Saturday Night Snack Food – Garlic & Herb Cheese Sticks

If I were to say that Hubby pretty much lives in a cave, you might think me cruel or possibly believe I’m exaggerating a bit, but he’ll be the first to agree. Because I cook every night and he rarely is faced with having to eat out, Hubby has no conception of what food costs. I do all the grocery shopping, plan all our meals, and do all the cooking. He doesn’t know how much I spend on food or what goes into preparing our meals other than what he sees me doing should he happen to lose his way walking from the office to the bathroom and end up in the kitchen. Sure he knows where the kitchen is, but unless you can give him specific directions, I doubt he’d be able to find a jar of pickles in the fridge. Nope, should he want something in the fridge, he’ll ask and I will tell him, “It’s on the third shelf, right hand side, about halfway back.” I know my fridge like the back of my hand.

Anyway, about the only time Hubby is faced with buying food is the once or twice a year we go out to dinner and our Saturday night treat of carry-out pizza. For at least the past 15 years every Saturday night around 8:00 p.m. he heads out to a local pizza chain and picks up two pizzas and bread sticks. This typically runs around $15.00. Sometimes it’s a little more if he gets a specialty pizza, but definitely no more than $20.00.

About two months ago when he returned from picking up the pizzas, however, he was very upset. He proclaimed, “I can’t believe how expensive pizza is getting.” Apparently he had ordered two specialty pizzas, had butter and Parmasan cheese put on both, and gotten breadsticks and sauce all to the tune of $27.00. He was in shock. For the next 45 minutes, as we ate our pizza and watched a movie with the kids, he ranted about how expensive this was and how outlandish it was to charge that much for two pizzas and a little bread.

Trying to point out that he had gotten two specialty pizzas or that he had added on an additional topping was pointless. He was on his soapbox and there wasn’t a thing anyone could say to quell his tirade. Finally, after listening to him complain, I suggested we stop getting pizza. I immediately regretted my statement and he immediately calmed down. “Maybe we should,” was his response.

Great, I just blew the one night a week that I got a taste of what it would be like not to have to cook every night. Sure I still made dinner on Saturdays, but it didn’t have to be a huge meal like every other night because I needed to make sure we were all hungry for pizza later on. Saturday night dinners could be soup and sandwiches or perhaps a chicken Caesar salad, or even a wrap of some sort. Without pizza on Saturday nights, now I’d have to rethink my meal planning and come up with yet another “real” meal to make. Me and my big mouth.

But don’t think I stopped there. No, that wasn’t good enough. I then offered, “I’ll just make us something on Saturday’s instead. I could grill hot dogs, make some burgers, or some other evening snack.” WHAT WAS I THINKING? Don’t I cook enough already? What is it I’m trying to prove? And yet, as I was saying this, my mind was racing with the possibilities. All I kept thinking was this was a great opportunity for me to try some of the snack and party foods I never get the chance to make because we don’t entertain very often, we never have parties, and for the most part don’t have a social life. Other than having a ton of recipes collected that I never thought I’d get to make, it works for us.

Well it came as no surprise when Hubby accepted my offer. I might have imagined it, but I actually think I saw him skip a bit when he headed to the table to take another slice of pizza.

So for the past two months now I have tried to come up with fun and unique Saturday night snack food. It’s been exciting being able to use some of those party recipe ideas I never thought I’d get to use, but at the same time it is somewhat exhausting. I like being done in the kitchen by 6:00 p.m. and spending the rest of my evening relaxing. I am usually in bed by 8:30, 9:00 at the latest and I don’t like going to bed with dishes in the sink (this is a new habit I began this past January and have been very good about it without fail for the past five months). Adding another meal to the mix that isn’t served until 8:30 at night has made maintaining my nightly habits challenging.

The solution to my dilemma? Making our Saturday night snack earlier in the day and just heating or cooking it in the evening. This means no time spent in the kitchen after 6:00 other than perhaps putting something in the oven or heating something up on the stove.

One of the first new snack foods and probably the families favorite, seeing as I’ve already made it three times in the past two months, is garlic & herb cheese sticks. I use one pound of pizza dough that I make earlier in the day, which makes two 10″ cast iron pans of it, and it takes just 8-10 minutes in the oven.

