Becka's blog

We had a very blessed and busy Easter week here at our house.

This is my egg tree that DH thinks looks like Charlie Brown's Christmas tree:

Our friend and my former college roommate, Cathy, came down from NC for a couple of days to see us and to attend the Living Gallery program on campus. This was the 13th year that the school has presented this program. This year's play had a very powerful evangelistic message.

While Cathy was here she wanted to reconnect with Jane, another friend from college. We were able to meet for lunch at a restaurant and hear about Jane's recent trip out west. As you can imagine, none of us has changed a bit in the last thirty or so years.

Everything is in full bloom here in Greenville. Rob brought in some daffodils and helleborus from our yard and I was given a lovely bouquet of tulips and a beautiful lily plant for Easter. I don't think I have ever had a lily before and I didn't realize that the white ones were so fragrant.

My Easter wheat grass experiment was a great success! I even had to "mow" my grass a couple of days before Easter because it was getting so tall. I need to make a note for future plantings that one week before Easter is sufficient for a healthy crop.

Here is the grass ten days after planting:

Here it is on our table for Easter:

I also tried a few more of the silk tie-dyed eggs. They are fun to do and I plan to try to do more of these in the future.

We had wonderful services at church on Sunday. The Sunday school hour was a time of focusing on the Lord's crucifixion and the morning service was a time of rejoicing in the resurrection. The evening service was a praise service where six different individuals were able to share how the Lord has worked in their lives in recent days.

We were also able to share lunch with family and friends gathered around our table. I hope all of you had an equally blessed day.

Before I close I need to post a couple of Easter pictures of GS, Drew.

Here he is meeting the Easter bunny at the mall:

Here he is tasting his first colored Easter egg. He was very excited about the whole process of coloring the eggs, but was very disappointed in the taste after eating marshmallow eggs earlier in the week!

Becka

In a recent post I mentioned using a Silpat to line a pan for easy clean-up. Rhonda wrote and asked about the Silpat, so I thought I'd post a picture to show what it looks like.

The Silpat is a silicone/fiberglass mat that can withstand high temperature. You have probably seen all kinds of bakeware made from this type of material in recent years. I have had my Silpat for a number of years as you can tell from it's stained condition. It is very handy for baking items such as cheesy sandwiches, etc. when you are trying to avoid a lot of clean-up

Another item I have been using a great deal lately to avoid clean-up are these foil sheets. I saw them a few months ago at Dollar Tree and decided to try a box. I have really enjoyed using them and have found all kinds of uses for them in my kitchen. I even gave each of the kids a box of them for Christmas! DH bought me a large box of them at Costco for even less than I paid for them at Dollar Tree.

The next tip is for lining a casserole dish or baking pan with foil. I think I read this tip in a magazine. Turn your pan or dish upside down and shape the foil on the outside of the pan. Remove the foil and then flip the pan over and place the shaped foil inside the pan. I have found this makes it fit much better than if you try to stuff the foil down inside the pan or dish and then try to smooth it out.

Do you ever need to cut a pie into an odd number of pieces? Here is a helpful tip: If you need to cut the pie into seven pieces (or five or nine) first cut a "Y" shaped cut into the pie. Then cut the large sections into three pieces each (or two or four). I have found this to work much better than just trying to eyeball the cuts.

Do you have a favorite kitchen tip you would like to share?

Becka

I saw a neat idea for decorating Easter eggs recently and was able to experiment with the technique last weekend. The idea was for dying the eggs with printed silk. Who knew you could even do such a thing? Here are my two "Egg-speriments":

You can use any printed silk fabric, but the sources I found suggested using old silk neckties. Here's how you do it:

Deconstruct an old necktie (it must be silk):

Cut a piece large enough to cover the egg. Wrap around the egg with the outside of the silk facing the egg and secure with string or a twistie.

Cut a piece of white fabric large enough to cover the egg and wrap this around the silk-wrapped egg and secure with string or a twistie.

Place the eggs you have prepared as described above in a large saucepan of water and then add 1/4 cup white vinegar. Bring to a boil and boil for 20-25 mins. Remove the eggs from the saucepan (I used a slotted spoon) and place in a colander to cool.

When the eggs are cool enough to handle unwrap them, shine them with a paper towel dipped in a bit of vegetable oil and then step back and admire your finished work!

The sources I found suggested that you use these eggs for decoration rather than eating since the dyes used for the silk are not necessarily food safe. Some said you could reuse the silk several times if desired, but I haven't tried reusing it. You can also stitch together small pieces to make them usable.

