Janice's Chicago Style Soy Dog

This "recipe" is for the Chefery Football Futbol Challenge. The team - The Chicago Bears!

The sandwich can be made with a soy hotdog or a turkey hotdog, a regular hotdog, or better still a nice Polish sausage! The nutrition facts were done for the soy dog as so many at CC Palate will choose one of those to save calories and sodium (I hear they have improved the taste too!).

If you use any other hot dog, be sure to use Calorie Count to find the nutrition facts for your dog of choice!

A Soy Dog Done in the Traditional Drag it Through the Garden Chicago Way

Ingredients:

1 Soy Hotdog
1 poppy seed bun
1 t mustard (approx)
1 T onion, fine chopped
1 T sweet relish
1 dill pickle, sliced lengthwise
1/4 tomato, half the tomato and make some nice half moon slices
2 Sport Peppers
Dash of celery salt

Directions:

assemble and eat!

Janice's English Muffin Bread

This is an excellent recipe. The wonderful flavor and texture of English Muffins, but in a bread you can slice. Easy and fast to make - the recipe makes two loaves so you can enjoy one and give the other to a friend! The nutrition facts, which are based on a fairly nice thick slice, are at Calorie Count!

English Muffin Bread

Ingredients:

1 1/4 C water
1/2 C Canola Oil
4 - 4 1/2 Cups of all purpose flour
1/4 Cup sugar
2 t salt
2 pkgs. active dry yeast
2 eggs
Cornmeal to dust the baking pans

Directions:

Heat water and oil in a small sauce pot until very warm but not hot (about 120 degrees is about right, a little warmer than body temperature).

Add 1 1/2 cups of the flour, sugar, salt, and yeast to a large bowl and stir. Add the eggs and warm water/oil and beat at a low speed until moistened, then beat a couple more minutes at a medium speed. Then add the rest of the flour stirring by hand - this will make a stiff batter.

Cover and let it rise in a warm location until it's light and doubled in size. Should take about an hour.

Use shortening and grease two 8 x 4 inch loaf pans. Sprinkle them with the cornmeal. Stir down the dough by beating vigorously by hand for about 30 seconds and spoon into the prepared pans.

Cover and let rise again until doubled in size. Doesn't take as long for the second rising, about 45 minutes or so.

Preheat the oven to 375 and bake the loaves for 15-20 minutes or until they sound hollow when tapped.

Remove from the pans and cool.

Football Games & Futbol Clubs Challenge #2.5

ok, here's the next challenge!

This is the time of year where many football and Futbol games are being played. Those of us that watch the games like to gather in groups and eat together! It's fun to create a menu to suit the competing team cities.

Your challenge is to pick the city of your favorite team and create a recipe that is would be considered a local specialty - put your own spin on it so that it can be served at a party as either a main dish or as an appetizer.

How to take up the challenge:

List your city and team choice below.

Post your recipe in the comments below!

Goal: to have enough recipes posted so that we can use the Chefery Challenge Page to plan all of our football or Futbol gatherings!

So far I have one person taking up the challenge!

A supporter of the New Orleans Saints football team, Aline will soon submit her Crawfish Etouffe!

I'll be posting a New England Corn Chowder - not because I'm from New England and support the team, but because I LOVE the Chowder!

Submitted recipes and links to the posts will be on the Chefery Challenge Page.

Recipe Challenge! #3

Getty Images

Ok friends, here's the newest Chefery Challenge! -

Take this recipe for baking powder biscuits as your starting point.

Now comes the hard part. Convert the recipe to weights instead of measures. It's not cheating to look about for biscuit recipes that use measurements to get the weights.

Then, use the following ratio as your guide and make flaky biscuits that are healthier for you. In particular, I'd like to see what we can do to remove the partially hydrogenated fat out of the thing, but you are free to improve as you see fit:

for each 9 oz of flour, use 3 oz of fat, and 6 oz of liquid

Your choice as to what each of the three main ingredients will be – your fave flour(s), your fave fat(s), and your fave liquid(s) – all weighed in the proper ratio and baked up with the necessary other ingredients into a proper biscuit. 

