Faith, Food and Family

My latest cookbook to review is Supermarket Healthy by Melissa D'Arabian. If you watch the Food Network, you may remember her from the Next Food Network Star competition. I loved the feel of the book and the beautiful pictures right away. There are plenty of healthy recipes in this book. You'll find things like Morning Glory Muffins, Baked Eggs in Tomato Sauce, Creamy Cauliflower "Baked Potato" Soup, Poached Chicken Puttanesca, and more! There aren't pictures for every recipe, but many do have pictures. The food looks very yummy! One of my favorite parts of the book is where Melissa gives you a blueprint to customize dishes how you like them. For instance, on page 36-37, there is a blueprint to customize your own frittata. I think this would be a great help from those cooks who want to start learning to come up with their own recipes. It's kind of a stepping stone to take to learn how ingredients work together. I think it was a great idea to add that ...

Do you buy ground beef or have your meat gound up fresh? I love to have ours ground up fresh. It's the only way I buy it. I usually use sirloin tip or london broil, and have used a couple of other cuts before too. I just watch for it to go on sale. Sirloin tip was on sale this time and I decided to make meatloaf again. I wanted something different for this one, so I thought why not stuff it with smoked gouda cheese! This was really good. Hope you enjoy it as much as we did! Smoked Gouda Stuffed Meatloaf 2 tablespoons butter 2 onions, diced 5 cloves of garlic, minced ½ cup of ketchup (I used just a tad less than ½ cup) ¾ cup of breadcrumbs 1 teaspoon of thyme 2 eggs 2 pounds of ground beef 1/3 pound of smoked gouda, cut into sticks (like cheese sticks only smaller) Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. In a sauté pan over medium heat, melt butter and then add the diced onion. Sauté until translucent. Add the minced garlic, allowing it to cook for a minute or two. ...

There is a take and bake place in town that has the most amazing lemon chicken artichoke soup. I decided to try to make a copy of it at home. This soup isn’t exactly like the one at the local shop here, but it’s close. This recipe is so good and highly addictive! I encourage you to try it as soon as you can! Lemon Chicken Artichoke Soup Ingredients: ½ stick of butter 1 tbsp oilive oil 5 cloves of garlic, minced 2 yellow onions, diced 2 12oz jars of quartered artichoke hearts in water (drained, rinsed and diced) 2-3 lemons 2-3 cups of cooked chicken breasts, diced 1 tsp of dried oregano 8 cups of reduced sodium chicken broth 2 cups of half & half Salt and pepper to taste In a 5-6 qt. stockpot over medium heat, melt butter and add the olive oil. Sauté the onions until translucent, add the garlic and then cook for a minute more. Add the artichoke hearts and salt and pepper if desired and cook for 3-5 minutes. Next, add your chicken stock. Allow this to come to ...

I recently received the One Pot cookbook From the Kitchens of Martha Stewart Living. I was especially looking forward to this cookbook, because one pot means less dishes right? That's always a plus! This book had plenty of mouth-watering photos to enjoy and that is something I consider very important when I choose a cookbook. I love seeing what the finished product should look like. You might think by the title, One Pot, it would always mean a stockpot or dutch oven type of pan. However, this book has recipe for all kinds of pots and even roasting pans! The chapters are: Dutch Oven Skillet & Saute Pan Slow Cooker Roasting Pan & Baking Dish Pressure Cooker Stockpot & Saucepan Desserts The recipes look delicious! Some that stood out to me were Carnitas Tacos, Arroz con Pollo, Sausage, Chicken, and White-Bean Gratin, Turkey Skillet Pie, Skillet Macaroni and Cheese (with multiple variations!), and more! There are definitely several tasty things to make in th...