Beef Vegetable Soup

"Mom, when I go to class tomorrow, I'd like to take a pot of Beef Vegetable Soup."

That, I can gladly oblige.

There's nothing like a hot, savory soup to warm the bones on a winter day. When my daughter requested this recipe to share at her homeschool co-op, I could practically taste it.

This one is a slo-o-o-w recipe because it's cooked in a crock pot. Normally, I don't care a whole lot for crock-pot cooking because it tends to be bland, turns things mushy, and most recipes rely on highly-processed foods like Velveeta and canned soups. But this recipe doesn't. As a matter of fact, this recipe is very flexible. I make it differently almost every time I throw it together. But I'll share with you the general idea of Beef Vegetable Soup. Do with it what you like.

*..SoSSoo--.O.--ooSSoS..*..SoSSoo--.O.--ooSSoS..*

Beef Vegetable Soup


Brown two pounds of meat. This can be stew beef, ground beef, ground turkey, venison...whatever.

Into your crockpot, place:

A medium-sized bag of mixed veggies, or you can throw in a small bag of peas, 1/2 cup or more of sliced carrots, and a small bag of corn. Whatever veggies you like will work.

Add to this:

Four or five medium-sized potatoes, cubed
Two medium onions, chopped
A large jar of spagetti sauce (I used leftover pizza sauce)
A couple of teaspoons each of your favorite herbs, like thyme, oregano and basil.
A bay leaf or two, if you have them.
Salt and pepper to taste
A few dashes of hot pepper sauce, if you like

When the meat has been browned, add it to the mix.
Add water or broth to cover (beef broth is especially good).

Now, here comes the slo-o-o-w part. Cook it in the crock pot for about eight hours on low or six hours on high.

*..SoSSoo--.O.--ooSSoS..*..SoSSoo--.O.--ooSSoS..*

My family devours this with cheddar on top, with a handful of crackers or just like it is.

After all, soup is Good Food!

Heavy Pizza Sauce

This pizza sauce comes from Diane Morgan's book Pizza. She calls it a robust sauce that won't make the crust soggy. This recipe makes 3 1/2 cups of sauce--enough for several pizzas or a couple of pizzas, with extra to freeze.

2 12 ounce cans of tomato paste
3/4 cup water
1 1/2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons sugar
1 1/2 tablespoons table salt or 2 1/2 tablespoons kosher salt
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon dried oregano
1 teaspoon dried basil
1 clove garlic, minced
4 chopped basil leaves or three additional teaspoons dried basil

In a large bowl, combine the paste, water and olive oil.

Add the rest of the ingredients and whisk well.

Can be stored in the fridge for five days or in the freezer for two months.

A Perfect Pizza Party and Pizza Sauce? Forget the Jar!

Yesterday afternoon, the Time to Cook kitchen was all aflutter. Crusts were mixing and rising. Food processors were chopping. Pots were bubbling on the stove. All of the Time to Cook family was at work in some way preparing for a pizza extravaganza; in just a few hours, we would be welcoming nineteen children and six adults to make pizzas from scratch. Fifteen-year-old Z was my right-hand-man, crumbling the feta, slicing the garlic, making his first-ever batches of pizza dough and mixing up this no-cook sauce in no-time.

The recipe Z threw together is not only delicious, but it's quick! Taking time to cook doesn't always mean cooking, and it doesn't always mean hours of labor. Sometimes it just means doing more than twisting off the top of a jar of store-bought pizza sauce.

This sauce meets the criterion. It doesn't need cooking, only takes a few minutes to assemble and--BONUS--it goes quite well with this crust.

If you don't make your own paste or have your own home-canned tomatoes, you can substitute by using store-bought.

This recipe comes from Diane Morgan's book Pizza. I very highly recommend it if you're a pizza lover, like I am.

88-^.o.^-::-^.o.^-88-^.o.^-::-^.o.^-88-^.o.^-::-^.o.^-88

New York-Style Pizza Sauce

1 can (14.5 ounces) diced tomatoes in juice OR whole tomatoes put through the food processor briefly
1 can (6 ounces) tomato paste
1 1/2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons chopped basil or 2 teaspoons dried basil
1 1/2 teaspoons dried oregano
1 1/2 teaspoons sugar
One clove of minced garlic
3/4 teaspoon table salt or 1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt.

Mix all of this together, then adjust seasonings to taste. Use immediately or store in the refrigerator up to five days or in the freezer up to two months.

88-^.o.^-::-^.o.^-88-^.o.^-::-^.o.^-88-^.o.^-::-^.o.^-88

This was one of three sauces we made for the evening, including this slow-simmered sauce, and this other heavy, no-cook sauce, in addition to an alfredo for white pizza.

About an hour before the guest were to arrive, we turned on both ovens and I assembled a Deep Dish Onion and Spinach Pizza Pie so there would be something to munch on while the guests' crunchy creations were cooking. I pulled out the pizza screens I'd ordered from A Best Kitchen Supplies (great prices! quick shipping!) and we began laying out the toppings.

