Pumpkin Soup for Hopey ! Or....Pumpkin, it's not just for pie anymore!!

Some of the biggest fans of my cooking have been the friends of my children who have eaten at our house over the years. We have always had extra places at our table for dinners, both routine and holiday.  One of my daughter Colleen's friends, Hope, came all the way from Florida to visit and ate dinner with us some time ago.  Now first I have to say that Hope is a really great woman and I am so jealous since she has my dream job - she is a midwife. Since she visited us, Hope has become one of my Facebook friends and I have to admit I really look forward to reading her updates about the many babies she delivers nearly every day.  Hope has become an honorary Dowd, even stopping in to visit my sister in law and niece when she and her husband took her dream trip to Ireland earlier this fall.

When Hope visited,  I honestly don't remember what I cooked, but Hope sure does. I made a Pumpkin-Chipotle Soup that she has been begging me for the recipe ever since.  I haven't been torturing her , but I made up the recipe, and I wanted to make it again to make sure I didn't give her a recipe for disaster. I actually made it in the interim but each time, I didn't think about writing down the ingredients until I was already halfway through. Well this past weekend when it was rainy and cool, I decided it was a perfect time to make Pumpkin Chipotle Soup and I was determined to capture the recipe so I could give it to Hope to recreate at home.

This is a wonderful soup recipe- a delicious meatless meal that is rich, but not heavy, with a touch of heat from the chipotle.  When we serve it, we top it with crumbled bacon, grated monterey jack cheese and french fried onions.It would also be great with a dollop of light sour cream.  I hope all of you will try it, but Hope, this one is for you and all the little pumpkins you deliver!! I guess it would be great for Autumn, too (maybe on Glee night!)

Pumpkin-Chipotle Soup

1 small onion chopped

2 tbs olive oil 

1 can pumpkin (not pumpkin pie mix)

1 quart chicken stock

1 quart fat free half and half (or real half and half if calories are no issue)

1/2-1 chopped chipotle pepper in adobo sauce(add a little at a time until you get the level of heat you want)

Optional garnishes: crumbled bacon, shredded monterey jack cheese, french fried onions

Saute the onion in the olive oil, until transparent. Add chicken stock. Stir in canned pumpkin with whisk until smooth. Add half and half in a slow stream,whisking into pumpkin mixture. Chop chipotle pepper very fine and add a little at a time, stirring and tasting after each addition to get to the heat you want. Heat through but do not bring to a boil. Ladle into bowls and top with garnishes as desired. Serve with bread and a salad for a delicious fall or winter meal.

Curry Toast - A Penzey's Inspired Meatless Meal

As I have posted recently, I am open to recipes wherever they come from. I particularly love to look in unexpected places for inspiration and recently my inspiration came from a Penzey's Spice catalog. Penzey's is an incredible purveyor of spices, but their catalogs, website and, and magazine, Penzey's One, are all great sources for unique and delicious recipes. So far I haven't made one recipe from them that hasn't been extraordinary, and this one is no exception. As a bonus this dish, Curry Toast, is  a quick and easy dinner for those busy nights you get stuck at the office- Add a salad or  some fruit and you have a balance meal in minutes. It also uses fairly cheap ingredients making it perfect for a family on a budget.

I used the recipe in the Penzey's catalog and made some adjustments based on what I had on hand, and every time I have made it it is a bit different based on the cheeses I use. As easy as a grilled cheese sandwich, but better!

Curry Toast

1 package (6 ) English muffins
5 tbsp butter
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese (Monterey Jack also works well)
1 cup shredded swiss cheese
1/4-1/3 cup mayonnaise (I used light with great results)
1 bunch green onions chopped (including the green parts)
1 tsp sweet or hot curry powder (your choice, but use Penzey's of course)
1-2 garden tomatoes

Split and toast the muffins, then butter and place on cookie sheet. Mix the cheeses, green onions curry powder and mayonnaise gently until well-combined. Slice the tomatoes in uniform slices and dry off with paper towels,placing a tomato slice on each muffin. Cover the tomato slices with the cheese mixture and broil for 4-8 minutes until brown and bubbly. Now try not to eat all 12 yourself!!

A Taste of Spain and Serrano

Visitors to this blog may know that one of my new favorite food resources is La Tienda (thanks Veronica!), an incredible resource for authentic Spanish food that just happens to be about 20 minutes away from me. I have purchased several items from there and have shared some of their recipes, however until about a week ago, my budget had not allowed me to try their pride and joy- their Spanish hams. There are two primary types of Spanish hams- the Serrano, and the Iberico, the Rolls Royce of hams made from the famous acorn- fed black Iberico pigs. So far, Iberico ham has been way out of my prices range (I have to buy gas after all!), but recently, as a member of Club Tienda,I got an email that told me I could get some Serrano ham for the teeny price of $6.95, so with the Olympics looming, I thought this would be a great opportunity to try this ham at a bargain price. Serrano ham is aged for a full year, and has a deeper flavor and firmer texture than it's Italian cousin, prosciutto.

