Recipe Monday – My version of the “Juicy Lucy”

A long time ago, when I was single and kid-free, I took a road trip all by myself to visit my Aunt who lives in Rochester, Minnesota. After my 36-hour visit with my Aunt, I decided to drive to my Great Aunt’s Vacation Resort and visit my parents who happened to be renting a cabin there for the week. To get there from Rochester meant I had to drive through Minneapolis. I stopped for lunch or dinner – I truly can’t remember which on the recommendation of one of my cousins at a restaurant that he gave me directions to since I was passing through Minneapolis anyway. He told me I “had to try the Juicy Lucy” so that is what I ordered. Oh My Word! Delicious! Over the years, I have played with this recipe. They always turn out great, but I like the Bacon-cheese Lucy the best.

What is a Juicy Lucy? It is a cheeseburger with the cheese on the inside. Here’s how to make it:

You will need:

1 pound ground beef, thawed (if frozen)
1/4 cup minced onion
4 slices cheddar cheese, quartered (or any cheese that you prefer)
4 slices bacon, cooked and crumbled
4 hamburger buns
4 slices of tomato
4 leaves of lettuce
ketchup, mustard and sliced pickles to taste

What I do:

Mix together the ground beef and onions in a medium bowl. Your hands work the best for this. Divide this mixture into 8 golf ball size balls. Flatten the balls into thin patties. On each of four of the patties, place 4 quarters of cheese and one crumbled slice of bacon right in the middle. Take the remaining four patties and place on top, pressing the edges together to seal. Season with seasoning salt and pepper, if so inclined. Grill or fry until both sides are cooked through (about 3 – 4 minutes on each side). Place cooked patty on hamburger bun topped with lettuce, tomato, pickles, ketchup and mustard (whatever your favorite cheeseburger combo is). Done! Serve it with fries or chips.
Wonderfully delicious!

I have relisted some photos. Please stop by and check them out! Thanks! Until Friday!

If you try this or any of my recipes, please leave a comment and let me know what you think! Like it or lump it – let me know, I can take it, I promise!

TTFN

This week at L & W 5/20/11

Let me apologize in advance for the length of this post.  Now onto the good stuff!

For those of you who read Monday’s post, you have already heard about the crashing table incident and how our week started (for those of you who didn’t go ahead and read it…I’ll wait for you) and that I forgot to post a recipe for Recipe Monday. So let’s get that out-of-the-way now with my kids’ favorite Cold Tuna Salad.

Cold Tuna Salad

You will need:

1 pound elbow macaroni
1 small jar Spanish pimento-stuffed green olives
1/2 of a large onion OR 1 teaspoon dried minced onions
2 ribs of celery
4 eggs
3 cans of your favorite tuna packed in WATER
1(30 oz) jar of Miracle Whip salad dressing
1 (8 oz) bar of mild cheddar cheese
Lemon juice
White distilled vinegar

What to do:

1. Cook the macaroni according to package directions, omitting the salt if you are so inclined. Hard boil the eggs (see here for how I do it) While your noodles and eggs are swimming in the pool, chop up the olives, onions, celery, and cheese. Put them in a large bowl or measuring cup and set aside. Open and drain the tuna cans. Add the tuna to the veggies and cheese.

2. Once the noodles are al dente, drain and completely cool under cold running water. Cool the eggs completely. Return noodles to the now-cool pot you boiled them in. Chop up the eggs. Add the eggs and veggies/tuna to the noodles.

3. Splash the noodles and other ingredients with the lemon juice and vinegar (not a lot mind you, use no more than 2 tablespoons of each). Add about 3/4 of the jar of salad dressing to the pan and mix gently but thoroughly. Cover and refrigerate for 20 – 30 minutes. Serve with some carrot sticks and it’s dinner made easy!

I spent the day on Tuesday while the kids were in school finishing up some painting on gifts for the kindergarten teachers. Then I did a little shopping for stuff that I forgot, did some data entry into my bookkeeping program, a couple of loads of laundry and made my version of “Juicy Lucys” for dinner – keep your eyes peeled for that recipe!

Wednesday started fine, until 5 minutes before the bus came to take the kids to school. My Kindergarten son was very excited to be going on a field trip to a farm that day. He woke up sometime during the night and got all dressed in his field-trip clothes and went back to sleep! I made him his sack lunch, made sure he had his umbrella (it was raining) and helped him with his boots. He decided he was going to wear his winter coat and a hat so that his sweat jacket wouldn’t get soaked by the rain. We were just about to walk out the door to go to the bus stop when the phone rang and an automated message told us that the field trip had been cancelled because of the weather. I watched my son explode with fury! He wanted to go so bad that he was more than disappointed he was mad! After a quick phone call to his father, who is better able than I at getting him to see reason, we made it to the bus with a minute to spare. The trip has been rescheduled, but I am sure glad I’m not his teacher, having to deal with 28 hugely disappointed kids!

On Thursday, I tended to our butterflies…we now have 19 Painted Lady butterflies living in 2 habitats in our dining room.  The kids have been very fascinated through the process.  From caterpillar to butterfly, they have watched the life cycle of the butterfly.  It’s been very educational.  We plan to release them all on Sunday, weather permitting.

