Happy 4th of July to everyone. Today is a day to reflect on the sacrifices of the many who are now serving or have served our country and to celebrate the birth of our nation. Today is also the day to adhere to the age old tradition of cooking meat over open flames in the back yard. Since the days of the cave people men have gathered around the fire to exchange opinions on the proper way to cook everything from mastadon steaks to pork ribs. For me there is nothing better than a rack of slow smoked pork ribs.

The secret to a good rack of smoked ribs is the preparation. The secret is in the rub. If you want really good ribs you have to have a really good dry rub to put on the meat.  There are several dry rubs on the market that you can buy with a variety of seasoning types and flavors that will enhance the flavor of the meat. I looked at several of these and I also looked at several recipes for dry rub online before smoking my ribs. I could not find a recipe I liked so I came up with one of my own. I have tried this rub on pork ribs, beef steaks and even chicken and it is good on all of them. The rub is also simple and quick to mix up.

J+L Meat Rub

Ingredients

• 2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper
• 1 teaspoon seasoning salt ( I use Johnny’s seasoning salt, but you can use whatever is your favorite)
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• 2 teaspoons onion powder
• 1 teaspoon red pepper flakes
• 1 teaspoon chili powder
• 1/3 cup brown sugar
• 1/4 cup sugar

Mix all the ingredient together in a sealable container and shake well to mix.

To prep the ribs for smoking make sure they are completely thawed and at room temperature. Generously cover each side with the rub and let the ribs set and absorb the rub for at least 30 minutes.

I use my Charbroil Smoker Grill to smoke my ribs. I start a couple of pounds of charcoal briquettes and add them to the offset fire box and let the smoke chamber come up to temperature. For smoking slow and low heat is the key. I keep the temperature of my smoker between 225 and 250 degrees for the cooking. When the smoke chamber is up to temperature I place the ribs on the grill and then add a chunk of wood to the coals for the smoke. You can use any type of wood for the smoke. My favorites are Alder, Apple, Cherry, Hickory, Maple, or Peach. You can buy most of these types of wood in bags of chips to add to your smoker. It is a good idea to soak the wood chips in water the night before to create more smoke and burn slower. I always keep the branches I trim from my Apple and Peach trees just for smoking. Keep an eye on the temperature and keep it low for 4 to 6 hours. The longer you cook the ribs the more tender they will be. Add more briquettes and wood as need to maintain the heat and smoke until the ribs are done.

After the ribs are done smoking they are ready to eat, but I like to then crank up the heat and add some BBQ sauce. I let the sauce caramelize for 15 or 20 minutes to get it thick and sticky.

When the ribs hit the table they do not last long. Everyone loves the ribs and they disappear off the plate as fast as I can  cut them apart.

I have written many times about my gas grill that I do a lot of my summer cooking on. A gas grill is great because they are fast to light and bring up to temperature for cooking, but I have wanted one of the barrel style charcoal smoker grills for a while now and I finally broke down and picked one up. This is a great rig for all your outdoor cooking. You can slow smoke by using the small offset fire box, or put your charcoal in the main grill chamber and grill right over the coals. My first use of this new grill was to grill chicken, and it was the best chicken I have ever grilled.

The biggest obstacle with a charcoal grill is getting the charcoal started. There are many varieties of charcoal available that have lighter fluid infused in the briquettes to make them easier to light, but a better choice is to use a charcoal chimney to light the coals.

These are simple and effective tools to get your charcoal going. Load the top chamber with your charcoal, and wad up 2 or 3 sheets of news paper and stuff into the bottom chamber. Light the paper and let it set for 20 minutes. After that the coals will be burning perfectly for cooking what ever you have on the menu. There are no fire balls shooting up and snatching your eyebrows to worry about and no trips to the ER for severe burn treatment.

After cutting up a whole chicken I put the back, wings, and neck back in the freezer to add to the other backs and wings I already have saved. My wife and i will save up these pieces until we have a good amount  and then we will spend a weekend making home made chicken noodles. I will have to write about that the next time we make it. Neither of us really likes the back and wings that much so this is a much better use of them for us. The breast, thighs, and legs I seasoned with some Johnny’s seasoning salt and set them aside while I got the charcoal going. Once the coals were hot I dumped the chimney load of coals on one end of the grill and spread them evenly.

I was a bit nervous about grilling the chicken. I have always had trouble with chicken on the gas grill. There is just so much fat that comes out of the chicken I always get a lot of flame and burnt chicken on the gas grill. I have had the best luck with the two burner gas grills by simply only lighting one burner and cooking the chicken mostly over the burner that is not lit. My plan was to use a similar tactic on the charcoal grill. I started by placing the chicken directly over the coals to get a good sear on the chicken, and then moved it off to the side away from the heat. This grill has a couple of drafts on it that make the temperature fairly easy to control and I was able to easily maintain a temperature around 300 degrees inside the grill while cooking.

After about 20 minutes the chicken was cooked and had an internal temperature of about 180 degrees which is hot enough to kill any bacteria that may be present in the chicken. I then coated each piece with some Bull’s eye BBQ sauce. This is my go-to sauce. I like the original blend the best and always have a bottle on hand. I let the chicken cook still off the heat for 5 minutes and then turn it over and coat each piece again. After another 5 minute wait I flipped the chicken back over and applied another coat of the sauce and then moved the chicken directly over the coals to caramelize the sauce.

After another 5 minute wait I removed the chicken from the grill and was ready to eat.

This new grill is definitely going to get a lot of use. It is easy to assemble and even easier to use. I have plans to grill some steaks, burgers, hot dogs, shrimp, fish, and vegetables. I am also getting things together to smoke some ribs, pork shoulder, and fish as well. I will be sure to tell you all about each of those when the time comes. There is nothing better than food cooked on a grill and if you do some shopping around you will find a grill like this one for a price you can afford. Once you start using it you will not want to stop.

Well, it has been an unbelievable month for me. Despite all the internet rumors that I was killed in a horrible grilling accident or abducted by aliens or captured by Sasquatch, I am alive and well and have been extremely busy with family additions.

On Memorial Day, my third grandchild was born. That is him with me in the picture. He is awesome and will fit right in with my other two. My band of mischief makers is growing and I am looking forward to many fun adventures with them all.

I spent Memorial Day traveling from Washington to Idaho and waiting for the news about Little D. I traveled back to Washington from Idaho the next weekend to see my new Grandson. I enjoyed the short time I got to spend with him and he and I hit it off right away. I think he and Grandpa will have lots of fun together as he grows. I know I am looking forward to that.

While I was in Washington, the weather was much better than it was over Memorial Day. Memorial Day weekend it rained the whole time. As the weather was good I was able to grill some steaks on the gas grill.

I have not been doing a lot of grilling lately and that is bothering me. I really like grilling food and have recently gotten a new smoker grill that I will be using a lot soon and will be posting some of my experiments with the new grill.

Last weekend was my Birthday. I had plans to spend a quiet relaxing weekend at home with my wife. I wanted to have a cake and for the two of us to spend the afternoon making a celebration dinner together. We always enjoy spending the time working together in the kitchen making a good meal. That plan was tossed out the window when my Daughter called and asked if we could watch our other two Grand children for the weekend. We had not seen David and Millie for a while so we said yes.

It is always fun to have the grandkids around, but it has been a long time since we had to keep up with a 21-month and five-month-old. They are so much fun, and Millie is a Grandpa’s girl who loves to talk and play and sing with Grandpa, but they do wear me out. Instead of making a nice dinner for two, we ended up making hot dogs, chicken nuggets and baby food; not quite the intimate dinner for two I had pictured, but so worth it.

At least I did get to have some cake and ice cream to celebrate.

All in all the last month has been crazy mad, but it has been a lot of fun.

