Mexican Haystacks

Adam's most favorite dinner!

Mexican Haystacks

Serves 6-8

4 cups cooked rice (I use short-grain brown)

1 pound ground beef (I use ground turkey)

1 onion, diced

1/2 cup salsa

Shredded cheese

Toppings:

Shredded lettuce

Chopped tomato

Diced olives

Crushed tortilla chips

Sour cream

Salsa

Brown meat with onion in pan over high heat; drain. Add salsa (you could also use a packet of taco seasoning, we prefer salsa). Cook over medium-high heat until bubbling.

To serve: layer rice, meat, and cheese. Stack on additional toppings as desired.

Potato Rolls

This is one of our favorite basic roll recipes. They always turn out and are so light and tender.

I usually make them when I make soup, but Adam and Grace love to make little sandwiches out of them for lunches with PB&Honey.

Potato Rolls

Makes 24 rolls

4 to 4 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 package active dry yeast

1 cup milk

1/4 cup water

1/4 cup sugar

1/4 cup shortening (I always have butter-flavored Crisco, so that's what I use)

1 1/2 teaspoons salt

1 beaten egg

1/2 cup mashed potato*

Combine 2 cups of the flour and yeast in mixer bowl. Heat and stir milk, water, sugar, shortening, and salt until just warm (120 - 130 degrees) and shortening almost completely melts and sugar has dissolved. Add to flour mixture along with egg and mashed potato. Beat with an electric mixer on low speed for 30 seconds, scraping bowl. Beat on high speed 3 minutes. Stir in as much of the remaining flour as possible.

Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface. Knead in enough of the remaining flour to make a moderately stiff dough that is smooth and elastic (6-8 minutes).** Shape into ball. Place into a lightly greased bowl, turning once to grease surface. Cover; let rise in warm place until double (about 1 hour).

Punch dough down. Turn out onto a lightly floured surface. Divide in half. Cover; let rest 10 minutes. Lightly grease a baking sheet. Divide each portion of dough into 12 pieces. Gently pull each piece into a ball, tucking edges under to make smooth tops. Place onto prepared baking sheet. Cover; let rise in a warm place until nearly double (35 to 45 minutes).

Bake in a 400 degree oven for 10 to 12 minutes or until golden brown. Remove immediately from baking sheet, and cool completely on wire racks.

* Peel and quarter 1 medium potato. Cook in a small amount of boiling water until fork-tender. Drain. Mash, and measure out 1/2 cup.

** I just change my beater out for the dough hook on my mixer, instead of kneading by hand.

Cream Cheese Chicken Soup

A few days ago, it was in the 40s and windy, and soup sounded so good. We tried this recipe from My Kitchen Cafe and we all loved it. It was so yummy! So, this isn't a "tried and true", but I wanted to share a new hit at our house. I served it with potato rolls.

(For us, the chicken didn't seem to do much for this recipe... maybe because I just boiled it, so it didn't have much flavor. I don't know. Next time, I think I might just add some frozen corn instead. I also added a cup of celery to the vegetables, to stretch it a bit more for Mike's lunch the next day).

Cream Cheese Chicken Soup

Serves 4-5

1 pound chicken breasts, cooked and diced

1 onion, diced

1-2 Tablespoons butter

3-4 cups chicken broth (I used 4 cups)

4-5 reg carrots, sliced

1 cup chopped celery

4-5 potatoes, finely diced

1 cup milk

4 Tablespoons flour

8oz cream cheese, softened at room temperature

Salt and pepper, to taste

Saute onion in butter. Put onion in pot and add 3 cups of chicken broth, carrots, and potatoes (and celery). Add more broth to cover vegetables, if needed. Bring to a boil, then simmer until veggies are tender (about ten minutes). When veggies are tender, mix the flour with the milk and add to the soup. Add cream cheese to soup little pieces at a time and stir until it is all melted. Add cooked chicken and heat through. Season with salt and pepper.

Gingerbread Boys (or Girls)

I made these twice this week. They were a hit at Cub Scouts the other night. I made another batch today to take to the Halloween Party tonight! It's just my regular ol' gingerbread cookies that I usually do for Christmas. Amanda saw a cute idea to make them into skeletons. Amberly is thrilled because this is her favorite cookie and I would only make them at Christmas. Now she gets them twice a year. 1 c. molasses
1 c. shortening
1 c. sugar
1 egg
1/2 c. hot water
2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. vanilla
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. ginger
3 tsp. cinnamon
3/4 tsp. cloves
6 c. flour

Glaze:
3 c. powdered sugar
3/4 c. milk
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla

Simmer molasses and shortening in saucepan for 5 minutes. Cream together sugar and egg. Dissolve baking soda in water and add to sugar mixture. Add vanilla, salt, and spices and mix together. Pour in molasses mixture and mix well. Add flour mixing well. Roll dough into a thick layer on floured surface. Cut in shapes. Scraps can be rolled out again. I keep a damp, warm towel or paper towels on the surface of my dough that is in the bowl so that it doesn't dry out or get too cold. Bake at 375 degrees for 6-7 minutes. After all cookies are baked, dip them completely in glaze and let drain and dry on cookie racks for a few hours. At Christmastime I like to put sprinkles or colored sugar on them after I dip them in the glaze.

Fairy Bread

I heard about Fairy Bread a while ago and then I read about it in Parents Magazine (I think). It is super simple and my kids love it. It is apparently very popular in Australia.

Fairy Bread

bread slices
butter
candy sprinkles

Butter the bread and pile on the sprinkles.

It also works well on toast.

Sweet and Sour Chicken

4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
1 egg, beaten
1/2 c. cornstarch
oil

Dip chicken in beaten egg, then dip in cornstarch, then fry in hot oil until a light golden color. Place chicken in 8x8 pan.

Mix together sauce ingredients and pour over chicken.

Sauce:
1 1/2 c. sugar
1/4 c. vinegar
1/2 c. chicken broth
1/2 c. ketchup
3 Tbsp. soy sauce

Bake at 325 degrees for 2 hours.

Gingerbread Waffles

Perfect on a nice Fall morning!! Kimball doesn't even like pumpkin but he likes these waffles.
3 c. flour
4 tsp. baking powder
2 tsp. cinnamon
2 tsp. ginger
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1/2 tsp. salt
4 eggs
2/3 c. brown sugar
1 c. canned pumpkin
1 1/4 c. milk
1/2 c. molasses
1/2 c. butter, melted

Combine flour, baking powder, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and salt. In separate bowl beat together eggs and brown sugar until fluffy. To egg mixture add pumpkin, milk, molasses, and butter. Combine until everything is moistened. Do not overmix.

Cook in waffle iron. Serve with syrup and powdered sugar. Yum!!!