Kid-Approved Football Food: Ham & Cheese Roll-ups

January 25, 2013 By
Ham & Cheese Rollups

There’s a rather big foot­ball game com­ing up! ;) If you’ve been around here long then you know we are big foot­ball fans, but more of the col­lege vari­ety! So, even though we don’t watch a lot of NFL dur­ing the sea­son, we’re usu­ally “game” to watch the Super Bowl. I love an excuse to make fun food & have a lit­tle party! Now with the kids though, we have to make sure that we have kid-friendly options. These ham & cheese roll-ups are great for kids and adults alike, are easy to make, and are even a bit football-shaped! Ham & Cheese RollupsPer­fect lit­tle foot­ball fin­ger foods for sure! And, they even freeze well too! I made a big batch & just kept them in the freezer. Sort of like home­made hot pock­ets! I could just pop them in the microwave and have a quick snack or meal for the kids!
Making ham rollups

The idea for these comes from Pills­bury. I hap­pened to have a cou­ple of cans of Pills­bury cres­cent roll dough and couldn’t decide what to make with them. I stum­bled upon their ham & cheese cres­cent rollups and knew they’d be per­fect for the kids!

The “recipe” for mak­ing these really couldn’t be eas­ier! You just unroll your cres­cent dough and sep­a­rate out the tri­an­gles. On each tri­an­gle place of slice of ham (as thinly sliced as pos­si­ble) and two small strips of cheese (pick your fave). Then, roll up the tri­an­gles (fold in the sides as best you can). The pos­si­bil­i­ties of fla­vors here are really end­less. You wouldn’t have to stick to ham & cheese! Pizza roll-ups? Turkey & pep­per jack roll-ups? So many great options! But, sim­ple ham and cheese was best for the kiddos!

Then, bake at 350 for about 15 min­utes (until the rolls are golden brown). Just beware, if you use Amer­i­can cheese like I did, some cheese run­ning out the sides was a bit unavoid­able. You might con­sider bak­ing on parch­ment or foil for eas­ier clean up!  Ham & Cheese Roll-upsEasy & yummy! Per­fect for some low main­te­nance football-watching fin­ger foods that every­one can enjoy!

And, if you need some addi­tional recipes to com­plete your game day menu, here’s a great list of ideas from some of my blog­ging friends! Go check them out and pin away!

What is YOUR favorite foot­ball food?

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Raspberry Stuffed French Toast

January 22, 2013 By
Raspberry Stuffed French Toast

I’m so excited to finally share this rasp­berry stuffed french toast with you all! It’s per­fect for a spe­cial break­fast (think Valentine’s day, Christ­mas morn­ing, Easter, when com­pany is over, etc) and the beauty is that it can be pre­pared ahead & frozen! So, the only work you have to do in the morn­ing is just pop it in the oven!

Raspberry Stuffed French Toast

This is actu­ally a Dream Din­ners meal that I made & served for the first time last Christ­mas morn­ing. I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to find the recipe any­where and hap­pily stum­bled upon some Dream Din­ners recipes shared in a Baby­Cen­ter Easter brunch post!

 Rasp­berry Stuffed French Toast

Ingre­di­ents:

  • 1 to 2 loaves French bread (depend­ing on size)- cut into 16 1-inch pieces
  • 1/2 C (1 stick) but­ter (softened)
  • 8oz (1 pack­age) cream cheese (softened)
  • 1 ½ C (about 1 jar) rasp­berry jam
  • 4 C liq­uid eggs (or non­fat egg substitute)
  • 3 C milk
  • 1 C sugar
  • 8 t ground cinnamon
  • 3 C sliced almonds
  • 1 C rolled oats
  • 1/4 C flour
  • 1 t vanilla

Direc­tions:

Making Stuffed French Toast

1. Spray one large bak­ing dish with non­stick cook­ing spray (mine was a dis­pos­able 1/2 steam table pan, but you can cer­tainly use a 9x13 or some­thing comparable)

2. Put down one layer of bread in the pan.

3. In a small bowl, com­bine but­ter, cream cheese, and rasp­berry jam.

4. Spoon the entire jam mix­ture evenly over each slice of bread. Top with remain­ing bread slices.

5. In a large bowl, com­bine eggs, milk, sugar, & half the cin­na­mon (4 t). The pour mix­ture over the bread slices evenly.

