Enchilada Dippers

Why is it that you can have the same breakfast for weeks and not get tired of it, but you are always looking for a unique dinner idea that everyone likes?

I love enchilada sauce, but wanted to change it up a bit. I thought, what if instead of a dish with tortillas saturated in the sauce and baked, I instead had crispy tortillas cooked on the stove that you dip into the sauce? I thickened the sauce to make it better for dipping.

BLT with Mushrooms and Jalapeno

Cilantro Lime Pilaf

Garlic Ranch Pizza with Bacon

One of my favorite meals, this pizza really has 2 secrets: the tasty garlic Ranch sauce, and the bacon. This works either with a homemade pizza crust recipe or a store bought one. 

BLT Pasta

I hope everyone had a great summer. In Tucson where I grew up, the kids are already in school for the fall semester. What did you do over the summer?

Frito Pie

This meal is always a winner, even if everyone is tired of eating leftover chili. While Fritos aren't healthy, I still buy them occasionally. After all, I have some tricks for making my chili healthy, adding hidden pureed vegetables and even oatmeal.

The other day I was busy and at the store and so I grabbed a bag of Fritos to dress up some chili I had in the freezer. If you're wondering, chili freezes beautifully.

Salisbury Steak

Before I tell you about a dinner recipe that my husband would never refuse, I do want to make an announcement about my commenting system. It's been updated, and I'm afraid I lost past comments, but thank you so much for them. I love hearing from you!
Now onto dinner.

Obsessed with these Sausage Muffins

I have made sausage cornbread muffins before, but yesterday I had a new brainstorm. It wasn't a regular brainstorm. There wasn't just wind in this storm, but water raging and a flash of lightning and so began a new recipe: sausage muffins with sauteed mushrooms, jalapenos, red pepper, garlic, cheese, carrots, and even some whole wheat flour, served with Tapatio or Sriracha hot sauce.

Turkey Hand Pies with a Buttery Wheat Crust

I first made this for March 14, but have worked on my recipe since then, and I am finally satisfied with it.
You do know what March 14th is, right? If you don't, hopefully someone will fill you in below in the comments section.

Pie Crust*

3/4 cup white flour

1/2 cup wheat flour (or use more white flour)

3/4 teaspoon salt

1/3 cup butter, softened

1/3 cup shortening

4-6 tablespoons cold water

*Or use a prepared single pie crust. 

Pie Crust Directions

1) Stir together flours and salt. 

2) Using a pastry blender or 2 knives (or even your bare fingers) cut the butter and shortening into the flour until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. 

3) While stirring, add the cold water 1 tablespoon at a time, sprinkling over the dry parts. When the dough forms into a ball, cover well and refrigerate at least 45 minutes or up to a day.

Note: Refrigeration will help your crust be light and flaky and tender. It will also make it a lot easier to work with. This is my main reason to do it, but in a pinch, I have skipped this step. The real butter will also make your crust flaky and tender too.

Filling Ingredients

1 carrot, sliced

1/2 a potato, diced
1 tablespoon olive oil

1/2 a jumbo sweet yellow onion, diced
1/4 pound lean ground turkey or beef

1 tablespoon ketchup

1 teaspoon cider vinegar

1 teaspoon Worcestershire Sauce

Salt and pepper

Bake at 400 for 10-15 min

Filling Directions

1) Steam or boil the carrot and potato pieces for about 10 minutes until tender. Lightly salt and pepper.

2) Meanwhile, in a large frying pan over medium heat cook onion in olive oil 4-6 minutes until clear. Add ground turkey or beef and lightly salt and pepper. Break into small pieces and add ketchup, cider vinegar, and Worcestershire sauce, stirring well. Cook for 6-7 minutes until browned through, stirring frequently.

Assembly

1) Preheat the oven to 400 F and line a baking sheet with a silicone baking mat or parchment paper.

2) Cut prepared pie crusts into four 4 x 7 inch rectangles. I usually end up rolling out the dough, cutting three of them, then having to re-roll the scraps to get the fourth.

3) Place the cut dough on the baking sheet--they will be hard to move once they are filled, so fill on the sheet. Place a small amount of potatoes, carrots, meat, and onions in the lower half of the crust. Fold the top over and seal with your fingers or a fork. Repeat with the remaining crusts. 

4) Bake 10-15 minutes until crusts are slightly browned and firm from being cooked through. Serve with A1 Sauce.

Just a reminder of my question: Why would I make meat hand pies on March 14?

Shared with

Tatertots & Jello

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Say Not Sweet Anne

Orange Chicken

One of my favorite meals is orange chicken, whether made at home for a light version or going out to eat. This version is flavorful without being overly sweet.

