to be firmer, you can add more confectioner’s sugar- if you want it to be looser, you can add more milk. Be careful with the amount of milk you add, though. A little milk goes a long way in changing the consistency of these glazes!

Dip as many donuts as you want into the glaze. You can dip only one side in so that it’s like a frosted donut (this glaze doesn’t harden, so it really is like frosting!), or you can do what I did, and coat the whole donut in the glaze. I will say, since the glaze stays soft, it makes the donuts a little harder to eat if they’re totally covered in the glaze… but who cares. It’s delicious, and you can lick your fingers after.

Cinnamon and Sugar Topping:

1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 Tbsp ground cinnamon

Melt the butter in a small bowl. In a separate bowl, combine the cinnamon and sugar. Dip as many donuts as you want in the melted butter. Make sure to get the sides of the donut, too, so that the cinnamon/sugar mixture sticks to the sides of the donut. Then, toss the donuts in the cinnamon and sugar mix until they’re fully coated.

And that’s it! You can eat the donuts hot, or you can let them cool and set a little bit. They’re delicious either way! I can say first-hand, a donut pan is a worthwhile purchase, and I highly recommend giving these a try! Happy fall!

Dinner with Foodie Dice

September 5, 2017Lunch and Dinnerlamb; herbs; potatoes; marketRuth Wendel

Hi, all! Happy Labor Day! I hope you all enjoyed your long weekend. My husband and I spent ours in Pennsylvania, visiting my sister. She lives in this great foodie/artsy town, so we went for a “First Friday” weekend, where we saw a lot of local art as well as enjoyed some awesome food! My sister loves to cook as much as I do, so we wanted to do something fun for dinner while we were there. My husband’s aunt had recently bought me “Foodie Dice” for my birthday, so we decided that we would use the dice to decide our meal! With the dice, you roll for a seasonal vegetable, protein, starch, herbs/spices, and type of cooking- then you have to combine all those ingredients into one delicious dish! We rolled lamb, potatoes, thyme, green beans, onions, and something in the dish had to be roasted.

We decided to get all our ingredients from Central Market, which is the longest continuously run indoor farmers’ market in the USA. Here are some pictures of the market:

We got some thick bone-in lamb chops and multi colored potatoes, along with some fresh green beans. Here’s what we did with them:

Roasted Multicolor Potatoes

3-4 large potatoes of varying colors (we used purple, red, and yellow- don’t use sweet potatoes unless you want a very different flavor!).
chopped rosemary to taste
chopped yellow onion to taste
powdered garlic to taste
extra virgin olive oil
salt and pepper

Toss all the ingredients together and arrange in a single layer on a baking sheet.

If you’re making these only, you can roast them at 425°F for about 30 minutes or until they’re fork tender. We roasted them so that they would be done at the same time as the lamb, so we put them in at 425°F for 10 minutes, then lowered the oven to 325°F for 20 minutes while the lamb cooked, and then raised the temperature to 475°F for 10-15 minutes until they were done.

Herb Rubbed Lamb Chops:

3 tbsp chopped rosemary (or to taste)
3 tbsp chopped thyme (or to taste)
bone-in lamb chops
2 tbsp brown mustard (or Dijon mustard)
salt and pepper
3 tbsp minced onions

Combine the herbs, minced onion, and mustard together until it forms a paste. Rub on each side of lamb chops.

Heat 1-2 tbsp olive oil in a cast iron skillet over high heat. Sear the lamb on one side in the skillet until it is browned. Flip the chops over and put them in the oven at 325°F for about 20 minutes.

When the chops are cooked (must be between 145-160°F to be medium rare to medium well), remove them from the oven. Put aluminum foil loosely over skillet, and let the chops rest for 10 minutes. Then, serve warm.

We also steamed some green beans and just dusted them with salt and pepper for our vegetable. All in all, it was a delicious meal!

I would definitely recommend giving these recipes a try. The food was seriously so good. Happy cooking!

Food for the Fourth

July 6, 2017Chocolates, Lunch and Dinnertoffee; saltines; chocolate; baked beans; molassesRuth Wendel

Happy Fourth of July, everyone! I hope you got to spend some time with friends and family over some cookout food, s’mores, and fireworks- I know I sure did! My family enjoyed two days at our lake house this weekend, so I made some food to share. For the first day, I brought dessert: toffee saltine bars (I give credit to Pinterest for this recipe). For the second day, I made my Aunt Sadie’s baked beans. They’re a famous recipe among the family, and even though she couldn’t celebrate the Fourth with us, it didn’t seem right not to have her beans there. Here are the recipes for both dishes.

Toffee Saltine Bars

Ingredients:

saltine crackers (about 1 sleeve)
1 cup light brown sugar
1 cup butter
1 package (~2 cups) chocolate chips

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Line a large baking sheet (~15×10″) with foil and spray with baking spray. Lay the saltines over the foil in a single layer.

