Family Favorite: Crockpot Vegetable Soup

This is my own recipe, basically learned from my mom, but now tweaked to suit my (and my husband's) taste. Mom always saved all the leftover vegetables in the freezer, until the container was full. I do that, too... but sometimes we don't have enough leftover vegetables to make soup when we want it, so I came up with this combination of canned veggies that also works well. You could always add/subtract any veggies that you like... green beans, etc. The soup has a tomato broth that we love... credit for that goes to mom. There's nothing better than coming home on a cold day and smelling this soup!

Amy's Easy Homemade Vegetable Soup
2 cans diced tomatoes

2 - 20oz cans Veg-All Homestyle (big chunks of potatoes, carrots, etc.)

1 can corn1 lb stew meat, cubed (Optional- I would leave it out, but DH prefers to have meat in the soup. It will cook in the crockpot. You can brown it if you prefer, but it will cook just fine in the broth.)

2 TBSP cilantro

2 TBSP dried onion flakes

2 TBSP Mrs. Dash

OPTIONAL: a small can of tomato sauce, to make a richer broth

Place stew meat in bottom of crockpot, add dried onion and Mrs. Dash. Dump in the canned vegetables and tomato sauce, top with cilantro. Fill the crockpot the rest of the way with water. Cover and cook on low all day (8 hours or more).

Forgive the repeat-- I'm pulling this out of a previous post that contained several recipes in order to link it up with my menu plan for today.

Spaghetti Sauce: FIF Sauce Edition

Well, true to my pattern lately, I'm a day late for the Favorite Ingredient Friday: Sauces Edition. Oh well, I'll share my spaghetti sauce recipe anyway! ;) This is a recipe that has evolved over time in my kitchen, geared to not be too garlic-y for my DH, and also not have too much meat for me. (I actually prefer meatless sauces, but DH has to have meat in his.)

Amy's Crockpot Spaghetti Sauce

1 lbs ground beef, browned and drained
1 large onion, chopped and cooked with the beef
2 small cans sliced mushrooms
2 (14 ounce) cans diced tomatoes (do not drain)
2 (14 ounce) cans tomato sauce
2 tablespoons dried Italian Seasoning

1 tablespoon Garlic Pepper
1 tablespoon sugar

Combine all ingredients in crockpot and simmer on low all day.

This sauce works great with any kind of pasta you have on hand.

Awesome Banana Muffins

Run, don't walk, to make these awesome banana muffins. I made them by the recipe with only two changes: I used 4 medium bananas instead of 3 large, and, I used 1/2 cup chocolate chips in place of the walnuts since nobody here likes walnuts. These baked up nice and moist in exactly twenty minutes. We have unanimously voted these as our family's new favorite muffins- I hope you'll enjoy them, too!

Sparkling Jello

I don't usually share my craft projects here- I post those over on my main blog. But, since I did this one in such a big font, I figured I may as well share it here, too, so I can share the recipe!My kids love Jello made this way. Note: I always use sugar-free Jello. Enjoy!

Broccoli Salad

I made this broccoli salad last week and was reminded again of how something so simple can taste sooo good. To make this even easier, I sometimes use the precooked bacon.

Broccoli Salad

1 head broccoli, chopped

1 cup shredded cheddar cheese (I prefer Kraft crumbles)

8 slices bacon, cooked and crumbled

1 red onion, chopped

Combine all ingredients in a large bowl.

In a small bowl (or large measuring cup) combine the following:

1 cup mayo (I usually use fat-free)

1/2 cup sugar

1 tablespoon red wine vinegar

Toss the salad with the dressing and chill until serving time.

Our Family's Favorite Cornbread

My DH never liked cornbread until I tried this recipe- now he loves it! :) This cornbread is sweet, dense, and moist. We like it as a side to Mexican foods, soups, or creamy casseroles. It easily doubles and keeps well for several days.

CORNBREAD
1 box Jiffy corn muffin mix
1 tsp dried minced onion
1 egg
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese
1 small can creamed corn (8.5oz, or half of a regular sized can)

Combine all, and spread into an 8x8" pan that's been sprayed with cooking spray.
Bake at 350 for 15-20 minutes or until lightly golden brown.

Menu Plan Monday 4/21

NOTES FROM LAST WEEK: The crockpot Pizza Potatoes were a flop... DH called me before I even got home from work to say that nobody would eat them, and I wound up picking up pizza on the way home. :( The crockpot chicken and stuffing was good, but a the stuffing got a little mushy... next time I'll cut back on the liquids a bit.