Why? Well, weights will give you more consistent baking results than the old timey measuring that we all used to do. And the ratio will get us all thinking outside the biscuit a bit and I bet we get some terrific results!

Post your recipe in the comments below. 

Janice's Applesauce Brownies

These are fantastic, really more of a cakey brownie, so I suppose you could call it applesauce cake if you want. A bit better for you than traditional brownies and kids love them! The nutrition facts are at Calorie Count!

Applesauce Brownies

Ingredients:

1/2 cup butter
1 1/2 cup dark brown sugar, firmly packed
2 large eggs
1 T pure vanilla extract
1 cup applesauce
1 1/4 cup all purpose flour
1/4 cup cocoa
1 t baking powder
1/2 t baking soda

Optional: 1/2 cup chopped pecans

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350 F. Lightly grease and flour an 8x8 inch baking pan.

In a medium sauce pan, melt the butter. Remove from heat and add the sugar, eggs, vanilla, and applesauce. Beat well by hand with a wooden spoon.

In a small bowl, mix the flour cocoa, baking powder, and baking soda.

Stir the dry mix into the liquid mix. If using pecans, add them here and stir.

Pour into the prepped pan and bake for about 25 minutes or so. Stick a knife in the middle to test for doneness. If it comes out clean, it's done. Another method to check is to lightly touch the center. If it sinks or feels liquid, it's not done. If it springs back to the touch, it's done!

Janice's Cornbread

Super delicious and easy to make! The nutrition facts can be found at Calorie Count!

Cornbread

Ingredients:

1 Cup all purpose flour
1 Cup cornmeal
3 T sugar
2 t baking powder
1 t salt
1 egg
1 Cup milk, low fat
1/4 Cup Canola oil

Directions:

By hand, mix all the dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl.

In a small bowl, mix all the liquid ingredients.

Add the liquid to the dry and stir just until the dry particles are moistened.

Pour into a well greased 8 inch square pan and bake at 400 F for about 25 minutes or until golden brown and the center is firm when lightly pressed.

Best served warm, but also great left over!

Grammie Vee's Chili

Grammie says - This actually sounds like more work than it really is - much of it can be started the night before so all you have to do is mix it all together in the morning. I have been making chili like this for over 40 years and everyone that eats it loves it. The recipe makes a lot of chili so make sure to freeze or can it for quick meals later!

The nutrition facts are at Calorie Count!

Grammie Vee's Chili

Ingredients:

2 pounds dry beans (you can use your favorite or a combination of varieties).
1 Quart beef broth or stock
2 32 oz cans diced tomatoes
4 Medium to large yellow onions (what we call cooking onions) diced
1 Garlic head seperated and finely chopped
3 Packages 6 Gun Chili Mix
2-3 Pounds extra lean ground beef or extra lean beef (like round steak) cut in small cubes. I usually just use the ground beef because it is easier.
1-2 T Cumin or to taste
Johnny's Seasoning Salt to taste

Options:

Peppers - hot or sweet chopped up
Olives
Celery
Anything else you think of you like in chili

Directions:

I usually set the beans to soak the night before I plan to start the cooking (i.e. if going to cook the chili on Saturday, I will start the soaking Thursday night then wash and rinse Friday morning and put to cook Friday night).

Open all three packages of the chili mix and throw the package with the directions on it away.

Soak the beans for a day rinsing and washing about every 8-12 hours.

In VERY LARGE crockpot (I have a 7 quart and usually run it over) put in soaked, washed and rinsed beans, the beef broth/stock (add enough water so beans are well covered - you may need to add more water before going to bed as the beans will absorbe a lot of it), 1/2 the garlic, 1 Tablespoon Johnny's Seasoning Salt, 1-2 Tablespoons cumin (I love cumin and usually make a well rounded tablespoon full) and all three red packages from one of the chili mix package. The littlest red package is cayenne and gives the chili just a little bit of a "back taste" but not that bad. For people that can't take even that much heat sour cream and cheese will tone it down. If you do not want any heat at all, just don't use any of the littlest packages. The only cayanne I use is what I put in the beans, I don't use the other two little packages of cayenne. Some of the guys will add to the other two little packages to their personal bowls or other foods; so it doesn't go to waste. Turn on high for 2-3 hours until bedtime. At bedtime turn down to low.