What a variety! We had:

Chopped spinach
Sun-dried tomatoes
Feta cheese
Sliced garlic
Mozzarella
Pepperoni
Banana peppers
Sliced roma tomatoes
Chunk roma tomatoes
Grated Parmigiano Reggiano
Sliced red onions
Sliced mushrooms
Olive oil
Basil
Oregano
Crushed Red Pepper

Kids and adults alike had fun taking turns around the big butcher-block island and arranging toppings, coming up with some wonderful creations. Some were tried and true. Some tested the boundaries. A square personal pizza? Why not? Nothing but tomatoes, garlic and olive oil along with a sprinkling of basil and oregano? What the heck? Never eaten Feta on a pizza before? Give it a shot!

The Onion and Spinach Deep Dish was a big hit, even among the young ones and those who claimed an aversion to garlic. I think my personal favorite pizza combination was the alfredo sauce with sliced garlic, feta cheese, chopped spinach, parmigiano reggiano, then drizzled with olive oil. And not just because I made it myself.

Clean-up was a snap, since the mamas of the families dove in to do and dry dishes.

And there were leftovers. I froze the extra dough and sauce. And the leftover pizza?

Breakfast, of course!

Another fascinating food blog:David Lebovitz

When you've mastered your yogurt making, surf on over to David Lebovitz's food blog and check out the recipe for Strawberry Frozen Yogurt. This recipe may even push me over the edge and force me to buy vodka or kirsch, something I've never done.


Photo from David's page.

Fettucine with Carmelized Onions and White Wine Sauce and A New Kitchen Tool

There are times when chaos rules all around me and I just don't care. Today was one of those days.

We'd just returned from morning service at church and I'd decided to experiment with a new pasta and a couple of sauces. The kitchen was still in a state of limited functionality after my previous day's venture into cleaning the spice drawer and reorganizing the pantry and cupboards. Everything hadn't been put back into place yet, but I didn't care. A clean washcloth to make a clear surface on my butcher block, my food processor and a couple of pots and pans were all I needed. Everything else could tumble down around me.

And it practically did.

Kids were tracking snow through the house. Other kids were scattering toys. Other kids were playing board games on the floor of the piano room. There was delightful chaos everywhere, and I was embracing it.

After sixteen-year-old Bard finished the Simple Hot Cocoa, I enlisted her help to make the two sauces I'd be tossing the fresh egg noodles in. She did all of it but chop the onions. The food processor did that.

She even used the best cheese grater in the world to turn a block of Pecorino into a bowl of light, fluffy flakes. If you regularly grate hard cheeses, the Microplane Classic Zester/Grater is the only way to go. It runs about $13.00 at the MegaKitchenType store and is totally worth it. Microplane originally began as a woodworking tool until the wife of a hardware salesman picked up a rasp to zest an orange for a cake after her other zesters just didn't cut it. She was pleasantly surprised by the results and made the Microplane Grater a regular kitchen tool. After trying rotary cheese graters and not being impressed, I'm thrilled to have added the Microplane to my list of favorite kitchen tools. I hope to soon add the Medium Ribbon Grater for soft cheeses, butters, chocolates and apples. It may even give my Cuisinart a run for its money!

Both of the sauces were good, but the one that follows was delicious and proved the favorite of my seven testers. I'm not sure it was quite enough sauce for one pound of fresh egg noodles, and I did have to add some cream during the last stage, but it was still quite tasty. It even stopped the chaos long enough for the masses to be fed.

It takes a good bit of time to make fresh egg pasta, so be sure to set aside an hour for a pound and another twenty minutes or more for the sauce, depending on how quickly your onions brown.

For a bit of variation, try browning a 1/2 pound of bacon, removing the bacon and leaving 1/4 cup of grease, omitting the olive oil and browning the onions in the bacon grease instead. Continue with the recipe from there.

For best results, serve the pasta in warmed bowls. It loses heat fairly quickly.

Enjoy!

xXx--=..oOo*oOo..=--xXx--=..oOo*oOo..=--xXx--=..oOo*oOo..=--xXx

After making your egg pasta into one pound of fettucine, bring four quarts of water to a boil.

Grate 1/2 cup of Pecorino Romano very fine, maybe a bit more if you like to sprinkle the cheese on top of your pasta. Maybe even more, because you must sample it after you've grated it. It's just too light and fluffy to resist. Don't use pre-grated. It doesn't melt as nicely. It's better to just invest in a good grater and buy fresh wedges of cheese. Often, the pregrated cheeses are of lower quality and have anti-caking agents and other preservatives added to them. If you can't find the Pecorino Romano, you can substitute a good-quality parmesan, like Parmigiano Reggiano but you still need to fresh-grate it.

While the water is boiling and the egg pasta is resting, chop four onions very fine.

Heat 1/4 cup of extra-virgin olive oil in a saucepan that will be big enough to accomodate the noodles and the sauce. Saute the onions in the oil (or use the bacon variation suggested above) until well browned but not black.