I was sitting around watching the snow fall around the valley this weekend and decided I would spend some time in the kitchen coming up with a new idea for dinner. I should be outside grilling steaks and burgers, and all other manners of goodness, but someone has forgotten to tell Old Man Winter it’s springtime here in Idaho so he keeps tossing snow balls at us. I guess that I should not complain — we will need all the water we can get later in the summer, but I am ready for some camping and cooking over the open fire. I don’t know what made me think about one of my childhood favorite meals, but the more I thought about my Mom’s pigs in a blanket the more I wanted to see if I could make my own. Today was a good day to try it out.

Mom’s pigs in a blanket were the normal hot dogs wrapped in biscuit dough and baked in the oven. We would get these for lunch in school frequently as well. I have made pigs in a blanket many times, but they just do not live up to the memories I have of them as a child. I guess the hot dogs today are just not as good as they were 30 years ago. Holy Moly, that makes me sound old. Grandchild #3 better get here this week — I need another little one around to make me feel like a kid again.

For my sausage in a sleeper I decided to deep fry them instead of bake them. I looked through the manual for my bread machine and settled on a dinner roll recipe in the dough section for the sleeper of my dinner. I added the ingredients to the bread pan and started the bread machine to make the dough. You can use the frozen biscuit or bread dough you buy in the store or you can make the dough by hand instead of the bread machine if you prefer. I like to make my own dough with the bread machine because it is easy and I know exactly what is in my dough.

For the sausages I used some inexpensive smoked sausages that you can get at the grocery in the large family pack. I like to keep some of these on hand because they are a fast meal when you are in a hurry. I have not figured out a good recipe for making my own sausage yet so I have to buy them. I will get it figured out eventually and when I do I will write about it here.

Sausage in a Sleeper

Ingredients:

• dough for 9 dinner rolls
• 5 smoked sausages
• shredded cheese
• 1 quart vegetable oil

Directions

After the dough is ready, divide it into 5 equal portions. Roll out each portion into a rectangle large enough to wrap completely around the sausage.

Add the shredded cheese and sausage to the dough and wrap the dough tightly around the  sausage. Repeat for all five sausages.

If you have a deep fryer, while you are rolling out the dough and preparing the sausages for frying heat the fryer to 400 degrees. If you don’t have a deep fryer add the vegetable oil to a large pot and place on the stove over medium high heat and use a thermometer to get the oil to 400 degrees.

Once the sausages are wrapped and ready to go and the oil is to temp, carefully place the sausages into the hot oil. I discovered with mine that the sausages were too long to fit correctly in the fryer so I just cut them in half and made sure I closed the dough completely over the end. Fry the sausages until the desired golden brown. Use a heat resistant spatula or tongs to turn the sausage over to cook evenly. It will take about 5 minutes to cook them completely. Carefully remove from the oil and let drain on paper towels for 5 minutes before serving.

If you don’t want to make 5 sausages you can make fried bread sticks with the extra dough. I like to roll the extra dough out flat and fill it with shredded cheese or some onion any vegetable would do and roll them up and fry them the same way. Sprinkle on some Kosher salt when they are done and you get a nice pretzel flavor from the bread sticks.

The other day I saw a commercial for the KFC Double Down Chicken Sandwich. I had to try one. Two deep fried pieces of chicken breast with two slices of bacon and two slices of cheese in the middle? What more could you ask for? I told my wife about this and that I was going to try one. My wife is not a big fan of chicken breast so she was not interested in trying one. The Double Down comes in original recipe and grilled. I am not a big fan of their grilled chicken but original recipe is one of my favorites. Overall the KFC Double Down is a decent sandwich. I would not want to make a steady diet of them but one is not going to hurt you. After I ate the Double Down I decided I did not particularly like the sauce they also put on the sandwich. I decided to make my own version of the Double Down sandwich.

I have no idea what the spices used in the KFC Original Recipe are. I like the original recipe, but it does have quite a bit of sodium so since I am always trying to eat healthier I wanted to come up with a fairly low sodium coating for my sandwich. So I sat down to consider the options for my breading on my sandwich. I wanted it to complement the taste of the chicken, add a little kick to the flavor, and not add a lot of sodium. This won’t be too hard, I figured. I started looking through my spice rack and everything seemed to have a lot of sodium in it so I ruled out a few right away. I ruled out my favorite seasoning salt. This is going to be more difficult than I thought. My original plan had been to season the chicken good with the seasoning salt, roll it in flour and fry it. I had assembled my spices so now it was time to thaw the chicken breasts and make my sandwiches.

Redneck Chicken Sandwich
Note: There is a print link embedded within this post, please visit this post to print it.

Ingredients:

• 2 boneless, skinless chicken breast halves
• 1/4 cup flour
• 1 tsp onion powder
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• 2 tsp chili powder
• 2 thick cut slices bacon
• 2 slices cheese (Use whatever is your favorite cheese. I used 1 slice American and 1 slice Pepper Jack.)

Directions

Preheat your deep fryer to 375 to 400 degrees. If you do not have a deep fryer use a large pan on the stove. Use a thermometer to make sure the temperature is right.

While the fryer is heating up, mix the flour, onion powder, garlic powder, and chili powder in a large shallow bowl. Once the fryer is up to temperature thoroughly coat one of the breast halves and carefully put it in the hot oil. Repeat with the other breast half. You want to make sure you go right into the oil so the flour does not have time to get soggy and doughy. Depending on the thickness of the breast halves it will take 8 to 12 minutes to cook. You do want to make sure that they are cooked through. My favorite technique for this is to cook a third breast half. When I think they are done I will take out the third half and cut it open to verify it is done. After the cooking I eat the evidence.

While the chicken is cooking, fry the 2 bacon slices to your desired crispness.

When the chicken and bacon are cooked allow them to drain for a few minutes on a paper towel.

After the chicken and bacon have drained lay the first breast half on the plate. Add the 2 slices of cheese and bacon then top with the second breast half, and you are ready to eat.

Now that spring is here, it’s time to clean up the grill and start cooking outdoors. One of my favorite side dishes is baked beans. There are many varieties of canned baked beans on the market such as B&M, Van Camp, or Bush’s. All of these are good beans and will go well with anything you might grill up, but if you want to step it up a notch and make it look like you really went all out for the BBQ, try my easy recipe to make your own baked beans. They’ll satisfy even the pickiest eater and convince everyone you slaved all day in the kitchen making these.

If you do want to spend more time cooking these baked beans you can start with your favorite type of dried beans. Soak them overnight to soften them up. Cook them to taste, and then use them for the baked beans. I’m usually too busy this time of year to spend that much time on one dish. It is much easier and faster to start with canned Pork and Beans. I will normally by the cheap store brand because by the time I get done doctoring the beans up you will not be able to tell that they are the cheap ones anyways.

Redneck Baked Beans

Ingredients:

• 2 15 oz. cans Pork and Beans
• 1/2 pound bacon
• 1 med-large onion diced
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup molasses
• 1-2 teaspoons dry mustard

Fry the bacon and set aside. I like to leave my bacon just a bit less done than I would normally cook it. When I am cooking bacon for breakfast I like it to be good and crispy, but when I am adding it to the beans I leave it a bit softer.

After I fry the bacon I will add the diced onion to the pan and cook just until they turn clear. Dice the onions as large or small as you like. I really like the flavor of onion cooked in bacon grease, so I dice mine into fairly large chunks. Crumble up the bacon and mix it in with the onion.

Open the two cans of beans and pour into a casserole dish. Add in the bacon and onion mixture, the brown sugar, molasses, and dry mustard. Mix well.

Place the casserole dish in a 350 degree oven and bake for 1 to 3 hours. The longer you bake the beans the thicker they will become so check them after 1 hour and then every half hour after that until they are at your desired thickness.

After removing the beans from the oven, let them cool for 10 to 15 minutes before serving. Garnish with some shredded cheese, bacon strips, or onion greens if you like.

