BBQ, Butter and Bargains

May 16, 2016May 16, 2016 RefreshHer5 Comments

We’ve been on vacation – maybe you’ve guessed. (A week alone with my preacher husband has me spitting out alliterated blog post titles! Ha!)

While we’re away, we usually stay in a condo with cooking facilities. We enjoy eating out, but after a while, we really prefer to fix our own meals so we can keep cost and calories to a minimum.

One huge blessing on this vacation was the discovery of two gas grills that have been added to the property where we stay! We made a trip to Kroger and purchased some boneless pork chops. Then I surveyed the ingredients I’d brought with me from home and I landed on a great recipe, mocking one we’ve enjoyed at The Chop House. It has an herbed butter that takes the simply grilled chop to another level! Here’s how I did it:

Grilled Pork Chops with Herbed Buttr

4 Boneless pork chops
Salt/Pepper
Cooking Spray

Herbed Butter
1/2 stick softened butter
1/2 tsp Garlic powder
1/2 tsp dried thyme
1/2 tsp dried oregano
1/4 tsp dried rosemary

Combine ingredients for butter in a small bowl. Refrigerate 30 minutes or longer.

Prepare grill by placing foil on grill and spraying with cooking spray. Heat grill. Season chops with salt and pepper. Cook for 3-5 minutes on each side. Check for doneness. Remove from grill Serve with a small ball of herbed butter on top of pork chops.

My Menu:

Grilled Pork Chops with Herbed Butter
Sweet Potato Fries
Asian Chop Salad
Toasted Sour Dough Bread

When I figured up our meal, it cost us right at $6 for BOTH of our dinners! I got the chops on sale, we got about 3 meals out of the bag of salad, and 3 meals from the Ore-Ida Potatoes! The best part was how delicious the chops were! They were every bit as good as what we’ve enjoyed at the restaurant! We cooked all four on one night, but ate two the first evening and the other two the next night! This meal was a scrumptious barbequed dinner, dripping with that herbed butter!

If you’re home, make this dinner and you might feel like you’re on vacation! Here was our view while we ate…

God is so good to us! It was a blessing that we don’t deserve, but that He graciously allowed.

Fire up your grill, and make these chops! Now, alliterate your recent meal and leave it as a comment!

Reminiscing about the salt air,

dessert · Main entree

Something Savory, Something Sweet for Valentine’s Day

February 1, 2016February 1, 2016 RefreshHer1 Comment

Salmon 1

It’s February! If you’re thinking ahead to Valentine’s Day and a special dinner for your sweetie, I have a couple suggestions for you! One is a main dish and side, and the other is a dessert. Both would are special, but not complicated and taste like elegant restaurant food! Dessert comes last in the meal, so we’ll look at the entree first.

Honey-Soy Glazed Salmon is a recipe I found in my Southern Living Magazine and pinned onto my Pinterest board. It’s cooked in about 10 minutes and the prep takes about 5!

Here are the ingredients:

Honey-Soy-Glazed Salmon and Veggies

4 tablespoons honey

1 tablespoon soy sauce

1 tablespoon Dijon mustard

1 teaspoon seasoned rice wine vinegar

1/4 teaspoon dried crushed red pepper

1 pound fresh medium asparagus

8 ounces fresh green beans, trimmed – I used just the asparagus

1 small orange, cut into 1/4- to 1/2-inch slices – (I just added orange peel instead of the oranges)

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 teaspoon kosher salt – I found this way too salty! 1/4tsp. would work!

1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

4 (5- to 6-oz.) fresh salmon fillets

Garnish: toasted sesame seeds

Preparation

Hands-on: 25 Minutes

Total: 25 Minutes

1. Preheat broiler with oven rack 6 inches from heat. Whisk together honey and next 4 ingredients in a small bowl.

2. Snap off and discard tough ends of asparagus. Place asparagus, green beans, and next 4 ingredients in a large bowl, and toss to coat.

3. Place salmon in center of a heavy-duty aluminum foil-lined sheet pan. Brush salmon with about 2 Tbsp. honey mixture. Spread asparagus mixture around salmon.

4. Broil 4 minutes; remove from oven, and brush salmon with about 2 Tbsp. honey mixture. Return to oven, and broil 4 minutes more. Remove from oven, and brush salmon with remaining honey mixture. Return to oven, and broil 2 minutes more. Serve immediately.

salmon 2

You could make this on a busy weeknight and have dinner on the table faster than going out for dinner! This is a healthy meal and absolutely delicious! It won’t make you feel too guilty about eating this dessert. It is from Cooking Light, so that’s another reason you can eat it and enjoy it!

