Ceasar Dressing, a Tasty Grilled Chicken Salad, and using fresh raw eggs the safer way.

Before I start here there is something you should know, and this is very important. I know most people can eat raw and undercooked eggs and have absolutely no problem in doing so, but that is not always the case.

The risk of salmonella in the summer months is very high in uncooked egg products, and that is probably why eggnog is a traditional winter beverage. There is an alternative. Pasteurized Eggs. There are the egg beater types that are a liquid in the carton but this will not work as well. You will need to buy fresh pasteurized eggs in the shell for the best results.

No, these are not from pasture raised chickens, the eggs have been pasteurized like pasteurized milk to kill harmful bacteria. I am not that crunchy when it comes to food safety.

So, this is a easy, very quick and refreshing Caesar Salad to serve on hot summer evenings as a full meal.

First component: Caesar Dressing ( this recipe is an old recipe from the Nugget)

whip together
~4 eggs (pasteurized eggs please)
~3t. red wine vinegar

Add very slowly, mixing constantly
~1 cup olive oil

Add:
~1t. fresh minced garlic
~1t. cracked black pepper
~2t. dry mustard
~1/4c. parmesan cheese
~1/4t. salt
~2t. worcestershire sauce
~3t. fresh lemon juice

Grind and add:
~6 fillet anchovies

Chill for 2 hours minimum.

Then the chicken breast filets, boneless, skinless, thawed ... sad really but stick with me here.

Marinade how many breast filets you think you need, be it two, four or a dozen... depends on how hungry you are and how many you are feeding but one filet per person is usually enough. I like to put them in a large zip lock freezer bag then add in enough of the cheapest you can find italian dressing to marinade them in, and toss and turn the bag every 20 minutes or when you remember to so everything stays  nice and coated with the dressing. A half bottle should be plenty for the marinade. Keep this in the fridge while marinating on a deep tray or shallow bowl in case of any leaks. These can marinate overnight so feel free to start this on the night before. When it is just about time to eat just take them out, slap them on a hot bbq grill and cook through. it does not take long so keep an eye on them.

And finally the salad itself. Get a ginormous bowl, rinse, shake dry and slice Hearts of Romaine lettuce into bite sized morsels... or just get a bag of prepared hearts or romaine, I won't judge. Toss the salad with the dressing prepared in step one in your huge bowl.

Plating: place a generous portion of the dressed salad on the plate, slice one grilled chicken breast and lay it over the salad so it looks pretty, top with croutons and parmesan and romano cheese if desired. Toast some garlic bread and enjoy.

But who am I kidding right? most people have never tasted an honest to god authentic caesar salad in their lives, so a commercial prepared dressing will work just fine but why not give it a try?

Bobbie Jo’s Daisy Dew Sipper Melon Daiquiri

Bobbie Jo’s Daisy Dew Sipper Melon Daiquiri 
In memory of Daisy of the Daily Pippin by Bobbie Joe the philosopher kitty.

Ingredients: 
4 Parts Light Rum 
1 Part Lime Juice 
1 Part Melon Liqueur 
Simple Syrup To Taste 
1 Slice Honeydew Melon 
1 Slice Peach 

How to mix: Fill a shaker with ice cubes. Add all ingredients. Shake and strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Garnish with honeydew melon and peach.

Another From Kimon, Vintage Dip? hahaha.

(this one sounds delish)

One more "vintage" recipe from Vegas. The alpine Village Restaraunt. This was an icon in Vegas for decades. Fine German dining upstairs and a ruckus downstairs in the Rathskellar.

Alpine Village House Seasoned Cottage Cheese dip

2 lbs cottage cheese, small curd
1⁄2 teaspoon caraway seed
1 1⁄2 teaspoons sugar
1 teaspoon Accent seasoning
1⁄2 teaspoon white pepper
1 tablespoon dried chives
1⁄2 teaspoon celery salt

Mix all ingredients together and chill for several hours before serving.

Serve with crackers, or fresh bread, and assorted veggies for dipping.

A Recipe From the Legendary Kimon Brown, Salsa!

For my Vegas and Arizona peeps - These two are a little different than mine. I use tomato sauce, and cayenne, granulated garlic, onion powder, kosher salt, and a little cumin. But these two sound like they are worth a try. Most important is to use real tortilla chips and not the store bought ones. Fresh fried and lightly salted in a brown paper sack.
None of these are salsa recipes that are so popular but for those of us that grew up with Macayo's sauce it is like liquid crack. Bowl of chips two cherry cokes and a TCT perfect high school date night.