You can also make these beans in the slow cooker. Put all the ingredients in the slow cooker in the morning and let them cook all day. By dinnertime the beans will be perfect.

You ever have one of those days where nothing sounds good for dinner? Everything in the cupboards looks like the same old boring thing? I hate it when that happens. I decided the best thing was cheese burgers for dinner. I then discovered that the only ground beef I had was frozen, but I did have a couple of chicken breasts. I decided to try a chicken noodle casserole instead. I did not have a recipe for this so I was not sure what I would end up with. Luckily my dogs were on hand to cheer me on. They like recipes that don’t work out so well because they get the left overs.

This chicken noodle casserole turned out to be an easy dish to make and not all that time consuming. It is a simple yet filling dish that can be easily reheated in a microwave or the oven as well.

Chicken Noodle Casserole

Ingredients:

• 2 boneless, skinless chicken breast halves
• 1 can Cream of Chicken soup
• 1 cup sour cream
• 1 pound egg noodles
• 1 to 2 cups shredded cheese

I start by frying the chicken breasts. Add a few tablespoons of vegetable oil or bacon grease to a large skillet and heat to medium high temperature. Place the chicken breasts in the pan and season to taste with your favorite seasoning salt. I like to use Johnny’s seasoning salt, but any seasoning salt will do. Cooking times will vary greatly depending on the size and thickness of the breast. I usually start with about 7 minutes per side for large breasts. Make sure the breasts are cooked through. Dice the breasts into 1/2 to 1 inch pieces and set aside.

Add 4 to 6 cups of water to a large pan. Sprinkle in about 1 tablespoon of salt and bring to a boil. Add the noodles to the pot and boil for 10 to 15 minutes.

When the noodles are cooked drain them and place them into a casserole dish with the diced chicken breasts. Pour in the can of Cream of Chicken soup and the cup of sour cream (you can replace the sour cream with a cup of milk if you prefer). Cover the dish with the shredded cheese. I like to use shredded mozzarella, but what ever your favorite shredded cheese is will do. If I want this to be really cheesy I will use sliced Velveeta instead of the shredded cheese.

Bake in a preheated 375 degree oven for 20 to 30 minutes. I bake mine until the cheese is melted and starts to brown. Remove from the oven and let cool for 5 to 10 minutes before serving.

Add a green salad, or other vegetable for a side dish and you have a family pleasing dinner that will not take a lot of time to cook.

It has been a long and busy week. I had no time to spend in the kitchen, or much of anything else. I normally get off work at 4:00pm Monday through Thursday and 1:30pm on Friday. On Wednesday at 3:00pm I got a meeting notice for a 4:00pm meeting. This was an important meeting that I had to attend. I got out of there at 5:30. On the plus side I did get off work at noon on Friday, which gave me plenty of time Friday afternoon to take both of my vehicles in for an oil change. By the time that was done it was too late to do much cooking and I was too tired to try anyways. I did make some good snacks this weekend I want to share.

I was cruising around the internet and came across something I am ashamed to admit I had never thought of. The headline alone really grabbed my attention: Bacon Popcorn. I was sure this would be some bizarre seasoning for your popcorn that would not be something I would actually want to try. The post was about using rendered bacon fat to cook your popcorn. “Why have I never thought of this before?” I asked myself.

I told my wife about it. Her first reaction was the same as several women I mentioned this to. “EWWW, yuck,” she said. What could be yucky about bacon? I use bacon grease to cook many other things instead of vegetable oil — why not popcorn? Friday night I made a pan of  bacon popcorn. After adding a little salt I tasted the popcorn. I could not taste the bacon at first. I ate a couple more pieces and took the bowls into the living room. By the time I got in the living room there was a light bacon flavor on my tongue. I handed a bowl to my wife and she tried it. She said it tastes like regular popcorn and could not taste the bacon. After eating a bit more she too got a nice mild bacon flavor from the popcorn. The best part of eating the bacon popcorn was after I was done, my hands smelled like bacon. I hated to wash my hands after that.

The other good snack I made was vanilla ice cream. We cleaned out our storage unit a few weeks ago and came across our ice cream maker. We had not used that for some time, so yesterday we cleaned it up and made some vanilla ice cream. It had been so long since we used it that neither of us could remember the recipe, so we went online and found the basic recipe and instructions on the internet (at about.com) — there was even a link to instructions for using our Rival Ice Cream Maker.

The only problem with making ice cream is keeping my wife from eating it when it is done churning. She really like the ice cream soft right out of the ice cream maker. I don’t mind the soft ice cream myself, but I prefer to let it set up a bit in the freezer before eating it so it is more like ice cream than pudding. Home made ice cream is the best. It’s as good as or better than even the best ice cream you can buy in the store and it is fun to make.

Now go dig that coffee mug of bacon grease out of the back of the fridge and make some popcorn … you know you want to.

I was browsing through previous posts here on CliqueClack and came across this Shepherd’s pie recipe. This got me thinking about my version of a Shepherd’s Pie. My Redneck pie is based off of the traditional Shepherd’s pie, but I have added my own twist to kick up the flavor a notch or two. I don’t add corn or peas to my Redneck pie, but I do add bacon and cheese.

This is really a simple recipe to make and it is another good use of leftover mashed potatoes as well. And the part I like best is I make the whole thing in one pan so fewer dishes to do after dinner. My dogs do not appreciate this because there are not enough dishes for them to lick afterwards. They think that it is their job to pre-wash all dishes before they go in the dishwashers and they are dedicated to their job.

Redneck Pie

Ingredients:

• 1 pound ground beef
• 1/2 pound bacon
• 1 medium onion, diced
• leftover mashed potatoes
• salt
• pepper
• 1 packet Brown Gravy Mix
• 1 to 2 cups shredded cheese. Use what ever is your favorite. I like the Fiesta blend myself.

Directions:

In a large cast iron skillet fry the strips of bacon and set aside.

Pour the bacon grease out of the pan leaving a few tablespoons in the pan. Add the onions and cook until the just start to turn translucent. Add the ground beef and cook until done.

Add in the packet of gravy mix and just enough water to allow the gravy mix to blend in with the meat. I never measure this part exactly so I would suggest starting with about 1/4 cup. If there is still dry gravy mix add a little more water. The secret to this is not to add too much water. If you turn the meat mixture into gravy the mashed potatoes will just soak into the gravy while baking. You will end up with a good mashed potatoes and beef gravy for dinner, but not a Redneck pie.

Crumble the bacon and mix into the ground beef. Leave on a medium low heat for about 5 minutes to give the gravy time to infuse its flavor. Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees while the meat is simmering.

Remove the skillet from the heat and spread the mashed potatoes over the top. Spread the potatoes out evenly and smooth the top. Sprinkle on the shredded cheese and bake until the cheese is melted and the potatoes are a nice golden brown. This will take about 20 minutes. Remove from the oven and serve.

You can add the corn and peas to this dish or any other vegetables you like. You could also replace the bacon with bacon bits and use extra lean ground beef if you are trying to reduce your fat intake.

Happy Easter everyone. My wife and I have been very busy this weekend getting ready for Easter today. We spent the day yesterday making a chocolate cake, potato salad, bread, and peanut butter chocolate chip cookies. After that I made Shepherd’s pie for dinner. Everything turned out great so I decided to try something new for breakfast this morning to start Easter off right.

I have to say that the Food Network is one of my favorite channels to watch. When I am not watching The Outdoor Channel or History channel I am watching The Food Network. One of my favorite Food Network stars is Paula Deen. Paula is awesome and when I saw this recipe from her for Baked French Toast Casserole I just had to try it. This is a fairly easy recipe and it was so good. And talk about filling. One helping and I was full and will be for some time to come.

