Pear Custard Pie

We had a shortened day of school today for parent/teacher conferences today. It was a sweet time for me and my boys. One of the things they wanted to do is bake. We had some pears that had ripened beyond being enjoyable by themselves. I suggested they find a recipe to use the pears. Joseph found this recipe. He ALLOWED his brother to help him, and they made this all by themselves. It is fantastic! We enjoyed our slices with a scoop of pumpkin ice cream.

Pear Custard Pie

Ingredients:
1/4 cup butter melted, plus more for the pie dish
3 ripe pears, peeled, halved and cored
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
2 tsp vanilla
3 eggs
3/4 cup milk
1/4 tsp salt
Confectioner's sugar for dusting

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and butter a 9 inch pie dish. Slice the pears 1/4 inch thick and arranged the slices in the dish.

2. In a blender, process the melted butter, granulated sugar, flour, vanilla, eggs, milk and salt until smooth.

3. Pour the batter over the pears; bake until golden and firm to the touch, 40-45 minutes. Serve warm or at room temperature, dusted with confectioners' sugar.

Vegetable Lasagna Bake

This is a recipe that I do either in the crock pot or the oven depending on how much time I have. If I know I will be out all day I will get this prepared the evening before in my crock pot insert, stick it in, and leave it on for 5-6 hours on high. All of the ingredients go in uncooked, but the come out amazing. Cooking this dish in the oven takes a while. If you go easy on the prep by using raw meat and veggies the bake is going to take between 1 hour and 1 hour 40 minutes. Just like a normal lasagna, the resting period is important. Let it rest for at least 30 minutes. It gives you time to make a salad.  In this recipe I used eggplant and summer squash, (plus some roasted veggies we had left over from grilling). The beautiful thing is that you can pretty much use whatever your family likes. Sliced zucchini is excellent for layering. Roasted red peppers are a great layer. Chopped spinach or Swiss chard can be added to the ricotta layer too. Make it your own, and use what you have

Vegetable Lasagna Bake

Ingredients:

1 eggplant sliced
1 medium summer squash sliced
2 tomatoes sliced
2 cups ricotta cheese
2 eggs
3 cups shredded mozzarella
1 cup Parmesan grated
1 lb ground meat (beef, sausage, turkey or a combination)
1 medium onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, diced
2 cups (1 jar) tomato sauce
Olive oil
salt & pepper
Dried oregano

Directions:

1.Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.  Prepare the ricotta cheese layer: in a small bowl combine ricotta cheese, 1 cup mozzarella, 1/2 cup Parmesan, 2 eggs and salt and pepper to taste. Set aside for later.

2. In your crock pot or baking pan, pour 1 cup of tomato sauce. Arrange half of the eggplant in one layer on top of the sauce, and sprinkle with salt, pepper and oregano and drizzle with 1 tablespoon of olive oil.  Crumble the raw ground meat onto the layered eggplant. Sprinkle the meat with garlic, onions, 1 cup mozzarella, salt and pepper. Next, layer the sliced summer squash on top of the meat. When the layer is finished, gently press down to flatten the meat layer. Sprinkle the squash with salt, pepper & oregano, and drizzle with 1 tablespoon of olive oil. Spread the ricotta mixture evenly on top of the summer squash. Layer the other half of the eggplant on top of the ricotta mixture. Cover with the remaining 1 cup of sauce, and top with 1 cup of mozzarella and remaining 1/2 cup Parmesan. (if you are making this in the crock pot leave the cheese off the top until you are almost ready to serve. Add the cheese about 5 minutes before and let it just melt. If the cheese is on top for the whole time it will turn into one big brown rubbery mess)

3. Bake at 400 for 1 hour and up to 1 hour, 30 minutes, or until the veggies are all soft and the sauce is bubbling rapidly. I usually test this by piercing the middle with a steak knife. Let the Bake rest for 30 minutes to set before you serve.

Chocolate-Espresso snowcaps

This is another tried and true Riddlehaus Christmas cookie recipe. It is delicious, easily multiplied and always works.

