Puff & Stuff Spinach Rolls

Review by Jami:

I had some artichokes that I’ve never used. I bought them on a whim to experiment with, but always got distracted by some younger, better-looking recipe. I went online and watched a few videos about how to cut them, none of which were super helpful. I’ve decided that fresh artichokes are too annoying for a lazy gal like me, and from now on I’ll stick with frozen or jarred. Anyway, I got through the ordeal, chopped up the ‘chokes, added spinach, cream cheese and garlic. I smeared it on a puff pastry and baked till golden.

I would like to add that one should be careful about removing all of tough outer leaves. I think I got wrapped up in using as much as I could and left a few chewies on there. It just seems wrong to cut away most of the item and just use the small inner bit. Regrettably, my frugalness got the better of me on that one.

1 fresh artichoke or several jarred hearts

½ package of frozen spinach

½ package of cream cheese (I like the light, but use whatever you prefer)

1 tbl of chopped garlic

1 sheet of puff pastry

Chop artichoke and mix with other ingredients. Unthaw the pastry sheet and place on a cookie sheet. Smear a layer of spinach mix onto the pastry. Roll into a log, cut into slices and bake at 350 until pastry is crisp and golden (about 20 minutes)

Lazy cake cookie bars

Review by Lyndee:

It was a crazy, busy week with lots of travel, tragedy and heartbreak.  But the bright spot of my weekend was a visit from an old friend that I adore.  She was coming Saturday afternoon and I wanted to make a dessert to have on hand, but didn’t want to spend all afternoon doing it. So I found this recipe and gave it a try.

Ingredients:

1 box yellow or white cake mix (I used yellow)

2 eggs beaten

5 T melted butter

2 C M&M’s or mini chocolate chips (I used regular size chocolate chips)

Mix all ingredients together.  Put in a greased 9×13 pan and bake at 350 for 20 min or until golden brown.  Cut and serve once cool. 

These were definitely easy to make and tasted pretty good for as little effort as they took.  You can never go wrong with chocolate chip cookie bars.  

Growing green onions

I've seen posts on here that you can "regrow" green onions and was intrigued. I finally tried it the other day because we go through green onions in our house faster than toilet paper.
The directions were easy: Take the white ends that are left after you use the green stalk.  Place them in a jar of water and sit in a sunny spot.  They will start sprouting in a couple of days. Just clip off what you need and change out the water and rinse the roots every so often.
I put three little stubs in the water four days ago and holy cow, look what I have now! This is awesome! Success!

Pork Roulade

Review by Lyndee:

Caution, this looks way harder to make than it really is.  And it's so worth the few hours wait while it bakes in the oven.

Ingredients:

2-3 pound pork loin

1 pound Italian sausage

1 pound bacon

Minced garlic

Pesto:

Fresh parsley

Fresh basil

Olive Oil

 Preheat oven to 400.  In a food processor chop up parsley, basil, garlic and olive oil until it creates a nice pesto consistency.  Set aside.  Filet your loin in half lengthwise so it unfolds into one big piece of meat.  Using a meat mallet, pound your loin flat.  Cover with pesto. Sprinkle on some minced garlic. Layer on the uncooked Italian sausage.  

Start at one end and roll tightly.  Cover with bacon strips and tie up with meat string.  We didn’t have any of this on hand but we asked the nice guys at the Hy-Vee meat counter and they gave us a little bit to use.  

Bake for 3-4 hours until the roulade reaches 165 degrees on your meat thermometer.  Remove from oven and let sit for 5-10 minutes.  Just before serving remove the string and slice up. If you don’t want to bake it you could do this on the grill too. 

This was amazing! All the flavors came together in a beautiful way. The bacon on the outside was crispy and wonderful. The pesto and sausage flavors blended throughout the loin.  We ate this with some roasted baby potatoes.  It would be great on French bread as a sandwich for leftovers too! Delicious and something totally out of the ordinary than what we usually cook.  Yum! 

Mom’s super easy sloppy joes (maidrites)

Review by Lyndee:

I don’t know about where you come from, but around here sloppy joes are a very popular potluck and dinner dish.  I’ve never been a big fan of manwich but I love the way my mom makes sloppy joes and they couldn’t be easier. 

Ingredients:

2 pounds ground beef or turkey

1 can cream of mushroom soup

1 can tomato soup

Ketchup

Onion

Brown ground beef in a pan with some chopped onion.  Salt and pepper to taste.  Once cooked through, turn heat to medium and add your canned soups.  Stir.  Add a squeeze of ketchup and stir again.  Cook until soups mixture is warm, stirring occasionally so it doesn’t burn.  Serve warm on a bun or over mashed potatoes.  

Bacon Spinach Cheese Ball

Review by Lyndee:

Ingredients:

6 slices bacon

6 ounces fresh spinach

1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

1/2 cup onion, finely minced

2 cloves garlic, finely minced

1 (8 ounce) block of cream cheese, softened

1/2 cup shredded cheddar jack cheese

1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper     

In a large skillet cook the bacon until crisp. Set aside to cool and drain on paper towels. Chop when cool.

Drain all but 1 tablespoon bacon grease from the skillet. Add the spinach and cook over medium heat until wilted and cooked through. Sprinkle the spinach with salt and set aside on a cutting board to cool. Chop finely when cooled.

Add the onion to the skillet and cook until it's translucent and a tiny bit golden at the edges. Add the garlic to the skillet and cook for 1 minute. Remove from heat. Place the cream cheese in a large bowl. Add cheese, onions, garlic, half of the chopped bacon, chopped spinach, and cayenne pepper and stir well. Roll the cream cheese mixture into a large ball and then roll in the remaining chopped bacon. Wrap tightly and refrigerate until ready to serve.

This was my first time ever attempted a cheese ball.  First of all, make sure your onions are cooked through. Mine were still a bit crunchy.  Also, crumbled the crap out of your bacon. I used half within and half to roll the ball in like directed but as you can see from the picture, it barely covered my ball.  The taste was very good but the presentation was lacking some style points. It was more of a cheese blob than a cheese ball.  

Cinnamon Toast Crunch bars

Review by Lyndee:

Ingredients:

4 cups mini marshmallows

¼ cup butter

4 ½ cups Cinnamon Toast Crunch cereal

On the stove over low heat, melt butter and marshmallows, stirring constantly.  Grease an 8x8 pan with butter or nonstick spray.  Once butter and marshmallows are melted, stir in cereal until well coated.  Press into pan and let cool.  Cut and enjoy. 

These were super easy to make.  Just like rice krispie treats but with cinnamon toast crunch.  If you don’t like the cereal, these bars aren’t for you.  But if you do, this is a fun and easy twist to a traditional cereal bar dessert.