Recipe of the Week: The Six O'Clock Scramble

Healthy Meals, 30 Minute Meals, Quick Easy Dinner Recipes, Family Meal Planning

The Six O’Clock Scramble® is an online dinner planning service.

AS A SUBSCRIBER YOU’LL RECEIVE EACH WEEK:

• Five family-tested, healthy and delicious and quick DINNER RECIPES THAT TAKE 30 MINUTES OR LESS TO PREPARE
• An ORGANIZED GROCERY LIST so you can grocery shop just once per week
• A SEARCHABLE DATABASE where you can customize your weekly dinner plan
• Your own personal RECIPE BOX where you can save your family's favorites 30 minute meals
• A newsletter with USEFUL TIPS for easier mealtimes, snacks and lunches
• NUTRITIONAL INFORMATION for each recipe to help you take charge of your health

For folks like me constantly casting about for something different to fix for dinner, especially if you're stuck in a rut of the same seven meals week after week, this service seems well-worth the price of $5 a month. They advertise themselves as 'family friendly', and a cursory glance shows them conservative in the budget department as well.

Here is their mini meatloaf muffins recipe: (printable version)

MINI MEATLOAF MUFFINS

Servings & Prep Time Prep time: 15 minutes. Cook time: 30 minutes Servings: 6 · serving size: 2 muffins Special Features Dairy-free Kosher-style or Kosher Alternative Nut-free Low-Sodium Make ahead/Freezable

My friend, Kirsten Thistle, shared this fun recipe for mini meatloaves. Both of our families gobbled these little cuties right up. One advantage of making the meatloaf in muffin tins is that they cook in half the time of a big meatloaf. Serve it with baked potatoes and steamed green beans with mustard-lemon sauce. 1 tsp. olive oil 1/2 yellow or white onion, finely chopped (1 cup) 1-2 carrots, finely chopped (1/2 cup) 1 tsp. dried oregano 1 tsp. minced garlic, (1 - 2 cloves) 1 1/2 lbs. lean ground beef, ground turkey or ground chicken 3/4 cup ketchup 1 cup Italian-style bread crumbs, or use crushed crackers 2 Tbsp. Dijon mustard 1 Tbsp. Worcestershire sauce 1 egg, lightly beaten (If you are making baked potatoes in the oven, start them first.) Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. In a skillet, heat the oil over medium heat and sauté the onions, carrots, oregano and garlic for 3 - 5 minutes until the vegetables are tender. Remove them from the heat and let them cool for about 5 minutes. Meanwhile, in a large mixing bowl, combine the remaining ingredients, then add the onion and carrot mixture, and stir thoroughly. Spray a 12-cup muffin tin with nonstick cooking spray. Spoon the meat mixture into the individual cups, dividing evenly (each mini meatloaf should completely fill a muffin cup). Bake the meatloaf muffins for 30 minutes. (Meanwhile, prepare the green beans, if you are serving them.) Remove them from the oven and let them sit for 5 minutes before serving, or refrigerate them for up to 2 days before reheating and serving. Scramble Flavor Booster: Serve the meatloaf with barbecue sauce. Tip: You can make the meatloaf mixture in advance and bake them just before dinner, or bake them up to 2 days in advance, as meatloaf gets even tastier after a day or two.

SERVE WITH BAKED POTATOES & GREEN BEANS WITH MUSTARD LEMON SAUCE To make baked potatoes, preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Pierce 3 - 6 russet potatoes in several places. (If you don't have time to bake them, prepare the potatoes in the microwave: Cook them on high for about 10 minutes, flipping them once, until they are tender when pierced with a knife. If they are not done after 10 minutes, keep checking every 2 minutes.) For baking: For a crispier skin, rub the potatoes with olive oil and sprinkle them with salt before baking. Place the potatoes directly on the oven rack and bake them for 50-60 minutes, or until tender when pierced with a fork, turning them once. While the potatoes are cooking, make a sauce with 1 cup low fat or nonfat sour cream or yogurt, 1/4 cup salsa, 1/4 cup thinly sliced scallions or chives. Slice the potatoes in half, and serve them topped with a thin layer of butter or margarine and with the sour cream sauce. To make the green beans, trim 1 lb. of green beans and cut them in half crosswise. Bring 1/2 inch of water to a boil. Add the green beans, cover, reduce the heat and steam them for 6 - 8 minutes until they reach desired tenderness. Drain them, return them to the pot, and stir in 2 tsp. butter or margarine, 2 tsp. Dijon mustard, and the juice of 1/4 lemon. Serve immediately.

Blog of the Week: Hungry? A Place to Gather for Food

Hungry?

Here is another great recipe blog lots of great recipes and lots of other information useful in the kitchen. My niece, Kami Allen, is one of a number of participants, so the spectrum of recipes is broad and comprehensive, with an emphasis on eating healthy.

