One of my primary goals as a Mom is to make sure that my kids, especially my son, have enough basic cooking skills when they leave home that they can prepare a meal for themselves. My 10 year old daughter is actually quite comfortable in the kitchen already and regularly offers to make dinner. My 13 year old son is the opposite, which is why it threw my for a loop last night when he said he wanted to make dinner this week. Let’s just say he had some inspiration! One of his friends had texted him that she (yes, she) had made Cheeseburger Pie yesterday for her brothers and they loved it.

He did the research and decided that the Impossibly Easy Cheeseburger Pie recipe from the Betty Crocker web site looked best. We checked to make sure we had all the ingredients and he put the ground beef in the fridge to defrost.

This evening he was ready to go . He got out all the ingredients and even chopped the onion in the Mini Chopper. Basically you brown the ground beef and onion, place it in a 9″ pie pan, the sprinkle cheddar cheese over the mixture. You whisk together Bisquick, milk and eggs then pour it over the ground beef mixture. The Bisquick makes the “crust” and holds it all together.

Prep time for the whole recipe was about 10 minutes and it took 25 minutes to cook.

The finished product smelled really good and tasted even better – he added some McCormick Montreal Steak Seasoning to the ground beef while it was browning which really gave it extra flavor.

I’m thinking he has seen one too many cooking shows with his sisters – he added a zig zag of ketchup when he served it. YUM!

Getting kids involved in the daily meal planning and preparation is one of the most important things you can do as a parent. Not only do they learn essential cooking skills, but kids are more likely to try new foods when they have a part in the preparation!

My favorite shortbread cookie recipe is the one my best friend’s Mother has used for years. It is so easy to follow and make and the best part is when I want the cookies I just slice and bake! No more eating the entire tray while I wait for the next to come out. In the time it takes me to make tea I can bake 3 (or 6) shortbread to enjoy with my tea.

Enjoy with tea, coffee, hot chocolate and friends. They also make a quick holiday gift or the perfect cookie to take to your next cookie exchange.

~Karen Owen aka Karenmomofthree

If you need a last minute gift idea for teachers, co-workers, neighbors or friends or an irresistible snack for the party table, check out this recipe I have borrowed from a good friend of mine. I added a Christmas touch – calling them Rudy’s Rockin’ Pretzels, but these are good anytime – for football parties, poker night, birthday parties, you name it.

Once the pretzels were made and tested (oh yeah, they are yummy) we packaged them up in treat bags with our own recipe tags. My son made the cutest reindeer graphic for me so it had to be on the tag. You can actually get the coloring page version of this silly reindeer on my Printables4Kids.com site.

Click on image below to view and print full size or you can download the tags as a PDF file.

These are so quick and easy to make and they will disappear just as fast!!

I usually like to test out a new recipe on my own family before I venture to make it for a larger audience. Thanks to an opportunity I was given through the Macy’s Culinary Council, I now have the perfect dish to share on Thanksgiving morning, Black Friday (aka how to use up the extra ham or turkey and fuel up for a day of shopping) or the next pot-luck dinner we go to.

In celebration of 85 years of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, Macy’s Culinary Council has teamed up with some of the most renowned chefs of our time to create a one of a kind Holiday Cookbook. Recipes in the book range from the very traditional – mashed potatoes to the newer culinary styles of Ming Tsai and Wolfgang Puck to recipes for Hannukah and even New Year’s. The cookbook is $24.99 and can be purchased at Macy’s stores or online at Macys.com.

I have long been a fan of Emeril Lagasse and happen to have a thing for comfort-food, like yummy casseroles, so I just had to try the Broccoli, Ham and Cheese Breakfast Casserole on page 49. If it turns out good (you’ll have to keep reading to find out) then I am going to bring it to our family Thanksgiving Day celebration so we can enjoy it while we watch the parade.

Everything in this recipe is fresh and for the most part healthy. I realized after I had taken this picture that the recipe calls for 8 eggs not 3 but by then there was no way to re-take this photo – I was in too deep!

