Taco Empanadas

I saw this originally on Down Home with The Neely's on Food Network. I remembered that I had some taco meat in the freezer and viola! Dinner in a pinch! I'm including only the empanada part, you can use whatever meat mixture you'd like best. I left out the corn kernels from mine and they were still really good! I even had enough to freeze for snacks later!


Cornbread Dough:

* 1 cup all-purpose flour
* 3 cups fine cornmeal
* 1 teaspoon baking powder
* 2 teaspoons kosher salt
* 2 tablespoons sugar
* 1 cup cold butter, cut in small cubes
* 2 eggs
* 2 tablespoons warm water
* 2 tablespoons lemon juice
* 2 tablespoons whole milk
* 1 tablespoons dehydrated lemon peel
* 1 cup roughly chopped corn kernels
* Water, for sealing
* Special equipment: 5-inch round cookie cutter

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.

In a large bowl, mix together flour, cornmeal, baking powder, salt, and sugar and cut in butter until the mixture is crumbly. In a small bowl, lightly beat the eggs and mix in the water, lemon juice, milk, lemon peel and corn. Add the wet mixture to the dry mixture and combine to form a soft and pliable dough. Knead the dough until fully mixed. On a floured surface, roll the dough out to 1/4-inch thickness and cut into 5-inch rounds.

Fill each round with 1 to 2 tablespoons of meat filling. Fold the dough in half and dab the edges with water to seal. There should be a 1/2-inch of dough to work with to form the seal. For a tight seal, press with the tines of a fork all around the edge of the empanada. Transfer the empanadas to a lightly buttered baking sheet and bake for 10 to 15 minutes.

Banana Cinnamon Cream Cake

So I know that I'm way behind in posting from Easter. I have no excuse....just been busy and haven't really thought about it. So for the big dinner we really didn't do much out of the ordinary. I made roast chicken and homemade mac n cheese. Chicken was on sale at the store last week and so I went with what was on sale rather than what tradition dictates for Easter dinner (we usually have ham). But I did branch out and made a super yum, banana cream cake. Here is the recipe

Banana Cinnamon Cream Cake
35 nilla wafers, divided
2 C cold milk
1 tub cool whip
2 tbsp melted butter
2 large or 4 medium bananas, sliced
2 pkg vanilla instant pudding
2 tbsp cinnamon (more or less depending on how you like it)

Crush 21 (give or take) wafers and mix with butter. Press crumb mixture onto bottom of round baking dish (9in) Stand remaining wafers vertically around the edge of pan.

Beat the pudding, cinnamon and milk in a large bowl with a whisk for 2 minutes. Stir in whipped topping. Spread half mixture over crust, cover with layers of bananas and remaining pudding mixture. Top with a few extra wafers crushed. refrigerate for at least 3 hours.


I dove into into this like a swimming pool! Soooooo good!! The cinnamon really gives it a great flavor and jazzes up the vanilla pudding! I hope you enjoy!!!

Make Life Sweeter Giveaway!

Melodee was our winner! Thanks to all who participated!

THIS IS NOW CLOSED....THANKS!

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Good luck and this will end Sunday March 28 at Midnight PST.

Happy St. Patricks Day!

I have to say this isn't an original idea. I tweaked the original to suit our family and it was AWESOME!!! I hope you'd had a great day doing whatever your family's traditions dictate. We don't do much other than wearing of the green and some sort of fun "green" or Irish themed dinner. For the past few years I've done a green themed dinner, but didn't feel like doing that this year. I had been wondering what on earth to do, when I was watching Food Network a couple of weeks ago and Guy Fieri made this on his show. The moment I saw it, I knew this is what I wanted to do. So tonight I got everything ready and made my substitutions not knowing how it would turn out. Some of my subs were pretty radical. But it was AWESOME! Did I say that already! So I must suggest that you MAKE this and make it SOON!!!! My kids even enjoyed it, which in and of itself is amazing!


Corned Beef and Pasta Toss
2 tablespoons butter, unsalted
1 tablespoon canola oil
1/4 cup small diced carrots
1 cup diced cabbage
1 onion, diced
1 teaspoon season salt
2 cups cooked corned beef, sliced
1 teaspoon freshly cracked black pepper
1 1/2 cups heavy cream
1 1/2 cups half-and-half
1 tablespoon mustard
1 tbsp relish
2 cups grated mozzarella cheese
3/4 cup fresh peas, or frozen
1 pound cooked linguine

Directions

In a large saute pan over medium-high heat, add the butter and 1 tablespoon canola oil. Add the carrots and cabbage and saute until they are just tender and the cabbage is starting to caramelize, about 20 minutes. Stir in the onions and salt and saute 3 to 4 minutes longer. Add the corned beef and black pepper and cook until the beef is starting to crisp, about 10 minutes. Stir occasionally during this process. Add in the cream, half- and-half, the mustard and the relish. Let simmer until the sauce has tightened up a bit, about 5 minutes. Stir in the shredded cheese and adjust seasonings, as needed. Stir in the peas and the pasta, then transfer into a serving dish. Serve immediately.