This Baked French Toast Casserole is a bit time intensive in that you have to prep the French bread the night before. Add the sliced bread and egg mixture to a 9X13 pan and refrigerate over night. Then the next morning  mix the praline topping, spread it over the bread and bake for 40 minutes. I was not sure what the praline topping would be like, but when I mixed it up and tasted it I thought it was pretty good and when the dish was done it was awesome. Some butter, brown sugar, chopped pecans, corn syrup, cinnamon and nutmeg and the flavor was all through the bread. After baking, the bread was crispy on top and almost a bread pudding underneath. the bread still held together well and was not soggy but was soft, tender, and juicy. Top this with some maple syrup and a side of breakfast sausage and you have a great breakfast to start your Easter.

For dinner tonight we will be having Lorie’s baked beans, BBQed chicken thighs, potato salad, and for desert chocolate cake and chocolate ice cream. I am going to be on a diet for a month just to undo the food for Easter, but it is going to be worth it. The grand kids are supposed to be here this afternoon so we have a dozen Easter eggs for my 18 month old grandson to hunt for which will be his first Easter egg hunt. This should be a great day and I hope everyone has as great an Easter.

My grandmother was a wonderful, sweet lady. My grandmother could not cook anything very well — except for potato cakes. I had not thought about Grandma’s potato cakes for a long time when out of the blue the other night my wife asked me if I have ever had potato pancakes. I remembered Grandma’s potato cakes and have been craving them all week. This morning I ended that craving.

My Grandma made potato cakes when ever she had leftover mashed potatoes. She would serve them for breakfast, lunch, or dinner depending  on the amount of left over mashed potatoes and her mood. These potato cakes are so simple and yet tasty and filling I don’t know why I have not made them for years. This is simple comfort food that brings back many fond memories of my childhood. Since I did not have any leftover mashed potatoes I had to make some fresh. I hoped that would not ruin the taste of the potato cakes.

Potato Cakes

Ingredients:

• 4 to 5 medium potatoes mashed
• 1 egg
• 1/3 to 1/2 cup flour
• salt and pepper

If you are making these potato cakes from leftover mashed potatoes add the egg and the flour and mix well. If you are using fresh mashed potatoes then let them cool after mashing them before mixing in  the egg and flour. Mix in salt and pepper to taste.

In a medium skillet heated to a medium high temperature add either a few tablespoons of vegetable oil or bacon grease. I know that the vegetable oil is healthier, but I, like my grandmother, always use bacon grease. It adds much better flavor and I love bacon.

When the oil is hot, or the bacon grease is melted add a couple of spoonfuls of the potatoes to the pan and flatten with a spatula. Let the cake cook for a few minutes and flip. The cake should have a nice golden brown color just like a pancake.

If the cake does not want to hold together like a pancake add a little more flour to the remaining mashed potatoes to help keep it together. The key to making these potato cakes come out correctly is to make sure that you keep plenty of bacon grease, or oil, in the pan. If you add more grease let it heat up to temperature before cooking the next cake.

As I made these for breakfast I topped them with fried eggs, crumbled bacon, and diced onions also cooked in bacon grease. Did I mention I love bacon? Add some country gravy, salsa, or ketchup and you are ready to eat. If you really want to get crazy you can top them with some pancake syrup like my wife does.

I was thumbing through past posts here on CliqueClack food today when I came across Debbie’s molten chocolate cake post for Lick My Lens. This sounded very good so I decided to make my Lava cake for dessert. The thing I like about these lava cakes is they are just so gooey and sweet that a couple of them will leave you dazed and drooling for hours just thinking of how sweet they are.

I guarantee if you are on a diet this is not the dessert for you. These lava cakes ooze a thick, rich, sweet  chocolate filling that is like eating raw brownie dough. They are easy to make and will satisfy anyone’s sweet cravings. I am normally not much for sweets — I tend to prefer more salty treats than sweet treats. Once in a while I do get a strong craving for sweet and the lava cakes are my favorite answer. The great thing about the lava cakes is that even though they are so easy to make they really do taste and look like they are a lot of work and you can easily impress anyone with your culinary skills. I for one like recipes like this, and I will let the people I cook for keep thinking I worked much harder than I did to make this unbelievable dessert for them.

Redneck Lava Cakes

Ingredients:

• 4 tablespoons butter, room temperature, plus more for muffin tins
• 1/3 cup granulated sugar, plus more for muffin tins
• 3 large eggs
• 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 8 ounces semisweet chocolate, melted
• Confectioners’ sugar for dusting
• Whipped cream, for serving (optional)

Directions

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Generously butter 4 cups of a standard muffin tin. Dust with granulated sugar and tap out excess. Set aside.

In the bowl of an electric mixer, cream butter and granulated sugar until fluffy, Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. With mixer on low speed, beat in flour and salt until just combined. Beat in chocolate (Do not over-mix).

Divide batter evenly among prepared muffin cups. Place muffin tin on a baking sheet; bake just until tops of cakes no longer jiggle when pan is lightly shaken, 8-10 minutes. Remove from oven; let stand 10 minutes.

To serve, turn out cakes and place on serving plates, top sides up. Dust with confectioners’ sugar. These are great with vanilla ice cream or with the whipped cream. I will normally whip up my own cream. I think it is has a fresher, richer taste than the whipped cream you buy in the store. Whipped cream is another of those easy to make dishes that will get people thinking you worked harder than you did. To make the whipped cream add 1 cup of heavy cream, 1/4 cup sugar, 1/4 teaspoon vanilla to a bowl and whip it with an electric mixer. It only takes a few minutes and you have excellent whipped cream. Serve these lava cakes for dessert the next time you want to treat your family and they will all appreciate your skills as a master chef.

Friday night I was working on my recipe for this post when my wife mentioned it was cooling down in the house. I got up and turned on the heater and went back to my recipe. A few minutes later we started smelling a burning smell. After some investigation I discovered the smell was coming from the heater. I turned off the heater and decided I would clean out the heater Saturday morning and then make my recipe, get some pictures and write my post.

Saturday morning I got up, had some coffee and made sure I had all my ingredients for my recipe. I was really looking forward to making this dish for dinner tonight. I got out my Air compressor and moved it and the heater out to the front yard. After tripping the breaker when I turned on the compressor I shut a few things off that were on the same circuit and charged up the compressor. I pulled the cover off the heating unit and blew out the dust. I saw no signs of burning dust, but was sure that would solve the problem. I put the cover back on and took the heater back in the house. I plugged it in and turned it on. Nothing happened. It would not come on. I checked to make sure the outlet was working and still no life from the heater. This heater is one of those fake fireplace heaters. It looks like a fire place, but really the heating unit is on the bottom. I had taken the cover off of the heating unit and cleaned it out. I packed the heater back outside and removed the cover from the back and blew out the dust. That is when I found the burnt connector at the bottom.

This connector has the wires from the cord on one side and the wires going to the controls on the other. The dust had built up and overheated this connector and fried it. I spent the next several hours rewiring the connections. Finally I got the heater put back together and working. I turned to my wife and she asked me, “Whats for dinner?” I looked at the time and realized it was too late to make the recipe I had been working on and decided to go get a Little Caesars Pizza instead. The great thing about Little Caesars Pizza is it’s cheap. $5.00 for a pizza that is bigger than and tastes better than a frozen pizza. One pizza is more than enough for a dinner for two and the pizza is pretty good. They do not over do the sauce like some pizza places do, the cheese is just right and there is plenty of pepperoni on the pizza. It is a fast, and cheap dinner and that is what I like.

In my continuing quest to discover the ingredients for the Mandarin sauce on my favorite Chinese food restaurant’s Mandarin Chicken, I came across this rather tasty number in the back of my recipe box.

I have a vast array of recipes my Mom collected over the years of her life. It’s fun looking through these old recipes because many are very old and have been handed down from generation to generation. Some of them are handwritten and some were cut from the back of a box of some cooking ingredient. This particular recipe has no other information so I don’t know where it came from. I was somewhat surprised to find this recipe because Mom never cooked anything like this that I can remember.

