Herbed New Potatoes
Posted on July 20, 2009
If you want quick-n-easy, here you go. These would honestly fit into a “30 minutes to mealtime” category. And 20 of those minutes is the potatoes cooking, so that’s some free time to fry some chicken, make a salad, or whatever else is for dinner. All you do is peel a stripe around the potatoes, throw them in a kettle to cook, then 20 minutes later, toss them with a butter and herb mixture and put them on the table.
This is one of those recipes I clipped a long time ago. Well, I didn’t technically clip it, I scribbled it down. When I have a clipped recipe, sometimes I can tell where they came from, but when I just wrote it, it’s only a guess. Maybe it was out of a magazine in a doctor’s office or somewhere (because, you know, I’d never rip a recipe out of someone else’s magazine!). I’ve seen this potato recipe in my stash of clipped recipes pretty often, but never tried it… maybe because it’s so hard and complicated. Just kidding.
Anyway, this recipe is definitely a keeper. It’s simple enough for a regular weeknight meal, but dressy enough for Sunday company. As I wrote that part about being dressy, I wondered what I thought makes it dressy and I guess it’s because of the peeled stripe around it and the parsley garnish. 
We ate these with sour cream, but I wish I’d have thought of Ranch dressing. I’ll bet that would’ve been really good with them too!
And here’s the recipe:
Herbed new Potatoes
12 small new potatoes
4 tsp. butter
1 1/3 tsp. dried parsley (or 1 1/3 Tbsp. chopped fresh parsley if you prefer)
1 1/3 tsp. chives
Fresh parsley for garnish
Peel 1/2″ strip around center of each potato. Place in cold water in saucepan. Boil potatoes about 20 minutes or till done. Don’t overcook.
Drain and cover. Melt butter and stir in chives and parsley. Pour over potatoes and toss to coat. Spoon potatoes into bowl and garnish with parsley. Serve immediately. Serves 4. Variation: Can also sprinkle with bacon or finely minced greeen onions.
Oh, and about ripping a recipe out of someone’s else’s magazine… *ahem* … Confession: I did one time several years ago at an oil change place while waiting on my car to get done. But only that one time. Seriously. I forget, but I probably didn’t have a pen and paper on me. It was a garlic biscuit recipe of some sort, but not these Red Lobster ones.
Change of subject now: This article hit the news last week. By Melissa Dutton for the Associated Press: http://www.wral.com/lifestyles/story/5579539/ I guess now you’ll know what Lexi’s 7th birthday cake will be. 
Filed Under Easy meals, Side dishes | 6 Comments
No-Drip Popsicles
Posted on July 6, 2009
So… how many moms perked up at the ‘no drip’ part?
I was just going to freeze Koolaid into popsicles, but then I saw this recipe and had to try it. Really, how can there be a no-drip popsicle?!
These are my friend Carrie’s twins, Chloe and Jasmine. Aren’t they just adorable? They are 2 1/2. You oughta hear them talk.
When I started thinking of how to make these popsicles, there was one problem… how to get the white part. The red is cherry, the blue is blueberry; both kinds are in the Koolaid dept and the jello dept. Well, what about white? The lightest thing I saw in the Koolaid was lemonaide, so I got that. And the lightest thing I saw in the jello section was pineapple, so I got that. When I mixed them together, it was yellow. Way too yellow. I still hadn’t put all the water in, so I thought of evaporated milk and replaced some of the water with that. Worked great! And that layer actually tastes good too. That’s always a plus.
No-drip Popsicles …recipe comes from here
1 3oz pkg jello, any flavor
1 pkg kool-aid, (same flavor as jello)
1 cup sugar
2 cups boiling water
2 cups cold water
Popsicle molds (I used 9 oz. plastic cups and popsicle/craft sticks)
Pour boiling water over jello, kool-aid and sugar. Stir till completely dissolved. Pour into molds; freeze. I did this recipe 3 times (once in red, once in white, and once in blue) and it made 16 popsicles. Freeze between each layer. When the middle white layer gets thick enough, put popsicles sticks in. Making these took all day (poured the first layer in around 9 am, and the popsicles were ready to eat by 7:30 pm).
And here is our test crew to see if the popsicles are actually no-drip or not.
They, of course, did drip some, but I was pretty impressed. I’ve seen popsicles make alot bigger messes! I think the jello in there made it thicker… the juice didn’t run too much. They’re easy and quick to make (especially if you make them all the same color instead of layered).
What a great summertime treat! Send your kids outside with some!
Filed Under Holiday cooking, Snacks | 4 Comments
Happy 4th of July!
Posted on July 4, 2009
Hope your day is filled with fun, friends, family, and good food!
On the menu for us tonight is burgers, hot dogs, beans, chips, salad, this dessert, and these popsicles for the kids.
It’s so easy to make food fit the 4th of July, especially if it’s dessert. Make a USA or flag or star shape out of it OR pick out blue and red M&Ms or Skittles to use in it OR sprinkle it with red, white, and blue sprinkles OR change the fruit in the recipe to blueberries and strawberries or raspberries, etc. I’ll post these trifle and popsicle recipes later.
