Faith, Food and Family

I haven't made meatloaf in forever and thought it would be yummy so I decided to make it. This time to be a bit healthier, I decided to add some veggies to my meatloaf. I really enjoyed the results. I have to warn you here that I am trying to watch our sodium a bit, so if you choose to make this, you can adjust the recipe to add more salt. This is a good way to sneak veggies into kids, you could even puree the veggies if you wanted to before adding them to the meat so they can't be identified. I like to leave them like they are though.

Veggie packed Meatloaf

2 tablespoons of butter
1 cup of finely diced onion
1 rib of celery, finely diced
1 carrot, diced finely
3-4 cloves of garlic, minced
½ of an 8oz can of tomato sauce
1 cup of breadcrumbs
2 eggs, large
2 pounds of ground beef
ketchup


Preheat your over to 350 degrees. In a saute pan over medium heat, melt butter and then add the diced celery, onion and carrot. Saute for 3-5 minutes allowing the veggies to soften. Turn …

I recently received My Perfect Pantry by Geoffrey Zakarian with Amy Stevenson and Margaret Zakarian. You may know him from the Food Network if you watch that channel often. I was really intrigued by the books premise of “150 easy recipes from 50 essential ingredients.”

Zakarian starts off the cookbook with foundation items to have on hand. These are various spices and such to have on hand to help your dishes have more flavor. Then he heads right into the meat of the cookbook, the pantry. He gives recipes for such common items as bbq sauce, rice, ketchup, honey, vinegar and more. There are many beautiful pictures of the food in the cookbook. I have to say, that’s a very important feature to me. I like to see what a recipe looks like before I decided to make it. There are exceptions to that, but they are rare.

There are some yummy sounding recipes in the book like Supercharged Chicken Wings, Huevos Rancheros, Veal and Bean Casserole, and even Chocolate-Dipped Candied Oranges…

My newest cookbook to review came today. It’s called The Kitchn Cookbook by Sara Kate Gillingham and Faith Durand. It’s a very nice sized hardback book. I wasn’t quite sure what to expect in this cookbook, but it looked very interesting. About half of this book is how to set up your kitchen, tools, stocking your pantry, meal planning and some essential skills. It has tons of information in that first half, and even gives you a peek into other people’s kitchens, which is really neat. I really enjoyed taking a peak into other people’s kitchens!

Included in this first section are a few recipes for homemade cleaning supplies, which are always handy since they are more natural than the chemical based cleaners in the store. There is also a daily cleaning plan for a constantly clean kitchen. The authors also cover basic kitchen sanitation.

The section on essential skills is very interesting and would be great for those learning to cook or want to expand a few more skills. This makes …

I have been very excited to get my copy of The Skinnytaste Cookbook by Gina Homolka with Heather K. Jones, R.D. First let me say that the book is pretty good size. There’s a little over 300 pages and it’s hardback. The book is filled with beautiful pictures of many of the recipes. The author starts the book with “The Skinny Basics” which gives some great tips on eating healthy. She talks about making a plan, keeping it simple, portion size, and giving your kitchen a skinny makeover.

Most recipes have a picture along with it. Which I always feel is such a plus in a cookbook. We eat with our eyes and it’s difficult to know if we want to make something if we don’t know what the recipe looks like. So I was very happy that Ms. Homolka included so many.

Some recipes that really stood out to me were Make-Ahead Western Omelet Muffins, Too-Good-to-be-true Baked Potato Soup, “Un”Stuffed Cabbage Soup, Chicken Philly Cheesesteaks, Loaded “Nacho” Potato Skins, Turkey Santa Fe Taco Salad wit…

I don’t know about you but I love Mexican food and many of the spinoffs of it. Things like enchiladas, Mexican rice, and guacamole are some of my favorite things to eat. So you can imagine how excited I was to receive The Homesick Texan’s Family Table by Lisa Fain. This book is full of so many yummy sounding tex-mex recipes!

