Wednesday, June 11, 2014

Creamy Macaroni Salad


I like to have a big bowl of this on hand for 'HOT' days (you know the kind-- hot and humid!) when I don't want to heat up the kitchen by cooking or baking-- boiling water included!   

Once you have the macaroni and 
sauce together (the first eight ingredients)
you can add exactly what you like...

INGREDIENTS:

  1. 4 cups UNcooked elbow macaroni 
  2. 1 cup mayonnaise
  3. 1/2 cup salad dressing (like Miracle Whip)
  4. 1/4 cup distilled white or red vinegar
  5. 2/3 cup white sugar
  6. 2 and 1/2 tablespoons prepared yellow mustard (I sometimes use honey mustard).
  7. 1 and 1/2 teaspoons salt
  8. 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper

Add what you like of the following:

  • 1 medium onion, finely minced (or, some snipped/chopped chives?)
  • 2 stalks celery, chopped
  • 1 green bell pepper, seeded and chopped (sweet red pepper can be used, and adds color).
  • 1 cup of cubed ham
  • 1 cup of cubed cheese
  • 1 cucumber, seeded and cut into chunks 
  • 4 radishes, thinly sliced
  • 1/4 cup grated carrot
  • 1/2 cup frozen petite peas, uncooked
  • Small cherry or grape tomatoes
  • 2 tablespoons chopped pimento peppers

DIRECTIONS:
  1. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil.  
  2. Add the macaroni, and cook until tender, about 8 minutes. 
  3. Rinse under cold water and drain.  Set aside.
  4. In a large bowl, mix together the mayonnaise, salad dressing, vinegar, sugar, mustard, salt and pepper.  Stir with a spatula/scraper  until you can feel the sugar has dissolved or lost its graininess.
  5. Stir in whatever else you like (see the list above).  Mix well.
  6. Add the cooked/cooled macaroni and gently mix until all is coated.
  7. Cover and refrigerate for at least 4 hours before serving, but preferably overnight.
You can also make this salad have a very different taste by substituting the cubed ham with canned/drained tuna, bacon pieces, canned/drained white chicken chunks, imitation crab, or ???

Thursday, June 5, 2014

Rhubarb Cream Cheese Squares

I was having "RHUBARB moments" yesterday...

Above:  Yes, yesterday was a "Rhubarb Day"-- 
sort of.  I made two kinds of Rhubarb 
desserts, not all for me/us, though!   
First, I made my family's favorite Rhubarb 
Custard Dessert (shown in the back) and, 
then,  something I'd never made before--  
Rhubarb Cream Cheese Squares 
(shown in the front).  

The recipe for the dessert below is one 
that's "around" on the Internet...
For this, I followed a recipe found in 
a blog entitled "a farmgirl's dabbles"*--   
except that I doubled it to make a 
9x13 dish of this.

Below:   After it cooled overnight, I 
drizzled caramel sauce over 
the top to make it "different"...

These are quite "rich" and quite "sweet"--  I think
a "not big" piece (half the size shown?) is best.

INGREDIENTS
  • 2 and 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1 cup packed brown sugar
  • 1 cup (2 sticks) cold butter
  • 1 cup old-fashioned oats
  • 2 packages (8-ounces each) cream cheese, softened
  • 1 and 1/2 cups sugar
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
  • 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
  • 2 eggs, lightly beaten
  • 3 cups finely chopped rhubarb (chopped to little 1/4" pieces)
DIRECTIONS:
  1. In my food processor, I combined the flour, brown sugar, cold butter and pulsed it until I had what looked like a crumb mixture.  At that point, I added the old-fashioned oats and hit "pulse" ONLY a couple of times so as to not totally break up the flakes of oats.
  2. Remove 2 cups of this crumb mixture and set aside for the topping.
  3. Gently press remaining crumb mixture into the bottom of a greased or sprayed 9x13" baking pan.  Set aside.
  4. For the filling: In a small bowl, beat softened cream cheese and sugar until very smooth.  
  5. Beat in salt, vanilla, cinnamon and nutmeg.
  6. Add eggs, beat on low speed just until combined.
  7. Stir in finely chopped rhubarb.  Pour mixture over crust.
  8. Sprinkle batter with reserved crumb mixture, and very gently press down.
  9. Bake at 350-degrees for about 50 minutes or until set/very light brown (check after 45 minutes).  Cool on a wire rack for 1 hour.  The baking time for just 1/2 this recipe baked in a 9x9" pan was listed at 35-40 minutes.
  10. Refrigerate for at least 2 hours.  Cut into squares (or bars).