BLT and Avocado Salad with Homemade Buttermilk Dressing

I almost always have buttermilk on hand as I love to use it in pancakes, waffles, biscuits and baked goods. So, when I decided to make a BLT Salad and discovered that I was out of Ranch dressing, I decided it was time to try my hand at homemade Buttermilk dressing. I have to say that it is really good! The cool, creamy and tangy dressing was a perfect topping to complement this wonderful salad! I used Romaine lettuce and some homegrown cherry tomatoes along with some thick, smokey bacon and buttery avocado. This BLT Salad was quite a treat!

BLT and AVOCADO SALAD with HOMEMADE BUTTERMILK DRESSING

Dressing ingredients:

1/2 cup buttermilk (be sure to shake it first)

1/4 cup sour cream, reg. or low fat

1/4 cup real mayonnaise, reg. or low fat

1/4 tsp. dry mustard

1/4 tsp. pepper, or to taste

1/4 tsp. salt, I used Kosher

2 tsp. sugar, optional

1/4 tsp. garlic powder

2 tsp. cider vinegar

2 T. finely chopped fresh chives
Add all ingredients into a small bowl and stir well with a whisk. Make a couple of hours before serving to the flavors can come together well. Makes 1 cup.

Salad ingredients for 2 main dish sized salads: 6-8 cups torn romaine lettuce, divided among 2 plates

4-6 strips of crisp bacon, crumbled

cherry tomatoes, halved, or other diced tomato

avocado- I used 1/2 of an avocado for each salad

diced red onion
Arrange romaine lettuce on plates. Top with the bacon, tomatoes, onion and sliced avocado. Serve with the Homemade Buttermilk Dressing. Enjoy!

This was a wonderful salad! I love romaine because of it's sweet, crunchy taste, which was perfect with the sweet cherry tomatoes and the salty bacon. The avocado is perfect with this salad! The amount of chives in the dressing was about right. I think I may try a small amount of dill next time too. And maybe some parsley. My first attempt at making dressing turned out very well! Do you make homemade salad dressings?

Green Beans and New Potatoes

We've had some slightly cooler weather here this past week and my thoughts have turned to comfort food! I have some new potatoes that my daughter's boyfriend brought me, and some green beans from my garden waiting to cooked into one of my favorite meals. My husband and I love this old fashioned dish. Both our mothers made this, our grandmothers made this. In fact, most people I know around here cook Green Beans and New Potatoes sometime during the summer. You can use bacon or ham hocks for the flavoring, or even some cooked ham from a bone-in ham. This time I used some ham hocks which give great flavor, but don't yield much meat unless you're lucky enough to find some meaty ones from a butcher. While I normally like green beans steamed or roasted the best, I still have to have this old time favorite several times through the year. It brings back lots of good memories from my childhood as I think of my Mother cooking a large pot of this for supper and my Father coming in at dark after working a long day on the ranch we lived on. Since Mom always had a large garden back then, she also canned, so we had green beans like this all year long. Yes, this is comfort food at it's best!

Green Beans and New Potatoes

About 3 pounds green beans, washed and stemmed and snapped in two, if desired

3 ham hocks, or 4-5 slices bacon, cut into 1 inch pieces, or some cooked ham pieces

small new potatoes( cut larger ones in half)

1 onion, cut into wedges

salt and pepper, to taste

In a soup pot or dutch oven, place the ham hocks and just barely cover with water. Cover and simmer for about 1 hour. Add green beans and onions and cook for another 30 minutes. Next add the potatoes and simmer with pan covered for another 30-45 minutes until beans are tender. Many people cook green beans for a longer period of time, but the beans tend to fall apart more. I prefer that they only cook for about 1 hour to 1 hour and 15 minutes total, but cook them longer if you prefer. Remove ham hock from pan and let cool. Remove any meat from the bones and add to the pot. Add salt and pepper to taste at this time.