Macayo Sauce from the 70’s
(2) 28 oz. can stew tomatoes or (1) 46 oz. can
1 med onion – cut in 4ths
3 small guerro jalapeno peppers hot
Put in sauce pan cook low for 1 ½ hrs covered. Pour mixture in a hand ricer or blender
Chips – use day old corn tortillas cut into 8ths in a regular deep fryer.

Macayo Sauce NOW
1 46 oz. tomato juice
1 1/2 tsp granulated garlic
1 TBSP and 1 ½ tsp cumin
1 tsp salt
For Mild sauce – 1 ½ tsp crushed red chilies
For Hot Sauce – 1 TBSP crushed chilies
Put all in the blender and blend in high for at least one minute. Refrigerate – serve with chips.

3 bean salad

This is one of my Grandma Gert's recipes, and a favorite for picnics. Perfect for keeping on hand during the summer months to serve as a topping for a green salad or alone as it is.

2/3 cup vinegar
1/2 cup good salad oil
1/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon celery seed.
4 cans of assorted beans-drained ( I know it says 3 beans but... well don't ask)
1 medium onion-sliced thin or Frenched
1/2 cup green pepper-sliced ( for me this is optional, I don't really care for raw green pepper)

Mix all together, chill for 6 hours.

This bean salad lasts a long time in the fridge, because of the vinegar, oil and sugar it has a pickling effect so bacteria or mold will not grow. Sorta like a refrigerator pickle. Double the recipe and add all the beans from the list below to be super festive, remember it keeps very well and just gets better.

Beans I like the best are green (string) beans, black-eyed peas, garbanzos, butter (lima) beans, great northern beans and Kidney beans. beans need to be packed in water so no chili seasoned beans here, and I give the beans a light rinse with cold water when draining.

What is up with bitter beers and Spicy Food?

That is a question posted by a childhood friend of my husband's on Facebook today. I am not much of a beer drinker, Tecate from the imported menu if i got a preference, other than that I can do without beer.

Spicy food does not have to be a challenge of one's manly manlyness. I got a recipe to show you how delicious (and cheap) spicy can be. The only previous requirement is experience in making fried chicken.

Hot Wings

Yeah, another hot wings creation from the interwebs, like we need another. We don't. But here is an easy, cheap, and delicious way to do it yourself. When wings go for a buck EACH in restaurants and take out joints... you are saving a fortune over an appetizer menu here. I have tried many different recipes and this is my version, adjusted for maximum crispiness and sauce soakabilty.  (is that a word?)

4 lb bag of frozen wing sections. (Aldi)
1/3rd cup red hot Sauce (the Aldi's label is very much like Louisiana or Texas Pete hot sauce... very good for this)
2/3rds stick Butter
2 cups flour to coat wings, seasoned with 1 tsp. season salt. (put in wide bowl or pie tin, do I need to include this?)
Oil for frying.
Deep cast iron cookware (see previous posts) or deep fryer.
Prepared dipping sauce of buttermilk ranch or whatever... homemade or from a jar does not matter much, but this is important to have.

Thaw wings, rinse in water, shake off excess water and while still damp roll in seasoned flour to lightly coat, fry in preheated oil till done turning halfway through. (about 7-10 minuets@300 degrees) set aside on wire rack to drain. Chicken is done when juice runs clear when pierced with a fork. This usually takes me 2-3 batches to fry the entire bag of wings.

Melt butter (microwave works fine) and mix with hot sauce. This is usually enough sauce to coat all the wings. This should be a 50/50 mixture of hot sauce and butter. This mixture will separate so give it a good stir before pouring on wings.

When wings are cooked and drained place in large bowl and drizzle half the wing sauce over the wings, toss, then drizzle the rest of the sauce, toss again.

Serve immediately with the dressing on the side and garnish with celery sticks. Everyone needs fiber.

Tecate beer is optional. Enjoy!

So cheap, so easy... the miracle of the casserole

Casseroles... the bane of many families to use up leftovers. There was once a joke I heard about the layer casserole, where all the leftover meals for the week ended up in the casserole as layers... then one day it happened, the leftover casserole from last week was at the bottom layer of the dish.