I'm hoping to make some more eggs closer to Easter to use along with another experiment I began last weekend. I soaked some wheat kernals overnight and then planted them in hopes of growing some wheat grass in time for Easter. The kernals have grown tremendously fast. Here is a picture of the wheat grass after just five days:

One of our cats, Adelaide enjoys eating greens, so I planted her some wheat grass too:

Do you do any creative egg dyeing at your house?

Becka

This is a busy week for us, so I tried to think of some quick meals. One quick meal idea is these Double Cheeseburger Pizza Rounds. I have adapted the recipe from one of those Pillsbury magazines that you can get at the checkout counter.

Double Cheeseburger Pizza Rounds
1/2 pound ground beef
1/4 cup finely chopped onion
1 can of Grands biscuits or something similar (you need the large biscuits for this)
about 1 1/2 cups of spaghetti sauce
2 Tbsps. sliced ripe olives
pepper to taste
garlic powder to taste
1/2 tsp Italian seasoning
1 cup mozzarella cheese, divided
1/2 cup crumbled feta cheese

Brown ground beef and onions. Drain and set aside to cool. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Line a cookie sheet with foil or a silpat. Open the biscuits and press each one to form about a 3 1/2 inch round. Combine the ground beef with the spaghetti sauce, olives, seasonings, feta cheese and half the mozzarella cheese.
Divide this mixture onto the biscuits and then spread it evenly. Top each biscuit with the additional cheese and then bake at 375 degrees for 15-20 mins. or until the cheese is melted and browned to your liking.

Here's the dough pressed out and ready for the filling:

Here they are ready to pop into the oven:

Another thing that I tried recently from the canned biscuits was making flatbread. I got the idea from this blog. For those who can't get to Blogspot, here's how you can make the flatbreads:

Using large biscuits, such as Grands, roll each biscuit to approximately a 6" circle.

Cook in a dry skillet or on a dry griddle until browned on each side.

We used these for fajitas and they were very tasty.

What is your favorite quick and easy meal?

Becka

As some of you may remember, DH Rob usually bakes something for our breakfast on Sunday mornings. We still have a few blueberries in the freezer from the garden, so this past Sunday he made this delicious Blueberry Coffee Cake. We hadn't had it for quite a while and we both really enjoyed it. Here's the recipe that was originally from Quick Cooking magazine:

Blueberry Coffee Cake
1/4 cup margarine or butter, softened
2/3 cup sugar
1 egg
1 cup plus 2 Tbsps. flour, divided
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 cup milk
1 cup blueberries (do not thaw if using frozen)
3-4 oz. cream cheese, cut into small cubes

Topping:
2 Tbsps. flour
2 Tbsps. sugar
1 Tbsp. margarine or butter

Combine the 2 Tbsps. flour,2 Tbsps. sugar, and the 1 Tbsp. butter with a pastry blender or your fingertips. Set aside.

Grease and flour an 8" square baking pan. Set aside.

In a large mixing bowl cream butter and sugar. Beat in egg. Combine 1 cup flour, baking powder, and salt. Gradually add the flour mixture alternately with the milk. Toss the blueberries with the remaining 2 Tbsps. flour. Gently stir the blueberries and the cream cheese cubes into the batter. The batter will be thick.
Spread in the prepared 8" square pan.

Sprinkle the topping on the batter. Bake at 375 degrees for about 30 mins. or until the cake tests done. (Take care not to test in a pocket of cream cheese!)

After Rob made the coffee cake we had half of an 8 oz. block of cream cheese left so I made Boursin. If you have ever purchased it in the store you know that it can be quite expensive -- nearly $5 for a small container. This is quite tasty. It can be used as a spread or in recipes. It also freezes well. I am hoping to try a new chicken recipe that calls for Boursin that DD Megan sent me recently. I'll keep you posted if it turns out well.

Boursin on a Budget

1 clove garlic, pressed, chopped, or minced
3-4 oz. cream cheese, softened
1/4 cup butter or margarine, softened
1/4 tsp. oregano
a small pinch each basil, dillweed, marjoram, thyme, pepper
(I used a grinding of pepper and about 3/4 tsp. Italian seasoning instead)

Cream together all ingredients and then store in the refrigerator until needed. This will keep for about a week in the refrigerator or 3 months in the freezer. You can easily make a larger batch if needed. Use as a spread on crackers or fresh vegetables, in pasta dishes, in mashed potatoes, stuffed chicken breasts, or anywhere else you might use the commercial Boursin.

*Note: You will need to let this warm up a bit before using, especially if you have made it with butter, or it will be too hard to spread.

Becka