Now if you have children you know that no package is coming to your house in the summer without them calling and begging to open it, and in this case, since the ham was a perishable, I told them to go ahead and put the ham in the fridge. The ham was lovingly packed with two ice packs to keep it cold and the beautiful, paper-thin slices were vacuum packed. It had been a long day when I came home from work and so Spanish night was going to be a one-dish meal of spinach, chickpeas and Serrano ham, inspired by a recipe I saw on the great list of Spanish dishes that La Tienda has on its site.

When I opened the Serrano, I had to have a taste, and I have to say that it was everything that I had read and heard. I threw together a quick dish with garlic, chickpeas and spinach and added shreds of the Serrano and a bit of white wine, for a quick and delicious taste of sunny Spain that is quick, delicious, and healthy! I guess now the question is how can I go back to ham or even prosciutto now that I have had Spanish Serrano? Luckily, I won't have to find out since I have two more packets waiting for me in my fridge. Try it for yourself, it's a taste of Spain without an airline ticket (or the hairy guy next to you who burps throughout the flight!).


Spanish Spinach, Chickpeas, and Ham

2 tbsp olive oil
3 large garlic cloves, minced fine
2 bunches (or 8 ounces, or three large fistfuls, depending on the scale you like best)
1 can of chickpeas drained and rinsed
4 ounces of Serrano ham cut into strips
1/2 cup white wine
Red pepper flakes (optional)
salt and pepper to taste

Heat oil in heavy skillet. Add garlic, being careful not to burn. Add spinach and stir in drained chickpeas and wine. let spinach wilt and add ham and pepper flakes. Salt and pepper to taste. Serve with thinly sliced Manchego cheese on top.

Leave...her...Alone...

I know it is really popular to dis Rachael Ray. Next to George Bush (and Sandra Lee) she probably elicits the most negative response on the blogosphere. But she is popular,with two Food Network shows, books and a magazine, and she is almost everywhere. And while RR is no Julia Child, she has encouraged a whole generation raised on fast food to break out their pots and pans and start cooking for themselves. That in and of itself is something good, in my book.

As a working woman, I often go to her 30-Minute Meals archive to find something to make in a pinch, and yesterday, after catching the end of her show on a spicy barbecue chicken, I looked up her menu to try an make something new and different that would appeal to my husband's latest addiction to Mexican food (it has become so much an issue that my oldest daughter got him a sombrero and pinata as a joke for Christmas!) The menu included some spice-rubbed boneless chicken, pumpkin polenta, and a salsa salad with grilled pineapple. I didn't have everything in her recipes on hand so I made a few substitutions and some additions, but the final products together made a perfect blend of spicy, savory, sweet, and fresh that went over very well at our table. Even my polenta-hating (he often calls it placenta) husband loved the pumpkin polenta even though mine turned out a little bit lumpy.

I was only cooking for my husband and myself since Bridget was working and Molly was not feeling that adventurous, and again I forgot to take pictures before we devoured the whole dinner. Here is my version of RR's BBQ Spiced Chicken, Salsa Salad and Pumpkin-Chipotle Polenta or you can look it up and try hers by the book, but this is a recipe that you can really play with. While it is good with chicken, I also used this same rub on a pork tenderloin, and I am thinking this would also be great on salmon.

Spicy-Rubbed Chicken Thighs

1 tablespoon Montreal Steak seasoning

2 tablespoons smoked chili powder

1 tablespoon coriander

3 tablespoons dark brown sugar

5 boneless skinless chicken thighs

Extra-virgin olive oil

Mix spices and sugar in a zip-loc bag. Add chicken and rub spice mixture into meat. Let sit for 15-20 minutes. Brush grill or stove top griddle with oil and grill chicken for 5-7 minutes on each side depending on thickness. Serve with pumpkin polenta and grilled pineapple salsa.

Grilled Pineapple Salsa

4 yellow heirloom tomatoes, chopped

handfull of fresh cilantro, chopped

1 red bell pepper, seeded and chopped

1 red onion, chopped

1 avocado, chopped

5 pineapple rings (canned, packed in juice) or fresh pineapple spears, grilled

2 limes

2 tbsp olive oil

A handful fresh cilantro leaves, chopped

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Combine all ingredients and juice of two limes, oil with salt and pepper to taste. Toss and chill.