Fajitas

Versatile fajitas can be served with just a tortilla or with beans, rice, spinach, chopped tomato, cheese, and sour cream. I've used this recipe for years and even my 2-year-old nephew would eat the chicken in a tortilla with refried beans and rice.

This recipe is great because you can have everything easily chopped and prepped before hand. I have walked in the door and been able to have a hot dinner on the table in 10 minutes.
If you're making for a bigger crowd, you can double the recipe to serve 8-10 and just heat up 2 big frying pans or woks to cook it all at once.

Stroganoff

This well-loved favorite has evolved over the years. The fact that it's a good solid main dish helps sell it both for me and for my husband. Here's how my recipe looks today.

Chicken Shawarma

In 2012 The Avengers movie came out. In it Iron Man, who has almost died saving the world from attacking aliens, brings up shawarma. "I don't know what it is, but I really want to try it." I guess even heroes reevaluate their lives when they almost die.

If you watch after the credits, you actually see a scene of them eating shawarma together in a mostly demolished building, all of them almost too exhausted and beat up to lift food to their mouths.

Well my husband recommended I learn how to make shawarma. My sister-in-law and I first made it together and it's become a favorite recipe in our house.

Skillet Lasagna

I made this several times for my sister-in-law and her family. It comes together really quickly--in about 30 minutes, but with the full lasagna taste. It's especially great when you don't want to heat up the entire oven for an hour. And kids like spiral noodles. To be honest, I think spiral noodles are pretty cool too.

Lentil Soup

Last Thanksgiving my husband, Jay and I took a great 10 hour drive to visit family and friends back in Utah. It was great, but does anyone else feel kind of icky when you get back after eating so many rich foods? Maybe it's just Jay and me, but we're always ready for real food after a long car ride of travel snacks.
So I made sure I had this soup and some sausage in our freezer for when we got back on a Sunday evening. It microwaved while we unpacked the car and took a walk. My body was so happy with me for feeding it hot, healthy lentils.

Easy Baked Potato--low-fat option

My mom has never met a potato she didn't like, and I'm her daughter. Even simple potatoes are worthy of a meal.

Growing up in a family of nine, my mom would make baked potatoes in the oven. I remember scrubbing and wrapping them for my mom, as she prepped the rest of dinner.

But now that I'm living with just my husband it doesn't always make sense to heat up the entire oven for 2 baked potatoes.

My father-in-law showed me this trick: Use plastic wrap to steam your potato in the microwave.

Trivia question for you:

What has more potassium, a banana or a baked potato?

Tortellini Soup

Wonderful, cool days call for warming soups. Here's a new one: tomato based soup with seasoned ground turkey, delicious cheese-filled tortellini pasta, spinach, carrots, and even some red bell pepper.

This soup isn't super-full of tortellini or meat or vegetables, but has a balance between them.

I served this with my recipe for Golden Rolls, so we got some extra hidden vegetables and whole wheat from the bread.

Hot Wing Pizza

This is the story of the Chicken Hot Wing that wasn't.
Here's what it wasn't: It wasn't deep fried, full of bones, containing chicken skin, and it wasn't overly greasy.
My husband asked me to make a pizza with wing sauce instead of tomato sauce with chopped chicken on top--and I of course use lean chicken, usually chicken breast. I even managed to add a few vegetables! And I love this spicy new take on pizza.

And if you have somebodies eating with you who don't like spicy foods, I also made a Supreme Pizza, one of my favorites.

Pizza Crust

I don't know about you, but we love pizza at our place! I make pizzas with specialty sauces, tinker with red sauce recipes, find great toppings, but mostly I feast on pizza with my husband. We may love Dominos, but homemade is healthier and cheaper, as well as lots of fun.
With a bread maker friendly recipe (that you can also do by hand), it's also not hard. When I choose easy toppings, I can make a pizza with only about 30 minutes of hands on time (with a bread maker) or 40 minutes hands on time without. It does need an hour for the crust to rise and another 25 minutes to bake both pizzas, but I'm good at leaving it alone to do that!

Curry

I had the honor of meeting and cooking with my husband, Jay's grandma a few summers ago. I was impressed by her cooking as well as her English--she is from Japan, with Samurai heritage.
The curry we made was so good, even the 4- and 2-year-old kids were begging for it. Somehow being made into such a thick dish made even the picky kids not realize how many veggies were in it. They just knew it all tasted good and came with rice.

Today I made a version of curry which was similar to the one we enjoyed together.

Curry is a very strongly seasoned thick, stew-like dish. It's traditionally served over rice or noodles.