Fall Fun

These past couple of weeks have been busy, but a good busy! Fall is my favorite time of the year! Let's start at the beginning. September 24th was my 28th birthday! :) We celebrated by heading to the apple farm that weekend. It was the perfect day for apple picking. My big story from that day was the LARGE spider Sam had on his leg for only God knows how long! We had been out in the raspberry picking area for a little while and then meandered back to the store to stand in line for apple donuts (yum!). After standing in line for over 1/2hr the guy behind us pointed it out to us...after he took a picture of it!





This past weekend was my brother's wedding! I now officially have 2 sister-in-laws with the name Jennifer! :) It was a beautiful outdoor wedding. The weather was unseasonably warm for October. My daughter stood up in the wedding as a Jr. bridesmaid, she looked so pretty!






We all had Monday off of work and school so we headed out to the pumpkin farm. We ran into a boy Claire went to preschool through 3rd grade with...and whom she's had the biggest crush on for all these years. I was very cute to see them so bashfully excited to see each other.

Yesterday on my day off I had a dentist appointment (yay?) and stopped in at Michael's on my way home to buy some materials for a fall decoration. I made a cute wreath for our front door. I'm happy with the way it turned out.

Maple Walnut Chicken Thighs with Cheddar Apple Rice

I made this recipe the other day. The over all taste of it was great, however the original recipe only cooks the chicken in the skillet for 10 mins. Being naive I followed it blindly believing RR couldn't steer me wrong. Oh boy did she ever. The chicken was very undercooked (as any sane person would expect). So we ended up warming the chicken in the microwave for a few minutes each piece and it cooked it the rest of the way through. So should I make this again in the future (which I probably will as it was very yummy) I plan to bake the chicken in the oven after browning it in the skillet. So as you will see I have added the baking the chicken direction into this recipe for your convenience.

Ingredients:
1 cup walnut halves
2 tablespoons butter
1 1/4 cups long grain white rice
2 1/2 cups chicken stock, divided
1 Honeycrisp, Gala or Golden Delicious apple, peeled, seeded and chopped
3/4 cup flat leaf parsley leaves, packed
1/4 cup fresh dill, packed
Salt and coarsely ground black pepper
1 brick sharp white cheddar cheese (6 ounces), cut into small, 1/4 inch cubes
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil (EVOO)
8 bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs
1/4 cup apple cider vinegar
1/2 cup dark maple syrup

Preparation:
Heat oven to 325°F. Spread the walnuts on a baking sheet and roast until well toasted and fragrant, 10-12 minutes.

Meanwhile, in a large skillet, heat the EVOO, one turn of the pan, over medium-high heat. Pat the chicken dry and season liberally with salt and black pepper. Add to the skillet and cook, turning once, until browned, about 10 minutes. Reserve grease.

(Increase oven heat to 375 degrees. Bake chicken on baking sheet in oven for 30mins.)

Drain off all but 1 tablespoon of the fat in the skillet and add the vinegar. Cook, scraping up the pan drippings, then add the remaining 1/4 cup chicken stock, maple syrup and black pepper to taste. Cook until thickened, about 1 minute. Add the chicken and walnuts and spoon with the sauce. Loosely cover the pan with foil and simmer for 5 minutes.

Cheddar-Apple Rice:

In a large saucepan with a tight-fitting lid, melt the butter over medium heat. Add the rice and toast for a minute or two. Add 2 cups chicken stock and bring to a boil, then lower the heat, cover and simmer for 10 minutes. Add the apple and simmer for 8 minutes.

While the rice cooks, using a food processor, pulse 1/4 cup chicken stock, the parsley, dill and 1/4 teaspoon salt until finely chopped. Stir into the rice during the last minute of cooking. Turn off the heat and let the rice stand, covered, for 1-2 minutes before fluffing with a fork. Transfer to a serving dish and stir in the cheese.

Serve the chicken, sauce and nuts with the rice alongside.

Pumpkin Cookies

This past Thursday was my mom's birthday, so as a nice treat I made some yummy pumpkin cookies to help bring in the fall season. They turned out very delicious! I made the glaze as per the recipe, however, I felt it was too sweet and would have preferred a cream cheese frosting instead.