How many of you out there have a card file full of these old recipes from a relative sitting in a cupboard somewhere? What condition are they in? I have a few that are only partially there now so it will be a lot of work to try and figure out what  the ingredients are and the amounts to use that are missing either from something spilled on them or part of another recipe card sticking to it. I am working on creating a database to store all of my recipes to keep them from being destroyed, and I am also scanning some of the older ones to save digital images of the markings added to them. I hope that you’re also doing what you can to preserve the history of your old recipes too.

Oriental Chicken

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Ingredients:

• 2 pounds skinless, boneless chicken breast halves – cut into bite-size pieces
• 1/4 cup cornstarch
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 6 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 4 teaspoons sesame oil
• 2 tablespoons grated fresh ginger root
• 1/2 cup chopped green onion
• 1/2 cup water
• 1/4 cup distilled white vinegar
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 2 tablespoons cornstarch
• 2 tablespoons soy sauce
• 1/4 cup ketchup

Directions

Coat the chicken pieces with 1/4 cup of cornstarch; set aside.

Beat the eggs, salt, and pepper in a mixing bowl until smooth. Stir in the flour and baking powder until no large lumps remain. Mix in the chicken until evenly coated.

Heat the vegetable oil in a wok or large skillet over high heat. Drop in the chicken pieces; cook until golden brown and no longer pink on the inside, about 12 minutes. Set the chicken aside; keep warm.

Reduce the heat to medium-high and stir in the sesame oil, ginger, and green onion. Cook and stir until the onion is limp and the ginger begins to brown, about 1 minute. Pour in the water, vinegar, and sugar; bring to a boil. Dissolve the cornstarch in the soy sauce and add to the simmering vinegar along with the ketchup. Stir until the sauce has thickened and is no longer cloudy. Stir in the chicken and simmer until hot.

I like to serve this over pasta, but rice would work just as well. Add some fresh vegetables on the side and you have a filling meal that is fairly light.

The one thing I hate about this time of year is that the fishing sucks. Water levels in rivers and streams are down and the areas that are open for fishing are hard to fish in these conditions. We have been experiencing an early spring here in Idaho so the fishing is improving, but it is still not great. I was really feeling like fish for dinner the other day, but when I went to the freezer all that was left was a small grouse. Pickings are slim.

I sat down and turned on the food network to get some ideas. I watched an episode of Iron Chef America and the secret ingredient was fish. There were several different types of fish and most of them I had never heard of. It turns out that several of the fish were members of the Tilapia family. I had at least heard of Tilapia, however I did not know there were several different types of Tilapia. I have seen Tilapia in the seafood section at the Walmart so I headed off to get some of this new fish to try.

Tilapia is a mild flavored fresh water fish that is farm raised and readily available. It’s an inexpensive fish as well. Unlike some farm raised fish I have tried, the Tilapia is not mushy. It is firm and holds together well.

According to Wikipedia, Tilapia have very low levels of mercury as they are a fast-growing and short-lived fish that mostly eats a vegetarian diet and therefore do not accumulate mercury found in prey.

Tilapia is a low total fat, low saturated fat, low calorie, low carbohydrate and low sodium protein source. It is also an excellent source of Phosphorus, Niacin, Selenium, Vitamin B12 and Potassium.

I got my Tilapia fillets home and took some out to thaw. When I am trying a fish I have never eaten before I go for my standby cooking method: I lightly flour it and fry the fish in some hot oil. I had some left over chicken breast in the fridge so I decided to add a variation of my Sour Chicken Casserole as well. I left out the cheese when I made my pasta this time, because I have been watching the food network, and now know that cheese and fish are a big no no. Maybe one of these days someone will explain why that is to me, but for now I will just go with it.

Fried Tilapia

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Ingredients:

• 4 Tilapia fillets
• 1 cup all purpose flour
• salt
• pepper
• 1/4 to 1/2 cup vegetable or olive oil
• 1 to 2 teaspoons garlic powder

In a large non stick frying pan on medium heat add the oil and garlic powder. Bring this up to temperature before adding the fish. If the oil is not hot when the fish is added the fish will soak up some of the oil and may stick to the pan.

Pour the flour into a large bowl. Add salt and pepper to taste. Mix the flour, salt, and pepper. Thoroughly coat the Tilapia fillets with the flour and carefully lay them into the hot oil. Tilapia, like most fish, cooks fast so keep an eye on it.Let it cook on the first side for 2 to 5 minutes, depending on the size of the fillet, then turn over and cook for 2 to 5 minutes on the other side.

Sprinkle on a little lemon juice or add your favorite tar-tar sauce and the Tilapia is ready to eat. Combine this with the pasta and you have a hearty meal that is sure to please.

So you’ve been sharing space with the dog for a week now. You thought that since you like getting power tools for gifts, your wife would love the new vacuum cleaner. Well, I’m going to help you get out of the dog house and back in your own bed. Both you and Fido will thank me so give yourself a flea dip and read on.

You’ve tried buying flowers, leftover candy, even one of the really expensive Teddy bears and she is still looking for a good divorce lawyer while Fido is looking at your neck wondering if he can get a good bite on it.

The way to get back in her good graces is simple — cook her favorite meal for her and give her some of these tasty homemade chocolate-covered caramels. This will show her how much you care about her and no one can resist the sweet, rich, gooey goodness of these candies.

Caramel is really easy to make, but it does require some attention to detail. The heat is the key to good caramel: Get it too hot and it will get hard instead of gooey, not hot enough and it will be runny. This makes good popcorn balls, or ice cream topping, but it is hard to dip in chocolate.

Chocolate-covered Caramels

Ingredients:

caramel

• 1 cup butter
• 2 1/4 cups brown sugar
• 1 cup light corn syrup
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 14-ounce can sweetened condensed milk

chocolate

• 1 pound milk chocolate
• 1 tablespoon butter

Grease an 8 x 8 inch pan.

Melt the butter in a large sauce pan on medium heat.

Add the brown sugar, corn syrup, and condensed milk to the butter.

Stirring constantly heat the mixture to 242 to 248 degrees F. I usually shoot for 245 degrees. I have no particular reason for that temp other than it falls in the range and is easy to see that mark on my candy thermometer. My wife always uses the cold water drop method to tell when her caramel is ready. I have never had good luck with that method so I stick to the thermometer.

When the temp is reached remove the pan from the heat and stir in the vanilla. Pour into the 8×8 pan and let cool until it is set. I like to let mine sit over night in the fridge to get good and set. This makes it much easier to cut into pieces and to dip in the chocolate.

Once the caramel is cooled cut it into one inch squares. You can see from the picture I did not get all of them exactly one inch square, but they taste just as good.

Melt the chocolate with the tablespoon of butter. You can do this in the microwave, or you can use a double boiler. If you don’t have a double boiler pan use a metal bowl that will fit on top of a sauce pan leaving enough room in the pan for an inch or two of water. Make sure that the bowl does not touch the water or you will get the chocolate too hot and have problems.

When the chocolate is melted dip the caramel pieces in and coat them thoroughly. Place them on a sheet of wax paper on a cookie sheet and place in the fridge to cool.

After she eats a few of these I guarantee you will be back in her good graces and not fighting Fido for that dirty old blanket anymore.

I have been told by friends who are either from Philadelphia, or have spent time there that if you’ve never been there then you’ve never really had a Philly cheese steak sandwich. I have tried the West of Philly Cheese steaks shop in Boise and thought the sandwiches were okay, but not all that great. I decided if I can’t get a real Philly cheese steak sandwich I would try my hand at making my own Redneck version.

I have written about using Steak-umm’s to make jerky in a previous post, but what I really like about them is that they can be used for so many things. they are fast and easy to cook so they take very little time and are a quick way to add some meat to any dish. This makes them perfect for these sandwiches. I also decided I would make some potato chips to go along with my sandwiches. I like making my own chips because they are thicker than most chips you can buy and yet they are not tough and hard to eat like some of the thick-cut fries I have tried.

