"My Friend Jen P Would Love This" Soup

Top Chef Masters, Season 1, Episode 1
Serves 2 to 4
Ingredients
2 yellow squash, finely diced
2 carrots, finely diced
1 red onion, diced
8 strips of bacon, diced
8 cloves garlic, diced
1 jalapeno, minced
1 Anaheim Chili, minced
1 quart chicken stock
3 1/2 tablespoons dark chili powder
Salt and pepper
4 tablespoons butter
Manchego cheese, shredded or whatever you have
Directions
In a large sauté pan on high heat, add enough oil to coat the bottom of the pan. Add bacon, onion, and garlic and stir briefly. Reduce heat and add 2/3 chili powder. Continue to stir for 5 minutes. Add squash, carrot, red onion, jalapeno, Anaheim chili, continue to sauté on medium heat for five minutes. Add chicken stock and remaining chili powder and simmer for an hour. Fold in butter. Season with salt. Garnish with chives and julienned pepper.© 2009 Tim Love

Jen's Roasted Broccoli

I happened to try this at Awesome Jen's today... YUM and so SIMPLE!

1 head of broccoli, washed and cut into florets

2 teaspoons of olive oil

1 tsp. seasoning salt...like Jane's Crazy Mixed Up Salt

Sea salt and pepper, to taste

Directions:
Preheat oven to 400 degrees farenheit. Use a large bowl to toss broccoli florets with olive oil. Lay florets in a single layer on a baking sheet. Evenly distribute seasoning salt, sea salt and pepper. Bake until tender and a little crispy, usually around 15 minutes.

Jen's Pumpkin Pie

Awesome Jen provides me with dessert inspiration (lemon bomb cake...). Anyway, I had pumpkin pie at her house the other day and I just had to give it a go myself. YUM!

Jen ...I mean Libby's Famous Pumpkin Pie
1 unbaked 9-inch (4-cup volume) deep-dish pie shell

3/4 cup granulated sugar

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon ground ginger

1/4 teaspoon ground cloves (our pumpkin pie spice in place of all spices)

2 large eggs

1 can (15 oz.) LIBBY'S® 100% Pure Pumpkin

1 can (12 fl. oz.) Evaporated Milk

Preheat oven to 425° F. Combine sugar, salt, cinnamon, ginger and cloves in small bowl. Beat eggs lightly in large bowl. Stir in pumpkin and sugar-spice mixture. Gradually stir in evaporated milk. Pour into pie shell. Bake for 15 minutes. Reduce temperature to 350° F.; bake for 40 to 50 minutes or until knife inserted near center comes out clean. Cool on wire rack for 2 hours. Serve immediately or refrigerate. (Do not freeze as this will cause the crust to separate from the filling.)

Saturday's Dinner Party - part II

Let me just start by saying I love black pepper and this recipe involves lots of black pepper...NOT RED...which by the way I cannot stand.

Awesome Jen's London Broil (compliments of All Recipes) was so good that I bought London Broil at Whole Foods yesterday so I could try to replicate it.

Ingredients

3 tablespoons crumbled blue cheese
2 tablespoons butter, softened
1 teaspoon fresh chives (optional)
1 tablespoon coarsely ground black pepper
1 teaspoon garlic salt
1 teaspoon onion powder
1/4 teaspoon ground cayenne pepper
1 (2 pound) beef flank steak
2 tablespoons olive oil, divided

Directions
Preheat the grill for low heat.
In a bowl, mix the blue cheese, butter, and chives. Set aside. In a separate bowl, mix the black pepper, garlic salt, onion powder, and cayenne pepper.
Rub the steak with olive oil. Coat both sides of the meat with the spice mixture, and rub in by hand or press with a spatula.
Lightly oil the grill grate. Place meat on the grill, and cook 10 to 15 minutes per side, or to desired doneness. Grill to rare or medium rare for best flavor. Remove from grill, and slice lengthwise into thin strips. Top with a large dollop of blue cheese butter, and serve.

Jen's Lemon Bomb Cake

Jen is the bomb!

This is actually called Lemon Wow Cake, but I am renaming it Jen's Lemon Bomb Cake because it is amazingly good. (Check out the "secret" ingredient.)

My awesome friend Jen actually threw a little dinner party for my birthday this weekend and let me select the menu throughout last week. It was an incredible meal and just great fun! It was definitely one of the nicest birthday presents I have ever received.

