Rutter Kitchen- Menu #22

All three of us were able to cook this menu, so that was fun. I was in charge of the Monterey Chicken and I decided to cook the bacon the day before and then I also pan grilled the chicken breasts and thighs several hours before we started cooking.  That was a big help so there wasn't too much left to do with that dish except prep the toppings, assemble & broil.  I followed the recipe and it went really well.  Ashley was in charge of the Honey-Lime Fruit Salad.  She followed the recipe and she used all the fruits that it called for.  She did double the recipe and that was good as we didn't have much left over:)  She did add the Poppy seeds and that was kind of fun to taste.  The lime zest does offset the sweetness of the honey, so that works really good in this recipe.  It was a simple recipe and the prep work was the time consuming part for her, which didn't take long.  Dana was in charge of the Graham Cracker Monster cookies.  She also followed the recipe and it was also pretty simple.  She used a food processor to grind up the graham crackers and then was able to use the stand mixer to finish mixing up the dough.  We were curious how the cookies would turn out without eggs, but they were very tasty!

 This is my plate. Its a bit messy as I'd already been eating when I realized that I had forgotten to put the chopped tomatoes and green onions on the chicken.  They really added great flavor to the chicken dish.  We also served baked potatoes with our meal. We decided to fix the Slush from menu #1 and it tasted really good with this meal.

The cookies turned out really well and tasted great!

  I think all these recipes will be ones that we will fix again.  Especially the Monterey Chicken.  

Leslee- Meal 22

This chicken was delicious and easy to make! We had soccer the night we ate this so I grilled the chicken a little earlier and then broiled it with the toppings when we were ready for dinner. For the fruit salad I just used what fruit I had on hand; grapes, bananas, apples, and pineapple.  The honey and poppy seeds were a nice little addition as well. I made the cookies a few days later but they didn't turn out too well. very flat. I probably needed to add more flour and I accidentally used baking soda instead of baking powder! The kids and Sean tried them anyway and said they had a good flavor.  Nika said her's turned out well so don't let my experience scare you off:)

  

Rutter Kitchen- Meal #1

Ashley and I were very excited to start the new cookbook! We've scanned the book and have seen lots of menus that we are ready to try.  I started the Chicken recipe earlier in the day in the crock-pot and followed the recipe.  Very easy.  I had fixed the sauce the night before and also cleaned the chicken thighs so everything was ready to go.  I don't do a lot of crock-pot cooking so was worried that we might not like how the chicken turned out.  No worries as we really liked it.  The meat was very moist and the sauce was very tasty.  We fixed rice and also some noodles and both were very good with the meat and sauce over them. 

 Ashley fixed the Sweet potato fries.  Unfortunately I cut most of the fries up thin and didn't mention about cutting back on the cooking time and some were burned.  We were able to eat some of them and they had really good flavor.  I want to fix them again and watch our cooking time :) I also forgot to take a picture as you can see.

I think the star of our meal was the Strawberry Lemonade Slush.  So easy to fix and I actually had all the ingredients.  I fixed it the night before like the recipe called for.  We used sprite as the lemon lime soda and the Slush was so tasty.  I plan on fixing it again :)
I think that Ashley and I would fix this menu again.

New Meal- menu 22

I am excited to have a chance to pick one of the meals from the cookbook this week.  We are going to go with menu 22.  This is a fruit salad, monterey chicken and graham cracker monster cookies.  

-Nika

Jacki's Meal # 1

Ok I was tempted to report that my meal went just as planned but it didn't and it was my fault. I cooked the chicken in the crockpot which worked out well although a little overdone since we got home later than planned. Since it was so saucy the sweet potato fries were an odd paring but I also made some rice for my husband. I over cooked the fries (go Jacki) and I needed more fries for the amount of seasoning. Mine were way too salty. The drink was scrumptious but again, I messed up but I made it work. The store didn't have the frozen lemonade so I just used powdered. The blender didn't work after I dumped everything in so I dumped it all into a bowl and stirred to mix and then removed the unmelted ice cubes. It wasn't slushy but still really good. The only soda I had that remotely resembled lemon lime was an old outdated Fresca that we brought with us in or cooler from our Virginia move!  It tasted pretty good in the drink! The chicken made good leftovers. I want to make the fries again and do them right because I love sweet potato fries! I would make all of these recipes again.