There is a little more to making casseroles than just tossing in your leftovers for the week and calling it good... because it probably won't be. The casserole is more of a formula of balanced and complementary component flavors based on a theme than a recipe. In other words, experiment and see what happens, once you get the formula down and stick to a theme there is very little that can go wrong. I love casseroles.

There are the basic building blocks of the casserole.
Meat - leftovers or canned are good but fresh is fine as well ~ only a small amount is needed ~ a cup or so,  a single leftover grilled chicken breast is enough for a tasty casserole. This can be fish, hamburger, roast beef, pork, sausages, chicken.

Starch 'filler' - one of my favorites to use is the tri-color spirals, but any pasta shape or noodle is also good as well as rice. This component is the bulk of the casserole. It is best to leave this a bit under cooked so it can finish cooking during baking time, if it is overcooked you will end up with a limp starchy mess.

The sauce - This is what brings it all together, you can easily use any cream soup like cream of mushroom or cream of celery or even cream of potato, but if you would like to cut down on expense and salt a thin white gravy (bechamel sauce) is also wonderful, and it is a neutral background for the other flavors. Other choices include alfredo sauce, spaghetti sauce, tomato sauce... it all depends on the theme and what you have available.

The seasonings ~ think of your theme ~ onions, salt and pepper, powder soup mixes like onion or vegetable, garlic, soy sauce, celery, other herbs and spices to enhance the theme.

The vegetable ~ this does not need to be in the casserole itself but it is a good way to use up the small amounts of vegetables left over from previous dinners. even if there is only a small portion of canned vegetable left over at each meal collect them in a small dish and add to it during the week when there are leftovers, you can also choose to open a can or even use fresh or frozen vegetables (my favorite). Of course in some "themes" you may just want to serve a side salad instead.

Cheese ~ optional but baked ziti would not be the same without it.

Topping ~ Now I hardly ever use a topping, some older recipes use corn flakes, bread crumbs and even smashed crackers but I don't find they are really necessary at all, they are more for appearance than flavor.

Your casserole dish ~ a 3 quart or larger round or oval deep baking dish with a lid, this prevents dry corners and over cooking as well as room for leftovers.

Baking ~ about an hour at 350 degrees. easy!

Some of my favorite combinations...

Tuna noodle casserole ~
2 cans tuna, drained
1 can cream soup - mushroom or celery with 1 can water added
egg noodles
peas
seasonings include onion, salt, pepper, celery seed

Baked Ziti~
hot italian sausage, browned
ziti or similar pasta
spaghetti sauce or marinara
ricotta and mozzarella cheeses
This is layered like a lasagna in the casserole dish - cheaper than making a lasagna and reheats even better!
serve with side salad and garlic toast.

Mock Lobster casserole~
Imitation crab chunks
bechamel sauce
broccoli -cooked
shredded cheddar cheese
season sauce using lemon juice or zest, salt and pepper.
This one is layered, broccoli, then cheese, then crab meat, seasoned bechamel sauce, top with bread crumbs, this one does not have a starch filler but feel free to experiment.

Chow mien casserole~
brown 1 pound hamburger in fry pan
add 2 bunches celery, chopped, saute until just bright.
then add to meat and celery about 1/2 cup soy sauce and can cream of mushroom soup and 1 can water.
rinse 1 cup uncooked rice and drain, add to bottom of casserole then pour meat and celery mixture on top of rice, do not stir. top with chow mien noodles.

Wild rice and chicken~ crock pot
1 cup wild rice, rinsed, place in bottom of crock pot
pour over can of cream of mushroom or cream of chicken soup mixed with 1 can water
place raw chicken pieces over rice, sprinkle with powder onion soup mix over top.
cook for about 8 hours on high add small amounts of water if needed.
this is not exactly a casserole but close, an easy way to fix wild rice. The chicken fat drains into the rice while it cooks making it very tasty. Wild rice has a bite and chew even when well cooked, that is just the way it is.

Chicken and garlic pasta~
canned chunk or leftover chicken, cubed
noodles (spirals)
chopped garlic
alfredo sauce
top with mozzarella and Parmesan cheese near the end of cooking time.

My dad's hot dish~
hamburger, browned
macaroni
canned mushrooms
tomato sauce
salt and pepper
onion
a few squirts of ketchup

I hope this gives some inspiration to your casserole night, feel free to experiment.