Maters & Eggs

Happy September, you guyssss!! September makes me happy for a couple of reasons:

1. Growing up, it meant school started. I loved school when I was growing up, and I love working at one, now. Everything. The environment, the excitement, the colors, the energy, and the kids. Ohhh the kids crack me up. Love, love, love my job.

2. September is when my oldest kid was born. YOU GUYS, he's going to be EIGHT! #imanoldlady

3. September = autumn. Autumn = sweaters. I'm so excited to wear sweaters and not sweat profusely at work. I just. love. sweaters.

4. I saved the best for last. Well, not really, my kid's the best, but the thing I'm actually excited about (certainly not that my sweet, squishy, giggly little baby is almost as tall as I am because you guys,  that is NOT COOL...). You guys. Comfort food is officially IN SEASON!

I love cooking comforting food like my chicken soup and chili, and now I have a new one for ya  - this is definitely one of those warm-your-belly types of recipes, good for chilly autumn days (even though "chilly" to Arizonans is like, 70 degrees). Its a little spicy, but totally avoidable if you're not into spice (just omit the peppers).

Stomping Out the Man Flu

This is my secret weapon. Its what I make if I ever want to comfort someone via the belly. So my sharing this with you... makes you pretty stinkin' special.

I learned how to make chicken noodle soup when I was still crushing pretty hard on my husband, before we were officially "together." He got sick for the first time in forever, and was....well, acting like boys do when they get sick.

My granddad had given me a Better Homes and Gardens cookbook for Christmas that year (what I wouldn't do to know where the heck that thing went!), and when I learned my hunk-a-burnin-love wasn't feeling well, I went home to make him some soup from my BHG cookbook... as soon as I got out of seventh hour.

Its been a favorite of his ever since, because to him, food is love. I think he realized I was head-over-heels for him when I went out of my way to make this, then ride the bus to his house with a giant pot of soup - and that feeling remains. So I could make it every week, and he just smiles and gobbles it up.

In the past year or so, I've started occasionally adding dumplings to the soup instead or rice or noodles. My mom made chicken and dumplings when I was little and I remember picking out the dumplings and scarfing them down. I could have sustained life on those things. I'm a total starch-o-holic.

I'll start by giving you my basic recipe for chicken soup. This is a very hearty soup, almost a stew. I include rice/pasta in the recipe, and the starch from the rice or pasta (since we don't rinse it) thickens the broth - it is very filling! If it's dumplings you want, the broth will be more like a broth - liquidy. I suggest omitting the rice/pasta if you're going with dumplings - there's enough starch in the dumplings, trust me!

Chilli. Just Chilli.

Once upon a time, we lived on a military base. There, we had a man-neighbor. He once made my family chili. I asked man-neighbor for the recipe, so he showed me a piece of paper. Listed on it was cans, packets, and jars of stuff mixed into a crock pot.

Are. you. serious.

So being the food snob that I can be, I wanted to duplicate the flavor, but eliminate the processed food items and make it from scratch.

"1 lb ground turkey."
First item of business - change ground turkey to organic, grass fed ground beef. It just makes me happier.

"1 packet McCormick chili powder."

I went to the grocery store and looked on the back of one of the packets. Minus the MSG and preservatives, I think I could combine paprika, cayenne, cumin, bay leaves, salt, and pepper all by my big-girl self.

"1 can diced tomatoes."
I have knives and a cutting board for those... What's "a can," like, a cup's-worth?

"1 can of pinto beans" + "1 can refried beans."
 So... one's just mashed pinto beans? I got this. I can do beans. Shewt, I'll even throw in some black beans for texture variation.

"1 can Contadina tomato paste."
Okay, I could probably make this, but they sell organic tomato paste at my most favoritest store in the world, so I won't get too picky. I'll give man-neighbor some credit on this one. One day I'll get the guts to make my own tomato paste. Until then, cans it is.

"1 bell pepper."
Can do. I used a sweet red pepper and it was a bigger hit with the family, so either/or, I suppose!

"1/2 onion, diced."

Psht. Why not throw the whole onion in there?