Breakfast Casserole with Broccoli, Ham and Cheese

Serves 6-8

Ingredients:

• Nonstick cooking spray
• 1 1/4 teaspoons salt, plus more to season
• 6 cups broccoli florets (from about 2 pounds broccoli heads)
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 1?2 cups finely chopped onions
• 1 1/4 cups (about 8 ounces) finely chopped ham
• 3 cups shredded Cheddar cheese
• 8 cups cubed crusty bread such as French or Italian (1-inch cubes)
• 8 large eggs, lightly beaten
• 3 cups half-and-half
• 2 tablespoons minced fresh chives or scallions (white and tender green parts)
• 1 1/4 teaspoons sweet paprika
• 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
• 3/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese

To assemble the casserole:

Spray a 9-by-13-inch baking dish with nonstickspray. Fill a large pot three-fourths full of water and bring to a boil over high heat. Meanwhile, prepare an ice bath. Season the water with salt, add the broccoli florets, and blanch until bright green and barely tender, about 1 minute. Using a skimmer, transfer the broccoli to the ice bath to halt the cooking. When the broccoli is fully chilled, drain well, pat dry with paper towels, and set aside.

In a small saute pan, heat the olive oil over medium-high heat. Add the onions and a couple of pinches of salt and cook, stirring occasionally, until the onions are soft, about 4 minutes.Remove from the heat and set aside to cool.

In a large bowl, combine the broccoli, cooled onions, ham, Cheddar cheese, and bread cubes. Toss gently to combine, then transfer to the prepared baking dish, spreading the mixture in an even layer.

Using the same bowl, whisk together the eggs, half-and-half, chives, 11/4 teaspoons salt, paprika, and cayenne pepper until thoroughly mixed. Pour over the broccoli mixture. Cover with plastic wrap and store in the refrigerator for at least 4 hours or up to overnight. About30 minutes before baking, remove the casserole from the refrigerator and allow to come to room temperature.

To bake the casserole:

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Remove the plastic wrap from the baking dish and cover the dish with aluminum foil. Place in the oven and bake for 45 minutes. Remove the foil and sprinkle the Parmesan cheese evenly over the top. Return the casserole, uncovered, to the oven and continue baking until the top is golden brown and puffed and the casserole is cooked through when tested with a knife, about 15 minutes longer.

Transfer the casserole to a rack and let rest for 10 to 15 minutes before serving. Cut into squares to serve.

Recipe compliments of Emeril Lagasse.

Cooking notes:

• This is best prepared the night before and I ended up having to cook the casserole for 60 minutes covered, then 30 minutes uncovered.
• When they say a large bowl, they are not joking! All those ingredients take up a lot of space and in order to have the room to mix the ingredients thoroughly, you need a BIG bowl.
• Your 9×13 pan will be FULL when you place the first batch of ingredients into it.
• You could easily substitute leftover turkey for the ham or add a bit of crumbled bacon for extra flavor.

The Verdict:

I will definitely make this again! I absolutely loved it and my 15 year old son must have, too, because he came back for seconds. Of course, I could not get my older daughter to try it because she doesn’t tolerate large amounts of cheese and dairy well, and my younger daughter ate it but picked out the ham. My husband thought it was good, but for some reason, broccoli just doesn’t say “breakfast” to him. He suggested swapping the broccoli for potato and adding some sausage or bacon to the mix.

You can get the printable version of this recipe along with others from the book at the Macy’s website. Enjoy!!

Disclosure: I wrote this post on behalf of the Macy’s Culinary Council and have been compensated for my time and materials, however, all opinions are my own.

I love to make sugar cookies, they are easy and people are always so impressed by them. One of my favorite times of year to make them is in the fall when the leaves are changing. Here is how to make your own fall leaf cookies that reflect the season.

First I make a batch of sugar cookie dough up. I make it the day before so it is a little easier to work with.

Karen’s Sugar Cookie Recipe

• 1 cup of margarine
• 1 cup of sugar
• 2 eggs
• 4 tsp vanilla
• 3 cups of flour
• 2 tsp baking powder

Beat the margarine and sugar add the eggs, vanilla and milk. Beat in the baking powder and flour. Place your dough on to some wax paper or parchment paper, cover with plastic wrap and chill at least two hours (I chill mine overnight).

Roll out the dough to your desired thickness (you will need to flour your work space and your rolling pin. Cut out your shapes and bake 10-12 minutes at 350 until the edges of the cookies are slightly golden brown.

Let cool completely before icing.

Swirled Icing Recipe

• 2 cups of icing sugar
• 1tbsp vanilla
• ¾ cup of water
• 1 tbsp of cream of tartar
• Food coloring ( I used gel color for the orange and I used liquid food coloring for red and green)

In a bowl place your icing sugar, vanilla and cream of tartar. Add your water and mix it in to the icing sugar, if you find your icing is not “liquid-y” enough you can add more water, if you think it is not thick enough you can add more icing sugar.

