Bananas Foster

1 stick of real butter
1 cup brown sugar
dash of cinnamon and nutmeg
4 - 5 bananas (thickly sliced and then quarter each slice)
1/2 tsp. vanilla

Melt butter in a skillet or saucepan over medium heat. Add brown sugar and stir constantly until melted and smooth (just a few minutes until it just starts to boil). Add cinnamon, nutmeg and bananas. Remove from heat and then add vanilla. You've made your own homemade caramel sauce!

Serve over a scoop of vanilla ice cream. Yum!

Chicken Enchiladas!

Yes ladies and gentlemen, I give you the delicious (though not technically nutrious) CHICKEN ENCHILADAS! Sure to please your husbands and friends.

INGREDIANTS
1 cup chicken broth
1 cup sour cream

1 can cream of chicken

1 package of enchilada mix

2-3 breasts of cooked chicken, shredded (Thanks to Elise for the shredding!)

Package or tortillas

Shredded cheese (however much you want!)

DIRECTIONS

(1) Mix the first 4 ingrediants together in a large bowl. Divide the sauce in half. Add the chicken to one of the bowls; save the remaining half for later.

(2) Heat up the tortillas in the microwave just so they are warm enough to wrap up (10 seconds) Add the sauce mixture with the chicken to the tortillas and put the enchiladas in a 13x9 pan. (NOTE: I like to put spanish rice in the enchiladas too! We just use a package mix of spanish rice. It gives it a little umpf!)

(3) Once all the enchiladas are in the pan, spread the second half of the sauce over the enchiladas. Cover the pan with aluminum foil, and place in the oven at 350 degrees for 20 minutes.

(4) After 20 minutes are up, take off the aluminum foil and add the cheese on top. Cook for 5 more minutes.

Sugar Cookies Too Good for Frosting?

Okay, so I don't know if you are familiar with the Phantom Ghost message and picture that goes around neighborhoods during Halloween time, but I am, and I was so sad that the Phantom Ghost wasn't going around our neighborhood.  SO....I decided to start it!

I'm not sure if the Phantom Ghost is a Utah thing, but everyone I "booed" in Idaho had no idea what was going on.  Basically the process of the Phantom Ghost is to bake a yummy treat for a couple neighbors and then leave it secretly on their doorstep.  Attached to the treat is the Phantom Ghost message and a picture of a Ghost so that the Ghost can continue to be passed along throughout the neighborhood.  The process is sometimes referred to as "booing"!  We "booed" three people in our neighborhood and not one posted the picture of the Ghost in their window...so basically, my "booing" was a lost cause.  However, I did make some pretty darn good sugar cookies to pass along with the message.  I didn't have any frosting at home, so I just dunked the small round balls of dough in sugar and they turned out great!

If you want a recipe for super soft EASY sugar cookies, 
this recipe is for you!

My Moms SUGAR COOKIES

• 3 1/4 cup flour (varies, I'd start with 3 cups)
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 tsp. vanilla 
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1/2 cup butter 
• 1/2 cup IMO (or sour cream works great)

Mix the dry ingredients together and in a separate bowl, mix the wet ingredients.  Combine both mixtures and cook at 325 degrees for 5-8 minutes.  

**For best results, remove cookies from the oven when they still seem pretty soft, let them cool for a good amount of time.  If you do have frosting to top them off with, put cookies in the freezer after you frost them.  They taste the BEST this way because the frosting hardens and the cookies stay SOFT!

________________________________

Good Evening!!!

The curse of the Halloween phantom GHOST

Is upon this HOUSE!

To lift this curse,

You must deliver a treat to TWO homes

in YOUR neighborhood.

You must deliver the treats within 48 hours!

POST THE GHOST IMMEDIATELY!!!

When you deliver your treat to two homes,

place a copy of this letter, along with a ghost picture!

It is very important that you deliver your treats SECERETLY to a home that DOES NOT have a GHOST POSTED.