Here is a sample of one of the recipes she has posted:

Grilled Vegetable Salad

Posted by Kamie

Grilled Vegetable Salad

A basic balsamic vinegar and olive oil combination does triple duty here, seasoning grilled vegetables, wilting baby spinach leaves and dressing this colorful warm-weather salad. Feel free to replace the asparagus with zucchini or yellow squash (just slice them in half before grilling) or to add a bell pepper or two to the mix. On the off chance that you have leftovers, they taste great in a veggie sandwich or tofu scramble the next day.

Ingredient List
Serves 4
1/2 cup balsamic vinegar
6 Tbs. olive oil
1/4 cup finely chopped fresh parsley
1/4 cup finely chopped fresh basil
3 cloves garlic, minced (about 1 Tbs.)
1 lb. asparagus, trimmed
2 medium-size portobello mushrooms, stems removed
1 large red onion, cut into 1/2-inch rings (about 2 cups)
6 cups baby spinach leaves, rinsed and dried

Directions
1. Whisk together vinegar, olive oil, parsley, basil and garlic in small bowl. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Toss sauce with asparagus, mushrooms and onion in shallow baking dish. Cover with plastic wrap and let stand at room temperature 30 minutes.
2. Coat grill or grill pan with oil or nonstick cooking spray. Preheat to medium-high heat.
3. Place spinach in large serving bowl; set aside.
4. Drain asparagus mixture, reserving marinade. Grill vegetables 6 to 8 minutes, turning occasionally, or until tender and lightly charred. Transfer to cutting board. Cool 2 minutes, and cut into bite-size pieces.
5. Add grilled vegetables to spinach. Transfer reserved marinade to small saucepan, and bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Remove from heat. Pour over salad mixture. Toss salad with hot marinade, using tongs. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Serve immediately.

Nutritional Information
Per SERVING: Calories: 285, Protein: 5g, Total fat: 15g, Carbs: 21g, Cholesterol: mg, Sodium: 203mg, Fiber: 6g, Sugars: 8g

Source: Vegetarian Times

Recipe of the Week: Super Easy Tomato, Garlic & Basil Pizza

From Debbie Tingey:

YOU WILL NEED:

• Your favorite Pizza crust (I use the Boboli Brand that you can buy at the store.....the pre-made stuff. Sometimes I make it home made, and that is good to. It is just easier to use Boboli if you can)
• 2-3 tomatoes (depending on the size)
  
• 1 clove garlic or substitute ~1 Tbls to taste
• 1/4 C fresh chopped basil or 2-3 Tbls dried basil to taste
• 3 Tbls olive oil
• 1 1/2 C Mozzarella cheese
  

1. Press the clove of garlic into the olive oil and set aside.
   
2. Slice the tomatoes, chop the basil and grate the cheese.
3. Brush the olive oil and garlic over the pizza crust
4. Add remaining ingredients.
   

If you use the Boboli crust: Bake at 400 degrees for 15-18 minutes. (Watch for the cheese to turn golden.) If you make the pizza crust, bake it according you your recipe.

Cool, and enjoy.

Recipe of the Week: Chocolate-covered Helping Hands Cake

Scott's Dutch Oven Delight

This looked like such a fabulous recipe, I determined as soon as I read it to post it as the next Recipe of the Week. Unfortunately, I forgot all about it in my customary addlepation. Be that as it may, this looks like such a fabulous recipe and a ready-made Family Home Evening or Family Day activity, that I just had to post it despite my earlier offering.

The provenance proceeds as follows: the dutch oven competition at our recent annual BFO (Big Family Outing), a camp-out at Fish Lake, became the topic of conversation on my family list. The consensus was that my sister-in-law won the competition hands-down in the particulars of scrumptiousness, participation, entertainment, and finger-licking goodness. More to the point, no other dish included the unbeatable combination of chocolate, chocolate, and more chocolate. It was, ultimately, my brother's recipe, and he posted to the list as follows:

• 2 chocolate fudge cake mixes
• 2 (20 oz.) cans cherry pie filling
• 2 (8 oz.) bricks cream cheese
• 6 eggs (just those required by the boxed mixes)
• 1 cup oil
• 3 cups water
• 6 Tabs sugar
• 2 tsp vanilla

1. Dump the cream cheese, sugar, vanilla, and 1 egg in a large zip lock bag, seal it, and invite every little kid in camp to help squish the contents together by hand. Watch closely, and stop as soon as somebody squeezes one time too many and a hole appears. Licking the mixture off their fingers is their bonus.
2. In another zip lock mix up the cake mixes, the rest of the eggs, oil, and water. Repeat the cooperative squishing/mixing process. Have a grownup make sure of the corners, as dry pockets can happen.
3. Pam a 14” pot.
4. Cut the corner of the bag of delicious brown chocolate go and squeeze it into the pot. More bonus finger licking ensues.
5. Spoon in glop’s of cherry pie filling.
6. Squeeze in randomly-placed golf-ball-sized glop’s of cream cheese. More finger licking.
7. 10 briquettes on the bottom and 16 on the top for 1 hour, or until a knife poked to the bottom comes out clean.
8. Serve warm with whipped cream.