Ingredients:
2 ½ cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons cinnamon
½ teaspoons nutmeg
½ teaspoon cloves
½ teaspoon salt
½ cup butter (softened)
1 ½ cups white sugar
1 cup canned pumpkin puree
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Glaze-
2 cups confectioners sugar
3 tablespoons milk
1 tablespoon butter (melted)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Cooking Instructions:
Step 1: Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees. In a bowl combine flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves and salt. Set aside.
Step 2: In a separate bowl cream butter and sugar. Add pumpkin puree, egg and 1 teaspoon vanilla extract. Beat until creamy. Mix in dry ingredients until well combined. Drop on a cookie sheet by the tablespoon-fuls. Flatten slightly.
Step 3: Bake for 15-20 minutes. Remove from oven and allow the cookies to cool.
Step 4: While cookies are cooling to make the glaze – Combine confectioner’s sugar, milk, butter and vanilla. Mix well.
Step 5: Drizzle glaze onto cookies with a fork.
(Makes 36 servings)

BLT Roll-ups

I made these this past week for a co-worker's wedding shower luncheon. They went over well, which always makes me happy! :)

6 - 9in tomato basil or garden spinach tortillas
8oz cream cheese, softened
3 Tbsp - ranch dressing
1 pound bacon cooked and crumbled
1 cup shredded lettuce
3 Roma tomatoes, diced

Directions:

Lay tortillas out on flat surface. Combine cream cheese and dressing in small bowel and mix until smooth. Divide between the 6 tortillas and spread into a thin even layer. Sprinkle with a sixth of bacon, lettuce and tomato over each tortilla. Starting at edge roll each tortilla up tightly into a spiral shaped log. Wrap each log in saran wrap and chill for 2 hours. Cut each log into 1.5 - 2in sections.

Cheesy Hashbrown Casserole

Ingredients:

1-lb ground beef (cooked and drained)
5 cups shredded hashbrowns
1/2 cup sour cream
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1/2 cup chopped onion
8oz mexican blend shredded cheese

Preheat oven: 350 degrees

Set aside 1/2 cup shredded cheese. Combine all remaining ingredients in large bowel and mix well.

Pour into 8x8 inch glass baking dish.

Bake 50-55 minutes or until center is hot and edges are golden brown. Sprinkle with reserved cheese over top. Return to oven for 2 more minutes to melt cheese.

(As a side note: I tend to leave the cooked beef out of the rest of the mixture and then layer it into the dish. It's just a personal choice, either way it will turn up with the same results)

Warm Bacon Potato Salad

Ingredients:

1/2 cup white wine vinegar
1 tablespoon coarse-grained mustard
1 tablespoon sugar
2 1/2 pounds red potatoes, diced into 1-inch cubes
salt
6 bacon slices, chopped
1 medium sized red onion, diced
black pepper
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1/4 cup freshly chopped dill leaves

Directions:

For the Vinaigrette:
Mix together the white wine vinegar, mustard, sugar in a small bowel and set aside.

Add potatoes to pot of salted cold water. Bring to boil, over high heat then reduce heat to simmer and cook for 20 minutes until tender. Drain and place in large bowel. Cover with foil to keep warm.

Add bacon to large saute pan and cook until crisp over medium heat. Remove to a paper towel lined sheet tray and reserve. Add onion, garlic and dash of pepper to bacon grease and saute until tender, about 3 minutes. Add vinaigrette to vegetables, let cook until reduced and thickened, about 2-3 minutes.

Add potatoes, dill and bacon to the pan and toss to coat with dressing. Allow to cook for 3 minutes. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

09.05.10

This Sunday Sam and I celebrated our 1 year wedding anniversary! I feel very blessed to share my life with someone so amazing. We started our celebration Saturday night with a campfire and some wine. Sunday morning we went to breakfast at a place called "Burnt Toast". Then we headed out to Yorktown mall, mostly to look for a dress for me to wear for dinner that night but didn't find anything I liked. So instead we ended up buying a blu-ray player as Sam's anniversary gift. My gift was a new ring. It's a white gold band that has 3 blue sapphire gemstones in it. It signifies our wedding month stone. Later that night we went to dinner at Fox Fire, a nice restaurant right across from where we had our reception 1 year before. We walked along the river and took a few pictures to remember the day by.






When we got home we toasted each other using the flutes we received at our wedding shower and watched our wedding video. The night before I had attempted to make a replica layer of our wedding cake. However it didn't turn out so well. The cake was yummy but the decoration was not so pretty. Cake decorator successfully removed from my "what I want to be when I grow up" list.

It was a lovely day but just like the actual wedding day it went by all too fast. :( I look forward to celebrating many more anniversaries with my hunny!!!