In a pot, melt the butter and sugar together over medium heat until the mixture comes to a boil.

Turn the heat down to a simmer, and continue to stir the mixture for 5 minutes until the mixture thickens.

Turn off the heat. Pour the mixture over the saltines and spread into a thin layer.

Bake for 8-10 minutes. Let it rest for 3-5 minutes after baking, until the toffee begins to set. Then, sprinkle the chocolate chips over the top. The toffee will still be hot enough that the chocolate will melt and become spreadable. When it melts, spread chocolate into a thin layer, covering all the toffee.

Refrigerate until the chocolate is hardened. Finally, break the toffee bars into small pieces and refrigerate until you are ready to eat them! These were a huge hit at the family party, and I will definitely be making them again. On to the beans, now!

Aunt Sadie’s Baked Beans:

Ingredients:

Two 15oz cans of pork and beans
3/4 cup light brown sugar
1 tbsp yellow mustard (the recipe calls for 1 tsp dry mustard, but Aunt Sadie wrote “I use regular mustard” next to this line- so regular mustard it is!)
6 slices bacon, chopped (I used 8)
1/2 cup ketchup

I will start by saying this was a bit of a trial run on the beans. I had never made them before, and Aunt Sadie’s recipe has a few edits that made the dish a little difficult to be specific with. They came out well, though, so all’s well that ends well! I suppose the easiest way for me to write this is to write her exact wording, and then put in my personal touches. Here goes:

“Preheat the oven to 325°F. Empty 1 can of the beans into a 1.5qt casserole dish. Combine brown sugar and mustard and sprinkle half over beans…”

Okay, first personal note. It is not easy to combine brown sugar and yellow mustard into a mixture that is easily sprinkled. It would make sense to use dry mustard as the original recipe called for to make a dry mixture, but Aunt Sadie says yellow mustard, so yellow mustard it shall be!

I tried it two different ways, one where I added the sugar and mustard separately, and one where I combined them and then added them. The combined sugar and mustard ended up being difficult to sprinkle, so I put the mixture in the dish with the beans and then just stirred it around. For sprinkling purposes, I am definitely an advocate for adding them separately! Here’s what it looked like separately:

I clearly wasn’t too worried about adding the exactly correct amount of mustard. I figure a good swirl did just fine. On to the next part of the recipe!

“Top with other can of beans and sprinkle with remaining brown sugar mixture, the chopped bacon, and ketchup.”

Again, highly recommend adding ingredients separately. With the bacon, Aunt Sadie writes that she only used about 4 slices. But c’mon, it’s bacon!! I doubled it and used 8 slices, chopped fine, and I have no regrets.

To finish off the dish, I swirled the ketchup over the top (again, not too concerned with the exact amount) and sprinkled the bacon over the top.

“Bake uncovered in slow oven (325 degrees) 2 1/2 hours.”

Easy enough!

I was really happy with how these turned out. As always, they were eaten up in no time, so I guess everyone else liked them, too! Thank goodness for old family recipes!

I hope you enjoy these recipes and that you get to use them at your next cookout! Happy baking!

Crock Pot Chicken Pot Pie Filling

June 30, 2017Lunch and Dinnerchicken; vegetables; dumplings; crock potRuth Wendel

Hi all! Here is a super yummy recipe that I adapted from my Mom’s chicken pot pie recipe into a crock pot recipe. There’s no crust, so I made biscuits to put over the top for some crunch. SO yummy! Here’s the recipe:

Sauce Ingredients:

1/3 cup margarine
1/3 cup flour
2/3 cup milk
1 1/2 cup chicken broth

Chicken Ingredients:

3 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
1/2 cup chopped onion
1/2 cup chicken broth
2 cups frozen veggies

Arrange chicken, 1/2 cup broth, veggies, and onion in crockpot. Cook on high for four hours until chicken is fully cooked. Using two forks, shred chicken.

Now, we make the sauce to add to this. Combine the margarine and flour over heat and stir until they form a paste (called a roux). Add the milk, and stir until the sauce is thickened. Finally, add the 1 1/2 chicken broth, and salt and pepper to taste. You can also add some cheddar cheese if you want! Stir until fully combined.

Pour the sauce into the crockpot and stir.

And now, eat your chicken pot pie filling with biscuits on top and be happy. Enjoy!

Baking and Breaking Bread

Yummy Creations that Inspire Community

All posts by Ruth Wendel

About Ruth Wendel

Basil Flower Pesto

The Best Chicken and Waffles

Homemade Girl Scout Cookies

Game Day Sopapillas

Easiest Cheesecake Ever

Apple Everything

Homemade Pumpkin Donuts

Dinner with Foodie Dice

Food for the Fourth

Crock Pot Chicken Pot Pie Filling