Taco Soup and Cornbread Wars

Well, apparently winter has no desire to leave any time soon. Sunday, north Texas was hit with another round of ice and even thunder sleet. You've heard of thunder snow. Well, we had thunder sleet. Considering temps had been 80+ the two days before the storm hit, it's no wonder. Just another phenomena of nature.

This is a video my son made. You can't see the sleet, but you sure can hear it. Along with some weird breathing. That is not me.

This storm was merely a drop in the bucket compared to the ice storm we had back in December. But boy did the temps plummet. We saw a 50+ degree drop in less than 24 hours and bottomed out somewhere in the mid-teens Monday morning. 

I know this is nothing compared to what much of the nation has endured, but weather like this calls for a steaming hot bowl of something. So I'm going to revisit a recipe I shared on Simple Saturdays, long before I was an official member of the cafe. 

Taco Soup is so easy I could make it with my eyes closed. Although, that might make dicing the onion a bit dangerous. Still...even if you can't cook, you can make taco soup.

Here's what you'll need:

• 2 lbs. ground beef (I sometimes use ground venison. You could also use ground turkey or bison
• 1 onion, chopped
• 2 – 4 oz. cans diced green chilies (I cheat and use 1 – 7 oz. can)
• 3 – 15 oz. cans pinto beans (my personal preference is Ranch Style Beans, but if you can’t find them where you live, plain pintos are fine. If you like variety, add two cans of pintos and one of kidney beans)
• 2 – 14 ½  oz. cans golden hominy
• 3 – 14 ½ oz. cans stewed tomatoes (Since my boys don’t like big chunks of tomato I use the petite-cut diced tomatoes, usually one 29 oz. can plus one 14 ½ oz.)
• 1 packet of taco seasoning
• 1 packet Ranch dressing powder mix (If you buy this in the bulk containers like I do, add three tablespoons)
• 1 ½ cups water
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon ground black pepper

Brown ground meat and onion in a large Dutch oven or stock pot and drain off fat.

Add remaining ingredients. No draining, just open, dump and stir.

Can it get much easier?

Bring to boil. Reduce heat to low and simmer for one hour.

There are two things that go very well with taco soup. Tortilla chips is one, the other is cornbread. My favorite. And since Jan shared her cornbread recipe yesterday, I thought I'd post my no-sugar-added cornbread recipe. The way cornbread ought to be, IMHO. :)

My daughters' great-grandmother taught me how to make this when I was a young bride, and I will be eternally grateful.

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Place pan in oven while preheating. You can use a cast iron skillet, but I'm making a small batch this time, so I used my ancient blackened metal oblong pan.

In a bowl, mix 1 cup of yellow corn meal (no, I did not grind my own :), ¾ cup of flour, ½ teaspoon salt, ¼ teaspoon baking soda, and 2 teaspoons of baking powder. 

Add 1 egg and 2 cups buttermilk. Stir well. 

If you don't have any buttermilk on hand, don't worry. You can use regular milk and the bread will be just as tasty and fluffy, thanks to the baking powder. Simply start with 1½ cups and add more, if needed, until mixture is just a little thinner than cake batter.

Remove hot pan from preheated oven and IMMEDIATELY pour in batter. This will “fry” the bottom, giving it a nice crispy texture. (the corner pieces are my favorite!) Return pan to oven and bake at 450 for 12-15 minutes, or until golden brown. 

I like to flip mine over in the pan as soon as it comes out so the bottom will retain that crispiness I worked so hard to achieve.

On a cold day, this meal is hard to beat. Even if it's a cold day and you're short on time. It's that easy. 

You could even brown your ground beef, mix everything together in the CrockPot and let it go on low all day. Boy would your house smell good.

Now for a couple gratuitous puppy pix.

Maddie wasn't quite sure what to think about the sleet.

She'd paw at it. Dig a little bit, then jump back before pouncing on it again.

Yet for as much as she liked the sleet, she was just as happy to come inside where it was nice and warm.

(especially when there was a bowl of food waiting)

Okay, now that the Polar Vortex is paying us another visit, how cold is it at your house?

Christmas Toys and Treats

Happy Tuesday, everyone! Are y'all shivering in your boots? As I type this post, my office is a balmy 52 degrees. Our downstairs heater has been out since early Sunday morning. Right about the same time out latest Arctic blast rolled in. Lord willing, our repairman will be by later today. In the meantime, thank goodness for space heaters.

 

I hope you had a wonderful holiday season. We sure did, winding it down with a week at the ranch. I must have wound down just a little too much, though, since I came home with a cold. You know what that means... Time for some homemade chicken soup, heavy on the garlic and red pepper flakes. (You can find that recipe here.)

 

Guess what Santa, aka my husband, brought me for Christmas?

Don't you love the red?

My 20 year old classic white KitchenAid mixer has shown signs of wearing out these past few years. Her gears were grinding, she'd groan and I always feared she'd give out completely right in the middle of a recipe.

 

So this lively addition to my kitchen is very much appreciated. Makes me want to bake some bread (recipe here) or anything else that needs to be mixed. Not to mention uses the nice, hot oven.

By the way, my old mixer still has a little life in her, so she will be providing our oldest daughter and her family with some much-needed assistance in the kitchen.

 

The other gifts the cook in me appreciated were these babies.