Garlilc & Herb Cheese Sticks

• Servings: 12 - 16 Pieces
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Ingredients

• 1 Recipe Pizza Dough or 1 Pound of Frozen Pizza Dough
• 1 Tbsp. Olive Oil
• 1½ Cups Shredded or Sliced Cheese – I use a combination of Mozzarella, Provolone, and Munster
• 1/3 Cup Freshly Shredded Parmesan Cheese
• 1 tsp. Italian Seasoning
• 1 tsp. Garlic Salt

Directions

1. To prepare the pizza dough: Combine 1 Cup of bread flour, 1 tsp. sugar, 2¼ tsp. instant dry yeast, and 2 tsp. kosher salt in large mixing bowl. Add 1½ Cups warm water (approximately 110° F) and whisk until well combined. Let stand for 15 minutes to form a sponge, which proves your yeast is fresh. With mixer running, add 2 tbsp. olive oil and 2½ to 3 Cups additional flour 1 cup at a time until dough comes together. Knead dough with mixer dough hooks for 4 -5 minutes, until dough is firm and elastic. Grease a large glass bowl with olive oil, add the dough, cover with plastic wrap, and proof in a warm area until double, approximately 1 hour.
2. Preheat oven 450°.
3. Place 1 tablespoon butter in 10” cast iron skillet and place in oven.
4. Divide dough in half. Wrap one half in plastic wrap and place in fridge until ready to use.
5. Flatten second half of dough slightly on lightly floured surface.
6. Remove hot cast iron skillet from oven and spread melted butter around.
7. Carefully press the pizza dough into the hot skillet, being sure to press firmly against edges.
8. Brush top of dough with olive oil; spread cheese on top and sprinkle with Italian seasoning and garlic salt.
9. Bake 10-12 minutes or until lightly browned and cheese has melted.
10. Cut in half; cut each half into 6-8 strips.

Cooking Note

These breadsticks can be served with ranch or pizza sauce, but we like them just the way they are. Covering them up with a sauce just takes away from the garlic/cheese flavor.

Note that the recipe for pizza dough will make 2 pans of these bread sticks. I have kept the second half of the pizza dough in the fridge for 3 – 4 days wrapped in plastic wrap without issue. Alternately you can freeze the unbaked dough for up to 3 months.

Saturday Night Pizza Night is no more, but the only thing that’s changed is the pizza. Now the family enjoys a variety of tastes and foods, and for this I am — Simply Grateful.

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Soft Strawberry Cheese Cookies

When I found myself with just a few strawberries to use up from our recent trip to the strawberry patch, I had to decide whether to selfishly stuff them in my mouth when no one was looking or use them in a recipe. Being always on the lookout for a new favorite recipe, I just had to find something to make with them.

The choices are really endless. There’s of course shortcake or pie, but there wasn’t enough of them for either of those — at least not to serve the entire family. Crepes and cobbler were out for the same reason. With just enough to make one cup of chopped strawberries to add to a recipe, my options were more limited than I had thought.

Scones sounded good, but although these strawberries were very sweet I didn’t think they could hold their own against the biscuit-type batter of a scone. A quick bread sounded interesting, but I wasn’t in the mood for bread. A small batch of cupcakes was getting closer to what I was looking for, but still not quite there.

COOKIES! That’s what I wanted. COOKIES!

My only concerns then were whether or not the strawberries would be sweet enough on their own and how to keep the strawberries from turning to mush while mixing. These concerns were remedied by the addition of a few white chocolate chips to my cream cheese cookie base and then coating the chopped strawberries with a little flour before carefully hand folding them into the batter just before putting them on the cookie sheets.

The results were strawberry bliss! Sort of like bite-size strawberry shortcakes, these gems didn’t last long at our house.

Hubby and the kids devoured them within a day and a half, and for this I am — Simply Grateful.