As a variation, a dutch-oven non-devotee could perhaps use a 10x13" pan, reducing the ingredients by half, then bake at 350F for 45-50 minutes. However, I haven't yet had the opportunity to try this, so you may be required be fluid in your settings the first go-round.

Recipe of the Week: Sloppy Jose's

From Carrie Pearce

This recipe comes from my sister, is as easy as it is good, and is a welcome break from the same old Joe.

Sloppy Jose’s (or Tex-Mex Sloppy Joes)

1 lb ground meat (I like to use good ground turkey to cut down on fats)

1c. salsa (use whatever you like best. Mango/peach is really yummy)

1 c. shredded cheese (I use whatever I have on hand, can use low fat or non fat cheese)

Brown and drain hamburger or turkey burger. There is no need to add extra seasonings to meat. Salsa adds plenty.

Add salsa and heat for five or ten minutes.
Stir in cheese last and remove from heat.

Serve on hamburger buns.**

** I bet it makes a good nacho grande topper as well

Yummy!

Recipe of the Week

Jenn’s Amazing Smoothie Recipe
from Jennifer Hatch

This is so amazing you will be smiling all day! My daughter Alyssa and I drink this for breakfast all the time.

In a blender, combine:

• 1 cup of plain yogurt
• 1 and ½ cups of frozen strawberries (I let them thaw about 20 min so they are easier to blend but don’t over thaw because the frozen-ness makes it taste better).
• 1 ripe banana cut into pieces
• 1 capful of vanilla (about a teaspoon)
• 2 squirts of honey (or your preference depending on your sweetness desire)
• ½ of cup of non-fat dry milk
• You can also add any vitamin powders that you like. There is a Flaxeed one I like a lot that has no taste. It is called “Omega 3 Brain Booster.”

Blend. Enjoy!

Today's Additions

Google Group Updates:

• The Gardening Club news on the home page has been updated to clarify the date and time of the feed store field trip. This will be on Friday, July 11th at 10:30 am. This conflicts with the Sewing Club's scheduled service project, but we'll try to make sure people who want to do both will be able to.
  
• New Feature: Recipe of the Day: This post may not be every day, but there are plenty of good, basic recipes floating around that itch to be disseminated. Remember, we're compiling a cookbook as we go, so send me yours! You can even submit tips or variations to what we've posted in the comment section. An index of these blog recipes is included on the Cooking Club Recipe page.
• I've also added the corn casserole recipe we had in March with the gumbo, but lots of you have brought dishes to the demonstrations for which we don't have the recipes (Verlayn's cheese dip recipe, for example). If you would email them to me so we can include them on the Google site, that would be terrific.
• I posted the new "Preach My Gospel" page which can be found following Home>Just Cool Stuff>Great Links>Preach My Gospel.
  

Okay. I can see how the "of the Day" clause of my little projects can become very dangerous for me. It's too easy to get sucked into the machine looking for good stuff and allowing the day to slip past without you. So, I'm going to discipline myself and make it 'of the Week' instead. It will work like this:

Sunday: Preach My Gospel
Monday: Weekly Update
Tuesday: Recipe of the Week
Wednesday: BYE (actually, Steadfast Faith in Christ: a Missionary Journal day)
Thursday: Link of the Week
Friday: Blog of the Week

Of course, I wouldn't mind at all of anyone got the urge to help contribute and thus increase the frequency/volume of the columns, but I have to pretend to discipline myself just a bit.

New Feature: Recipe of the Day

Eggplant Parmesan

from Claudia Del Papa

Ingredients:

1 eggplant
4 beaten eggs
salt an pepper to taste
about 2 cups flour
about 3 cups bread crumbs (Italian style)
about 1 cup fresh shredded Parmesan cheese
8- 10 oz mozzarella cheese, sliced
1 jar spaghetti sauce (Bertolli tomato & basil)

extra: bow-tie pasta prepared per directions

1. Peal the eggplant and cut into thin slices, about 1/4 in.
2. In a bowl beat the eggs, salt and pepper to taste.
3. In a plate pour the flour.
4. In another plate pour the bread crumbs.
5. In this order put these things: left - plate of flour, middle - bowl with eggs , right - plate of bread crumbs.
6. Flour each side of the slice eggplant, pour it in the egg bowl and
   last bread crumbs, both sides. Repeat with each eggplant slice.
7. Bake in a cookie sheet, at 375 degrees, for about 8 minutes, and then turn over
   and cook the other side for few more minutes, lightly basting each side with cooking spray (Pam) for crispness.
   
8. Pour tomato sauce over each slice of eggplant, (about 3 tablespoons), some Parmesan cheese, and a couple of slices of mozzarella cheese.
9. Bake few more minutes until the mozzarella melts.
10. In a plate, put some cook pasta, with some sauce, Parmesan cheese
    and the eggplant on top.

Yummy! my kids love this recipe, and is delicious and easy to make. Try it! I like to bake it instead of frying the eggplant, like restaurants do, as that is mushy and not healthy at all! :)

Enjoy it!

Claudia Del Papa