 

A shiny new Cutco chef's knife. I LOVE Cutco knives. Excellent quality and they're guaranteed forever. Seriously, forever. You send 'em back and they sharpen them. If something is broken or the company doesn't like the way it looks, they send you new one. How cool is that?

 

 And you've heard Julie and I touting Penzey's spices. So I was really excited when my SIL gave me a bag of their hot cocoa mix. Oh. My. Stars. You'll want to hide this from the kids. Best hot cocoa I've ever had. Rich cocoa flavor with just a hint of cinnamon. Makes drinking cocoa a real treat.

 

This week, I'm hoping to settle back into a somewhat normal routine. I still need to take down Christmas decorations. Of course, I have revisions due by the 20th, so Christmas stuff might have to wait. At least the kids will be heading back to school. With any luck, I'll even be able to hear myself think again.

 

What are you doing this first full week of 2014?



Time for company!

Hello, everyone! The Fresh Pioneer is back and we're having friends over! It's almost the end of the hot season here and I want to be the hostess with the mostest, so I'm going to whip up some super  EASY and delicious COLD drinks. Let's go ahead and start.

 

A little picture to get you in the mood.

Now, I love coffee. Love, love, LOVE it. But when it hits 100F, I tend to look at that steaming cup with a different sort of feeling. I want to go to Starbucks and get me a cold granita. But it's 12 miles away, and it costs a lot of money. What's a girl to do??

She brews up some coffee and puts in the sweetener. (For me, this is sugar. Some of you can use the fake stuff or honey. Or nothing, if you're tough like that.)

Then we put it in the freezer, in a large bowl, for about 5 hours. (A good hostess plans ahead. If she remembers. And has fair warning. But we'll just assume all that, no?) Take a fork and drag over the coffee until it comes off in tiny, frozen chunks.
                                

 MMMM, now if you're a wuss like I am, you don't like it black. You need milk! Fat free condensed milk...  And you're ready!!

 Oh, wait. Your friend doesn't drink coffee?? It makes her stay awake all night? It gives her an ulcer? Reverse. Back to the freezer, where you have RASPBERRY HERBAL TEA frozen in its own little bowl. (Say after me, "I am the hostess with the mostest." Say it again... )

Repeat the process with the fork, except for the milk. Add slice of lime. (This was melting. And I got to drink that one, too! I love this food blog thing.)

NOW you're ready.

Oh, wait! You think the kids might like something, too? We can't just throw popsicles at them? Well, we ARE the hostesses with the... you know the rest. Good thing that last night we cut a watermelon. (It was a Hermiston, Oregon, melon, too. Award-winning YUM.)

We squished it up and did NOT ADD SUGAR.

Because the kids don't need it. They're crazy enough as it is.

For the parents, we added vodka. KIDDING. Let's keep this playdate running smoothly, eh?

It sat in the freezer all night, just waiting for the moment it could become... THIS.

Oh, man.

NOW

YOU'RE

READY!

Let's head outside!

 

Not for the faint-of-heart...

 Hello, everyone! The Fresh Pioneer is back and it is still HOT. I'm not really melting anymore, but I sure don't want to cook. I want to eat, mind you, just not cook. So, what's a hungry girl to do?
Let's see what we can rustle up!


Now, when I was 14 I decided I was going to go live in France. Don't ask me why. I think it was mostly about this

 

and this

 

and this

 

But enough of that.

 *sigh*

We live here, and are starving for dinner, so let's see what we can find. Now, since I moved to that lovely country right after I turned 15 (merci, Maman!), I have a deep and abiding love for STINKY CHEESE and usually have some on hand.

Well, looky here! Feta!

Not French, but close enough. And it comes in low fat varieties.

 So, let's make sure it's not date night, or your 25th wedding anniversary, or even a night when your husband might ask you to go sit under the stars and chat.

No? Excellent.

 Let's eat some STINKY CHEESE.

We reach in the cupboard and pull out this bottle of balsamic vinaigrette. Who knows why it was there. It must have been waiting for this exact moment all its life. If you don't care for all the stuff they put in these dressings. you can make your own dressing for this dish with balsamic vinegar, salt, pepper, garlic, and some olive oil.

Now, the original recipe calls for pasta or white bread toasted, or (*sob*) crusty French bread, but we're going to put in a little more fiber to the dish to balance out the olive oil.

Here is some bread my husband refers to as 'nuts and twigs'. It has double the fiber and lots of flax seed which is good for... memory? I honestly can't remember. (Okay, I Googled. It's good for your HEART. Thank goodness. If it was for my memory, I'd want my money back.)

You can use 12 grain or even just whole wheat. It adds a nice, nutty flavor. Toast and cube.

At this point we're going to start cutting our fresh ingredients.

Tomatoes, a little sweet onion (they were free, let's use them!), basil, cucumbers (more free produce!), and whatever other fresh veggie you'd like to put in. Maybe some pretty yellow bell peppers?

 

Mix the feta in with the fresh ingredients. Add several tbs of the vinaigrette. Toss to coat. Put your cubed, toasted, nutty, high fiber grainy bread in the bottom of the bowl and toss on the feta salad mix. 

However you want to make it, add a little lime and some yoghurt to the side and you've got a super fresh, super tasty, no-cook dish.

Just don't go breathe on anybody.

 

(That's me on the left. My non-feta eating hubby on the right. Doesn't he look thrilled? Mmmmm. Revenge for all that cilantro.)

Hope you all are staying cool! Until next time!