I love, love, love chocolate and raspberries together. When I saw this next recipe in my new cookbook, I couldn’t wait to try it! I made it for our deacons group and it was a hit! These were so yummy that it would have been dangerous to have a whole pan of these lying around. Talk about temptation! There was one left in the pan. =)

Rasp. brownies

Cream Cheese-Raspberry Brownies

Ingredients

FILLING:

1/3 cup sugar

1/3 cup (3 ounces) 1/3-less-fat cream cheese, softened

2 teaspoons all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 large egg white

BROWNIES:

Cooking spray

3/4 cup all-purpose flour

1/4 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/8 teaspoon salt

1 cup sugar

2/3 cup unsweetened cocoa

1/4 cup butter or stick margarine, melted

1 tablespoon water

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 large egg

2 large egg whites

3 tablespoons raspberry preserves

Preparation

Preheat oven to 350°.

To prepare the filling, beat the first 5 ingredients at medium speed of a mixer until well-blended, and set aside.

To prepare the brownies, coat the bottom of an 8-inch baking pan with cooking spray (do not coat the sides of the pan). Lightly spoon 3/4 cup flour into dry measuring cups, and level with a knife. Combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a medium bowl. Combine 1 cup sugar and the next 6 ingredients (1 cup sugar through the 2 egg whites), stirring well with a whisk. Add to the flour mixture, stirring just until moist. Spread two-thirds of batter in bottom of prepared pan. Pour filling over batter, spreading evenly. Carefully drop the remaining batter and preserves by spoonfuls over filling; swirl together using the tip of a knife to marble. Bake at 350° for 40 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in center comes out almost clean. Cool on a wire rack.

These cut much better after being refrigerated, if a clean cut is important to you…and if you can wait that long before ~~tearing into them~~ having a square!

Rasp. brownies 2.jpg

You could win any heart with this meal! Who else is planning a Valentine dinner?

With love from my country kitchen,

Main entree · soup

Spicy Pumpkin Soup – A Different Angle on Pumpkin Spice!

October 12, 2015October 5, 2015 RefreshHer4 Comments

I am not one who has jumped on the “Pumpkin Spice Everything” Bandwagon! I like pumpkin just fine in a few things, but I’m not even crazy about the PS Creamers that most are wild over.

So, when I saw a recipe for Spicy Pumpkin Soup in the recent issue of Southern Living, I was quite skeptical. However, once I looked over the ingredients, I could tell that the pumpkin was not the main flavor in the soup. It has Chicken broth that smooths out the pumpkin flavor. And rather than the spices that make pumpkin pie, the spice added is the heat of a chili pepper and adobo sauce. The little bit of heat makes it perfect! It also has smoked sausage, which I love, and black beans added to it, to round it out. The result? A lovely, creamy, soup that doesn’t shout, Pumpkin spice at you!

Here’s the recipe from Southern Living:

Ingredients

1 cup diced yellow onion

3 tablespoons olive oil, divided

1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt, divided

2 garlic cloves, chopped

1 tablespoon ground cumin

1 (29-oz.) can pumpkin

6 -6 1/2 cups reduced-sodium chicken broth

1 canned chipotle pepper in adobo sauce

1 tablespoon adobo sauce from can

1 medium avocado, peeled and diced

1/2 cup whole buttermilk

2 tablespoons fresh lime juice

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

8 ounces smoked sausage, sliced

1 cup black beans, drained and rinsed

1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika

Preparation

1. Place onions, 2 Tbsp. olive oil, and 1 tsp. salt in a Dutch oven over medium heat; cover and cook 5 to 6 minutes or until translucent. Stir in garlic and cumin; cook 2 minutes. Whisk in pumpkin and 6 cups broth; add chipotle pepper and 1 Tbsp. adobo sauce. Increase heat to medium-high, and simmer, stirring occasionally, 12 minutes.

2. Process soup, in batches, in a food processor or blender 1 minute. Add up to 1/2 cup broth, 2 Tbsp. at a time, to reach desired consistency.

3. Process avocado, next 3 ingredients, and remaining 1/2 tsp. salt in a blender until smooth. Add up to 1/4 cup water, 1 Tbsp. at a time, to reach desired consistency. I personally didn’t think the soup needed the avodaco sauce. It added no extra flavor – just a pretty dollop of color.

4. Cook smoked sausage in remaining 1 Tbsp. olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat, stirring occasionally, 3 minutes. Stir in black beans and paprika, and cook 1 minute. Ladle soup into serving bowls; top with sausage mixture and avocado cream.

I trusted Southern Living’s good reputation, and I’m glad I did! This was a nice supper and also made a delightful leftover for lunch the next day (I halved the recipe). You need to try this – even if you’re like me and don’t LOVE Pumpkin Spice. I would definitely make this again!

Are you a Pumpkin Spice fan? If so, how do you enjoy it?

With love from my country kitchen,