Philoxenos

It’s 10pm and I’m sweaty. I just finished cleaning the kitchen, which included scrubbing the floor on my hands and knees. We have a tile floor and the mop just doesn’t get it all clean. Of course, by 8 am tomorrow there will be Cheerios and bit of fruit and who knows what else smeared all over it. But for now, it’s clean and I like it. When I wake up in the morning it will be clean. My mom comes over frequently and she’s so kind to not mention how dirty my kitchen is most of the time. Honestly, I do try, I really do. But these little people that live in my house keep wanting to eat and drink and I just can’t keep up with it all. So, I’ve mucked it out and it’s shiny and all the dishes are washed and the floor is clean.

And, although I didn’t get any formal exercise today, I was listening to music while I washed the dishes (by hand) and boy, did I get a workout. I was dancing all around and I’m assuming that no one was watching and I enjoyed it. At one point I heard a Carls Jr commerical that just gave me the giggles. It’s about their new Strawberry Banana Smoothie/Shake. They can’t decide what to call it - schmake? schmoothie? You have to hear it.

I’m off to shower. Trust me, that’s a good thing.

Just in case any of my 15 readers are interested in what we’re going to be eating this week, I’m participating in Menu Plan Monday, hosted by Laura at I’m An Organizing Junkie. I am usually quite organised in the kitchen because having a menu plan means that I generally spend less money on groceries. I have a steadfast rule that if it’s not on the list, I don’t buy it. The only exceptions are when I find a really good deal on something that wasn’t in the store flyer. For example, Saturday I went to Winco to do my fortnightly shopping and they had Stovetop Stuffing for 99 cents a box, which is really really good. I bought some, even though it wasn’t on the list. In spite of having a list and a menu, I’m still flexible. Even if the menu says we’re having pork chops on Wednesday, if Wednesday rolls around and I’m just not interested in pork chops I’ll substitute something else on the menu. But at least I know that I have the ingredients for different meals.

Anyway. On to the exciting part of the post. Almost all of these recipes come from my newest book purchase - Desperation Dinners. I first found this book at the Christchurch City Library (which is a great, fantastic, super library) (in New Zealand) several years ago. I still make one of the recipes (Speedy Black Bean Soup) on a regular basis. When we lived in Christchurch I had to go to the local health food shop to buy dried black beans and then soak them and cook them in order to the make the soup. Here I can buy a can of black beans for 50 cents. It’s still cheaper to buy dried beans, but boy, just opening a can is a lot easier. And I’m into easier at the moment.

So two weeks ago I was at the library and I discovered that they had the book!! I checked it out and started marking the recipes that I wanted to try. Like, real recipes that I knew we would probably like. When I got to over ten I decided to see if I could buy it used on Amazon. I was able to get a BRAND NEW copy from a second-hand seller on Amazon for about $1.50, plus $3.99 shipping. So of course I ordered it. And I love it. LOVE. IT. Handsome flipped through it while we were sitting on the couch a few nights ago and I could hear him saying Mmmmm… oh, that sounds good… yummmm… So this week’s menu features heavily with recipes from our newest cookbook (Edited to note: Actually, after typing it up I’m only using one recipe for the whole week. I’m sure I had a reason, but I don’t remember what it was. Stay tuned for next week. But I still recommend the book). I highly recommend you check your local library. The book purports that no recipe shall take longer than 20 minutes from start to finish. That is if you don’t have to soak and cook dried beans.

Monday: Homemade Hot Pockets (Handsome is at school on Mondays so we make easy, kid-friendly dinners. We love these and I make extra for the freezer)

Tuesday: Beef Stroganoff, garlic mashed potatoes, peas, salad

Wednesday: at mom’s house, trying to avoid trick-or-treaters. Our apartment will probably be inundated.

Thursday: Red Bean and Feta Salad (trying to recapture the summer.We love this salad. To all you NZers - a great salad for Christmas Day)

Friday: Homemade Pizza

Saturday: Leftovers

Sunday: PDQ Broccoli Cheese Soup (DD pg 11) . I bought a LARGE bag of broccoli at Costco a couple weeks ago so we’ve been eating a lot of broccoli.

What is to follow is a recipe that I remember absolutely loving when I was a child. My mom made it earlier this week and it was just as delicious as I remember. Now that we’re living in the US and can buy processed cheese food (Velveeta) I too can make this part of my repertoire. I’m writing it here so that I don’t forget it.