Friday, today, is going to be a day of some household stuff – laundry, dishes, etc. – as well as sewing.  I’m trying to come up with a practical solution to disposable baggies in the kids lunches.  I’m still working on the pattern, but I’m going to keep trying on it.  We go through way too many of those baggies in a week.

I have renewed some listings online this week, as well.  “Deck Chair & Flower Pot” and “Dew Drenched” being two of my favorite shots.  “Deck Chair” was taken in the North Woods of Wisconsin at my Great Aunt’s camping resort – Williams’ Cedar Point Resort.  “Dew Drenched” was taken one early morning at the Boerner Botanical Gardens in Greendale, Wisconsin.  Let me know what you think of them in the comments.  🙂    Have a great weekend and TTFN.

Recipe Monday – “Unstuffed” Peppers

It is a wonder that I don’t weigh 500 pounds. I love to cook. I am a lifetime member of the Cooking Club of America and belong to at least a dozen food/cooking websites. I watch the Food Network ALOT. Today’s recipe is a casserole I call Unstuffed Peppers. We’ve all had stuffed peppers at one time or another, and sometimes those peppers are just a little too bitter to eat. My kids don’t like green peppers unless they either can’t see them or they are covered with enough other stuff that they don’t know they are there. So I came up with this as a way to get some more veggies into them and to get around the curse of the bitter pepper.

You will need:

3 large green peppers, roughly chopped
2 cans (29 oz.) tomato sauce
2 pounds ground beef or turkey, browned and drained
3 cups instant brown or white rice, dry
3 cups water
Salt and pepper to taste

What to do:

1. Pour rice into bottom of large oven-proof pan (I use a roaster). Add water and let soak for about 2 minutes. Add the rest of the ingredients and mix well.

2. Place pan in preheated 350-degree oven (uncovered). Bake for 1 hour, until rice is tender. Dinner is served.

My kids like to sprinkle mozzarella cheese on top. I usually sprinkle some lemon pepper on mine. My husband eats it as is. I sometimes serve this with a fresh green salad for some color and that extra serving of veggies (we all love salad here).

If you try this recipe, please come back and let me know what you think. Pick or pan, I can take it. If you tweaked this recipe at all, let me know what you did and how it turned out – I may just try it!

Stop by our Etsy store and see all the great stuff we’ve been working on. Thanks for reading! TTFN

Recipe Monday – Deviled Eggs

I am a food-aholic. I love cooking different things. I am always looking for different recipes to try and I almost never make a new recipe without tweaking it first. When people have asked me for a recipe for a dish, they tend to come away a little frustrated because I don’t use exact measurements or I’ll add some weird ingredient that they weren’t expecting. Nothing is ever the same twice. So today I decided to try to write a simple recipe that I make off the cuff. There is nothing fancy about this recipe and you can find every ingredient at your favorite discount grocer. Today’s recipe is Kim’s Deviled Eggs.

You will need: 18 large eggs
1 small jar pimento-stuffed green olives
Approximately 1 cup Miracle whip salad dressing (NOT mayo)
Dried minced onions (1 or 2 good shakes will do ya)
Paprika

What to do:

1. Boil the eggs…I place the eggs in a single layer in the bottom of a metal pan and cover them with warm water (about an inch). Bring the water just to boiling. Remove from heat and cover. Let them sit in the hot water for 15 to 20 minutes. Cool the eggs by replacing the warm water with cold every 5 minutes until cold.

2. While the eggs are boiling and soaking, slice enough of the green olives so that each deviled egg has one slice on top at the finish (I use about 9 whole olives making 4 slices in each). Set aside in a small bowl. Rough chop the rest of the jar and put only the rough chopped olives in a medium bowl. Shake your dried onions on top of the olives in the medium bowl.

3. When the eggs have cooled completely, carefully peel them. Halve each egg lengthwise. Pop out the yolk into the medium bowl, placing the white onto a platter.

4. Using a potato masher or a fork, squish the yolks and olives until smooth but lumpy (in other words you should still be able to see the olives). Add the Miracle Whip and combine.

5. Time to stuff the whites! I use a spoon (just a regular old cereal spoon) to scoop and fill, but you can also put your mixture into a resealable bag and cut a corner like a pastry bag too. Once all the halves have been filled, take your sliced olives and place one slice on top. Shake some paprika over all (the amount is up to you) and you are done!

If you happen to try this recipe, let me know what you think (good or bad I promise I can take it). Also, let me know if there are any recipes you would like me to feature. Oh and stop by the website and check out our great photos for sale too!

Fabulous Find! Perfect for the busy Mom-preneur!

I found this great website filled with recipes, how-tos, and meal planning with easy-to-use and everyday item recipes: kraftfoods.com! I went to this site and found what they call “1 Bag, 5 Dinners” and was immediately captivated. I didn’t have to plan out what I was going to make a week in advance anymore and then hope that I remembered to get everything at the store! It was all right there! With a little smart shopping, I was able to get everything I needed to make 5 nutritious dinners, plus the stuff I needed for breakfast and lunches for under $70! Great news in this household!

I encourage you to go to this website and look around! Registration is free, the meals are easy and use everyday foods.

TTFN