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Showing posts with the label Side Dish

Exceptional Squash Casserole

Exceptional Squash Casserole, tender yellow squash in a creamy, rich sauce, topped with buttery crackers.  A must for holidays, bring it to a potluck and sit back and smile hearing all the yummy comments.   We have been eating this squash casserole recipe like mad this summer.  I made the squash casserole for Labor Day, and we devoured it.  The flavor of the squash is straightforward.  Just delightful! Summer squash is so plentiful this time of the year with having so many local farmers.  That is what I love about the little grocery store in my small town.  They stock fresh vegetables from our local farmers.  I buy all my fresh tomatoes ,  green tomatoes , cucumbers , eggplant , okra ,  squash , and zucchini from them while they still offer them.  

Southern Fried Green Tomato Stacks as Appetizers or Elegant Sides

Southern Fried Green Tomatoes, crispy on the outside tender and meaty on the inside, yielding a tangy sweet flavor like no other.  Serve them stacked as a delightful appetizer or an elegant side dish. It is time for Fried Green Tomatoes!  Summer is synonymous with Fried Green Tomatoes in my neck of the woods.   Right now we are in the middle of fresh garden vegetables appearing in Farmer's Markets and some local grocery stores.  I must say the first thing I check for in my local grocery is if they have any green tomatoes.  Last year they kept coming in the store until late September here in Texas.     I only buy a few green tomatoes at a time to make sure that they are nice and firm when I get ready to fry them. I like to pick out firm green tomatoes and some that are a little pink.   They are the ones that are just starting to show some ripeness, sweeter yet still tangy in taste too.   It is just a preference.

Magic Green Beans

Magic Green Beans , baked in a casserole dish with all the sweet, savory and amazing flavors of the fancy green bean bundles that are so popular in fine dining restaurants and around the holidays without all the fuss!   Have you made the Green Bean Bundles?  These fancy little bundles are a lot of trouble to make, but for our fancy Christmas dinner, Prime Rib, Smashed Fingerling Potatoes, Green Salad, and hot buttered rolls, nothing is too much trouble. Green Bean Bundles just go with our fancy menu. The Green Bean Bundles are so easy to put together, but they are very time consuming when you need to make enough to serve a large crowd.   Who doesn't love the flavor of bacon wrapped around a bundle of green beans, and a combination of brown sugar, butter, salt, and Worchester sauce poured over them and baked to perfection?

Old Fashioned New Potatoes and Peas in a White Sauce {Granny's Recipe}

Old Fashioned  New Potatoes and Peas , sometimes called Southern New Potatoes in a White Sauce.  There is one thing for sure about this recipe for New Potatoes, and English Peas smothered in a creamy white sauce, it has been around for ages.  My Mother passed it down to me, and her Mother passed it down to her, tried and true recipe. The first vegetable I want to eat in the spring from our garden growing up is new potatoes and fresh English peas. Mother would wash and scrap the new potatoes, slice them, or you can also quarter them if you like a chunkier potato.  While the potatoes are cooking, she makes the white sauce. I want to let you know I use leftover new potatoes at times to make a leftover makeover dish.  Especially in the summer when new potatoes are plentiful from the garden.  Boil the potatoes and eat them with butter and fresh herbs refrigerate the leftovers and then the next day use them to make New Potatoes in a White Sauce. Growing up mostly, I enjoy

Weeknight Family Supper Meal: #4 Salmon Croquettes

Weeknight Family Supper Meal , an inspiration for a meal one night of the week that may include ideas how to make part of the meal ahead, how to freeze any leftovers or how to make leftovers into a makeover for another meal.   Most people don't know how easy it is to make salmon croquettes.  Mix up a few ingredients, mince onions, egg, and seasoning in a bowl, roll them into small little rolls, roll them around some saltine cracker crumbs and fry in oil.  Voila, salmon croquettes.   See how easy, and oh! so delicious.  Perfect for a weeknight meal.

Southern Fried Cabbage with Kielbasa, LTYB, Low Carb, Gluten Free

Southern Fried Cabbage with Kielbasa , is a quick and easy one skillet meal for a busy weeknight supper.  Delicious, satisfying, and inexpensive, who could ask for more? Fried Cabbage is a regular side dish around our supper table.  Jim loves cabbage period, and so do I.  We usually add some kind of cabbage dish to our meal rotation two or three times a month.    Cabbage is low carb and has healthy nutrients and fiber.  It can be fried in different fats all the way from rich bacon fat to healthy avocado oil which is what I cooked it in this time. Although, I really like to cook cabbage in bacon fat we are trying to eat healthy these days so for this recipe I started the dish by cooking some thickly sliced turkey kielbasa chunks.

Weeknight Family Supper Meal: #3 Chicken Terrific

Weeknight Family Supper Meal , an inspiration for a meal one night of the week that may include ideas how to make part of the meal ahead, how to freeze any leftovers or how to make leftovers into a makeover for another meal.   Casseroles are loved at our house and especially the ones that can be made ahead, place in the fridge and pop it in the oven when time to cook supper.   If there is a buttery topping that is sprinkled on top like this casserole has, leave it to sprinkle just before baking.  Look out for the leftovers.  We love this casserole almost better the next day.  It is scrumptious.   Did I say it is not like your typical casseroles?  The ingredients may surprise you.

Weeknight Family Supper Meal: #1 Smothered Burritos Casserole Using Store Bought Frozen Burritos

Weeknight Family Supper Meal , an inspiration for a meal one night of the week that may include ideas how to make part of the meal ahead, how to freeze any leftovers or how to make leftovers into makeovers for another meal.   The main dish is Smothered Burrito Casserole using premade frozen burritos.    For the perfect accompaniment, a tasty recipe for Mexican Salad that goes all the way back to the 1960's.  Sometimes we add a side dish of whole kernel corn, Mexican Rice, and chips and hot sauce. Dessert is a simple layer of crescent rolls blanketed around a fluf fy cream cheese mixture known as Sopopia Cheesecake.

