Zucchini dinner

My cherry tomatoes are going crazy and my zucchini decided to finally start acting like a zucchini so I have large amounts of both. Luckily our whole family will snack on tomatoes like they are popcorn so they won't last long but the zucchini is another story.

So for dinner today I made veggie galettes and stuffed zucchini. The zucchini is stuffed with tomatoes, zucchini, caramelized onions, garlic, egg, and mushrooms then topped with parmesan. I cooked them at 400 for about 30 minutes in a 9x13 pan with a bit of water in the bottom.

I loosely based my galettes on this recipe. To make the galettes first make a pie shell but cut the butter in a little more finely than usual. Pretty much any pie dough will work and you roll it fairly thick then transfer it to a cookie sheet. Then assemble your filling and place it on the galette, keeping it a couple inches from the edge. Mine was sauteed onions and mushrooms, basil leaves (also growing like mad), sliced zucchini, and sliced tomatoes. Then just fold up the edges. I also mixed an egg with some milk (a couple tbsp) and poured it into the galette after folding up the edges. Then I liberally sprinkled parmesan on top. The galettes baked at 400 for about 35 min or until they were golden brown. I think that a bit of cheese would have been nice inside the galettes, maybe mozzarella or gruyere. Also I forgot to sauté some garlic with the onions and mushrooms, that would have been good too.

Vegetarian Burritos

As vegetarians we are frequently asked "But what do you eat?" The answer is very simple, everything except meat, or meat byproducts (ie gelatin). We do eat milk products and eggs at this point however. A traveling meat salesman when informed that we were vegetarian inquired whether we "at least" ate "sides". Sides, it turns out, are chicken and fish, since those are animals, no we do not eat "sides" either. When asked for an example meal once I listed burritos among others and recieved the response "So you don't put meat in your burritos?" No, no we do not. This is the latest incarnation of our home made meat free burritos.



Ingredients:
Tortillas - my sister makes her own and they are delicious but I am rarely that motivated so mine are store bought.
Beans - I made my own, recipe below
Rice - made this up as well, recipe below
Cheddar cheese - pepperjack could also be tasty.
Sour cream - "optional" topping
Salsa - I made my own of this as well
Avocado

Beans
Ingredients:
1 can beans (these were pinto but most beans should work pretty well) - drained
1 can chopped chilis or jalapeno if you like spicy
Cumin, coriander, cayenne and chili powder to taste
1 tb oil/butter
Heat all ingredients up in a pan and mash to desire consitency

Salsa (I stole this idea from my sister)
Ingredients:
1 can mexican stewed tomatoes - drain but save the juice and dice
~ 1/4 cup finely diced onions, I used the bottom bits of some green onions but my sister used yellow onions and that was tasty too
cilantro to taste (~1 tsp)
Other spices you like in salsa
~1/4 cup finely chopped bell pepper
chopped spicy pepper if you like spicier

Rice
Ingredients:
1 cup rice
1 cup water
juice from mexican tomatoes (1.5 cups liquid total)
cumin, coriander and chilipowder.
sauteed onions/bellpepper, optional
oil/butter
Put water/juice and rice into a sauce pan, cover and bring to a boil, turn down to low and simmer for 10 min. turn off heat and let sit for 5 min. mix in spices and onions/bell pepper, add oil/butter and sautee until it looks good.

Now you just have to put it all together. I put the beans, then rice then cheese into the burrito (the order is not important). Then I like to turn the oven on to about 350, put the finished burritos in a casserole pan and put them in the oven for 20-30 min to melt the cheese and toast the tortillas a little. This isn't necessary or you can fry the burritos in a pan, also tasty. I also like to put a wet paper towel over my tortillas and microwave them for a min or so to soften them up so they wrap nicer.

This recipe (as with most of my recipes) is in a constant state of change. Any suggestions for improving it are greatly appreciated.

Chocolate brownie cookies

See these cookies, they are delicious and very easy to make. They are based on a recipe from my aunt for fake Oreo cookies. They should have a delicious cream cheese frosting filling but I did not have the appropriate cream cheese and that would have been work anyway. Depending on how long you bake these they are either chewy and brownie like or crunchy like an Oreo, I prefer the former. 

The recipe:

1. 2 boxes of cake mix, any kind, whatever strikes your fancy, these are german chocolate.
   
2. 4 eggs
3. 1 cup oil

Bake at 350 degrees for 8-10 min. That's it. These are the quickest cookies ever.

I picked these fabrics up at JoAnn yesterday, I shouldn't have, but I did. You can't see it very well in the photo but they have an interesting texture to them and are a bit shiny.

I have the last of the three baby quilts quilted and the binding on all three. Now I just need to get the hand sewing done and run them through the wash and they are ready for the show. I am also working on getting a wedding quilt top for friends together in the hopes that I might also get that quilted and done for the show, we shall see. In a recent swap I received a charm square pack that I have decided to make a quilt like so out of. However I have run into some difficulties. First the fabrics I will use for borders to make it a decent lap sized quilt are at my mom's house so I need to quilt the middle portion and later add the borders. Second I got the backing and front pieces all square and trimmed to the same size and discovered a few little holes in the backing fabric which I had just purchased last night. So that quilt is on that back burner until I can figure out what I will do. Maybe some applique on the back to patch the holes? Just buy new fabric?

Apple-Nut Coffee Cake

I am taking a break from thesis work so I thought I would share the recipe for this delicious coffee cake.

The key to the deliciousness of this cake is the sour cream. Creamy deliciousness, you could also substitute 1 cup blueberries for the apples and that is quite tasty too

Ingredients:

1/2 cup shortening (I used butter)

1 cup sugar

1 teaspoon of vanilla

2 eggs

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 cup sour cream

2 cups finally chopped apple (I used one medium granny smith)

Topping:

1/2 cup chopped nuts (pecans)

1/2 brown sugar

1 teaspoon cinnamon

2 tb butter

1 tb flour

Preheat oven to 350 and grease a 9 x 13" pan

Cream butter and sugar, then add vanilla and eggs, 

mix in sour cream, baking soda, baking powder and salt

mix in flour then fold in apples

Spread evenly in the pan

Mix topping ingredients and crumble over coffee cake

Bake 35-40 min.