6. In another bowl, com­bine brown sugar, sliced almonds, oats, flour, rest of the cin­na­mon, and vanilla. Mix with you fin­gers until it resem­bles crumbs. Then, sprin­kle evenly over bread slices.

At this point, you have a few options. First up, you can cover and put in the freezer (for up to a few months)! I did that with the one I made last year (only it was only in the freezer a few weeks). If you do that, just let it thaw at room tem­per­a­ture before baking.

If you are going to want it within the next day or two, then, just go cover & refrig­er­ate. I made this one on Decem­ber 23rd & baked it Christ­mas morn­ing. So, it sat (uncooked) in the fridge for some­where between 36 & 48 hours before I baked it.

If you want to have it the same day, then just let every­thing soak together on the counter for 30 min­utes or so. That way the bread has a chance to soak up all the flavors!

When you’re ready to bake, set the oven to 325◦F and bake uncov­ered for about 1 hour. You’ll want the egg mix­ture to be cooked (no longer liq­uid) and the crumb top­ping to start browning.

Baked Stuffed French Toast

The out­come is deli­cious! I’m not a huge fan of “reg­u­lar” french toast, but this is so good! Plus, I love that it can be a freezer meal, per­fect for a fancy break­fast with no work that morning!

Enjoy!!! Raspberry Stuffed French Toast with almond topping

Do you have any favorite “make ahead” breakfasts?

*Linked to: *SNAP!, *Home Sto­ries A to Z

For more great break­fast ideas, come join #Dairy­Break­fast­Club recipe party at Tidy­Mom along with The Cal­i­for­nia Milk Advi­sory Board and RealCaliforniaMilk.com

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Easy Breakfast Egg Casserole

September 6, 2012 By
Easy Breakfast Egg Casserole

If you’re look­ing for an easy-to-make and  hearty break­fast dish, this is break­fast egg casse­role is fam­ily favorite around here. We have had it every Christ­mas morn­ing for years, but it’s great any­time. I even freeze it and it works great! It might be some­thing extra good this time of year if you’re get stuck in a back-to-school break­fast rut!

Break­fast Egg Casserole

(Makes 1 large 9x13 pan or two smaller 8X8 pans. I made 2 8x8’s…one for that morn­ing and I put one in the freezer).

Ingre­di­ents:

  • 6–8 slices of bread, but­tered on one side
  • 1-2lbs sausage (depend­ing on how “meaty” you like it)
  • 2 C shred­ded ched­dar cheese
  • 12–14 beaten eggs
  • 1 1/2 C milk
  • salt & pep­per to taste
  • *optional– 2 4oz cans of green chiles (drained)

Direc­tions:

You’ll need to start by brown­ing your sausage. I nor­mally use the tubes o’ Jimmy Dean sausage. But, I had a coupon for these links that made them SUPER cheap, so just went with that. So, brown it first and chop it up. Then, start lay­er­ing ingredients.

1. Put bread in, but­ter side down. Top with sausage.

2. Sprin­kle cheese (and chiles if using) over the bread & sausage.

3. Milk together the beaten eggs & milk. Then, pour over the lay­ered ingredients.

4. Cover & refrig­er­ate overnight. In the morn­ing, place pan in a large pan with water and bake for 1 hour at 350.

Then, let cool, serve warm & eat! :) Or, you can place one in the freezer & it for another morn­ing! I’ve got that alu­minum pan one in my freezer right now.

ENJOY!

For more great break­fast ideas, come join #Dairy­Break­fast­Club recipe party at Tidy­Mom along with The Cal­i­for­nia Milk Advi­sory Board and RealCaliforniaMilk.com!