If you are using bacon, just add it into the pot with the beans in the beginning. I love the fresh green beans with the creamy new potatoes. Normally, I use just the red skinned potatoes for this dish, but I had both red and white new potatoes, so I mixed them. Such a comforting dish for any time of year! If you can or freeze green beans in the summer, then this is a great dish to fix any time of the year. You may also cook this dish in a slow cooker! Place all the ingredients in the crock pot and just let it simmer all day and you won't have to watch the pot.

I am submitting this recipe to HoneyB at the Life and Loves of Grumpy's Honeybunch , and Laura at The Spiced Life , for the Family Recipes, Memories of Family, Food and Fun event.

What is your favorite way to cook green beans?

Chicken and Penne with Pesto Cream Sauce

A couple of weeks ago I tried to recreate a pasta dish that I had recently at a restaurant in a nearby city. The dish was full of flavor, the type where you want to savor every bite, and when you are done you desire to have it the next day too! Well, I came close and this pasta dish got two thumbs up from everyone at dinner! This is fairly quick to put together, only taking about 3o minutes, which is perfect for weeknights, but it is delicious enough to serve to company. I used a purchased pesto, but if you make homemade of course it will be great. I've also used fresh herbs in place of the pesto and this also works well. First, you will slice some chicken breasts and saute

them in olive oil. Remove chicken from skillet and add more oil, or butter, and some garlic and saute a minute. Pour in the cream. Add pesto and some sun-dried tomatoes, sea salt and pepper. Stir well. Bring to a simmer.

Add the chicken back to skillet and simmer just until the sauce starts to thicken. This is not supposed to be a thick sauce, and it will thicken some when you add it to the pasta.

Taste sauce before you add the pasta and add more salt and pepper if needed. Mix pasta and pesto sauce together. Pile on plates and top with lots of grated Parmesan cheese. Chow down! It will make enough for 6 adult servings.

CHICKEN and PENNE with PESTO CREAM SAUCE

16 ounces penne pasta, cooked to package directions and drained

4-6 boneless chicken breast halves, sliced crosswise into strips

4-5 cloves garlic, minced

4 T. olive oil or butter

1 1/4 cups heavy cream

1/4 cup chicken broth or pasta cooking water

3 T. purchased pesto ( you may want to taste sauce as you add this to find the strength you like)
3 T. or more of diced sun-dried tomatoes

sea salt and pepper to taste.

In a large skillet, add 2 T. of olive oil and saute sliced chicken breasts that have been salted and peppered, til barely done. Remove from pan to a plate. Add 2 more T. olive oil to skillet and the minced garlic. Stir until garlic is very fragrant, but do not brown. Add the cream, chicken broth or water, pesto, and sun dried tomatoes. Bring to a low simmer and add chicken back to pan. Simmer only until sauce is slightly thickened, as it will thicken more after the pasta is added in. Taste and add more salt and pepper, if needed. I wanted the sauce to be slightly thickened, but thin enough to run into those delicious tubes of penne and coat them thoroughly! If your sauce gets too thick, add more chicken broth to thin it a little. I did not add cheese to the sauce, but instead added lots as a topping on the pasta. I actually added more after the picture was taken! I made a fresh salad and garlic bread to accompany this meal. Enjoy!

Blueberry Crumb Bars

I'm sorry that I didn't get this delicious recipe posted yesterday. I tried, really I did, but every time I uploaded pictures they came out streaked and shaded. Same thing happened this morning, so I don't know what's going on! They seem to be fine now though.
I usually don't post back-to-back dessert type dishes, but these bars are so good that I just had to let you know! And besides, I call them breakfast bars, after all, they have oatmeal and blueberries in them! And I did eat them for breakfast, but my husband likes them with ice cream piled on top, (of course). This recipe came from Epicurious and was featured in the July 2009 issue of Bon Appetit. The crust is wonderful and holds up well so that you can eat this as a bar with you fingers. I changed the filling a bit. The recipe calls for the addition of 1 cup of blueberry preserves, but I had a lot of blueberries in the fridge, so I added an extra cup of blueberries and omitted the preserves. I also increased the flour so that the blueberries would thicken up. These Blueberry Crumb Bars turned out perfect! A crisp bottom crust, a perfect blueberry center and crumb topping on top with almonds! I'll be making these again and again!