Broccoli Cheese Casserole

1/2 cup chopped onion

1/2 cup chopped celery

1 can cream of mushroom soup

1 can cream of chicken soup

3/4 lb velveeta cheese

1 pkg chopped broccoli

2 cups cooked rice

Saute onions and celery. Add soups and cheese. Cook broccoli and mix with above. Cook rice and place as lining for dish. Pour vegetable and soup mixture over rice - sprinkle with paprika. Bake 375 for 10-20 minutes until bubbly and brown.

Optional: add shredded chicken to rice mixture.

We’re having leftovers tonight and I’m going to snag the rest of this. Processed cheese food, gotta love it!

Updated: links are fixed. 

The ladies at 5minutesformom are having another giveaway. You can win $300 worth of Horizon Organic dairy products. Go over and enter! We can all use a bit of free milk and cheese.

After my somewhat overwhelming shopping experience yesterday, I need to go back to the store at some point and write down some prices so I can comparison shop. I’ve been thinking about the organic thing for a while and wondering how the prices compare. Do any of you buy organic?

One of the random things that I’ve been thinking about in regards to our move is electric kettles. Here in New Zealand every home has an electric kettle. Used to boil water for the millions of cups of tea/coffee that are drunk every day. Someone comes over for a visit: Do you want a hot drink? and the kettle gets flicked on. It just sits on the countertop, often next to the toaster. And they’re cheap - you can get a cheap one for less than $15. One day I’ll have to tell you about the beautiful kettle I bought for the whopping price of $99. In my defense it’s the best kettle we ever owned. We bought it over four years ago and we just sold it at the garage sale. But I digress.

In America, electric kettles are not as common. Relatively uncommon, actually. And I can’t figure out why!! They’re brilliant! You need some warm water for making bread, just flick on the kettle for 20 seconds and you’ve got warm water. Need to sterilise a baby’s pacifier, boil some water and pour it over and you’re done. An electric kettle is so fast and it automatically shuts off when the water is boiled.

So. I’ve been looking at Amazon for an electric kettle because we’ve decided that’s even more important than buying a toaster. My husband is a coffee drinker but he doesn’t mind instant as long as we buy a good instant (I buy Robert Harris instant, which runs $7 for a jar, compared to $3 for a jar of the cheap stuff. And the cheaps stuff is GROSS.) And we figure we can toast bread in the oven if we really want it. I found one that I like and it looks like this: (I’m trying to put in a picture for the first time. We’ll see if it works.)

There must be a way to do word wrap, but I’ll have to figure that out another time.

From experience, I like this kettle because the cord isn’t actually attached to the kettle itself. So you can take the kettle off the base and set it on the table, like a pitcher. I’ve added it to my Amazon wishlist.

More stimulating information here at Philoxenos. I aim to please. And you are all welcome to come over for good instant coffee any day

I originally got this recipe from TopSecretRecipes

Homemade Fajita Seasoning:

1 tbsp cornflour

2 tsp chili powder (you can’t get this in NZ, but you can substitute about 1/2 tsp of dried chili powder)

1 tsp salt

1 tsp paprika

1 tsp sugar

3/4 tsp chicken bouillon (stock powder)

1/2 tsp onion powder

1/4 tsp garlic powder

1/4 tsp cayenne

1/4 tsp cumin

Mix it all together. This is one serving. Slice up some chicken breasts or beef and fry it in a pan. When it’s almost cooked, add some sliced bell pepper, onion, mushrooms, zucchini if you have it and cook until just little soft. Add the seasoning and stir it around. Add about 1/4 cup of water, maybe a bit more, to make a bit of a sauce. When the meat is all cooked, it’s done! Serve with tortillas, bit of sour cream, some cheese, avocado if you have it. YUM!

Wilm, a faithful reader from way back, has asked for some more Mexican food ideas. What follows is a meal that is influenced by Mexican food but I wouldn’t really call it Mexican food.

Nachos

Cook some mince (ground beef) with a chopped up onion. Add one can of Watties Mexican Baked Beans (have you seen those? They’re new. They’ve also got an Italian, Indian, and some other flavour one) or Chili Beans. Mix well. Serve over nacho chips, topped with sour cream, shredded cheese, maybe some tomato and avocado. My husband loves this! So easy.