 

Dana 's Kitchen Meal #1

I'm late publishing this. Meal one I cooked at my house. We really love it! I used the noodles below and it complimented the chicken nicely.  I felt the sweet potatoes were an of combination with the chickens. But they were very tasty. I cut them into medallions instead of like fries. The turned out great.  I also had 2 helpers. To those who have not seen James. Here he is!!!! Johnny loves his new Lil brother (If u can't tell by the pic.) Also, and added bonus; i had to post a pic of Great-Grandma Burrows meeting James for the first time. 

Nika’s Meal 1

 

Tonight we had our inaugural meal from the cookbook.  I had to improvise in a few areas because I didn’t have everything the recipes called for, but the other option was to wait longer to make the meal and procrastination never ends well for me.   Also, I have to say the recipes were easy.  I did almost the whole thing holding a baby and using my other hand to prepare/cook and had a 2 year old and 4 year old helping me. 

We only had 1 sweet potato so we did a mix of russets as well.  The cornstarch gave them a nice crispy coating and everyone liked them.  We will do that again. 

before cooking…

One of my helpers is really into taking pictures.  This can be done holding a baby, do not worry!

For the special drink I needed to double it because I had 6 thirsty people to feed.  I didn’t prepare ahead of time to blend the ingredients and freeze so I just left everything frozen plus added the water and soda and blended it up and it was perfect.  So delicious.  My husband said he would be fine drinking it every night. 

I had some frozen turkey meatballs to use up.  I thought they would work fine since I was out of chicken and they aren’t really seasoned or anything.  I simmered the sauce on the stove and thickened it right away, omitting  the crockpot altogether and since the meatballs were precooked just heated them and mixed with the sauce.  They were really good and were well received by the family.  I have one tip on the spices.  Sometimes spices can be a bit pricey at the regular grocery store and I usually buy them at one of several bulk stores we have nearby but this time I just needed to get them quickly and I discovered that in the Mexican aisle of our local grocery, which does not have a very large hispanic section, there were tons of spices in plastic bag type packages instead of jars.  They are about 1/4 of the prices of the spice aisle and the ones I got were very tasty and great.  Just a tip for you. 

 

I forgot to take a picture of the meatballs until I cleaned up so here are some leftovers.  The sauce was dark and thick and sticky and would go great on lots of types of meat or even veggies and over rice.  I didn’t end up adding the sesame seeds because I didn’t have time to toast them and usually they don’t taste like anything unless they are toasted.

Leslee's Meal

Last night I made the chicken and drink. I decided to serve it over rice so I still need to try out the sweet potatoes another night. I decided to cook this later in the day so I cooked it in a pan instead of the crockpot. I added the sauce to the pan first, cooked for a few minutes and then added the chunks of chicken. After the chicken was cooked through I added in the cornstarch and let thicken. This worked well.
The recipe is somewhat similar to a teriyaki chicken recipe we make a lot so my kids really just thought this was that. Everyone enjoyed it though!
I did make a few changes to the drink prep as well just because I didn't plan ahead enough:) I mixed up the water, ice, lemonade, and strawberries and then stuck it in my deep freeze for about an hour. This made it pretty slushy so that was perfect. The kids and I really liked this drink! Really whats not to like, but it was a fun addition to dinner!

Welcome Back, New Cookbook, Recipes

Hello Ladies,

Welcome back to the cooking blog!  I have missed you all and am ready to get back at it. The new schedule is posted. If your assigned week doesn't work for you just let me know and we can switch. For this first week I started out with menu one. It just sounded good to me.  You don't have to select in order, just choose whatever menu you want when it is your week to choose. Also, don't forget to post your review and pics!  If you have any friends, sisters, moms etc that want to join in then by all means invite them. Let me know their email address so I can add them and they can post. Kelsey, my daughter in law, is our newest member addition.  Welcome, Kelsey! Now, let's get cooking, shall we!?

Rutter Kitchen Catch-up

 Here's the Spinach-Artichoke Quiche.  We followed the recipe except we used Swiss cheese instead of the Gruyere cheese.  There were a fair amount of ingredients, but the Quiche really had great flavor.

 Here's the Sweetie Pie Pops.  I chose to do Cherry and did that for my Hubby's valentines Day.  I tried one also and they were very tasty! Not hard to make, but you can't put much filling in them, so you will have a lot of crust, which I like.

