Quiche, Easy Layered Chicken Bake, and Candy Cookies

I got a little busy on Saturday and am unplugged on Sundays so, this morning, you are getting my critique of the recipes I made this weekend.

First is the quiche.  This recipe comes out of my recipe box, and I have no idea from whence it came, but here it is for you:

Quiche For Lunch 

(no idea why it was called that...)

6 strips bacon, cooked and crumbled

1 9" pie shell, unbaked

1 c. grated Swiss

3 eggs

2 1/2 c. half-n-half

1/4 t. nutmeg

salt & pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 350.  Place crumbled bacon in bottom of pie shell.  Sprinkle with cheese.  

Mix remaining ingredients; pour into pie shell.  Bake at 350 for 45 minutes or till set.  

Yield: 4-6 servings

I would like to begin by saying that since my grandmother taught me how to make pie crust and I have, finally, mastered not overworking it, I have never been satisfied with buying a pie crust.  They never taste like I have grown up thinking pie crust should taste, and there is never any left over to bake up with cinnamon-sugar to just eat.  So, I did not buy a pie shell.

what was left of the leftover pie crust
I almost forgot to take a picture!

Also, I used turkey bacon, which comes out a little wetter in the finished product than regular bacon, but we've been eating it for so long that we prefer it for the purposes of just eating.  Also, I do not cook the bacon and then crumble it.  I dice it up first, then cook it.  I could be mistaken, but it seems to me that more of the fat gets rendered out that way, AND, I don't have to wait around for the bacon to cool in order to crumble it.

That being said, I have to tell you that this was another one of the recipes The Bug picked not knowing what he was picking.  He also doesn't know what quiche is anyway, so it doesn't matter.  But what I can tell you is that NOBODY, but me, wanted to eat quiche.  All I heard ALL WEEK was grumbling about the quiche.  Turned up noses, groans and moans, were abounding anytime I mentioned it.  Personally, I like quiche.  So, the fact that the 3 remaining people in my house were sneering at the idea of it made this week all the more enjoyable for me.  Why?  Well, the rule for this project (and for anything else I make) is:  You don't have to like it, but you do have to give it a fair chance.  So, I was masochistically overjoyed that it was quiche week. If you are old enough to remember Snidely Whiplash from the Dudley Do-right skits on The Rocky and Bullwinkle show, think of his sneering laugh, and you will have some sort of idea what I was feeling like this week.

Well, I got the last laugh this week!  Everyone liked the quiche.  I actually made it Friday, and we had a friend from church stop over for a quick visit, and even though he has never liked any quiche he's ever eaten, he liked this one!

SCORE ONE FOR ME!  Well, actually, that's score about 8 for me!  Woohoo.

A quick note about the recipe:  the 45 minute cooking time was more like a guideline for the way I made the recipe.  Because of the turkey bacon, and due to the fact that I added more than a cup of grated Swiss, my quiche ended up having to bake about an hour before we could slice it.  But...it was good nonetheless.  Also, my husband and daughter ate the remaining quiche the next day for breakfast, and it heated up well too.  I placed the individual slices about a 1/2-inch apart on a baking sheet, placed them in the oven, turned it on to 400, and by the time the oven had reached temperature, the quiche was hot.

The Quiche after we dished out our first helping
You can see the liquid in the pan from the turkey bacon

 The next recipe was also in my recipe box because I clipped it out of the Kraft Food & Family magazine.  It is called:  "Easy Layered Chicken Bake" and you can find it by clicking here.  I made the Tex-Mex version yesterday.

I did not care for it at all.  Neither did the kids.  However, my husband and father liked it!  In all fairness, however, I must declare that no one in my family was feeling very well yesterday.  My taste-buds were so "off" that not even a bowl of Honey Nut Cheerios tasted right.  BUT this dish smelled amazing while I was putting it together!  The smell of chopped, fresh green onions mingled with the smell of the Stove-Top stuffing, and I have decided that the next time I make stuffing to just eat, I am going to add green onions!

Also, my recipe came out wetter than I like.  I did my best to drain the tomatoes and the corn, but there was still a lot of juice in the pan when I dipped into the casserole.  I was not impressed.  But, then, I think that I was just determined not to taste anything properly yesterday because of the way I felt.


Lastly, I made The Bug's request - Candy Cookies - from a recipe out of "Just Desserts: and other treats for kids to make" by Marilyn Linton.  Here is the recipe:

Candy Cookies

1. softened unsalted butter

1. loosely packed brown sugar

1/2 c. granulated sugar

2 eggs

1 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

2 1/2 c. all-purpose flour

1 tsp. baking soda

pinch of salt

1 c. candy-covered chocolate pieces, such as Smarties or M&M's

Heat oven to 375.  