This week we're having all tried and true recipes that I know my family enjoys.

• MONDAY: our favorite beef enchiladas, stewed tomatoes
• TUESDAY: mozzarella hot sauce chicken, steamed veggies, my red smashed potatoes
• WEDNESDAY: crockpot round steak and gravy, mashed potatoes, green beans
• THURSDAY: our favorite crockpot spaghetti sauce, garlic bread, steamed broccoli
• FRIDAY: sour cream salsa crockpot chicken, rice, stewed tomatoes

Visit Menu Plan Monday to share your menu

and see what others are cooking this week.

Chicken Fingers & Potato Wedges: Frequent Repeat

Forgive the repeat, but I wanted to bring this entry from my old cooking blog to this blog for easy reference on how I make chicken fingers.

October 4, 2006

Do you have some menus in your house that you repeat over and over again? I do. As much as I LOVE to try new recipes, sometimes I just want one of my favorite meals.

One of my favorites is what I made last night: chicken fingers, baked homemade fries, and steamed broccoli. I vary the seasonings slightly, but the basic menu is the same. It's a meal I never get tired of.

Last night, I did everything with ranch. I took chicken breasts, cut them into strips, and marinated them in ranch dressing in a ziplock bag for a few hours. Then I threw in a lot of dried parsley (I use it often and buy it in bulk) and about half a tube of crushed Ritz crackers. I dumped that out into a 9x13" casserole, and topped it with the rest of the tube of crushed crackers.

Then I chopped up 4-5 potatoes, and shook them in a ziplock with olive oil and dry ranch dressing mix. I put them on a foil-lined cookie sheet that was sprayed with non-stick spray... the only problem with these potatoes is that they often stick to the pan!

I popped both pans into the oven on 375 for 45 minutes. After they were done, I steamed some broccoli in the microwave, and dinner was served!

Meatball Subs: crockpot & freezer recipe

This is a great recipe to pop in the crockpot and enjoy later in the day. You can also make the meatballs ahead of time and freeze them, so I thought I'd share it as a part of both Freezer Food Friday AND Slow Cooking Thursday. FFF is new to me, and I haven't done SCT in quite a while... my silly job keeps interfering with this fun stuff! ;)


Meatball Subs

For the meatballs:

• 1 lb lean ground beef



• 1/2 cup dry bread crumbs (I also add a small amount of oatmeal.)



• 1 small onion, diced



• 1 dash Worsterchire sauce



• 1 dash onion powder



• 1 dash salt



• 1 egg



• 1 TBSP grated Parmesean cheese

1 large (approx. 32 oz.) jar of your favorite spaghetti sauce

6-8 sub or hoagie buns

1. Combine all meatball ingredients in a large bowl and mix thoroughly.



2. Shape into walnut-sized balls and place on a cookie sheet.



3. Cook meatballs: either bake at 400 for 20 minutes or so, or, microwave until done-- it takes about 8 minutes in my microwave.



4. (May freeze at this point by placing meatballs on a foil-lined cookie sheet and freezing. After frozen, remove from cookie sheet and place into zip-top bag.)



5. Place meatballs in crockpot and cover with sauce. Cook on low for 4-6 hours.



6. To make subs: place meatballs and sauce on buns, top as desired, and enjoy!



7. Optional: I like to toast the buns with a little butter and garlic salt, and then top the meatballs with sliced mozzarella cheese and broil until melted.

P.S. I'm not sure what the problem is, but the font sizes in this entry keep changing from microscopic to huge on me. I can't find anything in the HTML to explain this. I hope you can read it!

Chicken Hurry

This is the recipe I just used for a recipe swap- the photo on the left is of the 6x6" scrapbook pages I made featuring this recipe. This is an easy supper. I usually serve it with rice and a green veggie.

Chicken Hurry:

1-2 lbs chicken pieces (I usually use around 1lb of tenders.)
1/2 cup ketchup
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup packed brown sugar
1 envelope onion soup mix

Place chicken pieces in a 9x13 casserole dish. Combine remaining ingredients and pour sauce over chicken. Cover tightly with foil and bake for one hour.

Bacon Biscuit Puffs

These always go over well at parties. I served them yesterday at my Stampin' Up party and had several requests for the recipe, so I thought I'd share it here.

BACON BISCUIT PUFFS

*You will need mini muffin pans.

1-2 tubes flaky layers biscuits

2 cups shredded swiss cheese

1/2 cup mayo (I always use fat-free.)

