Feeding My Flock

I have two of these cookbooks around, gifts from my mother-in-law Eleanor to Elise and me.  Emily has her copy, and I'm sure Stephanie does too.  I hardly ever use cookbooks any more since a quick Google search will find pretty much everything you need to know, but this is the ONE.

We have 3 go-to recipes that we never waver from in the FYF cookbook.

Taco Soup, Banana Bread, and Cornbread.  I've tried many others, but these are marked and spattered, and I know exactly what page they're on.

The first time I made the taco soup, it had yet to become popular, and I was just going on instinct.  My friend Karen and her husband were traveling from their home in New York to Atlanta - or vice versa - to visit her parents, and they stopped by our Greensboro home.  We had not seen each other in over 30 years, and I'm sure it was the taco soup that broke through the awkwardness of that reunion and helped make it such a fun visit.  That and looking through old annuals and pictures and doing a lot of talking!

I don't always follow the recipe as far as meat or no meat or what vegetables to include, but the taco seasoning and Ranch dressing mix are the secret ingredients.

I made enough with ground beef to send the Win-Bins 3 containers and keep one for Elise and myself plus one in the freezer.

Now I'll make the same recipe tomorrow with no meat, which is the way I like it.  

Another favorite, which I didn't make today but always make at Thanksgiving and Christmas, especially to go in dressing, is Charlie's Cornbread.

It's always so moist and really good, and it's hard to mess it up, but you'd better believe I have messed it up some way over the years.  I'm thinking about that New Year's Day in 2015 when Sherry and David were visiting us before we left Montgomery.  I did something with the salt, baking powder and/or meal.  I can't remember now, but it was just the worst.  I think David gamely gnawed on a piece before even he gave up!

And Jackie's banana bread.  I started using this recipe years ago and sometimes will veer away from it and try different ones but always come back.  It's just the very best and, even better, it always makes me think of Jackie and Joe and seeing them come in Mike's parents front door with a gift of banana bread for them.

I've also made a banana pudding from here, a broccoli salad, numerous casseroles, and most importantly the famous Eleanor's Sugar Cookies, frankly the best thing in there.  It was Jackie who made a batch of those for Emily and Ryan's wedding for a place of honor at the reception.

I can't remember very many visits to Andalusia that we didn't leave with a Maxwell House coffee can full of those melt-in-your mouth cookies.

Ryan and Emily are such good cooks and actually like it, so I don't ever think about cooking for them, but sometimes it's good to have something you don't have to worry about in the house.

I've already gotten the thank you texts, and Emily said Ryan was singing songs about the taco soup.  He gets a little excited about the brown rice that Kathy makes and the mushroom rice that I make too.

Now to the other two dishes I made.

This one:

I read a cute blog sometimes called Carolina Charm and get so many good ideas for the girls and recipes and all kinds of other ideas.  I need to link it to my sidebar.  Here's the link to this recipe.

It was so simple to put together.  I did text Ryan and ask him if the girls cared about green peppers and onions in food.  I've already forgotten.  He said peppers were okay for sure and maybe onions, so I just left out the onions.  I don't love chopping them anyway.  

But obviously I left off most of the salt, because as beautiful as it is, my one taste of it was just as bland and tasteless as could be.   I worry about making things too spicy for the girls, but next time I will season this one a little better.

I just hope they will add the salt and the girls won't hate it the first time.  I used to make a breakfast casserole with croutons, but this one has hash browns, eggs, milk, and cheese.  This is definitely worth trying agian.

The last one is the one I liked the best, enough so that I stole enough for myself for supper.

I got the idea for baked spaghetti from the Carolina Charm blog but ended up using this recipe.

She calls it spaghizza, and I saw some who called it pizza-ghetti.  I took the easy route, and it was really good to me.  I think it's just the thing kids will like too.  They can add their own pizza toppings.  I don't have a finished picture, but this is before I baked them.  Sometimes at least one of the girls is not liking "yellow" cheese, so I used mostly Mozzarella.

Next time I will break up the noodles more to make it easier to eat, and I will try the one with ricotta too. But this is one I'll check off as a repeat.

Half the blueberry oatmeal bars are gone, I hear, so I'll spend a few days at the end of week doing this again.  I really need to feel like I'm helping in some way.  My payback is going to be to ask Ryan to smoke something for me next time he has the smoker out.  And letting me come to the birthday tea party this weekend.  I'll have to make myself a Fancy Nancy mask!