Category Archives: kids

Pimento macaroni and cheese

kids, lunch, sides, supper 6 Comments

I love the simplicity of this one-pot macaroni and cheese; however, after 20 hours in the car with Kiddo (who, by the way, was a car-traveling champ) in the last four days I wasn’t really feeling the urge to watch the pot as closely as I would need to in order to avoid a boiled-over-milk scene on the stove.

I also had some pimentos that had ripened in the garden while Kiddo and I were gone.

So I crossed my fingers and totally made up tried this — and it worked!

Pimento macaroni and cheese

Ingredients

  • 3 Tbsp. all purpose flour
  • 3 Tbsp. butter
  • 2 cups milk
  • 1 tsp. salt
  • 1/2 tsp. dijon mustard (optional)
  • 1.5 cups dry pasta
  • 2 cups shredded cheese
  • 3 fresh pimentos, peeled (like this, only tiny), seeded and minced

Instructions

  1. Preheat oven to 375F
  2. In a heavy, oven-safe sauce pot melt butter till foam subsides, then add flour and whisk until fully combined; add milk while whisking and turn off stovetop heat
  3. Stir in salt, mustard, dry pasta, cheese, and pimentos; cover pot and place in oven
  4. Cook for 30 minutes, stirring halfway through; top with additional cheese and uncover for the last few minutes if you so desire

That’s it!

PB&J muffins

baking, breakfast, dessert, kids, snacks 3 Comments

Hello, lovelies!

Not to get all Bob Ross-ey on you, but these are happy little muffins. It’s a Paula Deen recipe (that involves only 3 Tbsp. butter, I might add) and were apparently quite a hit at The Yankee’s office. Yay!

PB&J muffins

Ingredients

  • 2 cups AP flour
  • 1/4 cup packed light brown sugar
  • 2 Tbsp. baking powder
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1/2 cup plus 1 tsp. creamy peanut butter
  • 1 cup milk
  • 1 egg, lightly beaten
  • 3 Tbsp. butter, melted
  • 1/4 cup thick jam (not jelly!)
  • 1/3 cup honey roasted peanuts, chopped (optional)

Instructions

  1. Preheat the oven to 350F and line 12 muffin cups with paper liners or spray with nonstick spray
  2. Combine flour, sugar, baking powder and salt in the food processor; add in all the peanut butter and pulse till it looks like coarse crumbs (think biscuit making); add in milk, egg, and melted butter and pulse till just combined
  3. Scoop half the batter into the muffin cups, then drop a teaspoon of jam on each; cover with the remaining batter and top with chopped peanuts if you’re using them
  4. Bake until muffins are light golden, about 15-20 minutes; cool on a wire rack (or eat immediately — these are SO GOOD still warm)

 

Paula says these will keep for 1-2 days, but they lasted about 1-2 hours in The Yankee’s office. So there you have it. 🙂

 

Chocolate chippers

baking, kids, snacks 8 Comments

Isn’t that the most fabulous name? It just makes me smile. On a recent impromptu stop into The Roost in Nolensville I may have nearly hyperventilated at seeing this book:

The Better Homes and Gardens New cook Book, copyright 1953. My mother had this book and I just adored looking though the pictures when I was a little girl; I’ve been looking for another copy for years and years. I thought the candy page was the prettiest food I’d ever seen.

My mother thought it more appropriate for us to eat such things as oat bran and tofu. I’ll let you browse the dessert pages of One Particular Kitchen and come to your own conclusion about that. 😉

On to the cookies in the book! This is a super easy recipe, and Kiddo had a BALL helping me out.

 

Chocolate chippers

Ingredients

  • 1/2 cup shortening
  • 1/2 cup white sugar
  • 1/4 cup brown sugar
  • 1 egg
  • 1 tsp. vanilla
  • 1 cup sifted flour
  • 3/4 tsp. salt
  • 1/2 tsp. baking soda
  • 6 oz. chocolate chips

Instructions

  1. Preheat oven to 375
  2. Cream shortening, sugars, egg and vanilla till light and fluffy. Add in dry ingredients, mixing well, then mix in chocolate chips
  3. Drop rounded teaspoonfuls 2 inches apart on a parchment-lined cookie sheet (or greased cookie sheet) and bake at 375 for 9-12 minutes. Remove from pan immediately and cool on wire rack.

The recipe said this makes about 3 1/2 dozen; I got a little less than that. These are light and crispy and just fabulous. Even the Kiddo, who has been known to shun any chocolate chip cookies that “look different,” ate these right up to the tune of four in one sitting.

Magee’s caramel corn

baking, dessert, kids, snacks 6 Comments

This recipe is from the fabulous Magee. The fabulous Magee is the mother of my fabulous friend Lissa (perhaps you’ve heard of her here? Or here?). This is her recipe for caramel corn and it is to die for. Crazy good. The Yankee doesn’t like caramel corn (should I call a neurologist?) and of course the Kiddo doesn’t (since it’s not Cheerios), so I cut the recipe down to involve just one bag of popcorn, but I doubled the amount of caramel because hey, it’s caramel. So here’s what I used:

Magee’s caramel corn

 Ingredients
  • 1 bag popcorn
  • 1/2 cup brown sugar
  • 2 Tbsp. white Karo syrup
  • 1/2 stick butter
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla
  • 1/4 tsp baking soda

Instructions

  1. Pop the popcorn and dump onto a parchment-lined baking sheet
  2. Melt the butter in a saucepan with sugar and Karo syrup, then boil for five minutes without stirring
  3. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla and baking soda
  4. Pour over popcorn carefully — this stuff is crazy hot and sticky; dangerous combo (just ask my pinkie finger)
  5. Bake at 250F for one hour, stirring every 15 minutes (the stirring will really help evenly coat the popcorn, so don’t worry if it’s not too even to start with)
  6. Slide parchment paper off cookie sheet (again, carefully) onto a rack and let cool. Store in an airtight container if any lasts that long

Notes

For the sake of reference, here are Magee’s original amounts: 4 bags microwave popcorn (6 quarts) 2 cups brown sugar 1/2 cup white Karo syrup 2 sticks butter 1 tsp vanilla 1 tsp baking soda

Flourless Nutella cookies and crisps

baking, dessert, kids 14 Comments

I came across a Food & Wine recipe for flourless peanut butter cookies in The Tennessean over Christmas and jotted it down. Then I thought — hey! NUTELLA! Because, you know, it’s Nutella. How could it NOT be good?

Because these are flourless they crisp up a lot as they cool. You can control the thickness with cooking time; around 10 or 11 minutes gets you a thicker cookie; more than 12 minutes gets you a crisp, thin wafer. Both are crispy after they cool, and both are fabulous. Make a tray of each and see what you like.

Flourless Nutella cookies and crisps

Ingredients

  • 1 cup Nutella
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1 large egg, lightly beaten

Instructions

  1. Mix all ingredients together and drop by tablespoon on parchment lined cookie sheets
  2. Bake at 350F, but don’t go far! These go from cookie to crisp in seconds, so watch for when they rise and start cracking on top
  3. Take them out just after cracking for a thicker result, or let them rise, crack and fall for thinner crisps.