When the onions are just about done, add two cloves of minced garlic and saute until onions are finished and garlic is lightly sauted.

Turn the heat up to medium and add 1/2 cup of white wine. Bring this to a simmer and make sure all of the onion bits are scraped off the bottom of the pan. Simmer it for about three minutes.

Add 1/4 cup of heavy cream to the pan and heat just until warm. Taste it and add salt to taste.

When your water comes to a boil, add one tablespoon of salt, then add your egg noodles. Cook them just until al dente, then quickly drain them and add them to the sauce, along with the 1/2 cup grated cheese.

Serve it warm with some more cheese on the side. A nice dish of steamed broccoli would go really well with this.

It will be worth the chaos, I assure you. Dishes, after all, can wait until tomorrow.

The First Snow and Steaming Cocoa

Last Christmas morning, my darling little ones gasped when they first caught a glimpse of the pile of loot. Sleds! Because they're so huge--and so Christmassey in and of themselves--we didn't bother to wrap them. I just leaned them picturesquely against the tree and let them take center stage, giving the first impression on the most magical morning of the year.

You know what happens when I give my kids sleds for Christmas?

It doesn't snow.

And so it was, the winter of 2005/2006 held no snow for my sweeties to try out their treasures. Every week, I would say, "It's still winter. There's still time. It'll snow. Just wait and see!"

They waited through January, and February, and March, and even April.

But they never did see.

This year, we feared the same fate would befall the sleds as did last year. Would they be destined to hang around in the barn loft, amidst the old farm sink and schoolhouse lights, both of which are waiting for our next building project? It seemed to be so. We passed through November, December and the better part of January with little more than a few fickle flurries, but nary an accumulation. The little noodles had all but lost hope.

And then, this morning as we sat through our church service, the Creator was crafting a world of white. After I'd done my morning gabbing post-service, I stepped toward the front door to find Sweetheart, my seven-year-old, lying flat out in the yard of the church, her arms sweeping wildly, here hair soaked with snow, flakes drifting onto her rosy little cheeks. She was absolutely delighted.

My eldest son brought a friend home from church, and the neighbor boy made his way over the hill. Soon, they were all digging through the piles of gloves, then dragging the long-neglected snow equipment out of the barn. There were snowbikes and snowboards and sleds, oh my, and the bundled boys made short work of turning these Amish hillsides into their own personal snow resort. Even The Baby, age three, bundled up in her brand-new (read: thrifted) hat, gloves and buttonhole scarf, and her hand-me-down snow coat--the same one that had fit her older sister four years ago, and her older brother four years before that. I took in every moment as I watched through the window, the sill decorated with a fluffy dusting of snow that looked so much like the soft pile of Pecorino Romano my eldest daughter Bard had freshly grated for today's lunch.

While I began preparing a Sunday afternoon pasta feast (more on that later), I called Bard into the kitchen to whip up a pot of scratch-made hot chocolate. She was almost caught in the act by her siblings twice, who came in to change their soaking-wet gloves or take a potty break. But she made a quick recovery.

"Are you making hot chocolate?" Asked the inquiring sibling.
"No," answered the misleading older sister.
"What is it?" The sibling persisted.
"Melon soup," she lied.

Disappointedly, they trudged back out into the crisp air.

Hot chocolate is so much better if it's a surprise.

Normally, we top off our cocoa with a dallop of homemade whipped cream, but the heavy cream was reserved for today's pasta meal, so the cocoa had to go naked. For you, however, I'll provide the recipe. You'll have to make it yourself, though.

*^..^*..*^..^..*^..^*..*^..^..*^..^*..*^..^..*

Simple Hot Chocolate

1/2 cup sugar or honey (more or less to taste)
1/4 cup cocoa powder
dash salt
1/3 cup water

Mix all of this together in a saucepan, bring it to a boil, then stir and boil for two minutes.

Add:

4 cups milk (I use raw, whole milk, of course :-) )
3/4 teapoon vanilla, or, if you want minty-flavored cocoa, some mint oil

Heat it, but don't boil it. Ladle into mugs and dallop with whipped cream. Serves two big mugs or four small mugs. Double it for best results.

You can make the sauce part ahead of time, put it in a jar and keep it for when-you-need-it use. Just pour a bit of your syrup into a saucepot and add milk to your likeness, heat it up and serve.

*^..^*..*^..^..*^..^*..*^..^..*^..^*..*^..^..*

Once inside, the children and their visitors were pleased to find not cold melon soup, but steaming mugs of rich, real hot cocoa. The didn't even mind that it was naked.

Ah, yes. Sustenance for more outdoor adventures in the long-awaited snow.

Real Whipped Cream

Use this whipped cream to top the delicious Simple Hot Cocoa or your favorite hot beverage. Mixing with the whisk attachment of a stand mixer makes the task go much quicker than whisking by hand, but either way, you'll want stiff peaks of cream.

1 cup whipping cream
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
3 tablespoons powdered sugar

Beat with a whisk until fluffy and firm.