 Here's the Chicken Orzo Soup.  I followed the recipe, but used spinach instead of the chard and omitted the lemon.  They've used lemon a lot in this cookbook & I've figured out that I need to omit it or cut back on it :)

 Here's my bowl.  I made it several times this past winter.  It's on our soup list now :)

 Muffins being mixed up

 Zucchini Banana Muffin ready to eat.  We all liked these.  They were  very easy to make and very moist and tasty :) I think that I doubled the amount of zucchini.

Roasted Red Potatoes.  These were so easy to make and had a lot of flavor.  I will definitely make these again!

Try these recipes out if you haven't :)

Jacki's Zucchini Banana Muffins

I made these on Sunday and we just ate the last one today.  I made a full batch - so glad I did! They were absolutely delicious. But, I just realized I forgot to take a picture. They looked really tasty though:).  I used all white sugar instead of some brown because I didn't have any brown sugar and I am in use up mode. I also added some chopped walnuts.  These muffins were very moist and flavorful and I will definitely make them again.  Hope you all get a chance to make them.

New Recipe For Week of April 13, 2014

One - Bowl Zucchini Banana Muffins.   75

Jacki's Peach-Kissed Turkey Burgers

I made these the other night for dinner and thought they were really good.  It was an easy recipe to make and cook.  I did omit the parsley and I used apricot jam instead of peach because that is what I had.  I really like the flavor and would make this again.  I just cooked it in a skillet on the stove.  I used the leftovers in a salad and it was delicious - just cut up the patty cold. 
I added a slice of cheese to the one below because I thought it would make it more appealing to my husband being that it was a turkey burger instead of beef :)

Recipe for Week of April 6, 2014

Peach - Kissed Turkey Burgers.   88

I will be posting a few more recipes from the current recipe book over the next few weeks and then probably will post recipes from Pinterest or the Internet during the summer. We will start up again with a new cookbook at the end of Summer if there is enough interest. I know several of us have a lot coming up over the next several months - moving and babies! Please let me know if you would like a turn selecting a recipe, otherwise I will do it. Just trying to keep it easy and simple for awhile.

Jacki's Cheesy Garlic and Chive Potatoes

I made these potatoes tonight to go with some steak and salad.  They were quite tasty.  I did change a few things though.  I peeled the potatoes before I grated them for one.  My potatoes actually turned more into mashed potatoes probably because I peeled them and also because I didn't refrigerate them beforehand so they were softer.  I also didn't add any chives because I didn't have any.  Another term for mine could have been loaded mashed potatoes.  They made a good side dish. The picture doesn't look too appetizing but I forgot to take a photo when they were all plated up. 

I'm really late! Sorry y'all! This weeks recipe

Cheesy garlic & chive potatoes pg. 38

St. Patrick's Day popcorn pg. 52

Jacki's Chunky Monkey Pancakes

I made these pancakes last night for dinner and they were really good.  I apologize that the picture below doesn't look very good and I forgot to put the peanut butter syrup on before I took it but they really were delicious.  The batter was a little runny and spread out quite a bit and it made a lot - way more than the two of us could eat so I cooked it all up and froze the extra..  It was easy enough to pull together and I followed the recipe exactly as directed.

 In the picture below the pancake is on the top and the bottom is a well fried egg in case you were wondering.

New recipe

For my pancake loving boys we will try chunky monkey pancakes, page 142.

Jacki's Tuna Casserole and Green Beans

Last night I made the Tuna Noodle Casserole and Honey-Ginger Green Beans and they were both excellent.  I am not a  tuna noodle casserole fan as made with the cream of chicken or mushroom soup but my husband is.  I thought this recipe looked like something that would taste better and I wasn't disappointed.  In fact we both liked it.  It is more work than using the can of cream soup but worth it. I followed the recipe as directed except I omitted the cracker/potato chip crumbs on top.  For those of you who are not tuna fans you could easily substitute some cooked chicken in its place.  The best thing about this recipe is I happened to have all the ingredients on hand except the mushrooms - bonus!
The Honey-Ginger Green beans were also delish.  More work than just steaming the green beans like I usually do but a nice change.  Again, I followed the recipe as directed except I omitted the sesame seeds because I didn't have any.  I would make both of these recipes again.