As an added bonus I added food coloring to the pasta water turning it green. It's a little harder to do with whole wheat pasta, but it sort of looked green. Regular pasta probably would've tinted better.

Easy French Bread Pizza

Tonight's meal is brought to you by one tired momma!! I've been baking a cake for a birthday party tomorrow (not one of ours, for a friend) and I'm beat! So we are having pizza-it's usually standard fare for Friday night, but tonight instead of ordering it (and believe me I was sssooo tempted) we are having this!

Easy French Bread Pizzas
1 loaf whole wheat french bread
favorite marinara sauce, pizza sauce or spaghetti sauce
mozzarella cheese
variety of your favorite toppings (or eat it plain like we are tonight-toppings are just too much to think about right now! lol!)

Preheat oven to 375
Slice bread in half, lengthwise and slather with sauce of choice. If you have small eaters like we do, feel free to cute the pieces down to more manageable sizes.
Top with cheese and your favorites.

Bake for 20 minutes or until cheese is bubbly!

Enjoy!!

Carribean Chicken

I do need to apologize for lack of pictures. My computer isn't recognizing the pictures from my camera so I can't download any. I guess until I can get it fixed you'll just have to use your imagination!! :)

So here is what's for dinner tonight. This is making my house smell so good right now. This is glorious! I hope you enjoy it too!!

Caribbean Chicken

1/4 C freshly squeezed orange juice
1 tsp orange zest
1 tbsp veg oil
1 tbsp freshly squeezed lime juice
1 tsp lime zest
2 tsp ginger (or 1 tsp minced fresh ginger)
2 cloves of garlic, whole
1/2 tsp fresh oregano
1 1/2 pounds boneless, skinless chicken breast, thighs or tenderloins (i'm using tenderloins this time around)

In a small food processor or a blender, combine all ingredients except chicken. Blend into a marinade, making sure that the garlic is in small bits.

Place chicken in a ziptop baggie (gallon sized) and put marinade on top of it. Refrigerate for 2-24 hours. The longer the better.

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Remove chicken from marinade (discard marinade at this point) and cook chicken for 10 minutes on each side or until no longer pink (ovens may vary-you can adjust heat as you see fit).

Serve with favorite sides. We are having this with a four cheese alfredo and a veggie. This would be awesome grilled too!!

Easy cinnamon rolls

My mom use to make these on the weekends and I loved it!! So this morning I got a little crazy and whipped these up. It was so worth it, they are ooey gooey and oh so good!!! Enjoy!

Easy Cinnamon Rolls

* 1 (.25 ounce) package active dry yeast
* 3/4 cup warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)
* 1/4 cup white sugar
* 3/4 teaspoon salt
* 1 egg, room temperature
* 2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
* 1/4 cup butter, softened
* ground cinnamon
* brown sugar

Frosting
powdered sugar and milk, mix until thick and top fresh from the oven rolls!

Directions

1. In a small bowl, dissolve yeast in warm water. Let stand until creamy, about 10 minutes.
2. In a large bowl, combine the yeast mixture with the sugar, salt, egg and 1 cup flour; stir well to combine. Stir in the remaining flour, 1/2 cup at a time, beating well with each addition. When the dough has pulled together, turn it out onto a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth and elastic, about 8 minutes. Cover with a damp cloth and let rest for 10 minutes.
3. Lightly grease an 8x8 inch square baking pan. Roll dough out on a lightly floured surface to 1/4 inch thick rectangle. Smear the dough with butter and sprinkle with cinnamon and brown sugar. Go as liberally as you want. I love it extra gooey so I put a ton on it. The more the better as far as I'm concerned! :)
Roll up the dough along the long edge until it forms a roll. Slice the roll into 12-16 equal size pieces and place them in the pan with the cut side up. I got about 11 rolls, but I cut them very large so you may end up with more or less depending on how you cut them.
4. Cover pan with plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight or cover and let rise at room temperature until doubled in volume, about 45 minutes.
5. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C). Bake rolls until golden brown, about 20 minutes top with frosting.