Spinach Artichoke Dip

• 1/2 c. sour cream
• 1/2 c. mayonnaise
• 1/2 c. grated parmesan cheese
• 1/2 c. cubed mozzarella cheese
• 1-2 tsp. minced garlic
• 1 (10 oz.) package frozen spinach, thawed and squeezed of its juices
• 1 (14 oz.) can artichoke hearts, chopped

1. Combine all ingredients.
2. Place in shallow casserole dish
3. Bake at 325 for 15-20 min.

Toffee

1 lb. butter

3 c. sugar

1 c. roasted almonds

1 lb. dark sweet chocolate

1. Melt butter and add sugar. Boil slowly stirring constantly until it reaches 280 degrees.  (it will be golden brown.)
2. Spread on greased cookie sheet and cool.
3. Shave and melt chocolate in double boiler and allow to cool.
4. Before setting, spread half chocolate on top of toffee and sprinkle roasted almonds on chocolate.
5. Place in fridge to set.
6. After setting, turn over and pour remaining chocolate over top. sprinkle almonds on top.
7. Break into 1 1/2" pieces.

Chinese Mother's Day

I have to say, I think my mom is pretty lucky when it comes to Mother's Day.  A few years ago Dad made a new tradition- every first day of the month is Mother's Day.  We don't have to get a gift every month but we try to make sure we at least say thank you and I love you and be a little extra nice on that day.  So when the real Mother's Day rolls around we have to outdo all the previous mini Mothers Days.  This year Dad did Chinese.  He went to Taiwan on his mission (working on putting a picture of that up) so I guess if we were to say he has a specialty, Chinese food would be it.  Another thing to add.  When Dad puts his mind to doing something, he doesn't just do the bare minimum.  Ever.  This meal was no exception. 

The menu:

Entrees:
-Pork noodles
-Sweet & Sour Chicken
-Beef & Broccoli
-White Rice

Dim Sum:

What's dim sum you ask?  It's Mandarin for the "everything else on the table."  I think it's just the greatest word for it!

-Steamed BBQ Pork Buns

-Pot Stickers

-Steamed Dumplings

-Shrimp Dumpligs

-Lychees

Pretty decent meal huh?  I made the (totally Americanized) Sweet & Sour Chicken so I thought I'd post that recipe up here.  

Sweet & Sour Chicken

• 4 chicken breasts
• 2 T vegetable oil
• celery
• red bell pepper
• pineapple chunks
• Kikoman's Sweet & Sour Sauce (so tasty- and even one of the cheaper brands!)

1. Thaw chicken breasts, cube, and using a large frying pan or wok, saute in the oil until thoroughly cooked. Drain liquid off.
2. Chop celery and red pepper, and add to chicken in pan. 
3. Pour enough sauce in to coat everything.
4. Add pineapple chunks.

See?  Not a lot of effort, still an awesome meal.

Funeral Potatoes & Spring Salad

Happy Easter!  

Isn't that just the most disgusting thing?  My sisters pick up worms and play with them.  I think it's safe to say I NEVER would have done that as a child and NEVER plan to do it as an adult.  Oh it just grosses me out.

Anyway, hope the Easter Bunny made it to your house and you ate your share of peeps.  (As a side note, I like my Peeps nice and stale.  So for the past few decades my Easter Bunny has planned ahead and slit my package open so they'd be perfect to eat on Easter morning.  Just a little luxury you never think about being thankful for until you're older....) 

So I thought I'd post a few Easter recipes.  Classic Easter funeral potatoes, which Mom made, and a salad and a few dressings that I made.  

 My mom was introduced to this recipe twenty-something years ago by her mother-in-law, Katie Cook.  Scalloped Potatoes (soon to be known as funeral potatoes) were just catching on back then, and obviously have been popular enough to stick around!  At one of my mom's bridal showers they collected recipes, and this is the one Grandma Cook chose.  Here is the recipe in her handwriting:

Funeral Potatoes

• 6 med. potatoes, boiled & grated (you can also use frozen hash browns if you're in a hurry)
• 1 1/2 c. grated cheese
• 1/3 c. chopped green onion
• 1 c. sour cream
• 1 can cream of chicken soup
• 1/4 c. butter + 2 T. butter
• corn flakes, crushed

1. Melt 1/4 c. butter in soup.
2. Add cheese, onions, and sour cream.
3. Add grated potatoes.
4. Pour into 9x13 glass casserole pan.
5. Mix crushed corn flakes with 2 T melted butter and sprinkle on top.
6. Bake at 350 for 45 minutes.

PS. This is a great freezer meal!

Spring Salad

• Spinach or Spring Mix
• Strawberries (slivered)
• Mango
• Slivered almonds
• Anything else you want- maybe Craisins, some feta, whatever

I had two kinds of dressings because we've got enough picky tastebuds that I knew just one wouldn't please everyone.  The honey dijon is more mellow, but honestly I think it goes better with a spinach salad, maybe with red onion slices, bacon, hard-boiled egg, mushroom, tomato kind of salad..  The lemon poppyseed vinaigrette just goes perfectly with the sweet fruit so I would recommend it if you used this salad.