Another variation is to get a couple scoops of chips and serve over chips. In the States you can get something called Chili Cheese Fries, which are WONDERFUL. So this is kind of like chili cheese fries. But New Zealand chips are way better. For our North American readers, chips are what we call French Fries.

Check back later for a recipe for Black Bean Soup (which is delicious and takes about five minutes to make, once you have the beans cooked) and also a recipe for homemade fajita seasoning.

New Zealand Readers, take note!! Barkers is now making a Sundried Tomato and Olive Chutney that is absolutely worth every penny (about $4 for a jar). I got a sample when we bought some bakery bread from Countdown and I used it on a homemade pizza. When Handsome took a bite, his eyes closed and he started chewing really slowly in order to savour the flavour. It’s delicious. The sample came with a coupon, which I saved, and a couple days ago I bought a jar. I bought it to use on our pizzas, in place of regular pizza sauce, but I’ve spread a bit on an English muffin for morning tea and it’s equally delicious.

Go buy some. You won’t regret it.

The longer I have lived in New Zealand, the more I have adapted my cooking to New Zealand tastes. But one flavour that I desperately miss is Mexican food. I remember the day I discovered tortillas at the supermarket. I was excited. Until I tasted them. They were imported by Old El Paso, with one of those flavour saver things inside, so who knows how old they were. But then, one of the local bakeries started making tortillas and selling them fresh, nationwide. I was literally jumping up and down in the aisle. I raced home and rang the company to say PLEASE DON’T TAKE THEM AWAY. And they haven’t (although they’ve raised the price by $1.30). I can make my own tortillas from scratch, but it takes forever. So every once in a while I will plonk down $4.60 for 8 tortillas so that I can make burritos, or in tonight’s instance, chicken enchiladas.

What follows is the recipe I’ve been using for years to make chicken enchiladas. NZ readers you will notice an unfamiliar ingredient, but I’ll give you a substitute. This recipe came from allrecipes.com

CHICKEN ENCHILADAS II

• 1 tablespoon butter
• 1/2 cup chopped green onions
• 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1 (4 ounce) can diced green chiles (can substitute lots of bell peppers)
• 1 (10.75 ounce) can condensed cream of mushroom soup
• 1/2 cup sour cream
• 1 1/2 cups cubed cooked chicken breast meat (I used leftovers from last night - Chilli Lime Marinade chicken YUM)
• 1 cup shredded Cheddar cheese, divided
• 6 (12 inch) flour tortillas (I find that just 4 means you get lots of filling in each)
• 1/4 cup milk

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Lightly grease a large baking dish.
2. In a medium saucepan over medium heat, melt the butter and saute the green onion until tender (about 3 to 4 minutes). Add the garlic powder, then stir in the green chiles, cream of mushroom soup and sour cream. Mix well. Reserve 3/4 of this sauce and set aside. To the remaining 1/4 of the sauce in the saucepan, add the chicken and 1/2 cup of shredded Cheddar cheese. Stir together.
3. Fill each flour tortilla with the chicken mixture and roll up. Place seam side down in the prepared baking dish.
4. In a small bowl combine the reserved 3/4 of the sauce with the milk. Spoon this mixture over the rolled tortillas and top with the remaining 1/2 cup of shredded Cheddar cheese. Bake in the preheated oven for 30 to 35 minutes, or until cheese is bubbly.

I’ve been thinking about fish lately. No, I don’t want to get a fish (although we are housesitting one). I’ve been thinking about eating fish. I’ve been doing some reading on healthy eating, particularly the low-carb thing, and fish comes up a lot.

Now, we’ve never eaten a whole lot of fish around here, simply because it’s relatively expensive, unless you buy it breaded and fried from the fish n chip shop. Even then it’s not cheap. When we lived in the South Island we used to get fish delivered fortnightly and it was delicious. It was so fresh it had been swimming in the ocean within the last 36 hours. Eventually we stopped getting it because we were getting bored with our two recipes for fish - Fish Curry and Baked Fish. Both were delicious, but even delicious becomes monotonous.

From everything that I’ve been reading, I should be eating more fish. Good stuff in them. And that’s the technical term, by the way. But what the heck do I do with the fish??

Does anyone eat sardines? Aren’t they super salty? and crunchy? Of course it’s the bones that make them crunchy and that’s where the good stuff is.

I don’t know where to start. Inspire me. Please. I’m begging you.