REMEMBER YOU MUST NOT BE SEEN…

HAVE A FUN, SAFE & HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

__________________________________

A simply Divine Treat

Divine Chocolate Truffles

Ingredients:
1pkg Oreos(mint, regular, etc)
1pkg Cream Cheese
1/2lb Melting Chocolate: Almond bark works best

Directions:
Blend or puree Oreos until finely mixed. (this is best accomplished by blending rows of Oreo separately). Once thoroughly blended, hand mix in the room temperature package of cream cheese. Using a measuring spoon, scoop out equal portions of the mixture and roll into balls. Place on a cookie sheet and place oreo balls in the freezer to chill. Melt chocolate in a medium size mixing bowl to coat the oreo balls(The amount of time it takes to melt the chocolate is the right amount of time to freeze the oreo balls.) Drop ball into chocolate dish and roll around using two forks or tongs. Extract the truffle from the melting chocolate with forks and place on wax paper or aluminum foil cookie sheet to set. Drizzle chocolates with melted whit chocolate or crushed cookie or candy-bars or leave plain.

One of my FAVORITE meals:)

These scrumptious pockets are good hot or cold. My husband really likes them after a day of being in the fridge, but my favorite is straight out of the oven with cream of chicken/mushroom soup or chicken gravy over the top:)

Chicken Pillows

Mix Together:

2c Turkey or chicken- cooked and chopped

8oz. pkg cream cheese

1 can mushrooms

2 or 3 green onions and some celery (amount to taste)- chopped

Cut in half diagonally: 2pkgs crescent rolls

Place: 1/4c meat mixture in each crescent roll section and wrap roll around meat.

Dip in: 1/2c melted butter or margarine.

Roll in: ½ box crushed, seasoned bread crumbs.

Bake: 350 for 25min.

Warm: 1 can cream of mushroom soup and pour over the top as gravy

2 pkg chicken gravy (optional)

Broccoli Cheese Soup

This recipe is super easy and came from my dear friend Sharlene.  She is currently out of the country, but I owe lots of my easy recipes to her expertise.

*If you haven't made the connection with my earlier post of "Cheese Fondue", my husband and I LOVE cheese.  Just this month we're grating out 3rd block of cheese...I hope for our budgets sake that this blog will help us branch out!

BROCCOLI CHEESE SOUP

• Boil the following ingredients in the broth until vegetables get soft.
• 16 oz. frozen chopped broccoli
• 2 tbl. chopped onion 
• 1/3 cup chopped carrots 
• 2 cups chicken broth
•  In a separate pan on medium heat, whisk together the following ingredients.  Mixture will get thick.
• 8 tbl. butter
• 9 tbl. flour
• 4 cups milk
• Combine all ingredients then add:
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1/4 tsp. pepper
• 1 1/2 cup grated cheese
• Simmer on low for 5-10 minutes.  

I also made the bread bowl pictured.  The bread bowl was a little more involved.  However, I was really proud of how it turned out.  I halved the recipe and ended up making four bread bowls and it still worked.  My favorite part of the recipe was when it suggested to baste the bread dough with egg whites scrambled in water.  The baste resulted in the most beautiful hard golden outer shell.  The recipe for the bread bowl I got off the internet at:

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/italian-bread-bowls/detail.aspx

I was wondering though, does anyone know any good tips on getting bread to rise faster?

Taco Soup

This is such a great idea! Im looking forward to learning how to navigate through my blog profile and also positing recipes and getting recipe ideas!

One of our family's favorite dinners, it's super easy!

Taco Soup
1 can of black beans
1 lb of hamburger
1 package of taco seasoning
8 oz can of tomato sauce
1 can of diced or stewed tomatoes
1 16 oz container of salsa
1 can of corn


Cook the hamburger first and then combine everything (including the juices in the cans) either in a crock pot or on the stove. Cook to your taste. Then top with sour cream.