Roasted Squash with Onions

I am quite possibly the worst when it comes to getting creative in terms of vegetables. I know how important they are to our diet, so I really do make a conscious effort to include them, but I'm so boring about it! I shy away from salads because my littlest will sit there for six hours before he ever eats a raw leaf (plus, I can't have ranch or blue cheese dressing, what's the point?!) My go-to recipes are usually just steamed carrots or a smoothie with spinach or kale. I'm glad no one ever fusses about those two things, but after it being a daily thing, it just gets old. Fortunately, as fate would have it, we figured out something new by accident.

When left to his own devices, my husband developed a love for kebabs. They were simple, filling, and pretty nutritious the way he was preparing them. He grilled them up for dinner a couple of times, but would frequently sacrifice the veggies to the gods of the charcoal, because they would overcook and fall off before the meat was cooked.

My solution: make only-meat kebabs, and just roast the veggies in the oven. 

Now aren't you lucky - I picked these honkin' zucchinis from my garden this morning, so lets use 'em up, shall we? There will be a proper recipe at the bottom of the post.

Take a picture of your shoulda-picked-it-two-days-ago zucchinis. Then set your oven to bake at 425 degrees.

Slice 'er up.

Dice 'er up.

Roughly (do you see this picture? I'm serious when I say "roughly") hack up some onions.

Mix it all together with butter (or oil of your choice), garlic, salt, pepper, and red pepper flakes.

(I had some yellow squash in the fridge that needed to be used, so I threw some of that in there, too).

Spicy Meatballs

... not really. Its only spicy if you put a ton of red pepper flakes in it... which I do... 'cause my husband likes it spicy. Rawr.

I make a ton of these at once because they're perfect for lunches (which I pack four of on a daily basis!), and a quick addition to dinners on tee ball or basketball nights. These make me happy because there's no gluten involved - so my little one doesn't have the alligator arms two days later.

They have a distinct, smoky flavor, so they don't need a sauce or gravy. I suggest serving them on their own alongside other things, rather than smothered in a sauce or mixed into something.

Meg's Meatball Recipe:

*2 lbs ground beef (or 1 lb beef, 1 lb pork)
*2 large eggs
*1/2 C Worcestershire sauce
*1/2 C rice flour (take dry rice and put it in the blender. Bam: rice flour)
*1 Tbsp salt
*1 Tbsp black pepper
*1 Tbsp red pepper flakes
*1 Tbsp smoked paprika (or regular paprika with a tbsp of liquid smoke)
*3 Tbsp minced onion
*3 Tbsp granulated garlic
*1 Tbsp turmeric - yes, I know. Just do it.



1. Throw all ingredients in a huge mixing bowl. Now stick your hands in the bowl and mash everything up with your bare hands until it is all incorporated (mix it really well, there's nothing worse than biting into a hunk of salt!).

2. Roll meatballs that are about an inch in diameter. I get something like 40 meatballs, give or take.

3. Put a thin layer of cooking oil of your choice in a large pan, and heat slowly on low (about 3 for those of us with numbers on the stove dials). Put the meatballs in the pan, searing each side. One pan-full of meatballs usually takes me about ten minutes, but stoves, pans, and meats (more or less fat content) will vary that time, so just cook slightly longer than you would a hamburger patty.

4. Place cooked meatballs on a cookie rack to drain excess cooking oil.

Your meatballs aren't going to be perfectly round, but they'll be perfectly delicious. Lemme know how yours turn out!

Baked Salmon with Lemon and Dill

I make salmon the exact same way every time. There are only so many ways you can make salmon when there are picky eaters in the house (and one of them is a grown man)!

This is a recipe I think my mom learned in cooking school, then taught it to her mother. My grandmother used to make it for most of her dinner occasions , so I thought it was her recipe until my mom spoke up, recently.

Disclaimer: I cook with "a little bit of this" and "add that till it tastes right," because I don't typically use processed food - and nature never, ever tastes the same twice. So even though this has mayo in it, there's still the dill and lemon which vary greatly depending on different factors. I'm taking a page out of my mom's book and throwing nonspecific measurements at you. So this is a "to taste" kind of recipe, for sure. Take the measurements lightly!

