If you’ve read this blog for a while you know that I bake cookies at Christmas. I have already shared my favorites, Polish Tea Cakes, so today I will share Hannah’s favorites.

Neapolitan Cookies

Ingredients

The one with all the pie tips . . .

1. You all know I make my pie crust from scratch but you may not know that I make it ahead of time. I made all the crust for the Thanksgiving pies last Sunday and I wrapped them in plastic wrap and stuck them in the freezer. It made things much easier on Wednesday, aka Pie Baking Day.
2. When I make apple pie I use about 8-9 apples. I peel them and slice them and mix them with flour, sugar, and cinnamon. Then I let them sit in the mixing bowl, stirring every now and again, for about 30 minutes. This allows the apples to soften a bit and then there is no shrinkage of the filling while the pie cooks.
3. I use One Pie canned pumpkin to make my pumpkin pie. I’ve done the whole bake-the-pumpkin-from-scratch thing and I just don’t think it’s worth the extra work.
4. There is no meat in my mincemeat pie. I use the little box of mincemeat pie filling and I reconstitute it with water. It’s apples and raisins and spices and it’s a very rich and delicious pie, especially when it’s served with vanilla ice cream.
5. When I make chocolate cream pie I use the cook and serve chocolate pudding from a box. It’s honestly better than my homemade chocolate pudding. When I make banana cream pie I make the vanilla pudding from scratch and then add sliced bananas. It is fabulous and rich and just about the best pie of all the pies I make.

And that’s that! Four Saturdays, each with five things about me, for a total of twenty new things about me.

Now I think I will go have some leftover pie. Mmm. Pie.

It seems like pumpkins are everywhere I turn these days. There are pumpkins to be carved and pumpkins to be baked and pumpkins to be turned into delicious treats. I wanted a fun and easy dessert to go with our turkey dinner last Sunday so I made Pumpkin Whoopie Pies.

They were awesome. I used a recipe I found on Home: Made Simple and the only thing I changed was to double it. I think I wound up with about 24 whoopie pies.

The cream cheese frosting is delicious and the cake is light and flavorful and everyone really loved them.

While I believe that traditional Whoopie Pies made with chocolate cake and buttercream frosting are still the best thing going, I will definitely be making these pumpkin ones again!

When we had our dinner party the other night I cooked steaks on the grill. We also had baked potatoes and what I think is the ultimate steak house side dish – creamed spinach. Kim asked for the recipe and Beth asked for the recipe, too. I figure if they both want it then perhaps everyone is interested so I turned it into a blog post. Clever, aren’t I?

Creamed Spinach a la Carole Knits

3 – 4 bags fresh spinach, preferably baby spinach
1 T butter
1 T olive oil
1/2 medium size onion, chopped into mall pieces
3 cloves garlic, minced
8 oz cream cheese
1/2 cup shredded Monterey Jack cheese
1/2 cup shredded parmesan cheese

Steam the spinach and drain it. In a medium sauce pan over medium high heat melt the butter and add the olive oil. Sauté the onion and garlic until the onion is cooked through and translucent. Stir in the softened cream cheese and heat until melted. In a casserole dish mix the spinach, the onion/cream cheese mixture, the Parmesan cheese and the Monterey Jack cheese.. Bake at 350 until bubbly, about 15-20 minutes. Serve immediately.

It’s rich and creamy and delicious.  I love it with steak but it’s also good as a dip with toasted baguette slices or crackers. Let me know if you try it!

The other night I found myself home alone (Dale was working with the band and Hannah was out with friends) and hungry. I wanted something delicious but I didn’t feel like going out for take out.

I scanned the fridge and found some summer squash and zucchini.

I searched the cupboards and found a box of penne pasta and a packet of Knorr’s 4 Cheese pasta sauce.

I put on a pot of water to boil for cooking the pasta. Then I started the cheese sauce. While that was cooking I used my mandoline to julienne the squashes. I sauteed the squash as the pasta boiled and when it was all done I tossed it all together in a big bowl.

I served it on a pretty plate with lots of fresh cracked pepper and parmesan cheese.

In just 15 minutes I had a delicious home-cooked meal with enough leftovers for lunch for the next couple of days.

It was way better than take out, too!

Things I did this weekend:

Visited Dale’s sister at her campsite. I mostly sat around at the pond. It was good. (picture inspired by Claudia)

Picked up our CSA share. It included peppers, tomatoes, onions, eggplant, celery, leeks, potatoes, blueberries, green beans and these beautiful sunflowers.

Baked blueberry muffins.

Knit on the Cascata shawl. There’s a story behind this one but I’ll tell you later.

You know what I didn’t do at all? Spin. I think I have completely fallen off the Tour De Fleece wagon. Whoops.

You all know I love summer. I love the hot weather, I love the relaxed schedule, I love cooking on the grill and dining on the deck. Sometimes, though, it’s just too hot to cook. And when it is, I make this salad.

I’ve been making a variation of this Salad Nicoise since I was a young bride in 1988. I even have the same 2 plates I bought way back then at Pier 1. It was quite a splurge at that time, if I recall, but I figured if I was going to serve a cold salad for dinner then I ought to at least serve it on pretty plates.

It’s a very simple dish – a bed of lettuce topped with some steamed new potatoes, hardboiled egg, tuna (Hannah was quite dismayed that the tuna was not mixed with mayo, I told her to live a little), steamed green beans, black olives and tomatoes. The dressing is a basic vinaigrette with a little Dijon mustard mixed in for a bit of a kick. I think it’s delicious. It’s pretty and it’s perfect for a hot summer night.

So what do you cook when it’s too hot to cook?

Apple pie for 4th of July. The stars made it extra festive! Either way, it was delicious!

Have a great weekend!

So I got it in my head that I wanted to try baking and decorating some sugar cookies. This first started at Christmas but life (and Christmas!) got in the way. Last week, though, I got to thinking about it again. A lot. So, despite my pneumonia and bronchitis, I decided to give it a shot.

I managed to decorate 5. The others are just plain and they are staying that way. Good thing I don’t get paid by the piece.

Truly, this is difficult. Just getting the icing into the decorator bags makes a mess!

And then the edges bled when I tried to flood the cookies.

I did better when I gave up on the whole flooding thing and just went for pretty designs, like swirls and plaids.

I guess, in the end, they looked pretty good and I know they tasted pretty delicious.

It was a learning experience, that’s for sure. I think I’ll try this again when I don’t have pneumonia. Ya know?

You may know yesterday as Valentine’s Day but if you’ve been around this blog a while then you know, in our house, it’s Cream Puff Day. You can read the whole story here.

Luckily I was feeling a bit energized yesterday and was able to whip up 2 batches of the little devils in the morning. That’s one batch for us (which really means Dale) and one batch for his dad.

Normally Dale is not one for over-the-top stuff. When we eat chips ‘n dip he puts very little dip on his chip. Cheese ‘n crackers is always a small smear of cheese for him. Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches have so little peanut butter I don’t think they should even be legal. But cream puffs? When it comes to cream puffs he is always urging me to stuff in more cream.  He has said for years that cream puffs are really just an excuse to eat whipped cream.

And he did. And it was good. Happy Cream Puff Day!