My mother is a fabulous cook. Whenever I spend a few days in Rochester, I just plan on gaining weight- there is no getting around it. She is always planning our favorite meals for when we are visiting and Easter was no different... the best glazed spiral ham I am ever eaten, my mother's famous cheesey potatoes (recipe seen in previous post), the most delicious fruit filled spinach salad, and broiled asparagus. But this year I felt like I should pitch in a bit. So I thought, hey, why not make homemade croissants?? ( I know, ambitious right?) And let me tell you, these babies were taaaassttyyyy. But we will reserve them for special occasions only... and maybe every 5 years or so...
It took me three days from start to finish-- including making the original dough and a butter block from three sticks of butter (!), then layering this butter block with the dough and folding, chilling, rolling, folding, chilling, rolling, folding, chilling, rolling, folding, chilling, rolling, cutting, rolling, proofing and (whoo!!!!) baking.
If you kept track of all those foldings, rollings and chillings that makes a total of about 160 tiny layers of butter and dough which equals a very flaky, tender, delicious product.
On top of the delicious Easter lunch we all enjoyed we also participated in one of my personal favorite family traditions on Saturday night... its called "Junk Food Night" and it is pretty much the best.
What's Junk Food Night? You poor, poor people.
Junk Food Night is when we prepare our most favorite foods that are usually only eaten on said night-- (including but not limited to) bacon-wrapped water chestnuts with a sweet brown sugar ketchup sauce, nachos, guacamole, "Dad's favorite dip" (cream cheese, salsa, lemon juice), shrimp cocktail, egg rolls, jalapeno poppers... oh yeah and some carrots.
We fill our plates and then go sit in front of the t.v. on an old blanket and watch movies until the food is gone and we are about asleep. This is definitely a family tradition that will live on in my house :)
HOWEVER, returning to our own house, I was really hungry for salads... And since this is a rare occurrence I thought I should take advantage of it. So here was our menu for the week!
Monday: Tilapia and chopped salad.
I think I am going to have to start making this tilapia once a week. For one, it takes all of five minutes, start to finish. For two, tilapia is really quite economical. I bought a bag of 7 frozen fillets at Walmart for $6. And for three... its delicious! Lately I have been craving the fresh caught walleye we used to eat at my Grandpa's cabin during our summer visits as kids and this tasted so close it was amazing.
All I did to prepare it was sprinkle the fillets with salt and pepper, coat them lightly in flour and cook in a large non-stick frying pan over medium high heat with a small amount of olive oil for about two minutes a side. Then just squeeze a little lemon juice on top and devour. I didn't get a picture this time, but I'll post one next week when we eat it again ;)
As for the salad it was a simple mixed green, avocado, yellow pepper and cucumber salad with some Good Seasonings Italian Dressing- yum.
Tuesday, Alex was supposed to have baseball practice and I was supposed to have egg salad (Hello, Easter.) Well, it rained, practice was canceled and we met his mom at Chipotle :)
Wednesday I used some leftover ham from Easter and made my mom's quiche. Simple, delicious and pairs perfectly with my new favorite salad for the summer: Mixed greens, strawberries, mango, homemade candied pecans and light raspberry walnut vinaigrette.
Quiche
Bake pie crust in 450 degree oven for 10 minutes in an ungreased glass pie dish.
(You'll want to make sure and prick the crust all over with a fork or it will blow up like a balloon!)
Cook in 3 Tbl. butter:
- 1/2 lb. sliced button mushrooms
- 1 c. diced ham
- 1/2 c. sliced green onions
- 1/2 tsp. salt
- 1 tsp. lemon juice
Cook until moisture is gone (about twenty minutes on medium, medium-high heat)
Pour into crust.
Beat:
- 4 eggs
- 1 cup cream
- 1/2 tsp. salt
- 1/2 tsp. pepper
Pour into shell, top with 1 cup shredded swiss cheese.
Bake at 350 degrees for 40 minutes (watch at the end for excessive browning and cover with tin foil if necessary)
Candied Pecans
Place 1/2 cup sugar into small non-stick frying pan.
Heat over med-high heat until sugar melts (you will want to watch this closely so it doesn't burn-- once it starts to melt you can swirl the pan to make sure it melts evenly)
Take off heat and add 1 cup pecan pieces.
Mix until pecans are coated and then pour onto wax/parchment paper.
Separate.
Thursday: Alex had baseball practice tonight as well- which was not on the schedule when I made my menu. We were supposed to have the Greek Salad that I have posted on before and some chicken cooked on the George Foreman.
However, since Alex was getting dinner somewhere else before practice I decided to try something new. I made the greek salad into a pasta salad and added chunks of grilled chicken directly to the salad... o.m.g. this is delicious. I had to use regular egg noodles because that was all I had but any small noodle would work. So I cut up all the veggies, added the noodles that I had drained and rinsed with cold water, added the feta and the dressing and then added the cooled chicken.
Definitely a great twist on a traditional pasta salad!
Tomorrow we are having BBQ Chicken pizza (I made extra chicken tonight purposely for an easy meal tomorrow.) All that goes into this simple dinner is making the dough in my breadmaker (dump ingredients, press start), par-baking, spreading with bbq sauce,and adding the chicken and thinly sliced red onion and cheese. Then... bake.
Saturday we are grilling with neighbors and Sunday is my day off ;)
I hope that these summery salads find their way onto your menu sometime while the weather is warm and if you happen to have three days that you would love to see filled up- I will gladly share my croissant recipe :)
looks delicious! great work!
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