Pumpkin-Chipotle Polenta with Monterey Jack Cheese

2 cups chicken stock

1 cup fat free half-and-half

1 chipotle chili in adobo, finely chopped with 2 teaspoons adobo sauce

3/4 cup quick cooking polenta

1 (15-ounce) can pumpkin puree

2 tablespoons butter

1/2 cup shredded monterey jack cheese

Heat the stock and milk or half-and-half in a sauce pot with chipotle and adobo sauce. Whisk in the polenta and thicken 2-3 minutes, stir in pumpkin to warm through. Stir in butter and season with salt and pepper. Stir in cheese just before serving.

Serve polenta with chicken and salsa.

Though sometimes RR uses a lot of prepared foods, this menu focused on fresh and simple ingredients combined to compliment one another. So, while I am not about to make a YouTube video crying, "Leave... Rachel...alone..." I, for one, will be giving RR a pass for a great idea that resulted in a delicious, simple and quick dinner.

A really inconvenient truth

Someone who has recently come to my blog (our new tenant- Yeah!, and welcome to Hampton Roads!), sent me a link to an article that appeared in the Wall Street Journal regarding convenience foods and the time they really save in the kitchen, which turns out to be... very little. As Tara Parker-Pope reports, convenience foods are not really used by families to prepare meals in less time, but instead provide a way for families to eat more intricate meals, often at the expense of nutrition and healthful eating.

The cooking habits of 32 middle-class Los Angeles families with two working parents were monitored by UCLA researchers, who knew they were part of a study, but they didn't know the use of convenience foods was the focus of the study. Researchers found that meals with little or no convenience foods took between 26 and 93 minutes to prepare, while meals relying on convenience foods took between 25 and 73 minutes to prepare, yielding no significant difference in preparation time.

Convenience foods did save about 10 minutes of preparation time-the time spent cutting, chopping, and stirring ingredients, but did not result in the food getting to the table more quickly (isn't that the point of convenience foods?) The only significant time savings was the time saved grocery shopping, where it took much less time to grab frozen entrees than to shop for the several ingredients to make a from-scratch meal.

This just confirmed my feelings when I began this blog - that way too many busy people thought they didn't have time or energy to cook a great meal for their family, and therefore were not developing, or fostering in their children, healthy attitudes toward food and eating. Now, I would be the last person to say that you should never have convenience foods. I am not above pulling out a Stouffer's lasagna or a canned soup once in awhile, but by relying routinely on convenience foods, you are not only filling up on foods with more sodium , fat and preservatives than you need, you are depriving yourself and your family of the fun that comes from working hands-on with fresh ingredients, herbs, and the tools and techniques that make them into something not only healthy but memorable.

Another interesting finding of this study was that families who prepared their own meals from fresh ingredients made simpler meals than those who relied on so-called convenience foods. You will see from many of my own posts and many of the best cooking sites on the Web that a simple meal can be fast and delicious. What time do you save by buying Hamburger Helper? You can just as easily brown ground beef (or meat substitute) with onions, cook whole grain macaroni, and stir in grated cheese with some milk and by doing so save tons of fat, sodium, and ingredients with names you haven't hard since General Chem class. And guess what? It will take the same time (+ or - 5 minutes) and it will taste better!

The article offer some sites to go or tips on cooking from scratch, and many food bloggers offer advice on stocking a pantry so that you can throw a quick and healthy meal together that is economical, healthy and delicious. You can find similar posts and features on the sites of many of our fellow bloggers, as well. So plan ahead, prep ahead (keep staples like chopped onions in the freezer in a ziploc), and you will be eating healthier and happier (and almost as fast) by playing with food. You won't be sorry.

Mix and match, hot or cold quick pasta dinner

This is more a formula than a recipe, so use this as inspiration and whip up a great meal in less time than it would take you to heat that frozen meal.

1/2 pound cooked pasta, any variety (I like longer noodles for a hot dish, and shorter pasta shapes for cool dishes

3 cups mixed chopped veggies (red and green peppers, chopped up broccoli, sliced mushrooms, zucchini, artichoke hearts, tomatoes, or even leftover veggies are good- saute in a bit of oil while the pasta is cooking if you want a hot pasta dish, just chop if you are serving as a cold pasta salad)

If you are serving Cold: 1/4 cup olive oil and 1/4 cup red or white wine vinegar, fresh herbs (thyme, dill, chives are all good; or if you don't have fresh, use dried Italian seasoning)

If you are serving Hot: 4 ounces neufchatel cheese, 1/4 cup grated cheese (cheddar, parmesan, gouda are all good choices) and 1/4 cup fat free half and half.

Mix sauce ingredients together and toss with pasta. Enjoy with a green salad or melon! That's food that is convenient and delicious!