Peach Pie

I was dying for some fresh peach pie last week, but not having any fresh peaches, I had to improvise. Fortunately, improvising is my specialty. :) What I did have were some jars of bottled peaches that needed to be used. (I know-big improvise) I pulled out some of my most trust-worthy cookbooks and found this in the ever-handy Betty Crocker cookbook:

Fresh Peach Pie (with canned peach variation)

9 in - 2 crust pie

2 cans (1 lb 13 oz) sliced peaches, drained

1 tsp. lemon juice

1/2 c. sugar

1/4 c. all-purpose flour

1/4 tsp. cinnamon

2 TBSP butter or margarine

Heat oven to 425. Prepare pastry. Mix peaches and lemon juice. Stir together sugar, flour and cinnamon; mix with peaches. Turn into pastry-lined pan; dot with butter. Cover with top crust which has slits cut in it; seal and flute. Cover edge with 2-3 in strip of aluminum foil to prevent excess browning; remove foil last 15 minutes of baking. Bake for 35-45 minutes or until crust is brown and juice begins to bubble through slits in crust.

I sprinkled the crust with cinnamon and sugar on the top for a little extra sparkle. Not one piece of this pie was wasted.

A New Look

I loved the clean, boring look I used to have, but when I saw this template, I couldn't help myself. (Doesn't that lime look perfect with it??) There is one tiny problem. All the font colors remained the same-black. Black on black doesn't work when you're trying to read. :) As a solution, I've edited all of this pages post (and all future ones) in white. If you happen to scan the back pages and are interested in a post, leave a comment on the newest one and I'll go change it to white as well. Otherwise, it'll be like reading invisible ink..He he he.

A Twist on Lime

I had this absolutely refreshing drink for the first time about 4 years ago. I don't remember who made it first (probably one of the super cute girls in my old FHE group), but I loooove it. Very easy and with a surprise ingredient-cucumbers-it turns into a perfect summer picnic beverage.

Ingredients
2 small cans or 1 large can frozen limeade concentrate
Cucumbers, peeled and sliced thinly
2 liters lemon-lime soda (or ginger ale)

Directions
Thaw limeade. Marinate cucumbers in limeade for a few hours. Add to the punch bowl with the soda. Add ice to chill.

What to do with Leftover Spaghetti

That was my quandary the other night. It's not like I had just one portion left, I had a whole meals worth of noodles. So, like any other good dilemma, I posted the question of what to do with the stuff on a forum. After 2 pages of responses, I picked a recipe to try. (Shocking that people would have idea. My idea was to just throw it away and count my losses.) We ended up trying a variation of chicken spaghetti. 2 out of 3 kids loved it and Jeff was blown away by its deliciousness. I was pleasantly surprised. Warning-the color is not aesthetically pleasing while making the sauce-don't let it fool you about it's taste.

CHICKEN SPAGHETTI
4 Large chicken breasts or one full chicken
16 ounces of spaghetti1 stick butter
1 medium onion
1 can cream mushroom soup
1 (16 ounce) can stewed tomatoes OR Rotel tomatoes
1 tablespoon garlic salt
1 tablespoon chili powder
Velveeta cheese

To make:
1. Boil chicken breasts or chicken. Save the broth. Cool and cut chicken into bite size pieces.
2. Boil spaghetti in the chicken broth.
3. Spray 9x13 pan with no-stick cooking spray. Pour spaghetti and chicken into pan.
4. Sauté the chopped onion in butter. Add cream of mushroom soup, stewed tomatoes, garlic salt, and chili powder. Pour over spaghetti and chicken.
5. Top with Velveeta cheese and melt in oven.

Vitamins and Supplements

Gee...It's been awhile, huh? Sorry about that!

I was looking through an article my friend sent me about what to do when you start feeling the blues and/or overwhelmed. One of the suggestions the article made as to the cause was a deficiency in either magnesium or B vitamins. That got me excited. Someone was telling me exactly what the mineral or vitamin was for! So, then I wondered if I would need to go to a health food store for that or if I could pick it up at Wal-Mart. I went to Nature Made's website (only vitamin brand I could think of). To my happy surprise, they have a fabulous website. You can search by supplement or by what you're trying to treat or need (energy, memory, health, etc.). Thought I'd pass a good thing on. www.naturemade.com

Quiche

In honor of spring, I'm posting a recipe for quiche (or as my kids call it "egg pie"). Serve with some fresh rolls (from the bakery or your freezer is perfect) and a yummy Spinach Strawberry salad (posted 7-18-07) and you'll have a yummy spring meal. By the way, it uses milk instead of cream.

Quiche
1 Pie crust

1/2 c. (or to taste) onion, chopped
1/2 c. butter
3 garlic cloves
1/2 green pepper, chopped

Saute veggies together (5-7 minutes)

1 tomato, chopped
handful shredded cheese
chopped ham (optional)
salt and pepper

Mix in with sauteed veggies and spoon into crust.

Mix 4 eggs
1 c. milk
salt and pepper to taste

Spoon egg mixture over veggie mix. Bake at 375 for 15 minutes. Sprinkle with another handful of cheese on top. bake for another 35-40 minutes. Enjoy!

Lucious Loaves

The other day my friend and I were chatting while waiting for our kindergartners to get out of school and she mentioned that she had some banana bread in the oven at home. Mmm....That sounded so good. As luck would have it, I happened to have 3 beautifully black bananas just begging to be made into bread. Yesterday I was still digging out of my organizing project, but today (in a freshly organized and clean kitchen I might add) I found I had plenty of time to make it. While it was baking, I picked up Twilight (again), but the heavenly aromas coming from my oven were somewhat distracting. Neither Lyndsi or I can wait till those beautiful loaves cool so we can try it!

Banana Bread

1/2 c. shortening
1 c. sugar
3 mashed bananas
2 eggs
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
2 c. flour
1/2 c. nuts (optional)



Mix shortening and sugar together. Add bananas and eggs and mix. Add remaining ingredients. Bake at 350 for 35-45 minutes. Makes 2-3 loaves.