New Recipes for Week of March 2nd 2014

Lets try the Tuna Noodle Casserole on page 148 and the Honey-Ginger Green beans on page 116.

Jacki's Chicken Orzo Soup and Mascarpone Ice Cream

I made both of these recipes the other day and they were both so good!!  For the Mascarpone Ice Cream I found the Mascarpone cheese at Trader Joes.  I didn't really notice that flavor because the almond flavoring seemed to dominate. I used the heavy whipping cream because I checked 4 stores and they all only carried heavy cream. But, regardless, it was delicious and oh, so easy to whip up in my little Cuisinart Ice Cream maker.  The Balsamic Strawberry Sauce was a great addition.  I was a little leery of the balsamic vinegar in there but it actually brought out the flavor.  It would be good without it too though - you can't really go wrong with ice cream and sugar. 
The Chicken Orzo Soup with Lemon and Chard was delicious and easy to throw together.  The store I went to didn't have the fresh chard so I just bought a bag of spinach and kale and used that - didn't even bother to chop it up.  I also used some shell pasta I had that I wanted to use up so I did that instead of the orzo.  It made a thick soup which I like so it was perfect! Definitely will make this recipe again.

                                Ice Cream ingredients all gathered.

Tarin's Tropical Slaw and Ice Cream

I really liked both of these recipes.

For the Tropical Slaw I made a half recipe and the kids really liked it too. I didn't have any dried cranberries and I wish that I had because I think the tangy from them would have really helped cut on the sweetness from everything else. But I will definitely make this one again.

As far as the Ice Cream and Topping. I ended up using cream cheese because I couldn't find mascapone anywhere--okay, at least not at either of the two stores I tried. But it was still really good. I would have even liked a stronger cream cheese flavor. Then I was stumped on the cream, but not heavy cream, and ended up finding a table cream, but I don't know how big a difference it would have been if you had to use heavy cream still. As for the strawberry-balsamic topping--this was the bomb. I hate to go all 90s with that, but really there was no better way of describing it. I could have ate the entire thing myself. I made it for dessert for the missionaries and they came back for seconds and thirds of this stuff! And my two year old ended up just eating the strawberries off of the ice cream :)

Soup and Salad

Last week I made the tropical slaw to go along with our hamburgers and french fries. Sean wasn't home for dinner and now that I think about I was probably the only one who ate it. I just made a few changes, slivered almonds instead of pumpkin seeds, less oil in the dressing, and I added chunks of pineapple. I made it only 30 min before dinner and it was pretty good, but the next day it was delicious. The cabbage really had a chance to soak up the dressing and I really liked it:)

Last night I made the Chicken Orzo soup for dinner. I added extra amounts of the vegetables and I couldn't find chard at the store so I added Kale (don't know how similar they are). My soup ended up pretty thick but it was really good, it reminded me of risotto. The whole family enjoyed and ate it, so I say the recipe was a success and a keeper! 

New Recipes for the week of 2/23

I had a tough time finding a recipe, but I finally chose one from the Spring section.  This will be good for those of us still having some cold weather :)
Chicken Orzo Soup with Lemon and Chard pg. 24

Jacki's Filet Mignon and Tropical Slaw

The other night I made the Filet Mignon paired with the Tropical Slaw from this weeks choice and baked potato.  Excellent!  I must admit I don't think I have ever bought or cooked a Filet Mignon.  I remember we had a neighbor when we lived in Sacramento whose kids would only eat Filet Mignon! Anyway, I shopped around and found some on special (probably for Valentines Day) for $10.99 a pound.  I followed the directions but used the already cooked bacon which turned out just fine.  I also needed to cook it a bit longer in the oven than the recipe called for.  It was seriously a whole new steak eating experience - so soft, tender, and flavorful - I may never go back! (We rarely have steak anyway). The Garlic Herb Butter topped it off nicely. 
The Tropical Slaw was easy to pull together.  I thought it had a very good flavor with the dried mangoes and cranberries.  I used regular vinegar instead of the cider and sunflower seeds instead of the pepitas.  Yum!
I have not made any of the desserts but have my ice cream maker bowl chilling in the freezer right now to make the Mascarpone Ice Cream tomorrow. 