Redneck Steak and Cheese Sandwich

Ingredients:

• 6 to 8 Steak-umms
• 1/2 medium onion, sliced
• 1/2 red, yellow, orange bell peppers, sliced
• 4 to 6 medium potatoes
• 4 to 6 hoagie rolls

I like big pieces of peppers and onions on my sandwiches so I slice the onion and peppers fairly coarsely. In a medium frying pan heat a couple tablespoons of olive oil with a pinch of garlic powder or some fresh minced garlic. Add the onions and peppers and saute. I like to cook them just to the point the onions turn translucent.

In a separate frying pan break up the steak-umms into pieces and fry until the meat is brown. turn the heat down to low and add the onion and peppers. Mix well and let warm together.

Place the hoagie rolls on a baking sheet and fill with the meat mixture. Add a slice of cheese on top and place under the broiler for 1 to 2 minutes to melt the cheese and lightly toast the rolls. Add your favorite condiments and enjoy a tasty sandwich.

For the potato chips I just peel the potatoes and slice them as thinly as possible. If you have a mandolin slicer you will get more consistent chips that will make cooking easier. I normally just use a knife and cut them as thin as I can by hand. I don’t mind the differences in the thickness.

You can cook the chips in a deep fryer if you have one, but I like to cook them in a wok. Put about a cup of oil in the wok, add a teaspoon or two of sesame oil and heat to about 375 degrees. Add the chips a few at a time. Add enough to cover the pan, but not so many that they are overlapping. Cook until they are a good golden brown. Remove from the oil and drain on a paper towel. Add some salt and you will have some good chips that are crispy on the outside, but tender on the inside to go along with your sandwiches.

Normally around my house we only have French toast when we have some leftover bread that is getting too dry to make good sandwiches. However, now that we’re making our own bread instead of buying bread we don’t have much bread that gets dried out. I still like having French toast for breakfast once in a while so this morning my wife and I made some with the homemade bread.

French toast is a quick and tasty breakfast to make. It is quite filling and really is an ideal way to use up dry bread, however if you use fresh homemade bread it is even better.

French Toast

Ingredients:

• 4 eggs
• 1/4 to 1/2 cup milk
• 6 thick slices fresh bread
• salt
• cinnamon
• vanilla

Crack the 4 eggs into a bowl and whisk them until well blended.

Add the milk, a pinch of salt, 1 teaspoon vanilla, and cinnamon to the eggs and whisk again to combine the ingredients. I don’t really measure the cinnamon, so start with 1 teaspoon. I put in enough that I have a good even distribution throughout the egg mixture.

Place a medium size frying pan on the stove and heat to a medium heat. Use some butter or pan spray to help keep the toast from sticking to the pan.

For the bread I like to cut slices that are 3/4 to 1 inch thick. This is more of a Texas toast size slice and it makes for a much more substantial slice that really holds a lot of the egg mixture.

Once the pan is hot, dip a slice of the bread in the egg mixture. Give the bread a few seconds to soak up the egg mixture and then flip it over and soak the other side. You want to give the bread enough time to get fully saturated with the egg mixture. Let the excess egg drip off the bread into the bowl and then put the slice into the frying pan.

Let the bread cook until a nice golden brown then flip it over and cook the other side. The cook time will depend greatly on the thickness of the bread. The thicker it is the longer it will take. I have also found that if the heat is too high the outside will brown quicker, but the inside will not get cooked. You will end up with a nice crispy outside and a doughy, soggy inside. If you gently press a finger into the bread in the pan and no egg comes out, and the bread bounces back it is ready.

Serve the French toast with pancake syrup and butter, or cover with your favorite sausage gravy and enjoy a filling breakfast that will get your day off to a great start.

Around my house we tend to get into a food rut. We eat the same old things week in and week out. Now, I can eat cheese burgers every day for breakfast, lunch, and dinner and be happy with that, but my wife likes variety in the dinner menu. We have watched many of the cooking shows on TV for new recipe ideas and have spent a good amount of time searching the web for new ideas as well. The biggest problem with all of that is most of the recipes we have found use ingredients we have never used, or in some cases, never even heard of and we have no idea where to even get these ingredients. So is there a simple and easy way to prepare the same old thing that will make it new again?

I don’t know if this really makes the same old thing new again, but it is a simple and easy way to make a tasty dish out of just about anything. What I like to do is whip up a batch of my tempura batter and then deep fry it. I have tried some of the ready-made tempura batter mixes in the past and have not cared for them at all so I came up with my own we have used this batter for many different things. We have used this on chicken, fish, hot dogs, onions and even leftover pork roast to create tasty treats to add to the menu.

Tempura batter

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup corn starch
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper
• 6 tablespoons flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• water, just enough to give the consistency of pancake batter

Whip the eggs, salt, and pepper until smooth.

Mix in the flour, corn starch, and baking powder until no large lumps remain.

Add the water until the pancake consistency is obtained.

This recipe will make enough batter for about 2 pounds of boneless skinless chicken breasts.

After mixing up the batter, take whatever it is you are planning to deep fry and coat it with corn starch. This step is the key as it helps the batter bind to your  meat.

Dip the meat into the batter and coat thoroughly.  Let the excess batter drain off and carefully drop into 350 degree oil. You can use a deep fryer or a pan of oil on the stove for the cooking. cooking times will vary depending on the size of the food you are cooking. I have found that the best results for chicken breasts are to either cut them into uniform bite size pieces about 2 inch square or 1/2 to 3/4 inch thick strips. Most chicken breasts are so thick in places that the batter tends to get a little over done before the chicken is cooked through. For the bite size pieces, cook 5 to 8 minutes. So the next time you are struggling to find a way to freshen up dinner, try this simple tempura recipe. I am sure you will be happy with the results.

In my quest to improve my diet and eat healthier, I’m trying to expand my cooking skills to new and different ingredients. I’ve spent a lot of time searching for recipes on the internet. Recently while searching for fish recipes, I came across this delicious Mexican orange chicken recipe on allrecipes.com. For me, fried is about the only way I like my chicken so this recipe is one of several I’m trying now that are way outside my comfort zone.I decided that I would take this chicken recipe for a Recipe test drive. My biggest problem when it comes to eating healthy is that I have certain things I like and I stick to those things. I know how to cook them and I know that I will have a satisfying  and filling meal.

When it comes to chicken I defer to my wife. She is the Queen of cooking chicken and I just can’t make chicken taste as good when I cook it. I’m a beef eater and can out-cook her when it comes to anything beef so she was skeptical when I told her I was going to try this new chicken dish. One of the great things about allrecipes.com is that you can enter the number of people you are cooking for and it will modify the ingredients list for the number of servings you requested. This does not change the cooking instructions so you may have to modify that yourself. I always look at cooking times as a suggestion anyways and check my dish often as I cook until it is cooked to my liking. I modified the recipe for two people and followed the ingredients list provided with the revised Mexican orange chicken recipe.

The cooking directions I left as is except that I did shorten the cooking time to 1 1/2 hours.

When the chicken is done, there will still be a lot of juice left in the pan. The recipe does say that this is the way that the dish should turn out. I had decided already to serve the chicken over rice so the extra juice was added to the rice to add the flavor to the rice. This turned out to be a very good idea. The juice added a citrus, bacon flavor to the rice that was amazing.

For the rice, I cooked 1 cup of rice in 1 1/2 cups of chicken broth and 1/2 cup water, 1 tbsp margarine, and a pinch of salt. Whenever I am cooking rice to use in a dish I like to cook it in chicken broth to add a little flavor to the rice.

As we sat down to eat we were both anticipating a tasty treat. The aroma of the chicken was wonderful. The chicken was incredibly juicy and the bacon and citrus flavor was infused throughout the meat. The flavor the juices from the chicken enhanced the rice and really added to the meal. This is one recipe that will be a showing up on our menu again.