I usually get my meat mixture ready the night before so I can just throw it in before going out the door to work. Brown the beef with a little salt (not too much though as the seasoning packet has salt), add in the balance of the garlic and all four chopped onions and countinue to brown until onions are nice and carmelized. Add in the two larger red packages from the other two chili mix packages (total 4 red packets) and stir to distribute evenly. Then add all three white packets (masa) and stir until evenly distributed.

Assembly - The best thing to do is use a HUGE roaster pan or steel bowl to mix everything up. Pour in the beans, stir in the meat mixture, then empty the two cans of diced tomatoes in and stir until well mixed. Refill the crockpot as much as you can and put the balance into a container with a lid and refrigerate until after your dinner. After you and your family have eaten 1/2 the pot for dinner, you can add the reserved chili cook for an hour or two more then put into a covered container and refrigerate. OR... If you are going to can your chili, you can just go straight from this point into the jars and pressure canner. The chili also freezes quite well.

Janice's Cheese Popovers

Delicious, savory, and quick to make! The nutrition facts are at Calorie Count! I don't have a picture as it has been a long time since I've made these delicious things, but I'll do them soon and post a pic!

Cheese Popovers

Preheat the oven to 425 F

Ingredients:

1 Cup all purpose flour
1/2 t salt
1 Cup milk, low fat
1 T butter, melted
2 eggs
1/4 Cup shredded cheddar cheese

Directions:

In a small mixing bowl combine the flour salt, milk, butter and eggs. Beat until smooth. Stir in the cheese.

Grease one of those small muffin cups (I've got one that does 6) or grease half of the cups in a regular sized muffin pan, and fill to 2/3 full.

Bake at 425 F for 15 minutes, then reduce the heat to 350 F and continue to bake 35 minutes longer - or until they are a pretty brown.

Prick each popover with a knife when there's five minutes of baking left to go - this allows the steam to escape and is what creates the popover texture and look.

Buggy's Scones

If you think in terms of ounces and pounds instead of grams, you can translate those grams into ounces with the Calorie Count Unit Converter Tool. The nutrition facts for these light and beautiful scones can be found at Calorie Count!

Buggy's Scones with her delicious Moose Stew!

Scones

Ingredients:

1025 grams  flour

60 grams baking powder

10 grams salt

200 grams canola oil

625 grams skim milk

5 grams zest of 3 key limes

20 grams juice of limes

50 grams sugar

Directions:

Pre-heat oven to 425 F.

Put dry ingredients in to a large bowl. Mix.

Add the remaining ingredients. Mix just until combined.

Roll out on lightly floured surface. Use a 2 1/2 inch cookie cutter. Place on cookie sheet.

Bake for 10-13 minutes, until light golden.

Janice's Italian Beef Stew

The nutrition facts for this comforting fall and winter stew can be found at Calorie Count!

Italian Beef Stew

Ingredients:

(Makes 8 servings)

3 pounds sirloin, cubed

5  tomatoes, squished

1 medium  onion, chopped

2 c  carrots, cubed

3 medium  red potatoes, cubed

½ c  celery, sliced

2 t  basil

1 t  oregano

½ t  black pepper

1 T  olive oil
1 bay leaf

Directions:

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

Trim all visible fat from the sirloin and cube, place in oven suitable pot with an oven proof lid. You could brown the meat, but I usually don’t.

Squish and add the tomatoes. You can use 1 or two cans of crushed tomatoes if you like, but Italians just squish those tomatoes up by hand! The number is an estimate; you want to have just enough liquid to come up about 2/3 of the way up to the top of the ingredients – the beef will add its own liquid to the mix.

Chop the onion, carrots, potatoes (peeling is optional), and celery and stir into the pot.

Add the spices and stir.

Add the olive oil (this is replacing some of the fat you trimmed off and it’s much better for you than the animal fat) and stir gently. Insert a bay leaf into the center.

Cover and cook in the preheated oven for at least 2 1/2 hours. Stir after 1 1/2 hours. Stir and taste after 2 hours, test to see if the veggies are cooking well, and adjust seasonings if necessary. Remove the bay leaf and serve.