German Style Salisbury Steak

German Style Salisbury Steak
Originally uploaded by Ajidivine

Mmmm good! This was last night's dinner. Michael came into the kitchen and saw ground turkey patties going into the pan and asked if we were having burgers. I said no, it's salisbury steak without the beef. He just shrugged his shoulders and said if you say so. This recipe came from Weeknight Menus by Cuisine at Home. The recipe calls for beef chuck, but I decided to use ground turkey. The gravy calls for a dark beer or beef broth and thankfully I had a dark beer on hand in the fridge. I also used chicken broth in the gravy too. The mashed potatoes were instant also. I had some frozen spinach, so it became my other side item. The gravy was so rich tasting and I believe the dark beer had something to do with that, so glad I didn't have beef broth. I am telling you the ground turkey worked wonderful in this dish. I may try it with beef one day, but somehow I doubt it. I like my beef in the form of a juicy porterhouse or ribeye. As always, if you want the recipe I am willing to share.

I will be making Shepherd's pie for the first time in my life this weekend and I will make my own mashed potatoes for that recipe.

Garlic Lime Chicken

Garlic Lime Chicken
Originally uploaded by Ajidivine

Garlic lime chicken, mashed potatoes and fresh asparagus was Wednesday nights dinner. I found the recipe in a book called Saving Dinner by Leanne Ely. It was fairly simple to do and not to costly to prepare. I wasn't so sure if I would like lime juice on my chicken, but the combination of all the spices together actually worked well. I made instant mashed potatoes as opposed to doing it myself. I do have a 5lb bag of russett potatoes sitting in my kitchen that are waiting for me. I love fresh asparagus (can't stand the canned variety). I cooked the asparagus in a little chicken broth, butter and adobo seasing, just enough to keep some of the crunch.

The chicken recipe has been added to my recipe database, because I will make this again. If you want to the recipe let me know and I will share it with you.

Homemade Biscuits

Homemade Biscuits
Originally uploaded by Ajidivine

I realized that I have yet to post anything about breakfast items, so when I made biscuits this morning I knew I had post something. I have been making biscuits for years and sometimes they didn't turn out as good as I wanted them to. In watching FoodNetwork I learned that I was perhaps overworking my dough sometimes. So I now I don't knead the dough, but more folding it over itself a few times to make the biscuits flakier. This turned out to be a great technique, because my biscuits rise higher than ever and taste wonderful. This morning we had biscuits, hickory smoked turkey, eggs and hashbrowns. Hmmm it was so good.

Entertaining

I love the thought of hosting a really nice dinner party, but for now it is a thought. I did put together a smallish gathering with a few appetizers this past Saturday evening. I made a trip to the new ABC store for some libations. The new store is the largest ABC store I have yet to visit and it is nicely laid out. And I found a couple of beverages that had rebate forms, yep....rebates for liquor. I bought some pre-mixed blue melon margarita and a bottle of kamakaze shots. I made Hawaiin meatballs, BBQ chicken wraps and a spinach salad. The meatballs were made with ground turkey, plain bread crumbs, and Hawaiin sauce, then baked in the oven and once they were done I put them in a crockpot with Hawaiin sauce and pineapple chunks. I bought a whole garlic chicken from the deli department and pulled the meat off the bone. I mixed meat with Sweet Baby Rays Raspberry Chipotle BBQ sauce and the spooned the mixture into the crescent roll dough, wrapped them and baked them. My guests loved everything and it wasn't too much work for me the host. We had a great night of snacking, drinking and great conversation.

Calzone night

Calzone
Originally uploaded by Ajidivine

Friday night I made calzones, two huge one. I filled them with mushrooms, thinly sliced onion, fresh basil, turkey pepperoni, mozzarella cheese and little parmesan cheese. I used my pizza dough recipe once again, but this time I added a bit a garlic to the dough. These things were so huge, we could only eat half it for dinner. The flavor that basil gave to mushrooms was so good. The other half was still good when warmed in the oven the next day for lunch.