Ingredients:
* slab-o-(raw) salmon (I usually use 2-4 lbs so we have leftovers. This one is 3.5 lbs)

* 1 C mayonnaise. (If you can't make it yourself, get the kind with actual egg in it - the low fat junk has artificial WTF listed on the label and doesn't brown in the oven).

* Juice from 1/4-1/2 a lemon. (I like it tart, but you may not. Start small!)

* 3 Tbsp dried dill. Or more. Because I. Love. Dill.

Tips for Cooking Beans

My family lerrrrrvs beans. They're a nutritious addition to any meal, and sometimes serve as a meal by themselves in our house! A couple tortillas, some pickled jalapeños, nommmm.

I suppose we could just buy a can of refried beans, but aside from possible additives, BPA can linings, and way more salt than I'm interested in, dry, bulk beans can cost as little as $0.12/lb through co-ops or warehouse stores. From the "regular" grocery store, I get beans for about $0.79-$1/lb in the bulk section. Most of us pay $1-$10/lb for meat, why not cut some costs and throw down some beans and still get your dose of iron at dinner time? (And fiber, to boot)!

I'm gonna give you the basics - its how my mother-in-law (Mexican cooking ninja) taught me how to cook. Some of this, a little of that, "just cook it until it looks like this." I'll break it down with a little more reason behind why I do things, just because I love a good over analyzation...

Soaking

Soaking aids in digestibility, thus eliminating or greatly reducing your post-bean fart issue by breaking down oligosaccharides and phytates (among other things). If you soak them before cooking and your belly is still in an uproar, you may have a sensitivity that you could further investigate. But for the vast majority of us, soaking should suffice.

Beans at least double in size after a 12-hour soak. So to soak your beans, put enough water in the bowl/pot/bathtub to cover 3x as many beans as you have in there (1 C beans:3 C water).

Salting

Avoid salting the beans prior to cooking. Doing this hardens the skins on the beans... thus increasing cooking time. Add salt when the beans are done cooking. This way, you can add salt to your preference and its not a guessing game. Nothing worse than cooking something for 4 hours only to find out it tastes like a salt lick.

Here's my basic bean recipe.

**Note: It will be a few hours, so my suggestion is to soak the beans overnight, start cooking the beans in the morning, and they will be cooked by lunch or dinner time, depending on your ability to babysit the pot

Ingredients:

1 lb dry beans of your choice (pinto, black, and Peruvian are our favorites)
1 Tbsp Apple Cider Vinegar (optional, but useful)
1/2 of one medium white onion, sliced
3 tbsp cooking fat (bacon grease or butter are my favorites)
salt, to taste

To Soak:

1. Dump your pound of beans on the dining room table. Pick out any rocks, sticks, or dirt clumps.

2. Put your beans in your soaking bowl. Rinse and drain the beans a couple of times. Something you may have thought was a bean was probably a dirt clod, and now its going to be mud. Now rinse.

3. Fill your soaking bowl (with the beans in it) with water (remember our 1:3 ratio), and the ACV. Let them soak for 12 hours.

To Cook:

1. Heat your bean pot to a medium-high heat and add cooking fat.

2. Slice your onions, add them into the pot when the cooking fat is hot (if the heat is too low, you will caramelize your onions and the beans will be sweet. If you start them on a higher heat, it's a very different flavor).
3. Cook the onions until the edges burn a little. Black-burn is okay! Just make sure your cooking fat doesn't start smoking.

4. Add your beans and enough water until you have about an inch left of space from the water line to the top of the pot.

5. Keep the pot on medium-high heat long enough to get a little boil rolling. When the pot reaches a smallish boil, set the heat to very low, and cover. 

6. Check every hour or so and stir regularly. This should take about 4-6 hours. 

7. To check readiness: Pop a bean in your mouth after letting it cool down for a second. If its not dry or powdery, you're done cooking your beans.  This is the time to also add your salt!

8. If you choose to mash your beans, or once they've simply cooked down a bit, you need to stir them frequently. They settle more easily and you risk burning them if you leave them to cook alone too long.

Now go figure out what you're going to eat them with. Yum!