Leslee's Meal

Last night I made the steak and brownie dessert. I sent Sean to the store on Saturday night and he came home with Beef Tenderloin since there was no filet minion. I prepared it as the book says although I might have cooked it in the over a bit longer than they suggested. Honestly I am not sure i have ever cooked a steak in the oven so I was a little worried about how it would turn out. Well no need to fear, it was delicious! It was melt in your mouth tender! Sean and I had gone to Outback on Friday for Valentine's Day and I think this steak was just as good if not better then the ones we got there:) All the addition of butter made it delicious but a little more heavy! Fun for a nice occasion though:)

Next up was the Mint Chocolate Chip Brownie Ice-cream Squares. Although a lot of layers, this was easy to make! I should have made it a little earlier so it could have frozen back up longer but we didn't mind. I just made it in a 8x8 pan. The only thing I changed was when I melted the chocolate chips I didn't add any cream, I just spread it on as is. We were all really excited to eat it and everyone loved it. It was definitely rich though!

New Recipes

While it seems like most of the country is pretty freezing right now, we've been having some awesome warm days so I'm skipping into the summer section for the recipes this week. They don't really have anything to do with each other, but they both look yummy, I'll blame pregnancy cravings :)

Tropical Slaw with Pineapple Vinaigrette, pg. 78
Mascarpome Ice Cream with Balsamic Strawberry Sauce, pg. 119

New Schedule

Hey Ladies,

I just put up a new schedule for recipe selection. I also updated the "what we have cooked" section so if you are not sure if we have already cooked a recipe just check there. Don't forget to post your results, reviews, and pictures! If you don't want to be included in the recipe selection rotation just let me know. There are a lot of recipes left to pick from. I know I still have a few to catch up on including the yummy recipes from this past week!

NEW RECIPES

I always think it is fun to cook a nice meal at home on or around Valentines' day, so I chose two meat recipes! Both use nice, expensive cuts of meat so I figured we could choose which one we wanted to make, or of course you could make them both:)
- Garlic-Rosemary Rib Roast p 224
- Pan Seared Filet Mignon with Garlic Herb Butter pg 226

And if you need a fun dessert...
- Mint-Chip Brownie Ice cream squares pg 236. (I have been eyeing these for a while!!)

Rutter Kitchen- Catch-up!

 This is the Tortellini Sausage Soup.  Most of us really liked this soup.  Very easy to make and pretty hearty with the sausage and cheese tortellini.  It has a very nice flavor.  I've made this quite a bit this winter.

 Grilled Chicken Caesar Salad.  We followed the recipe for this and it was fun to make the chicken, dressing and croutons.  I think the croutons were the biggest hit :) This salad had real good flavors.  I'm sure that we will make this again. 

 Here's the S'mores Hot Chocolate.  We followed the recipe and did like it, though we would probably skip putting the graham cracker crumbs on the cups edge next time.  Didn't really care for that being there while sipping the hot chocolate ;) Of course then it wouldn't be a S'mores Hot Chocolate!

 Next are the Beignets.  It was fun to try these, but they do take a little time.  They tasted really good and we like drizzling honey on them.  They tasted similar to sopapillas that you can get at Mexican Restaurants.

 Here's the Pepperoncini Beef Sandwiches.  I started the recipe the night before in the crock pot since we were going to eat these for lunch the next day.  So easy! Well the next day we had a power outage do to the weather, but by then the meat was ready and since I have a gas cook top we were able to pull the rest of the meal together.  That's one reason I love my gas cook top!

 Here's our group

We had chips with our meal, since we couldn't make the Spinach Walnut Salad with no power.  It was a fun afternoon making do.  Of course the power came on after about 4 hours ;)

Muffins and Stew

About a week ago I tried out the two muffin recipes, blueberry and pumpkin streusel (from a while back). The pumpkin ones were easy to make and smelled delicious! My two younger kids were big fans of these!
The blueberry ones also turned out well and weren't too hard to make. By batter and also the muffins turned out a bit dense but my husband still thought they were great! I usually just make muffins from a box mix so it was fun to make them from scratch for a change:)

Next up is the stew! This was delicious! I made it last Sunday for dinner and put it in the crockpot before we headed to church. I realized I forgot to get the V8 juice and I needed a substitute for the tomato soup so I ended up adding a jar of pizza sauce with some water and broth. It sounds funny but it actually worked great!! We really liked the recipe!