I like mine the consistency of white craft glue but you may like yours thinner.

Take out ¾ cup of the icing and place it in a small bowl that you can dip the cookies into this will be the red and green bowl.

Color the remaining icing orange this will be the bowl you first dip your cookies into. If you have not worked with gel food coloring before, only add a little bit of color on a toothpick to your icing at a time. Use a clean tooth pick each time to add color to your icing with out contaminating the gel color.

 Next add a few drops of red and green to your bowl in different places in the bowl and swirl with a tooth pick.

Dip your cookies one at a time in the orange bowl of icing first. Then immediately dip in the red and green icing mix and place on a cooling rack over wax paper to dry. It will take at least 45 minutes for your icing to set. Repeat with remaining cookies. If you find you want more color to your red and green bowl you can keep adding drops of color through out the process. I added more red and green 4 times while making my cookies.

This recipe will make at least 5 dozen 2 inch cookies, but it all depends on the size of the cookie cutter you use.

These cookies look great on any plate, platter or in any lunch box. They are very easy to make and are always a crowd-pleaser!

By Karen Owen of KarenMomofThree’sCraftBlog

My son loves Pumpkin Pie – and not just at Thanksgiving. He loves it so much he requested it for a treat in his school lunches. Trying to put a piece of pie in to a back pack is challenging so we came up with Pumpkin Pie To Go. We bought some mini tart shells from our grocery store (but you can make your own) and used my favorite recipe to make the pie filling. This way the tart shells hold the tart together in his lunch box.

Mini Pumpkin Pie to Go Recipe

• 2 eggs
• 1 can (14 oz) of Pure Pumpkin
• 1 1/3 cups of evaporated Milk
• ½ cup of sugar
• ¼ cup or brown sugar
• 1 tsp of cinnamon
• ½ tsp of ginger
• ¼ tsp cloves

In a bowl whisk the eggs and then add the pumpkin, milk and then beat in the sugars add the spices and stir.

Transfer batter in to a large glass measuring cup so that it is easy to pour the batter into the tart shells.

Place the tart shells on a baking sheet and fill them with the batter. This recipe makes 24 mini tarts. If you use the larger tart shells like for butter tarts you will only bet about 16. Bake them in the oven 25-30 minutes at 350 until they puff up slightly and are set.

Let them cool and then you can serve them in the lunch boxes. THESE FREEZE REALLY WELL so you can make a batch and “stash and store” them in the freezer. Just take them out in the morning and they will be fine by lunch time.

By Karen Owen of KarenMomofThree’sCraftBlog

My Blueberry Coffee Cake is one of my most favorite recipes. It is great any time of the year especially if you are one to save and freeze your own blueberries.

Blueberry Coffeecake Recipe

Preheat oven to 375

For the Cake:

• ½ cup of margarine
• ½ cup of sugar
• 1 egg
• 2 cups of flour
• 2 tsp baking powder
• ¾ cup of milk
• 2 cups of fresh or thawed and drained frozen blueberries (you can also make this recipe with mixed berries or fruit)

Cream margarine, egg and sugar together in a large bowl. Add 2 cups of flour and baking powder to a sifter. Sift half the mixture into the creamed margarine, egg and sugar. Then add and mix in the milk and add the remaining flour. Gently fold in the berries.

Place the very thick batter into a prepared 9X13 inch baking pan.

For the Topping:

• ½ cup sugar
• ½ cup flour
• ¾ tsp cinnamon
• 1/3 cup of margarine

Mix all these ingredients together and crumble over the batter in your pan.

Place the pan in the oven (at 375) for about 1 hour until the topping is slightly browned and a cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean.

This is a great recipe served warm with whipped cream or ice cream or simply enjoyed on it’s own with a great cup of tea or coffee. You can always place covered leftovers in the fridge and reheat for a snack or dessert later!

By Karen Owen of KarenMomofThree’sCraftBlog

It’s official! We survived the wackiest weather week ever! Last week we kicked off the week with violent thunderstorms on Sunday, followed by the strongest Earthquake in recent history (and we are only 30 miles from the epicenter) on Tuesday plus two days of random aftershocks, another round of violent thunderstorms on Thursday and then Hurricane Irene over the weekend. Seriously, Mother Nature! And our reward for surviving her little temper tantrum – 5 days of gorgeous sunny weather. I’ll take it.