BLUEBERRY CRUMB BARS (adapted slightly from Epicurious)

Crust:

2 cups flour

1 cup old fashioned oatmeal

1 cup packed brown sugar

1/2 tsp. salt

1/2 tsp. cinnamon

1 cup(2 sticks) chilled, unsalted butter, cut into 1/2 in. cubes

1/2 cup sliced almonds

Filling:

4 cups fresh or frozen, (do not thaw) blueberries

3 Tbs. flour

2/3 cup sugar (next time I may drop that to 1/2 cup)

1 tsp. finely grated lemon peel

Preparation

For Crust:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Butter bottom of a 9x13 in. pan. I used a glass baking dish. In a large bowl, mix flour, oats, brown sugar, salt and cinnamon together. Add butter and use a pastry blender or fingers to mix butter into flour mixture until it sticks together in small clumps.

Transfer 2 cups of flour mixture to another bowl; mix in the almonds, and reserve for topping.

Press remaining crumb mixture evenly onto the bottom of prepared pan. Bake crust until golden and firm to touch, about 20 minutes.. Cool 10 minutes.

For filling:

Mix blueberries, 3 T. flour, sugar and lemon peel together in a bowl. Spread evenly over the baked crust. Now, sprinkle with the reserved topping.

Bake bars, at 375, until filling bubbles at edges and topping is golden brown, about 40 minutes. Cool in pan on rack. Try to restrain yourself from cutting and eating them before they are cool!

They are best on the day they are made, of course. The crust can be stirred together up to 2 days ahead and stored in the refrigerator, covered.

This is the second day for ours and they are still nice and firm, but I will store them in the fridge tonight, if there's any left! Hehe! Really, these are good, try them!

Baby and Garden Pictures

Yesterday our wonderful, adorable and beautiful granddaughter was 1 month old! She is adored by all in our family, as you may expect. Seems like every time she and her parents come over, we grab the camera! Note to all young families with babies: when your children grow up and have babies of their own, when they are fussy, you get to send them home with their parents! : )
But kidding aside, I have been able to help out some and it has been a real blessing not only to my DIL and son, but to me- I'm loving it!
And, here are some garden pictures, closeups again. If you look closely at this next picture you'll see what looks like small balls or balloons on stems. These are Balloon Flowers and after the "Balloon" forms then they burst open in pretty blue flowers! The flower isn't upright so next time I'll have to get on the ground to get a good picture!

The color on this Purple Coneflower isn't quite right, but I had to show it to you anyway, as I was able to catch a bee busy pollinating! If you look closely, you can see what looks like dust right below the bee. It's actually pollen! I normally don't hang around bees, but I'm glad I did here!

Have you ever smelled the intoxicating fragrance of Phlox! It's heavenly and butterflies love it. I tried to get a good picture of a couple of butterflies on the Phlox a few days ago, but the winged wonders were too skittish. We've had lots of rain last night and today, so a lot of the petals have fallen to the ground. The Phlox are about 3 feet high and easy to photograph.

And I do have some tomatoes! I planted these by our back door this year and they have really grown tall. However, the actual tomatoes are taking forever to ripen, so we have had only 1 large tomato and a small bowl of cherry tomatoes. At least there were enough cherry tomatoes to make my Avocado, Cucumber and Tomato Salad!

It seems the tomatoes around here are ripening rather slowly. I went to the farmers market last week to buy some, and the locally grown ones were green! I guess I'll have to be patient! Hope you enjoyed my pictures. I'll have another recipe tomorrow!