Have a safe and happy holiday!
Filed Under Holiday cooking | 2 Comments
Rice Crispy Bars for July 4
Posted on July 2, 2009
I’m going to an out-of-town birthday party for the day, but before I leave, I just wanted to let you know that I’m making a few things for July 4th posts in red, white, and blue. Here is one and I’ll write more when I get back home this afternoon/evening.
Have a good day!
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Ok, back from the birthday party.
Speaking of the birthday party…
Yeah, Katrina, I did use the USA shape last year. It was with finger jello, pictured here and here, and recipe featured here. This year is rice crispy bars. I’m going to try to use it for something different every year. My options are a bit limited because it is plastic, so I can’t bake anything in it. I may end up asking for ideas one of these years.
To make the rice crispy bars, I greased the mold and lightly pressed the rice crispy mixture in, then turned it out onto a piece of plastic wrap. Then, I took a bag of mini M&Ms and picked out the blue and red and filled the states with them, then put the rice crispy shape back in and pressed it down harder so the M&Ms would stick, then turned it out onto the serving plate.
So, now I have a bunch of little M&Ms left without red and blue. I just might make these Peanut Butter Dream Bars with them. Everytime I think of mini M&Ms, I always think of these bars… kinda like every time you think of 4th of July, you think of fireworks.
I had some rice crispy mixture left over, so I flattened it out, then melted vanilla chips and colored half of it red and half of it blue and drizzled it over the rest of the bars. I forgot to take a picture of that part, but you can see a few of the squares at the bottom of this picture:
I’m going to make something else red, white, and blue tomorrow, so check back!
Filed Under Holiday cooking | 5 Comments
Broccoli Au Gratin
Posted on June 29, 2009
While we were eating this at lunch today and someone said, “I’ll take some more broccoli”, the person passing it said, “It almost seems wrong to call it broccoli”. Getting your vegetables by eating this broccoli dish is kinda like getting a fruit by eating strawberry jam. Besides the broccoli, this has: sour cream, Parmesan cheese, buttered toasted crumbs, and cheese. I don’t think I need to tell you whether or not it was good!!! We’ve got a winner here. A recipe that will be repeated in this household.
Another reason that this recipe will be repeated is because it’s fast. I made it for lunch today. When we got home from church, I hadn’t done anything ahead of time for this. It took a couple minutes to cut up the head of broccoli, then during the 7 min that it was cooking, I toasted the crumbs, measured the sour cream and Parmesan cheese, and grated the Swiss cheese. It took a minute to throw it together in the dish and then several minutes under the broiler. So, from start to finish, about 15-20 minutes total. Not bad. And I could’ve even saved a couple minutes by cutting up the broccoli earlier.
I don’t know where this recipe comes from… it’s an anonymous clipped recipe in my mammoth clipped-because-I-want-to-try-it-sometime recipe collection. Sometimes I wonder if I’ll ever get thro’ them. The reason I wonder that is because I think I keep clipping them faster than I’m trying them! Beside the recipe, it says, “Meal Ideas: Baked ham, oven-roasted potatoes, broccoli au gratin, apricot tart”. Our meal was: Beef roast, herbed new potatoes, broccoli au gratin, crescent rolls, and fresh strawberry pie.
Broccoli Au Gratin
1 large head broccoli (about 1 1/2 pounds)
3/4 cup sour cream
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
3 Tbsp. butter
1/2 cup bread crumbs I always use cracker crumbs when a recipe called for bread crumbs. They’re tastier.
1/2 cup shredded Swiss cheese
Trim broccoli; cut off florets. Peel stalks; cut into 1″ chunks. In a saucepan, bring one inch of water to a boil over high heat. Add broccoli stalks; cover and cook for 2 min. Add florets; cover and cook until crisp-tender, about 5 min. Drain.
Melt butter in small skillet. Add crumbs and stir until coated with butter and toasted.
Combine sour cream and Parmesan. Stir in the broccoli. Pour broccoli mixture into a baking dish.
Sprinkle with bread crumbs and Swiss cheese.
I don’t know if you can tell it, but at this point is when I thought of it that there’s no salt in this recipe, so I sprinkled s&p over it. Oh, and the cheese… I didn’t measure it so I could put more on.
Broil until cheese melts. 4 servings. 4 servings is right… we had 3 adults and 2 kids and we had just a teeny bit left over.
Filed Under Side dishes | 2 Comments
About Me
Hi! Welcome to my kitchen! My name is Kay. I'm from central Ohio. I love cooking and baking. Especially baking. It's thereapeudic for me. I'm not a professional or gourmet cook by any means. I'm a Christian homemaker who happens to take pictures of some of the food I make. I have 2 little 'helpers'... Lexi (7) and Tiffany (3), who are young cooks in training. I don't do anything on the grill... that's where my husband Shannon comes in! He grills quite a bit, especially in the summer. So, sit back and enjoy browsing thro' the recipes. If you try some of them, I'd love to hear feedback on how you liked them! If you want to contact me, my email address is kaylouann@gmail.com
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