I will share the other dinner recipes throughout the week.
Jen's Lemon Bomb Cake
Ingredients
1 (18.25 ounce) package yellow cake mix
1 (3.5 ounce) package instant coconut cream pudding mix
1 teaspoon dried tarragon
1 cup lemon-lime flavored carbonated beverage
1/3 cup lemon juice
4 eggs
2/3 cup vegetable oil
Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour a 10 inch Bundt pan.
In a large bowl, stir together cake mix and pudding mix. Crumble the dried tarragon into a fine powder and mix with the cake and pudding mixture. Make a well in the center and pour in lemon-lime soda, lemon juice, eggs and oil. Beat on low speed until blended. Scrape bowl, and beat 4 minutes on medium speed. Pour batter into prepared pan.
Bake in the preheated oven for 30 to 35 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Let cool in pan for 10 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack and cool completely.

StrengthsFinder

"To build strengths, you must first discover your greatest talents." The book goes on to encourage you to make an "investment" in those strengths to get the most from them.

This book is a fun and insightful way to find out more about yourself. And, it's an easy application in the workplace. I also encouraged Awesome Jen who is looking for a new career to take the assessment as she proceeds through her "adventure".

It's about $11. You get a code in the book and then go online to do the assessment. In return, you receive a relatively detailed report. I must admit someone guessed what my most primary strength would be and they were correct. My Top 5 were:

Woo
Communication
Strategic
Relator
Achiever

Just a thought...friends and relatives far and near

One of the things that I am realizing about my blog and that occurred to me today as I was talking to my awesome friend, Jen....is that I have a hard time keeping up with all my friends and generally it's the basic "How's your job?" How's the baby?" "When are you going on vacation?" "Are you ever coming to visit?" etc. (I have lived a handful of places since I graduated from high school in Western NY State -- Ohio, New Hampshire, and Virginia.) However, with the blog it's as though my friends see another part of my life -- cooking etc., and I am excited that as they post more (hint-hint) , I will get to "see" more of their lives.

Is it gravy? Is it stock?

No...it's Champagne punch. My awesome friend Jen introduced me to this yummy treat -- very fun for a girl's get together.

Champagne Punch

1 cup Triple Sec

1 cup brandy

1/2 cup Chambord

2 cups unsweetened pineapple juice

1 quart chilled ginger ale

2 chilled 750-ml. bottles dry champagne, cava, or sparkling wine (save the good stuff)

Where's the beef?

So my awesome friend Jen who grew up on a cattle farm was all excited to come over and cook a recipe with me and then "blog" about it. We were all set to make Shepard's Pie with ground beef. But guess who forgot the beef!?? Fresh beef from the farm at that!

Anyway, we debated using chicken but it really called for beef. So, we ran to the store grabbed some beef and we were good to go.

For the filling:
1 tablespoon olive oil

1/2 pound ground beef

1/2 pound ground sausage

1 sweet onion, chopped

3 carrots, peeled and chopped very small

1/2 pound mushrooms

1 tablespoon tomato paste

1 tablespoon chopped fresh thyme leaves

2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley leaves

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 tablespoon all-purpose flour

1 cup red wine

1 1/2 cups veggie or beef stock

Salt and freshly ground black pepper
For the crust: (This is where we get a little lazy.)1 package ready-made potatoes (like Bob Evans)

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

1 cup scallions, cleaned and chopped

1 cup Cheddar
Pre-heat the oven to 400 degrees F.
Heat olive oil over medium-high heat in a Dutch oven and brown meat – should be about 80% cooked . Remove the meat from the pan. Add the onion to the pan and saute until the onion are translucent - about 5 minutes. Add the chopped carrots and cook for 5 minutes. Add the mushrooms, tomato paste, thyme, parsley and cinnamon. Stir and saute for 2 minutes. Next, stir in the flour then the wine and stock. Taste and add salt and pepper, as needed. Return the meat to the pan and bring to a boil. Cover, turn down the heat to low and simmer for about 10 minutes.
Cook the potatoes according to the package.
Season with salt and pepper. When the meat is ready, spoon it into a 9-by-13-inch baking dish and level it out with the back of the spoon. After that, spread the mashed potato evenly all over. Sprinkle the scallions on top of the potato, scatter the cheese over the scallions and bake the pie until the top is crusty and golden, about 25 minutes.