Triple Chocolate Brownie Cookies! (from Family, Friends and Food)

I made these decadent, brownie-like, chocolate cookies over this past week end and they were an instant hit! Actually, they were a hit before they even made it to the oven. You see, I have a couple of grown kids that like to steal bites of cookie dough when it is first mixed in the bowl. Well, these kids just happened to be here, and the stealing continued even after the dough was put into the refrigerator to firm up! And I must confess, that even I gave into their wayward temptations! Yes, this dough is to die for! The cookies are to die for! This recipe is supposed to make about 60 cookies, but believe me, it didn't in this house. This addictive cookie recipe came from Patsy at Family, Friends and Food, who is my mentor in the Adopt a Blogger program. This program, started by Kristen, from Dine and Dish, is to help the novice blogger (me), by pairing them with an experienced blogger (Patsy). Patsy has been wonderfully patient as I've asked a lot of questions and she has been able to answer them all, or find an answer for me through some blogging friends. Thanks, Patsy! Thanks for putting up with me! Anyway, I found this recipe on Patsy's blog and knew I'd have to make them as most of my family are chocoholics! These Triple Chocolate Brownie Cookies are rich, chewy and deliver big time on the chocolate flavor. These are going on my list for the holidays and will be made throughout the year as well. Let's get to the recipe-I'm eating one as I type!

Triple Chocolate Brownie Cookies- from Family, Friends and Food

3/4 cup butter

4 squares (1 ounce each) unsweetened chocolate

2 cups sugar

4 eggs

1 1/2 cup flour

1/2 cup baking cocoa

1/2 tsp. salt

2 tsp. baking powder

2 cups(12 ounces) Semi-sweet chocolate chips, divided

2 tsp. shortening

DIRECTIONS:

In a small saucepan over low heat, melt the butter and unsweetened chocolate together.Cool. Transfer melted chocolate to a large bowl; add sugar and eggs and beat until smooth. In another bowl, combine flour, cocoa, baking powder and salt. Gradually add the dry ingredients to the chocolate mixture and stir well. Add 1 1/2 cups chocolate chops to the dough and combine well. Cover and refrigerate for 2 hours or overnight until dough is easy to handle. Drop dough by the tablespoon full onto greased cookies sheets, 2 inches apart. Bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for about 7-9 minutes, until edges are set and the tops are slightly cracked. Cool cookies on the pans for about 2 minutes and then remove to wire racks. After all cookies are cool, heat 2 tsp. of shortening with the remaining 1/2 cup chocolate chips until melted. Stir well and drizzle over the cookies. Let cookies stand 30 minutes until the chocolate has is set. Store in a covered container.

Patsy's cookies were actually prettier than mine, as she used white chocolate to drizzle over the tops of the cookies. But I had plenty of the semi-sweet on hand, so that is what I used. Check out Patsy's blog; she has lots of great recipes to please the palate! Make these cookies and take a plateful to your neighbor; they'll love you for it!

Avocado, Cucumber and Tomato Salad

My mother-in-law was a great cook. This is my version of a salad that she used to make that I absolutely loved, but I've not been able to make the dressing like she did. So, I changed it a bit and it worked great! My MIL was a very frugal shopper and cook, but she always made well balanced meals. This salad was a favorite in the summer when the tomatoes and cucumbers were ready in her garden. She cut all the veggies very thin and used more dressing, but I have cut these in a large dice and used minimal dressing. The result is a very delicious salad with crisp vegetables, creamy avocado and a simple, tangy dressing. This salad dresses up any summer meal. I've made a small salad here, as the avocados won't keep well, so you will need to double it for a larger group. However, I kept eating this after I made it and now there's not much left! I'll have to make more of this delicious and healthy salad!

AVOCADO, CUCUMBER and TOMATO SALAD

1 avocado, skin and seed removed, cut in a large dice

1/2 cup diced red onion

1/2 of a green bell pepper, diced

1 cup of cherry tomatoes, cut in half, (or, 1 cup of diced tomatoes)

1 cucumber, peeled and seeded, if desired and cut into chunks, I had a little over 1 cup

Put all veggies and avocado in a bowl. Make dressing.

Dressing ingredients:

2 T. olive oil

4 tsp. red wine vinegar

1/2 tsp. sugar, if desired (I always use it; sorry, I omitted this when first posted!)

pinch of sea salt

dash of pepper

Mix well and pour over salad. Stir lightly with a wooden spoon so you won't tear up the avocado.

Best served the day it's made. The dressing may seem too tangy if you taste it before adding it to the salad, but it mellows out after it is stirred into the veggies. Enjoy!