Chocolate-Espresso Snow Caps

Ingredients:
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
4 teaspoons instant espresso
1 tsp baking powder
1/8 tsp salt
4 tablespoons butter
2/3 cup packed light brown sugar
1 large egg
4 oz bittersweet chocolate melted and cooled
1 tablespoon milk
confectioners' sugar for coating

1. In a medium bowl, sift together flour, cocoa, espresso, baking powder and salt. With an electric mixer, cream butter and brown sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in egg until well combined; mix in cooled chocolate. With mixer on low; gradually add flour mixture; beat in milk until just combined. Flatten dough into a disk and wrap in plastic or tightly with parchment. Freeze until firm, about 45 minutes.

2. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line two baking sheets with parchment. Shape dough into 1-inch-balls, roll balls in confectioners' sugar twice, letting them rest in between sugar baths.

3. Place sugar coated dough balls on prepared baking sheets 2 inches apart. Bake until cookies have spread and coating is cracked, 12-14 minutes. Cookies will still be soft to the touch. Cool cookies on a wire rack

Crock Pot Fresh Pumpkin Soup

We got a beautiful pumpkin in our farm share this week, and I decided to make it into pumpkin soup. The only problem is that I have been super busy, so mom assisted me. We made an incredible pumpkin soup in the crock pot which tasted excellent and made the house smell amazing when we came home from a brisk fall soccer game. Honestly, that is my favorite part of the crock pot. I love coming home from a busy day and smelling dinner already done. Enjoy this fresh, healthy and easy Fall comfort dinner.

Crock Pot Fresh Pumpkin Soup

Ingredients:

1 1/2 small sugar pumpkins peeled, seeded, and chopped into chunks

1 yellow onion, diced

2 stalks celery

2 carrots

3 garlic cloves

1 bay leaf

3 sage leaves

32 oz bone broth

Salt & Pepper

 1 cup Greek yogurt or heavy cream

dash of cinnamon

Directions:

1. Place pumpkin, onion, celery, carrots, garlic, bay leaf, sage and bone broth in the crock pot. Season with salt & pepper. Set the pot for high, and leave to cook for at least 5 hours.

2. When you get home, puree the soup either by using an immersion blender or by blending in batches in a stand blender. Stir in yogurt or cream and pinch of cinnamon. Serve with a dollop of Greek yogurt and peppitas.

Spiced Shortbread Cutouts

This is easily the best cookie recipe I have ever used. It is a bit labor intensive, it is not an "easy" recipe, but it comes out perfection. The only thing that I sometimes do is add more spices because I like my life to be spicy.


Spiced Shortbread Cookie Cutouts:

3 cups flour
3/4 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp ground black pepper
1/4 tsp allspice
1/4 tsp nutmeg
2 sticks butter
1 cup white sugar
1 large egg
2 tsp vanilla

Directions:

1. Whisk together flour, baking powder, salt and spices in a medium bowl.

2. Beat butter and sugar with a mixer util pale and fluffy. Next, beat in egg and vanilla. Reduce speet to low. Add flour mixture gradually until well combined.

3. Shape dough into two disks. Wrap both in parchment or plastic wrap and refrigerate until firm. (at least 1 hour)

4. Roll out dough. (This is very hard to do the first time...be patient) Cut into desired shapes and place on a parchment lined baking pan. Place the cookies in the refrigerator to cool on trays for 30 minutes.  Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. By the time the oven has come to temperature the cookies will be well chilled. Bake for 12-15 minutes. Cookies are done when they are slightly browned on the edges. Remove to a rack to cool.

Vanilla Glaze:
( makes 1 cup, enough to glaze one recipe of cookies above)

3 cups sifted confectioner's sugar
1/4 cup + 2 tablespoons whole milk
3 tablespoons light corn syrup
1 tsp vanilla

1. Whisk all ingredients together. Sometimes I will add spices to the glaze too.

2. Dip cookies in the glaze or use a small spoon to spread the glaze on each one. let cookies rest on a cooling rack to allow the glaze to drip down and so all sides dry. It does take a long time for the glaze to dry, several hours. Glazing is a good activity to do before you go to bed, then you and the cookies rest at the same time.