• Servings: 18 - 24 cookies
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Ingredients

• 1 1/4 Cup Flour
• 1/2 tsp. Baking Powder
• 1/8 tsp. Salt
• 1/4 Cup Butter
• 4 oz. Mascarpone Cheese or Cream Cheese
• 3/4 Cup Sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 tsp. Vanilla Extract
• 1 Cup Chopped Fresh Strawberries
• 2 Tbsp. Lemon Juice
• 2 Tbsp. Flour
• 1/4 Cup White Chocolate Chips

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 and line cookie sheets with parchment paper.
2. Pour lemon juice over strawberries and let sit for 2 minutes. Drain.
3. Whisk together 1 1/4 cups flour, salt and baking powder and set aside.
4. Beat butter with sugar until light and fluffy.
5. Add softened cheese to butter mixture and whip with a whisk until creamy.
6. Add egg and vanilla and mix well.
7. Slowly add the flour mixture in three separate batches and mix until combined. Do not over mix.
8. Stir in white chocolate chips.
9. Sprinkle strawberries with remaining 2 Tbsp. flour and toss to coat.
10. Fold strawberries gently into batter.
11. Drop batter by heaping tablespoons onto cookie sheets and refrigerate for 10 minutes before baking.
12. Sprinkle cookies with raw or sanding sugar (see note).
13. Bake 13 – 15 minutes until edges are golden brown.
14. Let cookies cool for 2 minutes before removing from sheets to wire racks to cool completely.

Cooking Note

Note: These cookies can either be dusted with raw or sanding sugar prior to baking or with powdered sugar after they have cooled.

My original recipe called for cream cheese, but I was out so opted to try the mascarpone. It worked beautifully. I will definitely be swapping these cheeses on a regular basis when the occasion arises.

These cookies are very moist. In order to keep them fresh, if they are around for any length of time, be sure to refrigerate them.

Gougere — Or For Those Of Us Not So French — Cheesy Choux Bread

I have listened to the correct way to say ‘Gougere’ no less than 20 times and I just cannot put this word to memory. Foreign languages have never been my strong point, but this is really ridiculous. It isn’t that difficult.

Gougere – Goo – Jer (goo as in Goo Goo Dolls and jer like the first part of Jerry)

Not that difficult by any means, just not something my brain is willing to accept in its memory banks. So, an easier way to say it, albeit longer, is Cheesy Choux Bread.

But wait, how do you pronounce Choux? Yep I Googled it. Had to, I had no idea how to say it.

This one is easy to remember though. You pronounce it – Shoe! I think I can remember that one. Of course, cheesy Shoe Bread doesn’t really sound right, but what’s a girl to do when saying gougere is not in her vocabulary.

At any rate, I made this bread to serve with my Tomato Orzo Soup today. It was the perfect accompaniment and so easy to make.

Hubby couldn’t even wait for me to take a picture before digging in.

The most difficult part of this recipe is making the choux (shoe) dough. Mixing the melted butter with the flour is easy enough, but just like when making cream puffs, when it comes to incorporating the eggs, this is a real workout for the old biceps. The first egg is easy; the second is only a little harder; by the third your arm is getting tired; but by the fourth, my arm is burning and I’m beginning to have flashbacks of long hours spent in the gym on the bicep curl machine.

Once the choux part is done, it’s downhill. You mix in shredded sharp cheddar, shredded swiss cheese, salt, fresh ground pepper, minced garlic, chopped jalapeno pepper, chopped onion, and cayenne pepper. Then the dough is spread in a greased cast iron skillet and baked in the oven.

The results are an out-of-this-world cheesy bread with crunchy ends and bottom, yet soft and tender inside. Hubby ate four slices before dinner which meant he only ate one bowl of soup, along with two more slices of bread for dinner. The kids ate the bread later in the evening for a snack and now there is one piece left. Definitely not a bread that will go to waste in our house, and for this I am — Simply Grateful.

