Munchie Monday: Quick and Easy Corn Pudding/Corn Bread

Corn bread is something many people love. I have not been notably fond of corn bread.  Usually it is dry and crumbly.  I do not like that unless I have some really good chili to actually crumble it into. 

We had company coming for lunch (the missionaries, both seniors and young elders).  I was making black bean chili and sweet potato soup...both new recipes.  So, why not try a new corn bread/corn pudding recipe.

The one I found was on I Wash, You Dry blog.  It turned out pretty good.

For myself, I have to say it is more corn bread than corn pudding because it was cooked in a 9 by 13 pan. I think if I make it again, I will use a 2-quart casserole.  Just for texture's sake.  Of course, it will need to cook longer at lower heat, I think, if I do it in that size dish.

This is a picture of the dish when it was just recently removed from the oven.  I pretty much had to try it to see if it was edible.  Since it was, we served it to the missionaries!

The ingredients are Jiffy Corn Bread Mix, eggs, drained whole kernel corn, creamed corn, melted butter, sour cream and shredded cheese. Very likely to clog up your arteries.... Since I made it virtually the same as the I Wash, You Dry folks, I refer you to them for the actual recipe.

The only thing I did differently was that I cooked it Saturday evening and let it cool overnight.  The next day I heated it in the oven while the 60 Minute Rolls were baking.  The pudding developed a more crispy exterior.   I think I would like it even crispier.  Still, it did taste good just as is.  It would probably be fabulous with bits of jalapeño in it.

New Taste for Creamy Cheese-y Pasta!

In the back of the cupboard I found an opened package of Number 8 Spaghetti last night.  I knew we had some sharp cheddar, some mozzarella, and some Parmesan cheese as well as milk, butter, and flour so I decided to make some pasta for supper.

To make the white sauce I used 4 Tablespoons of butter, which I melted in a medium stainless steel saucepan.  When it was mostly melted I added 1/3 cup of flour and stirred until combined.  Now I added 2 cups of dairy milk and stirred with a whisk until it was smooth then added another cup or more of milk and let it thicken while whisking.

With the white sauce  nearly cooked and the spaghetti cooking in a large pot of well-salted water,  I started dumping in seasonings.  These are the ones I used:

Dried parsley--1 1/2 teaspoons
Granulated chicken bouillon--a rounded half-teaspoon
Benson's Salt Free Seasoning--as I write this away from the kitchen, I think it was their Mediterranean seasoning--about 1 teaspoon
SMOKED Paprika--1 teaspoon

With the seasoning in I started adding clumps of shredded cheese.  There was probably 1/3 cup of the sharp cheddar.  When I opened the bag of mozzarella I was sorry to see that it was pretty colorful so I put it in the trash.  Sad.  Well, I don't usually put mozzarella in white sauce anyway, so it was just as well.  The Parmesan had a tiny spot of color which I disposed of then pulled out a large handful and plopped it into the sauce.  At the bottom of the package was more color but it was too late by that time to re-think.  Well, I am pretty sure there was no mold that got into the sauce, but I would not stake my life on it...

When this was all added and well stirred, and the pasta was cooked and drained, I put them together back in the large pasta pot and stirred well.

IT WAS DELICIOUS!!  I think the smoked paprika made the difference.

Food Friday: (Quick) and Easy Aquafaba Mozzarella

If you are trying to be vegan and you love cheese, AND you don't want to buy highly processed fake cheeses, then you need to make your own.  In the past I think I shared one or more failures along this line.  Today I have a success.  Sort of.  I found the recipe at Avocadoes and Ales.

This recipe really works.  You really do have a tasty cheese-like food.  The only glitch is the percentage of fat.  I suppose one should be happy that this is plant fat, but still, it is fat.

Here is the recipe I used to make the cheese in the pictures.

1/2 cup raw cashews, soaked in water overnight in the refrigerator
2 cups aquafaba (the water that you cook garbanzo beans in...though you don't have to cook your own.  Just open a can or two of garbanzos from the store and use that water.)
4 Tablespoons tapioca flour
4 teaspoons kappa carrageenan
4 Tablespoons lemon juice
2 teaspoons nutritional yeast
1 1/2 teaspoons coarse kosher salt
2/3 cup REFINED coconut oil, melted . (use the refined to avoid coconut flavored cheese)

Blend the soft cashews and aquafaba in a high speed blender.  If you use a less high speed blender you will have to blend longer then strain the slurry through a fine-mesh strainer.  You do not want chunks of cashews in your cheese.

Aquafaba drained off the garbanzo beans.

Garbanzo beans cooked in Instant Pot.  I cooked them an hour because I DO NOT LIKE garbanzos that are even slightly firm.  These are perfect for my taste.  Now, on to hummus...

Put the wet back into the blender along with the tapioca flour, carrageenan, lemon juice, nutritional yeast, and salt.  Pulse to combine everything fully.  I did not pulse.  I just turned on the blender.  When I was done, there was still a few dry clumps of the tapioca flour on the side of the blender...so I scraped it down and blended again.

Add the melted and cooled coconut oil and blend again briefly until smooth and slightly thick.

Put this mixture into a heavy-bottomed sauce pan over medium low heat and start stirring. It takes quite a while.  The recipe I used said you had to get the mixture up to 170 degrees F which you would recognize by the bubbles around the edges.  At this point it should be uniformly thick and remain thick when you run the wooden spoon through the food.  For me, I stopped stirring at 20 minutes.  I was sick of stirring.  The mixture was sort of glossy and thick but it never bubbled around the edges.

At this point pour it into a mold of some type. I used a glass bowl then smoothed the top.

Put into the refrigerator to cool for several hours.  You can slice this, and theoretically, grate it, but we did not get that far.  We used it on mustard and "cheese" sandwiches, between fresh tomato slices (good, but would have been better with garden fresh tomatoes, field grown, and local...not commercially grown greenhouse tomatoes), and finally, we used it in lasagna.  Dear One ate lasagna two nights in a row with NO complaints about leftovers...that says something!

So, I would call this a success.  It did work.  Was not a pain to make, except for the stirring, and it tastes good.  Unfortunately, I have made a semi-commitment to knock off the fat consumption so it will be some little time before I make it again.  Sad.

Food Friday: Quick and Easy Broccoli Cheese Soup in Instant Pot

This soup was remarkably quick and easy to make and was just enough for two meals for two people.

Broccoli Cheese Soup in the Instant Pot

2 tablespoons butter
1 onion, diced
1 carrot, peeled and grated
1 strip celery, diced
2 cups vegetable broth
2 tablespoons whole wheat flour
3 cups broccoli florets
1 1/3 cups evaporated milk
2/3 cup 2% milk
2 cups grated cheese
2 teaspoons homemade Greek seasoning salt

Turn the Instant Pot on to the sauté function.  Add butter to start melting then add the onion, carrot, and celery and stir well with a long handled wooded spoon for a couple of minutes.

Stir in the whole wheat flour then add the broccoli and vegetable broth. Stir until well combined.  

Add the evaporated milk and 2% milk, the grated cheese, and the Greek seasoning salt.

Stir well.  Cancel the sauté function and re-set to the soup function.  Set the timer to 5 minutes.  Put on the cover and turn the pressure gauge to "pressure".  When the timer goes off, let the steam release naturally for about fifteen minutes.  When the steam has released, remove cover, stir, and taste to correct seasoning.

This was just about perfect for my taste, and it was ok by Dear One's taste buds.  There was just enough left over for one more small meal.  This is good because more than twice in a row and Dear One objects/calls it leftovers and prefers not...!

The Instant Pot wins again!