The Mothership

This right here is one of the main reasons that I started my blog. This notebook was given to me at my wedding shower by my husband's mother and his grandmothers. The beginning of the book contains family recipes that they often made for my husband growing up, most of them are  his favorites. The rest of the book is filled with recipes I collected over the last 17 years. I added some of my family's traditional recipes, the pizza dough recipe my best friend's mom used that always works, new recipes that my growing family loved. It was a place to put these treasures so I could find them again and again when I needed them.

But then it started to look like this:

The well used and well loved book started to look a little battle worn. It now has a protective coating of grime and some recipes are hard to read between the stains and fading. I realized recently, as my own boys are attempting to build their cooking skills, that many of these recipes are not on the blog. I am going to amend that soon. There will be a lot of family favorites making their way off the dirty pages of the book and onto the net. I hope you enjoy the journey with me.

White Chocolate Cranberry Cookies

These are some of our family's favorite cookies. They come out perfect every time. If there is an event where we have to bring cookies this is easily our default. We have used other dried fruits in place of the cranberries like blueberries and cherries, and the recipe worked great.

These cookies got brought to work recently for homemade cookie day

White Chocolate Cranberry Cookies

Ingredients:

1/2 a cup of butter, softened

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup white sugar

1 egg

1 tablespoon vanilla (or brandy)

1 1/2 cups all -purpose flour

1/2 tsp. baking soda

1 cup dried cranberries

3/4 cup white chocolate chips

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees

2. In a large bowl, cream together the butter, brown sugar, and white sugar until smooth. Beat in the egg and vanilla. Combine the flour and baking soda then stir into the sugar mixture. Mix in the cranberries and white chocolate chips. 

3. Cover a cookie sheet with parchment paper. Drop batter by tablespoons onto the cookie sheet.

4. Bake for 8-10 minutes. Cookies are ready when the edges are just browning but they are still soft in the center. Allow cookies to cool on the tray for 2 minutes before removing to the cooling rack.

Shakshuka

One of the new loves of my life is Shakshuka. I tried a pre-made jarred sauce from Aldi. It was OK, a little sweet and too spicy. With some recommendations from a friend I tried it on my own at home and had pretty good results. Tried it again at Tate cafe in Boston with  lamb meatballs which was magical and revolutionized how I think about Shakshuka.

Our Shakshuka was especially good with home made sourdough focaccia from friends

If you are not familiar, Shakshuka is a traditional dish made in the Mediterranean and Middle East.  A spicy sauce of vegetables and sometimes meat is made and eggs are poached on top. We have come to enjoy this for both breakfast and dinner. It can be really easy using canned tomatoes, or you can take your time and use up your beautiful summer harvest. It is a great way to incorporate veggies in with breakfast, and use up all those great CSA greens and veggies. This is also a great showcase for your summer herbs. Shakshuka is fabulous topped with parsley, cilantro, or basil.

Shakshuka: The Riddlehaus Way

1lb ground pork sausage
1 medium yellow onion, diced
3 cloves garlic, diced
1/2 jalapeno pepper, seeded & diced
1 medium zucchini, cubed
1 bunch Swiss Chard, separated, stalks diced, leaves chopped
1 14 oz can of diced tomatoes
1 cup tomato sauce
10 eggs

Directions:

1. Head a large, deep frying pan on medium heat. Add the sausage and cook for about 2 minutes. When the sausage has released some of its fat and juice add the onion, garlic, swiss chard stalks, zucchini and pepper. Continue to saute until the vegetables begin to get tender and the sausage is cooked through. (about 5 minutes) Add the Swiss chard leaves and toss to wilt them. Add the diced tomatoes and tomato sauce. Season with salt & pepper, bring up to a simmer,  cover and cook for 10 minutes to soften the zucchini.

2. Bring the sauce to a brisk simmer. Gently crack the eggs on top of the sauce. Monitor the cooking of the eggs carefully. Lowering the temperature too much will leave you with raw eggs, too  high a temperature will leave you with overcooked eggs. You want the sauce to be bubbling and slowly poaching the eggs. You can put the top on the pan to help cook the top of the eggs, but be careful, if it is too hot your eggs will cook  hard instead of being soft poached.

3. When the eggs are poached to your liking, serve topped with Harissa, herbs, feta cheese or spicy yogurt.