Last week, I posted my plan to change my way of eating to eat healthier and get into better shape. I am still working on figuring out the the nutritional info on what I eat and finding new recipes that are healthier. One thing I’ve been thinking a lot about this last week is snacks. After having  chef’s salad for dinner and watching the food network I get that gnawing urge to snack. I’m not really hungry, I just want to eat something. My wife is happy to chomp away on carrots, but I can’t do it. I hate vegetables. Sometimes an apple, banana or orange will satisfy me but most of the time I’m looking for something either salty or sweet. I can easily sit and eat a whole bag of cheese puffs, potato chips, or a cold burger patty or four and not think twice about it. So what do I do for a snack that is healthier for me and still satisfies my taste buds?

Today most of the foods we buy come with the nutritional information listed on the package. I suppose if you are a dietitian or rocket scientist this information is useful, but for me not so much. I looked at the nutritional information on two snack foods that I really like: cheese puffs and cashews. Now just in thinking about which would be better for me to eat I would pick the cashews. These are naturally grown nuts and should be a good snack. Looking at the info for both however I find that the info does not seem to agree in all categories.

Cheese puffs:

• Serving size: 1 ounce.
• Calories: 160
• Calories from fat: 90
• Total fat: 10g
• Saturated fat: 1.5g
• Cholesterol: 5g
• Sodium: 370mg
• Carbohydrates: 15g
• Dietary fiber: 0g

Whole Cashews:

• Serving size: 1 ounce.
• Calories: 160
• Calories from fat: 110
• Total fat: 13g
• Saturated fat: 2.5g
• Cholesterol: 0g
• Sodium: 115mg
• Carbohydrates: 8g
• Dietary fiber: 1g

Watch any commercial for yogurt or a diet plan and they will tell you calories are bad. Read about most diets and they will tell you to reduce the calories you eat to lose weight. So what does all of this info really mean? By doing a side-by-side comparison it would seem that the cheese puffs are better because they are lower in fat and yet the nuts are lower in cholesterol, sodium, and carbohydrates.

So I started researching healthy snacks on the internet. Like everything else, there are lots of different places to look. I read about avoiding snacks that are high in simple carbohydrates (sugars) and going with snack high in complex carbohydrates ( whole grain breads). The more I read the more confused I get. The one thing that I have been able to get out of all of this research is to stick to whole foods instead of processed foods. Eating whole fruits, vegetables, and nuts are better snacks than cheese puffs, potato chips, and candy bars. So now when I want a snack I will grab some nuts and some vegetables. It will be tough to train myself to eat carrots, or broccoli, or celery for a snack. My wife is part rabbit so she enjoys nibbling on veggies for snacks. I am part bear so I want to eat the rabbit for a snack. It’s no wonder people fail at eating healthy. After all of the research I just want to buy a family size bag of cheese puffs, a box of snack cakes, and a 2 liter bottle of cola and watch bikini oil wrestling the rest of the night. I hope the oil is light virgin olive oil so it’s healthy.

I have been writing my weekly post here for some time now and I have never really paid much attention to how healthy, or more accurately unhealthy, most of my posts have been. Now that we are starting the new year 2010. I am starting to look more closely at what I am eating. I will turn 45 years old in June. I am wondering where all the years have gone. It seems like just yesterday I turned 21 and today I am looking at 45? How does that happen?

I’m also looking at the addition of two more grandchildren to my family in the next few months. I know it still feels weird to think of myself as a Grandpa. I’m looking forward to the grandkids, but I suddenly realized how much energy a toddler has and then multiplied that by three. Holy guacamole, I am in no shape to keep up with them! It’s time to make some changes.

Over the years I have tried many different fad diets. All of them have worked and I lost weight, but the problem with diets is they are impossible to stick to long term. The idea of a diet is to severely restrict what you eat in order to starve your body and force it to consume the stored fat and muscle to get the energy it needs. At some point I have always gotten to the point that I can no longer overcome my urge to eat all the things I have been denying myself and end up going on an eating binge that leaves me dazed and drooling in a near catatonic state. This is not a good feeling. I usually then convince myself that it is better to go back to my old eating habits instead of going back on the diet and heading for another binge.

So what is the answer? Well the answer is to teach myself to eat healthier. For this year my goal is not to lose weight. I have thrown the bathroom scale out the window. That evil satanic device does me no good, it simply mocks me and shows that I have failed to meet my goals. I have seen more people give up on a healthy eating plan because the scale says they gained weight instead of lost it. Couple this with the weekend state from the exhaustion of focusing all of their will power on the diet to stay on the plan and they just give up and eat a box of Twinkies. So my goal is not to lose weight, but to change my lifestyle and eating habits.

Here is my simple plan that I believe will help me to get into better shape to chase three grandchildren around the yard on a summer day.

First. Sit down and look at what I’m eating. Get out the ingredients and look at the nutritional data and start calculating the calories, fat, sodium, and cholesterol that I am eating on a daily and weekly basis. Identify the foods that are the most harmful to a healthy life style and which ones are good for me too.

Second. After identifying the unhealthy things in my diet, look for healthier replacement items and healthier ways to prepare the things that are unhealthy. One of the things I have done and been able to stick to is drinking diet soda instead of regular soda. I know that diet soda is not all that good for you either, but I do like my soda and I just cannot quit drinking it all together. I have cut way back on the amount I drink, and when I do drink soda I drink diet.

Third. Before going grocery shopping write out a menu for the week and a shopping list. When I go shopping only buy what is on the list. No more impulse items that just sound good because I am hungry.

Fourth. Snack foods are my biggest downfall. I love potato chips especially. Find healthier snacks. Popcorn is one that I like. The problem with popcorn is not the popcorn itself, but the extra stuff added to it that makes it so good. I have started making popcorn in oil and just adding a little salt for flavor. No butter or anything else and this makes for a healthier snack.

Last. I will not deny myself any food. If I get the craving for a bacon double cheeseburger with all the fixings I will have one. The trick will be not to have them for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. I will also start looking for new recipe ideas. Find some new cookbooks that have recipes for healthier dishes and new foods. Smaller portions of the less healthy foods and add more healthy foods to the meal. If I decide to have the bacon double cheeseburger instead of the greasy fries I will have some mixed vegetables to go with it. or some fruits. It can be hard to find good fresh fruits and vegetables in my area this time of year so I often times by the frozen veggies and canned fruit. When buying the canned fruit I buy the “no sugar added” fruits packed in fruit juice instead of the syrup. This is not as good as fresh but is better than raspberry-filled powdered doughnuts.

The key to this plan is to focus on changing the lifestyle and not worrying about how much weight am I losing or gaining. I’m looking now to find more fish recipes to add to my menus and look forward to sharing those recipes here with everyone. I’m a cube dweller at work so I don’t get near the exercise that I should so I will also be adding more exercise to my lifestyle as well. I will post more on that when I figure out how I am going to add that into my daily routine.

Last week I wrote the review of the Breadman TR520 Bread machine. This week I am comparing two loaves of bread made in the bread machine.

I am sure that all of you read the manuals that come with new appliances cover to cover before ever using them. I don’t normally read them until after I cannot figure out how to make all the bells and whistles work on my own. The Breadman TR520 bread machine manual has a very lengthy explanation of why you should only use bread flour to make your bread.  The manual goes into great detail on glutens and elasticity, and various other reasons. I decided that the taste test would be the best way to determine whether bread flour or all purpose flour was the best way to go.

I decided to use the basic white bread recipe with all the same settings. I was off to the Walmart to find some bread flour. I had no idea there were so many different types of flour. Using various secret scientific methods to calculate which of the bread flours would be best for the bread, I had it narrowed down to three different choices. At this point, my wife, who was tired of standing there looking at flour, picked up one that said “best for bread machines” on the label and headed for the check out.