Because we expected the worst from Hurricane Irene over the weekend, we did quite a bit of stocking up in the days prior which means I really don’t have to go grocery shopping this week! Yeah, me!! I think I need to buy three things – chicken breasts, chicken broth and celery. Sweet! So, here is the menu for the week:

Recipes:

• Monday – Slow Cooker Beef Bourguignon from A Year of Slow Cooking – I forgot to add that I will serve it over mashed potatoes
• Tuesday – Easy and Delicious Chicken Noodles from the back of the Pennsylvania Dutch Egg Noodles package
• Wednesday – Easy Crockpot Potato Soup
• Thursday – Bean and Beef Enchilada Casserole

What’s on your menu plan this week? Looking for more inspiration? Visit Laura’s massive Menu Plan Monday link up for hundreds of menu ideas!

I love it when my husband sends me a text message mid-day saying he’s taking care of dinner that night! I am a firm believer that food made by someone else always tastes better than something I make myself (grin). Last week he decided to make one of his childhood favorite recipes – Stuffed Cabbage Rolls or as he calls them, Pigs in a Blanket.

In the past I have fought with this recipe and have ended up resorting to a great Unstuffed Cabbage recipe instead. However, this time we made a few tweaks and ended up making them together and it was the best batch yet. We ended up making enough to do two large pans and put one of them in the freezer for another meal later.

Ingredients for Stuffed Cabbage:

• 2 large heads of cabbage (the biggest ones you can find!)
• 2-3 cups of uncooked minute rice
• 2-3 lbs of ground meat (your choice – ground beef, turkey, sausage or a combination)
• 1 sweet onion – chopped fine
• 2-3 eggs
• Perfect Pinch – Italian blend
• Kielbasa (sliced thin)
• Sauerkraut (optional – I like it, the kids don’t, so we left it out)
• 2 cans of Tomato Sauce

How to make:

• Cut the core of the cabbage out and submerge the whole cabbage heads in boiling water until leaves are tender and start to pull away from the core. Remove from water and let leaves cool.
• While the cabbage is cooking, mix the ground meat, uncooked rice, eggs, onion and seasoning together until well blended.
• Depending on the size of the cabbage leaves, take about a golf ball size scoop of the meat mixture and wrap in a cabbage leaf. I fold one end over, then fold the sides in, and then roll the rest of the cabbage leaf so they make little packets.
• Pour some of the tomato sauce in the bottom of your baking dish – just enough to cover the bottom. Then place the cabbage rolls in nice and tight against each other until the whole bottom is filled. If you use a deep dish, you can do multiple layers.
• Cover the layer of cabbage rolls with the sliced kielbasa, sauerkraut (if you like it) and then tomato sauce so that all the “pigs” are covered. The cabbage rolls absorb a lot of liquid so be generous with the tomato sauce – you could use tomato juice, too.
• Bake covered at 350 for about 2 hours.

These were by far our best batch ever! Since we were working on it together it didn’t take any extra effort to just make a second pan while we were at it. We used a disposable foil pan for the batch that we put in the freezer. The second batch will come in handy in a few weeks on a crazy sports practice night.

One of my favorite desserts to make and share is my peach cobbler recipe. It was sent to me by a friend and it was the first time I had ever made a cobbler that was perfect. I have now made it countless times, and it always turns out.

Peach cobbler is such a simple dessert to make and is best served warm with ice cream or whipped cream.

Perfect Peach Cobbler

• ½ cup of butter or margarine
• 1 cup milk
• 1 cup flour
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 ¼ tsp of baking powder
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 can of peaches juice and all
• Cinnamon to sprinkle on the top

Preheat oven to 400F

Melt the butter in a 9X9 baking dish. In a medium sized bowl combine the flour, baking powder sugar, milk and vanilla. Once the butter is melted pour in your batter into the 9×9 pan. Then open a can of peaches and “dump it right on top” – you don’t even have to stir it. Sprinkle with cinnamon if desired and place in the oven at 400F for 50 minutes or until your peach cobbler is golden brown.

This simple and low cost recipe is one of my most cherished and most requested pot luck items.  Add it to your recipe repertoire and impress your family and friends.

By Karen Owen of KarenMomofThree’sCraftBlog