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Strawberry Banana Oatmeal Muffins {Gluten Free}

August 11, 2012 By
Oatmeal Muffins

Thank you, Pin­ter­est! I stum­bled across this recipe for banana oat­meal muffins and thought they sounded great! We had some bananas that needed to be used up, so I decided to give them a shot, tweak­ing the recipe a bit (and adding in straw­ber­ries that needed to be used to). And, I’m pleased to say that they are deli­cious. I like them bet­ter than our fruity morn­ing muffins and love that they con­tain no flour & are full of oats instead (oats are known to help with milk pro­duc­tion too, so they are extra good for me right now)! I made a big batch– half for now and half for the freezer!

Strawberry-Banana Oat­meal Muffins

(yield: 2 dozen muffins)

Ingre­di­ents

  • 5 C rolled oats (old fash­ioned, not quick cooking)
  • 2 6 or 8oz. con­tain­ers of yogurt (plain greek yogurt would be ideal, but I didn’t have it. I used one con­tainer of reg­u­lar vanilla and one of greek pineap­ple yogurt. So, clearly, any yogurt will work just fine! ;) )
  • 4 eggs
  • 1 C sugar + 2T
  • 3t bak­ing powder
  • 1t bak­ing soda
  • 2 ripe bananas
  • 1 to 2 C diced strawberries

Direc­tions:

1. Pre­heat oven to 400. Prep muf­fin tins–I just used some non-stick spray.

2. First up, you’ll need to grind up the oats. I used a small food proces­sor, you could also try the blender.

3. In a large mix­ing bowl, com­bine all dry ingre­di­ents. Then, add yogurt & eggs.

4. Dice straw­ber­ries and add the 2T sugar over the berries. Add mashed bananas to the mix­ture, then fold in strawberries.

5. Spoon bat­ter into the greased muf­fin tins and bake for 20–25 min­utes (until a tooth­pick comes out clean).

6. Eat (or freeze) & enjoy!

Have YOU tried any good, new recipes lately?

Linked to: *Flamingo Toes

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Homemade Refried Beans

February 21, 2012 By
Homemade Refried Beans

In going through the pantry for January’s chal­lenge, I dis­cov­ered a par­tially used 10 lb. bag of dried pinto beans. Hon­estly, pre­vi­ously, the only thing I had made with them is numer­ous batches of ham & bean soup. So, I needed to try some­thing new and I’d been see­ing var­i­ous recipes for home­made refried beans pop-up on Pin­ter­est (the two I pinned & adapted from are here and here).  And, I’m pleased to say that we were thrilled with the out­come! :)

Home­made Refried Beans

Direc­tions:

- Cook beans in crock­pot for 6–8 hours on high heat. I have a LARGE crock­pot, so I put in 6 cups of beans and about 12 cups of liq­uid. Approx­i­mately 10 cups were water, then I had about a 2 cup quan­tity of frozen chicken broth (from a chicken freezer cook­ing ses­sion) that I added. I also added one onion cut into large wedges (so that I could remove them after cook­ing) and 2 cloves of freshly minced gar­lic. The crock­pot was full up to about an inch from the top.

slow cooker beans- Once the beans are done cook­ing, you’ll have a pot full of beans with not nearly as much liq­uid. Mine looked like this:

- If you like beans this way (charro beans as some of our favorite Mex­i­can restau­rants call them here), you could just eat them now. But, to make them more like “refried”, you’ll need to do a bit more.

- Add a small amount of but­ter (1 or 2 T) to a fry­ing pan/skillet. Then, add cooked beans (includ­ing some of the liq­uid) to the skil­let. I just esti­mated, but it was at least 2 cups. Heat over medium heat and while sim­mer­ing, use a potato masher to mash the beans.