Gougere (Cheesey Choux Bread)

• Servings: Approximately 18 Slices
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Ingredients

• 1/2 Cup Butter
• 1 1/4 Cup Flour
• 4 Eggs
• 3 Cups Grated Sharp Cheddar Cheese
• 1 Cup Grated Swiss Cheese
• 1/2 tsp. Salt
• 1/4 tsp. Freshly Ground Pepper
• 1 Clove Minced Garlic
• 2 Jalapeno Peppers, chopped
• 1/4 Cup Chopped Onion
• 1/8 tsp. Cayenne Pepper

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 375 and grease a 10 inch cast iron skillet.
2. In medium saucepan melt butter over medium heat.
3. Add flour and stir until mixture forms a ball.
4. Remove from heat and continue stirring until mixture cools.
5. Beat in eggs, one at a time, stirring until mixture is slightly glossy and smooth.
6. Stir in remaining ingredients.
7. Pour batter into skillet and bake 40 to 45 minutes.
8. Cut bread into slices to serve.

Cooking Note

This bread is awesome as is, but experimenting with various types of cheese would be fun. Perhaps using 1 cup of pepper jack in place of 1 cup of shredded cheddar and eliminating the 2 jalapeno peppers or perhaps substitute some smoked cheddar for some of the sharp cheddar. 

Eastern European Poppy Seed Bread

The recipe for this bread makes enough dough for more than two loaves of bread, but you can make far more than poppy-seed bread with it.

Poppy Seed Bread

6 – 7 Cups Flour

2 1/2 Cups Warm Water (approximately 110 degrees)

2 1/2 tsp. Dry Yeast

1 Tbsp. Butter

1/2 tsp. Salt

1 tsp. Sugar

1 Can Poppy Seed Filling

1 Egg

1 tsp. Sugar

In a large bowl combine water, 2 cups flour and yeast. Stir to combine. Let this sit for 15 minutes to form a sponge.

Using dough hooks on a stand mixer, add melted butter, salt and sugar to sponge and mix. With mixer going add remaining flour until a soft dough forms.

Place the dough in a warm place to proof for 2 hours.

Dust a surface with flour and knead dough until it is firm and not sticky. Divide dough into two or three portions. Roll it gently to a 12 x 16 rectangle about 1/8″ thick.

Spread poppy-seed filling on dough, leaving a 1″ border on all sides. Fold the border back over the filling on all sides and press down. Pick up the shorter side of the rectangle and roll it like a jelly roll. Pinch ends together to prevent filling from leaking out.

Let rest in warm place for 1 hour.

Make egg wash by mixing 1 egg yolk and 1 tsp. sugar. Baste top and sides of bread.

Bake in preheated oven at 350 for 25 – 40 minutes. Remove from oven and cover with a clean towel to keep crust soft. Cool completely before slicing.

With this recipe I made one loaf of bread and used the remaining dough to make sticky buns. Recipe coming soon.

This bread gave Hubby a taste of home this holiday season, and for this I am — Simply Grateful.

Poppy Seed Bread

• Servings: Serves 8 - 10
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Ingredients

• 6 – 7 Cups Flour
• 2 1/2 Cups Warm Water (approximately 110 degrees)
• 2 1/2 tsp. Dry Yeast
• 1 Tbsp. Butter
• 1/2 tsp. Salt
• 1 tsp. Sugar
• 1 Can Poppy Seed Filling
• 1 Egg
• 1 tsp. Sugar

Directions

1. In a large bowl combine water, 2 cups flour and yeast. Stir to combine. Let this sit for 15 minutes to form a sponge.
2. Using dough hooks on a stand mixer, add melted butter, salt and sugar to sponge and mix. With mixer going add remaining flour until a soft dough forms.
3. Place the dough in a warm place to proof for 2 hours.
4. Dust a surface with flour and knead dough until it is firm and not sticky. Divide dough into two or three portions. Roll it gently to a 12 x 16 rectangle about 1/8″ thick.
5. Spread poppy-seed filling on dough, leaving a 1″ border on all sides. Fold the border back over the filling on all sides and press down. Pick up the shorter side of the rectangle and roll it like a jelly roll. Pinch ends together to prevent filling from leaking out.
6. Let rest in warm place for 1 hour.
7. Make egg wash by mixing 1 egg yolk and 1 tsp. sugar. Baste top and sides of bread.
8. Bake in preheated oven at 350 for 25 – 40 minutes. Remove from oven and cover with a clean towel to keep crust soft. Cool completely before slicing.