I love make- ahead dishes and this one fits the bill. It can be assembled the night before (or three hours before baking.) Its base consists of split English muffins which have been buttered and laid in a long 8 inch dish or pan. This recipe serves four, but it can easily be increased. In fact, you can hardly do anything wrong with this dish. I added some ingredients, but here is the recipe as shown with one of its rave reviews.
"My husband used to take this casserole, doubled, to his office for potlucks. It was a favorite to serve at special-occasion breakfasts or even dinner for two. Leftovers taste just as good reheated in the microwave," says Linda Hinkley from Oregon.
Southwest Brunch Casserole:
4 teaspoons of soft butter
2 English muffins, split
1/2 pound pork sausage (I used Bob Evan's zesty)
4 jumbo eggs
1/4 cup sour cream
1/2 cup shredded sharp cheddar cheese
1/4 cup canned chopped green chilies (I used Ro-tel)
Spread butter over cut sides of each muffin half. Place buttered side up in an 8 inch square baking dish coated with cooking spray: set aside.
In a small skillet, cook sausage over medium heat until no longer pink; drain. Spoon sausage over muffin halves. In a small bowl whisk eggs and sour cream; pour oer sausage. Sprinkle with cheese and chilies. Cover and refrigerate for 3 hours or over night.
Remove from the refrigerator 30 minutes before baking. Bake at 350 for 20-25 minutes until the eggs are set. Let stand for 5 minutes before cutting.
I had a former student who grew up to become an HER realtor. She kindly sent me the HER cookbooks each year and the recipes are just fabulous. Today, while I was looking for a recipe for peanut butter pie with streusel for a requester from Cook's Corner I ran into a recipe that I had requested on Cook's Corner many years ago. While I did not find the peanut butter pie recipe, I grabbed the cherry-pecan loaf recipe to try today! Someone told me about this but would not give me the recipe, so now I am about to try it. It uses buttermilk and maraschino cherries. If it is good, I will add the recipe to this entry.
CHERRY-PECAN LOAF: (I MADE IT AND IT IS GOOD!)
This is from he HER holiday cookbook from many, many years ago.
1/2 cup butter
3/4 cup sugar
2 eggs (I use jumbo)
1 tsp. vanilla
2 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1 cup buttermilk
1 cup chopped pecans
1-10 ounce jar maraschino cherries drained and chopped (If I were doing it again, I would use more cherries.)
1 cup powdered sugar, sifted
1/4 tsp. vanilla
milk to drizzling consistency. Drizzle over cooled loaf.
In large mixing bowl cream together butter, sugar, eggs and vanilla until light and fluffy. In medium mixing bowl stir together flour, soda and salt. Alternately add dry ingredients and buttermilk to creamed mixture, beating just until blended after each addition. Fold in nuts and cherries. Pour batter into greased loaf pan and bake at 350 for 55 to 60 minutes depending on your oven. Let stand10 minutes before removing from pan. Cool and drizzle if you like.
It's Wednesday and Cook's Corner is packed with wonderful information and recipes today.
Did you know:
How much alcohol actually remains in baked desserts?
A dessert in which the alcohol is mixed into the batter and baked for 30 minutes ends up with 35 percent of the alcohol.
When alcohol is poured over the batter, then baked, about 45 percent remains.
A cake soaked in alcohol after baking picks up 70 percent.
When alcohol is poured into a frosting, 100 percent remains.
When alcohol is poured into boiling liquid, 85 percent is left.
When alcohol is added to a flambe, 75 percent stays in the dessert.
I'm just saying...Sounds good to me.
Culinary lavender:
The lavender bought for cooking should be labeled "culinary lavender", says Kathleen Gips owner of the Village Herb Shop. If you grow your own, then use varieties hidcote and munstead--but not lavandins, because of the high perfume content.
North Market Spices, 59 Spruce St. sells lavender 614 224 4107
Village Herb Shop, www.village herbshop.com
Since Andy put in 72 tomato plants this year, I have been knee deep in sauce. Here is a hint that I am going to try tomorrow. This way, we can have the freshness from Andy's garden all winter long. Give it a try.
Freezing whole tomatoes with peels: Prepare tomatoes as described above. Cut away the stem scar. Place the tomatoes on cookie sheets and freeze. Tomatoes do not need to be blanched before freezing. Once frozen, transfer the tomatoes from the cookie sheets into freezer bags or other containers. Seal tightly. To use the frozen tomatoes, remove them from the freezer a few at a time or all at once. To peel, just run a frozen tomato under warm water in the kitchen sink. Its skin will slip off easily.
I am a real fan of Barefoot Contessa (Ina Garten) on the food TV Network. Especially now that she has toned down the giggles and is producing more new shows rather than the constant reruns and redos of recipes. Today, for lunch, I made her Szechuan Noodles with Chicken and broccoli although I changed a bit of it because it is long. I used shrimp, too, instead of chicken and I used the Hills peanut sauce in a bottle instead of making hers. She is showing the recipe on Saturday on her regular spot on the food network and you can view the recipe as well on the food network TV show. So I won't go into it now, but I found it to be very tasty. It is a pretty dish, as you can see from the picture and it is special enough for company.