Put butter in large bowl and beat it with a beater for about 30 seconds.  

Pour in the brown sugar and white sugar and beat till fluffy.  

Add eggs and vanilla and beat well.  

Mix the flour, baking soda, and salt in a separate bowl, then pour them into the large bowl.  

Beat until well mixed.  

Stir in the candies and drop teaspoons of dough about 2 inches apart onto ungreased cookie sheets.  

Flatten the cookies slightly with your hand.  

Bake for 8-10 minutes or until the cookies are lightly browned.  

Yield: approximate 36 cookies.

I didn't change anything in the recipe, except for the cookie size (I always make mine bigger than the recipes call for) which increased the cooking time a bit.  However, since I notoriously get busy and forget about the cookies, I just waited in the kitchen, checking on them periodically.  So, I don't really know how long mine were in the oven, but I didn't burn them!!  Also, my kids had a bowl of cookie dough about the size of one of these cookies.  This means that my yield was "somewhat less than" 36 cookies. The recipe was good enough, but I think, next time The Bug asks for these cookies, I'll just use the Toll House cookie base, and then add the candy pieces; I have it memorized, and I like that cookie dough flavor better.  Also, I make it using 1/2 the butter and only 2 cups of flour, and the recipe calls for 1/2 the brown sugar and an actual full teaspoon of salt, which makes a difference in the way the dough tastes.

Lent, Giving up Coffee, and Creating Monsters

Lent is upon us, and it has been nearly a week since we have begun our annual fasting.  Not being Catholics, nor being raised that way, we do not do Lent the way true Catholics do.  We find something that would be tantamount to a sacrifice to give up, something that usually makes everyone cringe at the thought.  This year has been no exception.

But, as the title might lead you to believe, what I chose to fast is not coffee.  I did, once.  And it didn't really seem like such a big deal.  I had been thinking that it might be time for me to say farewell to my morning coffees; I have never drunk it because I needed the caffeine anyway.  I don't like the idea of doing something "just because;" the only thing worse is having an addiction.  I'm old enough (or secure enough with myself) now that I don't want anything in my life that hasn't been examined and tested, no exceptions.  Not even my morning coffee.

I would like to say that I came to this decision by way of divine revelation, or because I decided to conduct some scientifically sound experiment.  That might make this sound so much more important.  Rather, I just kind of fell into the decision.  A couple mornings in a row, while reading and working on this blog, I was in the mood for tea.  So, I had a few cups.  Never missed my coffee.  Like I said before, I never drank it because I "had to have it" anyway.  However, after those mornings, I decided that I would make some coffee.  It just sounded good.

Both times (with the tea and with the coffee) I had my cups before I ate anything.

With the tea, my stomach never got upset, I never got grumpy, and when I did get hungry, I just felt hungry.  I never felt groggy, sleepy, grouchy, or like my blood sugar had dipped so much that I wanted to bite off my children's heads.  When I had the coffee, the exact opposite thing had happened.

Now, don't get me wrong.  I had drunk a cup of coffee the night before at a church function, and nothing happened.  It was late in the evening.  I never had an upset stomach, never got grouchy, anything.  But, first thing in the morning, me and coffee - not a good thing.  So, from now on, for me, it's going to be tea for my morning drink.

As for creating monsters:

When I decided to start this project, I went through all my recipes, organizing them into actual meals, and then I divided up all those meals among the remaining months of the year, and made out a checklist for each month.  From those lists, I have let my family pick what we would eat each week.  This week, it was The Bug's turn.  He picked out his meals, not knowing what he was picking because the list was written in cursive and he still has a bit of a hard time deciphering it (which is a euphemism for - he didn't really feel like trying to figure out what the words said).  I was about to give him a hard time for this when he approached me with a cookbook of his own.

"Look Mom," he said, "since you've been working on this project and cooking and stuff, I thought you might like to try to make one of the recipes out of this book.  I found it at the library, and thought we could make some of the stuff together."

The book - a cookbook he found in the kids' section of the library - is called "Just Desserts: and other treats for kids to make" by Marilyn Linton.  The recipe he and I will be making together:  Candy Cookies.

Along with the Candy Cookies, I will also be making BBQ Mini Meatloaves and Mashed Potatoes Ole,  Tex Mex Chicken Bake, and Quiche for Lunch (don't know why that's the title).  This last one, I can tell you, is not being thought of favorably!  So, instead of a full recipe, I have decided that I will make a smaller version, and will spare everyone the torture.  LOL!!  Or maybe I won't because I like quiche.  We'll see!