2 TBSP sugar

5 drops hot sauce (I use whatever's on hand- buffalo sauce, red hot sauce, etc.)

8 slices cooked, crumbled bacon (I use precooked bacon crumbles.)

1/4 to 1/2 cup chopped onion (I have used both yellow and green onions, either one works.)

1/2 TBSP garlic powder

Spray mini muffin pans with cooking spray. Peel the biscuit layers apart- I usually get two or three from each biscuit. Place each biscuit piece in a muffin pan and gently press down the center. Combine remaining ingredients to make filling. Place a spoonfull of filling into the center of each biscuit. Bake at 375 for 8-11 minutes, or until biscuits are golden. Serve hot or at room temperature.

Note: I usually have more biscuits and filling than will fit into my two mini muffin pans. We like to save these, and make full-sized biscuit versions the next morning for breakfast. :)

National Soup Month

I just realized that it's National Soup Month. Sounds like a great thing to celebrate to me-- I could eat soup almost every day. The rest of my family isn't quite as fond of it, though, so I mostly have it for lunches and only occasionally make it for everyone for supper.

My personal favorite is potato soup. I've created my own recipe over the years, and it's posted over on RecipeZaar-- here's the link. (I'm Chef AmyMCGS there.) I'll make a big pot of this and have it for my lunches several days in a row- it reheats well.

Another favorite of mine is Broccoli Cheese soup. I've tried several recipes, and liked them, but I haven't found that "perfect" recipe yet.

One of the few soups that my DH really enjoys is one we simply call "Hot Soup". I've blogged about it before-- it's a quick and easy soup that basically involves combining canned ingredients. If you have a little more time and you enjoy spicy soups, try my take on Tortilla Soup:

Amy's I-Don't-Feel-Like-Cooking Version of Tortilla Soup:
1 can cream of mushroom soup
2 cans cream of chicken soup
1 can cheddar cheese soup
1 can diced tomatoes/ chili peppers (Rotel)
1/2 cup salsa (guess-timated amount)
1/2 onion, chopped
several shakes of dried cilantro
two shakes of chili powder
2 teaspoons minced garlic
1 can precooked, chopped turkey

Put that all together in a crockpot and let it simmer on low for a couple of hours. I usually do this around lunchtime and serve it for supper, so it probably cooks around 3-4 hours. Top it with shredded cheddar cheese and crushed tortilla chips.... yum!

And for comfort food, there's always vegetable soup- another one my DH likes.

Amy's Easy Homemade Vegetable Soup
This is my own recipe, basically learned from my mom, but now tweaked to suit my (and my husband's) taste. Mom always saved all the leftover vegetables in the freezer, until the container was full. We never have enough leftover vegetables to make soup when we want it, so I came up with this combination of canned veggies that works well. You could always add/subtract any veggies that you like... green beans, etc. The soup has a tomato broth that we love... credit for that goes to mom. There's nothing better than coming home on a cold day and smelling this soup!

2 cans diced tomatoes
2 - 20oz cans Veg-All Homestyle (big chunks of potatoes, carrots, etc.)
1 can corn
1 lb stew meat, cubed (Optional- I would leave it out, but DH prefers to have meat in the soup. It will cook in the crockpot. You can brown it if you prefer, but it will cook just fine in the broth.)
2 TBSP cilantro
2 TBSP dried onion flakes
2 TBSP Mrs. Dash
OPTIONAL: a small can of tomato sauce, to make a richer broth

Place stew meat in bottom of crockpot, add dried onion and Mrs. Dash. Dump in the canned vegetables and tomato sauce, top with cilantro. Fill the crockpot the rest of the way with water. Cover and cook on low all day (8 hours or more).

So, what are your favorite soup recipes? I'd love it if you'd leave me some links or recipes to try!

P.S. I'm also celebrating National Soup Month with my residents at the nursing home where I work, and I made this wordsearch puzzle in honor of the occasion. It's best viewed by clicking on the "printable PDF" link at the bottom. Enjoy!

The best sugar cookie icing (WFMW)

I have looked this recipe up twice in the last two days, so I thought I'd post it here for safekeeping. This is the best icing-- it dries hard and shiny, which is great for decorated cookies that you're transporting to Christmas parties. Enjoy!