After our return from the Walmart I started a loaf of bread using the all-purpose flour. I added the ingredients for a 2 pound loaf, set the loaf size to 2 pounds, and the crust color to dark. After the all-purpose loaf was complete I removed it from the baking pan and let the pan and the bread machine cool before repeating the process with the bread flour. When the bread flour loaf was done I again removed it from the pan to cool.

I placed both loaves in a cool place for the night to cool. The next morning I took both loaves out and carefully cut the end crust off of them to compare the two loaves. According to the manual, the all-purpose loaf would be more dense and heavier. By holding both loaves in my hand the all purpose loaf did feel slightly heavier to me, but my wife thought the bread flour loaf felt heavier. after cutting off the end to examine the bread inside there was very little difference between the two loaves. According to the manual, the bread flour loaf would be more coarse and look more like normal bread whereas the all-purpose loaf being more dense would be less coarse.

The loaf on the left is the bread flour loaf and it is slightly more coarse than the all-purpose loaf on the right, but it is very hard to tell the difference by weight, or by visual look. So the final test was in the taste. Would I be able to tell the difference between the bread by tasting them? I took both end crusts and lightly buttered them then handed them to my wife to tell me which was which. She could not tell the difference between the two and really neither could I. Both loaves of bread had good taste and texture. They make good burger buns and sandwiches. As long as you’re careful when slicing the bread so that it’s not too thick for the toaster, both loaves also made great toast. I recommend that you follow the instructions in the manual for your bread machine when making bread, but as for me I’ll continue to make loaves of white bread using the cheaper all-purpose flour. I like the bread that comes out, I am happy with the taste and texture, and the homemade blackberry jelly will not soak through the bread faster than you can eat it.

I have recently purchased the Breadman TR520 Bread Maker. This is one of the more inexpensive bread makers available on the market today and it is a simple unit to use.

The TR520 has eight automatic settings that make it very simple to program for whatever bread you are making. These settings are for basic white bread, fast bake, French bread, whole wheat bread, sweet, quick bread, dough, and bake-only. The TR520 will make three different size loafs of bread: 1, 1 ½, and 2 pound loaves, and has three crust color settings: light, medium, and dark.

The 64 page manual that comes with the TR520 is full of helpful tips to make your bread making easy and a success, along with many good recipes for making many different types of bread. All of the functions are well explained in the manual, which includes a chart that shows the bake time for all the different types of bread, loaves, and crust color settings.

One of the features that I was really interested in when I bought the TR520 was the fast bake setting. Most loaves of bread take three to four hours to bake, but with the fast bake setting you have a two pound loaf of bread in one hour. When you select the fast bake setting, you do not have all of the other options to choose from. You can make a two pound loaf of basic white bread with a medium crust and that is all. If you want anything else you will have to wait the three to four hours for the loaf of bread.

The basic bread setting is for your basic white bread recipes and for most of the prepackaged bread mixes. The French bread setting is for recipes that are low in fat and sugar, which gives you a loaf with a crisp crust and chewy interior. The whole wheat setting is for recipes that are more than 50% whole wheat. The sweet bread setting is for recipes that are high in fat, sugar, eggs, or cheese. The quick bread setting is for recipes that use baking powder or baking soda instead of yeast to make the bread or cake rise. The dough setting is for making dough to use in other things. This is great for making homemade pizza crusts, or really good pretzels. The bake-only setting is for baking breads or cakes for longer periods. This setting can be set in ten minute increments.

The recipes in the manual are very well written, with a list of ingredients that includes measurements for 1, 1 ½, and 2 pound loaves as well as for active dry yeast, quick rise yeast, and bread machine yeast. The ingredient list is followed by very thorough step-by-step instructions for adding the ingredients, setting the programs and starting the baking process.

The recipes range from simple white bread, one of my favorites, to a honey wheat bread, rye bread, and cinnamon-raisin bread. The quick bread section has banana nut, cranberry nut, corn, zucchini, and apple walnut bread recipes, all of which sound pretty good. The dough section includes bagel, dinner rolls, whole wheat pizza crust, regular pizza crust, almond cherry coffee cake, soft pretzel, and cinnamon roll dough recipes.

So far I have made about eight loaves of bread in the TR520 and have really been pleased with each loaf. I have made a couple of fast bake loaves, a couple of French bread loaves, and the rest have been basic white bread loaves. All have been very good and much better than most of the bread available in the average grocery store. The only complaint I have with the Breadman TR520 is the yellow sticker with white writing on the control panel, which is a bit hard to read, so until you get familiar with the setting,s it is a little hard to see what you are setting the machine to do.

So, I know what you are thinking. “Enough with the sales pitch already. this is a food blog”. Show us the food, man. I will, but you will have to wait for my next post. I have a comparison of a couple of loaves I am working on for next time.

Well my post today is late going up. It’s all my fault. I know for some of you that messes up your whole weekend because who doesn’t like starting their Saturday with some Redneck cooking?

I normally write my weekly post on Friday evening and I had planned out a post that I think would have made Emeril and Wolfgang jealous. I was looking forward to writing the post when I went to bed Thursday. When I got up Friday morning I had a slight tickle in the back of my throat. I felt fine otherwise so I had my morning coffee and got ready for work.

As the day wore on, the tickle in the back of my throat grew worse and my nose got more and more stuffed up. By the time I left work for the week I could barely breath through my nose, my head felt like it was stuffed with cotton and was slowly spinning much like the restaurant in the Space Needle in Seattle.

After I got home, my wife and I ran to the hardware store to pick up some material for a Christmas project we are working on as well as to the grocery store to pick up some groceries. By the time we got home I was really feeling bad. My cough was much worse and my head was really clogged up. I decided I needed to take some cough medicine to clear my head and ease the coughing. I took a dose and after a little while I felt a little better. I was coughing less, but my head was still stuffed up. I took another dose of cough medicine and sat down in the recliner to relax. Again the cough medicine made me feel a little better, so I took another dose and then another and was really feeling pretty good.

After 5 doses of my cough medicine and some time relaxing in the recliner I felt good enough to write my post. I sat at the computer and began typing up the post. Wow, this one was going faster than ever. In no time I had it all written up and ready to upload it to CliqueClack. I went to get another dose of cough medicine and something to snack on. Lorie happened to walk by my computer and look at what I had written. When I walked back into the living room she asked me what I was working on. My CliqueClack post I told her. You cannot post that she told me. After a lengthy discussion I agreed to wait until this morning and proofread the post again before posting it.

I got up this morning and had a cup of coffee. I sat down to check email and look over my post before submitting it. As I read the post I realized that writing that post after 5 doses of my cough medicine really was not a good idea. It rambled on about many different subjects that did not even relate to the post in any way. There were words I could not even identify and I have seen Rube Goldberg devices that were less complicated than the recipe steps. In the end when I had finished reading this bizarre post, I thought it was impossible that anyone, whether on cough medicine or not, could write that long a post and screw up the directions for taking a frozen pizza out of the freezer and putting it in the oven to cook that badly. If I were to post that and anyone were able to follow the directions they would be lucky if they only burnt up their kitchen and not the whole house.

The basic steps I had in the post after extracting all of the rambling were: Take frozen pizza out of freezer. Pre-heat oven to 500 degrees. When the oven is hot, place frozen pizza in oven. Bake for 45 minutes. Remove pizza from oven, The pizza may be hot, so be careful. Eat and enjoy. There was no mention of taking the pizza out of the packaging. And most frozen pizzas are supposed to be cooked for 15 to 20 minutes at 400 to 450 degrees so I am not sure where the 500 degrees for 45 minutes came from.

The bottom line is, while this cough medicine is great for treating a cold, it should have a caution label not to try to write a recipe post for a food web site while under the influence of the medicine. Have a great weekend and hopefully my next post will not put your kitchen at risk.

West Bend 76006 Rotary Snack Oven