- Con­tinue mash­ing until you like the con­sis­tency (*note–if you like them really creamy like some of the restau­rants, then put them in a food proces­sor & then put them in the fry­ing pan. I did this with about half of the sec­ond batch I made & like the con­sis­tency even bet­ter). I added just a pinch of salt, gar­lic pow­der, and a bit of shred­ded cheese while they cooked. Then, we ended up with this:

The ver­dict?…

Really good! Now, admit­tedly, they weren’t quite as tasty as restau­rant beans (but, that’s no sur­prise since they weren’t refried in bacon grease with a bunch of added salt & stuff). But, we did like them MUCH bet­ter than canned! They were MUCH closer to the taste & tex­ture of restaurant-style than canned. So, they are health­ier than canned, cheaper than canned, and taste bet­ter. Win!

What about all the rest of the beans?…

Freeze them! Really! I made the one batch you see above. With all the rest in the crock­pot, I divvied it up into freezer bags (let it cool first)! I didn’t process them at all before plac­ing it in the freezer. Just spooned out about 2 cups into each bag­gie (beans & liq­uid) and placed in the freezer. Tonight, we had tacos, so I removed one of the bag­gies from the freezer. After defrost­ing for just a few min­utes in the microwave, I did the same skil­let process men­tioned above and in about 10 min­utes, had fresh, home­made refried beans. So, it cer­tainly takes a bit longer than pop­ping open a can. But, the con­ve­nience of hav­ing the cooked beans in the freezer really helped! For the lower cost & bet­ter health val­ues (com­pared to canned), I think the added few min­utes are worth it! :)

Do YOU make home­made refried beans?

Linked to: *I’m Lovin’ It, *Fru­gal Friday

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Whole Wheat Oatmeal Pancakes

February 18, 2012 By
Oatmeal Pancakes

Pig­gy­back­ing on the overnight oat­meal post, here’s another “bulk” cook­ing idea involv­ing oat­meal! With just a bit of extra effort (really, in the time it would take you to go to the store any­way), you can have home­made frozen pan­cakes (or waf­fles) ready to go for easy hot break­fasts in the morn­ing. I got a grid­dle on Black Fri­day at a sweet price, so have loved mak­ing batches of pan­cakes since then! I almost always make pan­cakes from scratch instead of mix, but I wanted some­thing healthier/heartier this time than just your typ­i­cal white flour pan­cake. Then, I stum­bled upon the Happy Housewife’s recipe for whole wheat oat­meal pan­cakes.

Here’s my adapted version:

(Yield: approx. 40 small pancakes–3 to 4 inches across)

  • 1 C oat­meal (ground)
  • 1 C whole wheat flour
  • 1 C white flour
  • 1/4 C brown sugar
  • 1/4 C  white sugar
  • 3 t bak­ing powder
  • 1 t salt
  • 2 T flaxseed meal (optional)
  • 2 eggs
  • 1/2 C applesauce
  • 2 2/3 C milk

Grind the cup of oat­meal in a food processor/blender (I used old fash­ioned oats). Com­bine all dry ingre­di­ents in a large bowl and com­bine. Then, add wet ingre­di­ents into the mix­ture. Mix until well-blended.

Spray grid­dle with non-stick spray or but­ter grid­dle. Cook pan­cakes on medium to medium-high heat (some­where between about 250 & 300). I use my 2 T scoop to drop bat­ter onto the grid­dle. That way, each pan­cake is about the same size. When all is said & done, you’ll have around 40 small pan­cakes! :)

They’ll keep fine in the fridge for a few days. But, if you don’t want to be eat­ing pan­cakes for days in a row, then you can freeze them! I like to flash freeze them on a parch­ment or wax paper lined cookie sheet. That way, they are indi­vid­u­ally frozen & you can then just toss them in a freezer bag­gie with­out them stick­ing together. Just pop out how­ever many you need at a time & microwave them! Almost just as easy as buy­ing frozen pan­cakes at the store, but SO much healthier!

They were def­i­nitely more dense than “nor­mal” pan­cakes, but we all actu­ally really liked them! The boys each ate 4, so it’s def­i­nitely kid-approved! :)

Enjoy!

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