SUGAR COOKIE ICING:
1 cup powdered sugar
2 tablespoons milk (keep adding spoonfuls until it's the right consistancy)
2 teaspoons light corn syrup
1/4 teaspoon almond extract *This is the key to this recipe!
Optional: food coloring

Beat together the powdered sugar and the milk until smooth. Beat in corn syrup and vanilla until icing is smooth and glossy. If icing is too thick to work with, add a touch more corn syrup. Add in food coloring if desired. Use icing to paint cookies, or, my favorite method-- dip the cookie tops into bowls of colored icing. Let dry at room temperature- when dry cookies may be stacked for storage.

P.S. I decided to link this recipe up with the Works for Me Wednesday Christmas Edition, because I think it's a great recipe and very handy this time of year. Visit my main blog, Tiny Blessings, for my other WFMW tip regarding cards (what NOT to do) and having Christmas unwrapping supplies at the ready.

Menu Plan Monday 11/26

I'm in the mood for familiar favorites this week- only one new recipe. The others have all been made many times in my kitchen, and a couple came from my mom originally.

SUNDAY: Copycat Beef Meximelts and Layered Taco Dip
MONDAY: *My Ham-Cheese Salad Spread on sandwiches with corn chowder (The corn chowder is a mix that my parents brought back for us from a trip they took last month- looks yummy!)
TUESDAY: *new recipe* Jolean's Crockpot Spanish Chicken over Noodles and asparagus tips

WEDNESDAY: my tater tot casserole, peas
THURSDAY: *My Mom's Crockpot Pizza, garlic bread, green beans
FRIDAY: *My Mom's BBQ Ribs (crockpot) and corn

*= you can find these recipe links in my sidebar!

Head on over to I'm An Organizing Junkie to share your menu
or see what others are eating this week!

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

These are my favorite fall cookies! I got this recipe off the internet a few years ago, unfortunately I don't remember the original source. I'm making a batch this morning to take to my daughter's preschool program.

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

• 1 (15oz.) can pumpkin
• 2 cups sugar
• 1 cup oil
• 2 eggs
• 4 cups flour
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 tsps cinnamon (I use a little more)
• 4 tsps baking powder
• 2 tsp baking soda dissolved in 2 tsp of milk
• 1 12oz. bag of chocolate chips
  
• Preheat oven to 375. Mix pumpkin, sugar, oil, eggs, vanilla, and milk mixture and set aside. In another bowl, sift together the flour, cinnamon, baking powder, and salt; after sifting combine with pumpkin mixture. Drop by spoonfuls onto baking sheet & bake for 10-15 minutes.
  
  This blog is PINK for Breast Cancer Awareness month!

Sunday dinner: Pork Chops

Parmesan Baked Pork Chops (8pts),

with mashed potatoes (2pts), and steamed broccoli (0pts)

This is one of my favorite meals!

What's cooking at your house tonight?

P.S. This is my photo... you'll also see it posted on RecipeZaar with the chops recipe!

Hot Broccoli Dip

Here's one of my favorites, and it's quick and easy:

HOT BROCCOLI DIP
1 lb of pepper jack cheese, cubed
1 can cream of mushroom soup, undiluted
1 box frozen, chopped broccoli
for serving: 1 bag of Fritos scoops, or hearty crackers

Cook broccoli per directions and drain. Combine cheese, soup, and broccoli in a bowl and microwave until cheese is completely melted, stirring every minute or so. Stir dip well and serve hot (I keep mine in a mini crockpot- it will get very thick if it cools).

Leftovers are great poured over baked potatoes for lunch the next day.

One of my sisters requests that I make this any time I ask her what appetizer I should bring to any family function. :) Enjoy!

Hamburgers, my way

It seems to me that everyone has their own way of making hamburgers at home, and everyone thinks that their way is the best. Here's how I make mine- this recipe has developed over the years, but I'm pretty consistant with it now. They have just a little spice to them, but even our four year-old enjoys them.

Amy's Hamburgers

• 1 to 1 1/2 pounds lean ground beef
• a large handful of rolled oats (added in to stretch the meat and to sneak some more oatmeal into the diet of someone in my house)
• an envelope of onion soup mix
• a 4oz can of diced green chili peppers
• an egg (not always used, depends on how the patties hold together)

Combine all ingredients in a large mixing bowl and form into patties. (I usually get about six to eight patties, or four if I make them huge!) Grill or pan-fry as desired.

I like to top mine with steak sauce and sharp cheddar cheese, and sometimes some sauted onions.

I've published this recipe over on RecipeZaar, and it's gotten good reviews there. If you'd like an easy-to-print version.... not to mention a version with more specific measurements, LOL.... just click here. Yes, I'm Chef AmyMCGS over on 'Zaar. :)