Honey Dijon Dressing

• 1/4 c. honey
• 2 T Dijon mustard
• 1/2 c. vegetable oil
• 1 T fresh lemon juice
• 1/4 tsp ground white pepper
• pinch salt

1. Combine all ingredients.  I used a whisk to get the honey mixed in thoroughly.

Lemon Poppyseed Vinaigrette (From Our Best Bites)

• 2-3 large lemons (1/3 c. juice and 1 tsp. zest)
• 1/4 c. rice wine vinegar
• 1/4 c. canola oil
• 3/4 tsp. kosher salt
• 1/4 tsp. black pepper
• 1/4 c. white sugar
• 2 tsp. poppyseeds
• 1 tsp. grated onion
• 1 clove finely pressed garlic

1. Using a fine grater, grate 1 tsp. of lemon and 1 tsp. onion.
2. Place in a small container with a lid.
3. Add remaining ingredients and shake vigorously.
4. Refrigerate at least an hour before serving.
5. Shake well before serving.

Easter Treats and Peeps

I am well known among my peeps to be a junk lover.  I'm not denying that.  I have memories of fighting my mom because I didn't want her to throw away the toilet paper rolls.  I thought I could make something out of them (and most of the time I did, thank you very much).  So I think this may be one of the roots of that habit of mine. 

I remember making these with my grandma around Easter time.  How?  Use an old egg carton (see!  good for something), cut the bottom in half, and decorate it like a caterpillar.  Use pipe cleaners, glitter, feathers, markers, whatever!  Doesn't matter!  The point is that your kids are creating something and their wheels are turning. Collette and her friend Kristen made these ones.  Nice huh?

I also remember (like the rest of the world) making these rice krispies nest.  It's pretty self-explanatory from the picture but I'll give you the recipe for rice krispy treats in case you don't have it.

Rice Krispy Treats

• 3 Tablespoons butter
• 4 c. mini marshmallows (or about 40 big ones)
• 6 c. rice krispies

1. Melt butter in saucepan over the stove.  Add marshmallows and melt completely.  
2. Add rice krispies and thoroughly coat.
3. Press into a (greased?) pan....if you don't eat it all out of the saucepan.......

To make the nests though, just spray your hands with cooking spray, and mold it into little nests.  Sprinkle coconut flakes (colored green with food coloring) inside for grass. Use jelly beans or other egg-like candy, and then put yourself a birdy in that nest!  

Microwave Peanut Brittle

Ladies and Gentlemen, may I present a very special guest poster....

Grandma Joan Allen!

I know, you're all as excited as I am that Grandma is posting on the blog today.

So, with no further ado, let's talk about peanut brittle.

I remembered a recipe I always made at Christmas that Grampa Joe loved and could not leave alone either. I haven't made it since he left- but I have definitely made many many platefuls for the holidays over the years.

Grandma's story behind this: About 28 years ago I began demonstrating this recipe in different wards' homemaking meetings (Aunt Karen Cook Anderson also demonstrated this so it's actually connected to both sides of the family!). One night I was doing it at the old white church building on 4th Ave when someone ran in and said my daughter had been hit by a car and was at the hospital. Needless to say I did not finish the demo. I felt so guilty as Grampa was Home Teaching and I was teaching RS and a neighbor had to come to the church to let me know. And so you know that was your Mom, although at the time I thought it was Melani riding her bike. Truly, recipes do bring back memories.

The recipe:

• 1 c. sugar
• 1 c. raw peanuts
• 1/2 c. white corn syrup
• 2 T butter
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp vanila

1. Into a 4 cup measuring cup (Grama uses a pyrex quart cup) place sugar, peanuts, and corn syrup.
2. Put in microwave and boil 4 minutes- stirring at 2 minutes.
3. Add 2 T butter
4. Cook 5-6 minutes stirring half way through
5. Remove from oven
6. Add soda and vanilla and stir.
7. Pour onto greased cookie sheet
8. Cool and break into pieces

This is delicious and not too expensive and makes a lot. If it is overcooked even a tad it is too brown and burned. It depends on your microwave. They all heat differently.

Have a great Christmas. I love you.

-Grandma

Kelsey again. I thought I should take a moment to note the "daughter got run over by a car" part of that story. I always had a sense of pride in my elementary years that I could say "oh yeah? Well my mom got run over by a car!" I don't know, things like that just give you standing on the playground. Grama sent me an email telling me about it all....

Once upon a time, a man was drunk. he left the Kimberly police station (still drunk) and headed home because the police said they wouldn't cite him if he drove straight home. My mom and her friend Melanie happened to be walking on the road he chose to drive home on. Mom was 16 and got hit by the rear view mirror and was thrown into the borrow pit and shattered her elbow. A neighbor friend, Jon Wagstaff, put her in his truck and drove her straight to the hospital.
Grandma said she freaked out when she got to the hospital, but all Mom wanted was a blessing, which Grandpa gave her. She was in surgery for 3 hours because they had to pick out all the shattered bone. She couldn't use her left arm for a while and says it's still not the same.
Want to know what happened to the truck driver? He was cited for hit and run, no insurance, no driver's license, running a stop sign, and drunk driving, and was fined a whopping $14.50 in court fees. I don't think it would have gone over the same now.
I had to literally beg for this picture. But here's the scar down her arm where they had to put a plate in for a while. I'm telling you, this story is the stuff of celebrities at school.