Perfect Roasted Sweet Potatoes with Smoked Paprika

Perfect Roasted Sweet Potatoes with Smoked Paprika , roasted crispy tender bite size pieces of sweet potatoes coated with avocado oil, and generously sprinkled with paprika, coriander, salt and pepper, a little sugar, and a pinch of cayenne pepper. Sweet potatoes are plentiful right now.  We love them baked whole, pies, and in a casserole, but our new favorite is roasted.  The flavor combinations are endless.  You can make them savory or sweet.

Roasted Sweet Potato Cobb Salad with Walden Farm's Honey Dijon Salad Dressing

Roasted Sweet Potato Cobb Salad, golden roasted sweet potatoes, chopped tomatoes, cucumbers, purple onions and avocados on a layer of fresh collard green ribbons and arugula salad greens and drizzled with honey dijon salad dressing.  I'm keeping it Southern! Do you ever have a few sweet potatoes needing to cook before they go bad?  Well, that is where I am, and two sweet potatoes are not enough to make a pie.   Now I could put them in a casserole or bake them, but that means lots of butter and cinnamon and sugar.  That's how I like my baked sweet potatoes, so I opted for a healthy version, roasted sweet potatoes. 

Cornbread and Sage Wild Rice Dressing

Cornbread and Sage Wild Rice Dressing, rich and moist, savory and crisp, and a uniquely delicious side dish for a Thanksgiving meal.   For me, there can never be too many Southern cornbread dressing recipes.  I for one do not think dressing is just for a Thanksgiving meal.  We love it all year long.

Seasoned Flat Italian Green Beans Southern Style

Seasoned Flat Italian Green Beans Southern Style,  flat  Italian green beans simmered on the stove in a pot of bacon fat, chicken broth, and seasoned with minced garlic, salt, and pepper and then finished off with a generous pat of butter. Flat Italian green beans are a style of beans that are meatier, wider and like the name flat instead of round and this variety of green beans while picked young are stringless.    With flat Italian green beans being meatier and wide in size, they do well cooking them on a slow simmer.  I used canned beans for this recipe, but fresh are equally delicious.  These cooked for about 2 hours on low heat.  This keeps them firm but soft and tender. 

Carrots in Parsley Butter

Carrots in Parsley Butter, a simple side dish, yet rich in color and flavor.  The carrots are cooked in salt, pepper, and a little bit of sugar and tossed in parsley and butter.    I am always looking for simple sides to accompany spicy casseroles, meat and potato stews, or heavy pasta main dishes.

Ombre Roasted Vegetables

Ombre Roasted Vegetables, a beautiful display of fading orange-colored vegetables, carrots, sweet potatoes, and butternut squash that have been tossed with flavorful herbs, avocado oil,  and honey then perfectly roasted. The past weeks have been making me hungry for all the flavors of fall.  Don't you think sweet potatoes and butternut squash scream fall?

Fried Okra and Green Tomato Combo

Fried Okra and Green Tomato Combo are two Southern favorites coming together most deliciously.  The vegetables are cut into equal sizes, coated with a self-rising coating, fried to perfection and sprinkled with a heavy dose of salt and pepper with a little pinch of cayenne pepper.   This is a post to celebrate the bounty of two Southern favorites, Fried Okra and Fried Green Tomatoes.  Some summers I don't fry okra or green tomatoes but once or twice, but this summer I couldn't get enough of them.

Roasted Ratatouille Vegetables Recipe

Roasted Ratatouille Vegetables,  roasted summer vegetables, eggplant, bell pepper, zucchini, and onion with a whole garlic into a delightful side dish. The recipe is healthy and comforting at the same time--pure deliciousness! I grew up with traditional cooking methods, and they are hard to change, but the older I get, the more I make changes to easier methods. As is with this Ratatouille recipe.   While traditional Ratatouille is made by sauteeing vegetables separately before combining them, I decided to roast the vegetables.

Pimento Cheese Deviled Eggs

Pimento Cheese Deviled Eggs, two southern favorites come together to make an everyday dish at your next gathering into extraordinary.   You might say a double dose of southern hospitality all in one bite! Deviled eggs are classy all by themselves when served on a table at the holidays, at a bridal shower, a brunch, to even a spring picnic.

Sweet Potato Spoonbread

Sweet Potato Spoonbread,  a spin on an old Southern classic, corn pudding, simple to make, served sweet or savory.  Such a delicious side dish to whip up throughout the year.   We are such a fan of spoonbreads .  We have it at all our family gatherings.  The grandchildren absolutely adore it.   It is the perfect side dish to serve with roasted chicken as well as beef or pork roast.

Weeknight Supper Meal: Quick Flat Roast Chicken

Weeknight Supper Meal, an inspiration for one of your meals for the week including a quick roasted chicken, vegetable casserole, simple salad, and a classic Southern dessert.   Flat Roasted Chicken,  cutting the cooking time in half bringing a crispy, moist  chicken .  One of my favorite go-to meals that stretch our dollars and makes my  meal planning  a lot friendlier.     

Super Bowl Party Eats

Football Party Food , a collection of our favorite game day food we enjoy!   I have included good eats from all spectrums, appetizers, main dishes, sandwiches, sliders, salads, and don't forget the sweet treats.   Are you ready for some football this weekend?  If you are having a Super Bowl Party or headed to one, these football eats are sure to wow your guest.  Enjoy!