Roasted Carrots

It's embarrassing that it's taken me three months to post a recipe as easy as this.

Roasted Carrots
From America's Test Kitchen

1.5 lbs carrots, peeled, halved crosswise, and cut length wise to make even pieces
2 T melted butter
Salt and pepper

1. Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 425 degrees. In large bowl, combine carrots with butter, 1/2 t salt, and 1/4 t pepper; toss to coat. Transfer to foil lined baking sheet and spread in single layer.
2. Cover baking baking sheet tightly with foil and cook for 15 minutes. Remove foil and continue to cook, stirring twice, until carrots are well browned and tender, 30 to 35 minutes. Transfer to serving platter, season with salt and pepper to taste, and serve.

We love this and make it frequently.  I can't handle too many boiled carrots,  but these are fine. One note though-- don't use baby carrots, they don't taste as good.

Black Bean Soup

This recipe came from a food storage pamphlet the Columbus Ohio Stake put out.

1 1/2 cups dried black beans
vegetable oil
2 cloves minced garlic
1 teaspoon salt and pepper to taste
fresh parsley for garnish
4 cups soaking water
2 medium onions, chopped
1 cup chopped tomatoes
1/2 teaspoon dried crushed thyme
sour cream to garnish, optional

Pick over and clean beans. Rinse then place in bowl with soaking water. Place in refrigerator to soak overnight then drain and discard water. Add enough vegetable oil to large saucepan to saute onion and garlic. Saute over medium heat about 2 minutes then add tomatoes and herbs. Cook about 5 more minutes then add drained beans to saucepan, cover with three cups water and heat to boiling. Reduce heat and simmer, covered about  2 hours. Add more water if necessary to prevent beans from drying out. When beans are tender drain and reserve bean broth. Process beans in blender or food processor until smooth. Add enough of the reserved bean broth to make soup consistency. Return soup to saucepan and heat through. Season as desired with salt and pepper. Ladle soup into bowls and top with sour cream and sprinkle with parsley as desired.

Makes 5 one cup servings.

We all liked this. I don'r think I drained the beans, but instead just blended it all up together. The consistency was perfect. The only thing we would change is to use some chicken bouillon
to give it a little more flavor.

This will be a good recipe for us to have around if times ever get really rough and we have to live off our dry bean supply.

Greek Lamb Pockets

1 lb. ground lamb or beef
1/2 c. barbecue sauce
2 T parsley flakes
1 t. salt
1/2 t. mint flakes
1 med. pepper cut into strips
3 rounds petra bread, halved
1 small onion
plain yogurt or sour cream

Brown meat, add sauce, seasoning, and vegetables. Simmer 5 minutes. Wrap bread in aluminum foil, bake 350 degrees for 10 minutes. Fill with meat mix, serve with yogurt or sour cream.

These were okay, but definitely not Greek in any nature. Big Chubb was very disappointed. Little and Baby Chubbs both did not like it because they saw the green peppers.

I made some flat bread using Mel's recipe. They were awesome! I have yet to come across a bad recipe from her.

Sprouted Wheat

I've never sprouted wheat before, but since this "recipe" is in my collection, I thought I would give it a try. We seem to have no problems digesting normal wheat, so I'm not looking for the supposed health benefits of sprouted wheat.

Sprouted Wheat

Place 3/4 c of clean washed wheat in a quart jar and over wit 3/4 c of warm water. Soak about 12 hours. Drain off the water, saving it to use to make soup, juice, etc. Rinse the wheat, drain, and put the bottle in a cupboard where it is dark and warm. Don't handle or interfere with germinating wheat. Gently sprinkle a little water over the grain two or three times a day. For ventilation, tip the bottle on it's side. Cover top with nylon net, nylon stocking, or gauze, secured with a rubber band. Your sprouts are ready to eat when they have reached 1/4 inch long, which will be in two or three days. Place jar in a window to acquire sunlight for a few hours; this adds chlorophyll. Refrigerate.

This was a fail. Some of the wheat sprouted really fast, but I kept it in the cupboard longer so the rest could sprout. By two and a half days, not all the wheat had sprouted yet, but the first sprouts were over an inch long, and it was starting to mold.

I poked around the internet a little to see what I did wrong. Apparently there are special products dedicated to sprouting wheat and other things. Since we digest normal wheat just fine, I don't plan on investing money on such a product, but I would like to successfully sprout some wheat so I can try sprouted wheat bread.

Chicken Hawaiian

Here is one last chicken recipe from our chicken marathon.

1 large green pepper, cut in strips (I halved them in half after that so they weren't really long)
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 T. salad oil
2 cans cream of chicken coup
1 can (13 oz) pineapple tidbits in juice
2 c. cooked chicken, cubed
2 T. soy sauce
3 c. cooked rice
1/4 c. slivered almonds.

Cook green pepper and garlic in saucepan with oil. Stir in  soup and pineapple juice. Add chicken, pineapple tidbits, and soy sauce. Heat slowly. Serve on Rice. Top with almonds.

I warned Big Chubb that this would be like Hawaiian Haystacks a little. He said he was pleasantly surprised because he doesn't like haystacks. Little and Baby Chubbs liked it a lot, too!

It came together really fast, especially since we had some cooked chicken in the freezer. However, we had to wait extra long for the rice. The burner either wasn't on all the way or the pan wasn't on the burner so the brown rice took extra long to cook. If you do make this I would only use one can of cream of chicken soup. It made lots of sauce, so I would just cut the soup down so there is more pineapple and soy flavor. There were enough leftovers from our dinner of Sunday that we are having this again tonight!

Chicken Casserole

We've been on a chicken roll here, so here is another recipe. I had never had this until Big Chubb. Apparently, his family ate this frequently while growing up. I have quite a few variations of this recipe, too, so here is what we usually do.

I froze this for post surgery, and it cooked up great!

Cooked chicken
A can of cream of chicken soup
Some sour cream
A box of stuffing mix

Mix the chicken, soup and sour cream. Top with made stuffing. Bake in 350 degree oven until it is heated through/bubbly.

Always a dinner winner in our house. Big Chubb likes to pull out some jellied cranberry sauce and have an almost Thanksgiving dinner. In fact this would be good use of leftover turkey, gravy and stuffing.

Other variations include some ham lunch meat and Swiss cheese to make it chicken cordon bleu casserole.

Broccoli Chicken Casserole

I think I have a million variations of this dish in my collections of Mom recipes. Coincidentally, this is also a favorite easy meal that the kids love. It works great as a freezer meal, too, so if I am feeling extra generous when I take meals to people, I take this one along frozen. In fact, we have one waiting in the freezer.

Here is the gist:

Some cooked chicken shredded or cubed
Some broccoli
Some cream of soup (I typically use chicken) or make up your own.

Mix it all together and bake until heated all the way through, usually 350 degree oven.


I like to add in cooked rice (white or brown) to make a complete meal in one dish. I also mix in or sprinkle cheese on top. Just make sure that you taste it because it usually needs lots of salt. When I freeze it, I just let it thaw and then bake. I have never had trouble with this recipe after freezing it.

The best part is that both little Chubbs gobble it right up. It is filling and it hits 4 food groups which makes me happy. Sometimes if I want to make the meal a little heartier, I'll add another cooked vegetable on the side.