Sugar Cookies

Another guest post! I'm thrilled. I have been meaning to make these sugar cookies to put on this blog because they really are part of our family. We make them in heart shapes for Valentines day, pumpkins and headstones and ghosts on Halloween, and ornaments and snowmen for Christmas. Since we're getting to the end of the year I figured Christmas was the last shot I got, but with the move it just hasn't happened! (I had to be banned from cooking the past few weeks so I could actually get something done).

So, I'm just so excited that Aunt Kim made these for the blog. Take it away, Kim!

Hi! This is Kelsey's favorite aunt, Kim. I have a picky husband and three year old, so if a recipe gets their approval, it must be good. This is a perfect cookie for any time of the year.

The recipe:

Cookies:

1 c. sugar + 2 Tablespoons

3/4 cup shortening 2 eggs 1/4 cup milk 1 tsp vanilla 3 3/4 cup flour 1/2 tsp salt 3 tsp baking

powder Cream sugar and shortening, beat in eggs; add milk and vanilla. Add flour, salt and baking powder, mix well. Chill in fridge (for about an hour). Roll out using as little flour as possible. Cut out, bake on greased cookie sheet at 375 for about 10 minutes (mine take 11.5). Remove from the cookie sheet after a few minutes.

Frosting:

1 Tablespoon melted butter

1 cup powder sugar

1 Tablespoon

milk (I usually double or triple the milk)

1 tsp vanilla

Frosting is best when it is slightly runny, but not too runny that it will run right off the cookies. I add the food coloring when I put a portion in zip lock bags. I cutoff a tiny bit of the corner so I can do designs. Remember a little goes a long way (except when you re-frost your three year olds cookie, then you just need a lot). The frosting will setup in about an hour, so you can s

tore them easier. If you want to eat them immediately, just use less milk. Enjoy!!

Sorry that picture's so small, Kim, I couldn't get it to go any bigger!

Happy Halloween!

Here are some close ups of our HORROR D'EUVRES...... most of these ideas I got fromthegirlwhoateeverything.blogspot.com- her blog is grrreat! That got me thinking (googling) about other recipes and I think it all turned out pretty good in the end!

First up, the Halloweenies. Vienna sausages with crescent rolls to mumify them. Mustard eyes add the final touch!

Next time I'm using real hot dogs. I didn't know it until today, but apparently vienna sausages are disgusting.

Peanut Butter Pumpkin Puffs: Reese's peanut butter puffs cereal + scotcheroos recipe = YUM!

Witch's Hats: Fudge stripe cookies and a Hershey's kiss- so easy. The tube frosting we used was solid rock though. Made it tough. But Kennedi and Dad did a great job. Don't you agree?

Candy Corn Trifle: Yellow cake, butterscotch pudding, cream cheese/whipped cream... Collette made this all by herself. Wonderful job :)

Some of My Own

I'm going to include some of the things I make here on this little blog too. So here we go...

CUPCAKES :)

Basketball cupcakes for Danny's birthday- no real special ingredients, just fun frosting.



Penguin cupcakes for Collette's birthday-

Penguins:
-Using thick frosting as glue, stack a mini doughnut (cut in half lengthwise so you have a flat bottom), and then a doughnut hole. Put those in the freezer to set.
-Put a few drops of black food coloring into a tub of chocolate frosting. Microwave it so it's runny.
-Dip the cupcakes into the frosting so the whole doughnut stack is coated.
-Take two Oreos (I got the oval shaped "dipper" kind), take out the cream and place them on the body for wings.
-Cut marshmallows up and stick on for the tummy.
-Let that set up in the freezer for a few minutes (not too long, because you have more to stick on)
-Use half a starburst to form the mouth
-Put a dot of white frosting for eyes and place a mini chocolate chip for the black part of they eye
-Freeze it like their life depends on it! We made ours on a hot day and our poor penguins' faces melted off

Icebergs
-Frost the remaining cupcakes with white frosting.
-Sprinkle with coconut
-Add rock candy, pop rocks, and Swedish fish however you like!

Toy Story Alien Cupcakes for Katelin's surprise Disney goodbye/birthday party


-Most grocery stores sell neon food color- use the neon green to color a tub of frosting.
-Frost all your cupcakes with the green.
-Place 3 mint mentos for eyes, and add the black dots with dots of black frosting.
-Use green apple sour straws for the antennae
-Cut green apple sour tape (or whatever you can find that's big enough) into ears. (I thought "leaves" when I cut mine and they turned out right
-Put a dot of black frosting for the mouth so they look like they're saying "oooooh"
-That's IT!