What kinds of recipes did I find inside? Instructions for tamales as well as recipes are included. I once made tamales with a couple of friends and it was so fun! There are recipes for fajitas and enchiladas. Then there are kicked up classics like Chipotle Chicken and Dumplings and Jalapeno Fried Chicken. Chapter 7 includes hot sauce and salsa recipes as well as several others. There is a nice section on chile peppers that describes different types and how to use them. There are even directions on making your own chili powder and roasting fresh chiles.

If you enjoy these types of food, I highly recommend you checking out this cookbook. I am glad to …

I’m finally getting around to my first recipe from one of the cookbooks I reviewed. I really am sorry it took so long, but life has been pretty hectic lately. My husband and I are both back in school full-time and we have begun homeschooling our oldest. This recipe is from My Irish Table by Cathal Armstrong and David Hagedorn. You can find my review of the cookbook here.



Beef Stew
Serves 6

Ingredients:
1.5 pounds of beef stew meat cut into 1-inch cubes
Kosher Salt and freshly ground pepper
2 tablespoons canola oil
1 yellow onion, diced
4 carrots, peeled and diced
4 celery stalks, diced
8 cloves of garlic, roughly chopped
1 tablespoons all-purpose flour
3 cups of veal demi-glace or store bought beef broth
1 serrano chile, coarsely chopped, with seeds
3 large bay leaves
2 tablespoons chopped fresh thyme leaves
1 tablespoon chopped fresh rosemary leaves


Brown the beef: Pat the beef cubes dry on all sides with paper towels and season well with salt and pepper. In a large slope-sided sa…

How many of you watch Food Network? I'm guessing there are quite a few of you that do! One of my favorite shows to watch is Chopped, so I was excited to get to review The Chopped Cookbook. I do have a recipe planned to make from this book to share with you soon. I am hoping to get caught up on my cookbook review recipes by the end of next week. I have a recipe ready from each book to share with you, just need more time in the day!

One of the neat things about this book is that the recipes all seemed to have easy to find ingredients, so nothing crazy like the show. The book begins with a pantry list of items that are good to have on hand. There is a good variety in the cookbook with chapters on a variety of meals. The chapters that are included in the book are: Pasta Night, Chickens Gone Wild, Eggs after Breakfast, Flash in the Pan (meaty entrees), Completely Fun Ways to Cook Vegetables, All Things Ground: Beyond Beef, Big Salads: Hearty and Fresh, Fishing for Compliments, Gre…

I recently received The B.T.C. Old-Fashioned Grocery Cookbook by Alexe Van Beuren with recipes by Dixie Grimes to review from Blogging for Books. I'm planning on making a recipe from it to share with you a bit later. I still need to make one from the Irish cookbook I reviewed, but it's summer vacation and school starts back soon so I haven't had a chance to do it yet. I will try to asap though. :)

Anyway, back to the review. This is a very nicely bound book with a very neat cover that has a ridged feel to it. Very unique! The B.T.C. Old Fashioned Grocery is a store and cafe in Water Valley, Mississippi, owned by Alexe Van Beuren and her husband. Dixie Grimes is the chef for the cafe part of the store and cooks up many customer favorites. I have to say, that Mrs. Van Beuren made me fall in love with this little town. I literally read every bit that she wrote throughout this book, falling more and more in love with this town and it's people. I even had my husband do a…

I'm very excited to be back at my blog, and begin reviewing books! I recently signed up to be a book reviewer at Blogging for Books and received my first book to review. It is called My Irish Table by Cathal Armstrong and David Hagedorn. Ireland has always interested me so it was a no brainer that I picked this book to review. I hope one day I can visit and explore the beauty of Ireland.

I want to begin with saying that the book itself is very beautiful. It's hardcover with wonderful pictures of just about every recipe in the book. I'm hoping to make a recipe from the book to share with you later this week. So make sure to keep an eye out for that post. There is a very neat introduction that gives Cathal Armstrong's story, and it is very interesting.

You won't find a bunch of processed, canned ingredients in this book. Recipes are from scratch. Armstrong informs you how to even make your own sausage and pork loin bacon. I was also very impressed with his in…