Samosa Puffs

From: Good Enough cookbook by Leanne Brown

Hot Mama Grade: A

Hot Mama Notes: lots of work but tasty! I ended up using 3 pastry sheets. 1 that saw refrigerated, and 2 that were frozen. 

Roast Potatoes & NY Strip Steak

From: NYT

Hot Mama Grade: A

Hot Mama Notes: This recipe is simple and tasty. The kids loved it, as well. I roasted some carrots as well as petite potatoes. I did use parmesan. Delicious!

Also:

White Bean Stew

From: Good Enough Cookbook

Ingredients:

Directions:

Hot Mama Grade: A-

Hot Mama Notes: This is a simple recipe, which is the whole point of the good enough cookbook. I didn't have chorizo (and I don't love it anyway as it is oftentimes too spicy for me), so I used cubed chicken. I used 1 can of garbanzo beans and 1 can of great northern beans. I used 2 big handfuls of spinach, and I had a mix of red, yellow, orange, and green bell peppers. I used 1t of dried shallots in lieu if fhe fresh. This recipe was a bit on the bland side. Next time, I might add some smoked paprika to liven it up. Probably this is due to me using chicken in lieu of chorizo which has way more flavor. Still, this is a good quick and easy recipe. I also used some chicken broth (half cup) along with 1 cup of water. I find it odd that the water isn't listed in the ingredient list, only in the body of the recipe. J think the sweet Italian sausage recipe sounds tasty, as well.

Quick Chicken Enchiladas

From:

https://thewholecook.com/easy-salsa-verde-chicken-enchiladas/#wprm-recipe-container-35891

Ingredients:

2 cups fully cooked shredded chicken

▢28 ounces salsa verde, divided

▢6 tablespoons cream cheese, regular or low fat both work great

▢½ teaspoon garlic powder

▢½ teaspoon onion powder

▢½ teaspoon salt

▢¼ teaspoon paprika

▢8 flour or corn tortillas, see recipe notes if using corn tortillas

▢2 cups shredded Monterey Jack cheese, shredded Mexican blend cheese, or shredded cheddar 

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Spread ½ cup salsa verde on bottom of 9 x 13 baking dish.

In a large bowl, stir together shredded chicken, ½ cup of the salsa verde, cream cheese, salt, garlic powder, onion powder, and paprika. Add a generous ¼ cup of the chicken mixture down the center of one tortilla. Carefully roll it up and place seam side down in the baking dish. Repeat with all remaining tortillas until you have 8 filled tortillas in your dish and used all the chicken filling. 

Pour remaining salsa verde over your enchiladas.

Spread the shredded cheese over the sauced enchiladas.

Cover with aluminum foil. Bake for 10 minutes. Remove foil from top and bake uncovered for 15 to 20 minutes. Enchiladas should be heated through and cheese should be melted when done.

Enjoy as is or top finished enchiladas with sour cream, pico de gallo, fresh chopped cilantro, sliced jalapenos, and/or avocado before serving!

Hot Mama Grade: A

Hot Mama Notes: I was looking for a quick and easy enchilada recipe, and this fits the bill. I used cheddar cheese and flour tortillas. And my chicken was diced instead of shredded. I added in a can of black eyed peas as I like beans, and I wanted more filling volume in the enchiladas. I used 1/3c filling per enchilada roll. I also added about 3 teaspoons of diced hatch chiles into the filling. 

These enchiladas are very tasty. The kids really liked the cream cheese based filling. It is super creamy. My usual enchilada recipe is sour cream and enchilada sauce based. My oldest really liked the straight up green salsa over the top. It is a different flavor than the green enchilada sauce that I usually use for the topping. 

The one error I made on this recipe is that I cooked up the chicken on the stove top and I added seasoned salt and pepper. Then then I added the seasonings per this recipe. I should have held off on adding the recipe seasonings until I tasted the filling mixture, as my filling turned out saltier than I like as I salted per the recipe and also during the cooking of the chicken. Oops. Luckily the cream cheese and the extra can of beans cut down some on the saltiness, but it was still pretty salty. 

Basic Meatballs, any meat

From: NYT

Hot Mama Grade: A

Hot Mama Notes: These meatballs are simple, easy, and delicious! I used ground beef, panko, pepper, and a little bit of cumin. I think I also used onion and garlic powder, as well. They turned out surprisingly tasty! I had to cook them about 30 minutes on 375F. I used my oven thermometer to 160F for testing doneness. 

Cider Donuts

Hot Mama Grade: A-

Hot Mama Notes: Thesw donuts were super delicious but they fell apart. I will try to below recommendation to try to make them less soft next time. It was no issue, though. We just ate them with a fork. I wasn't able to pick them up to put in butter and sugar, so instead, Ai brushed the donuts with melted butter and sprinkled the cinnamon sugar over the top. 6T of butter is too much. 3T would be enough. And half the cinnamon sugar is enough. I don't think the butter is needed at all because the donuts are so moist.

In reading comments about this recipe, a lot of people used reduced apple cider for stronger cider flavor. I actually like them as is with a subtle cider flavor. There was also mention of cutting the sugar in the donuts down. I think that would be okay as they are very sweet. 

This is a tasty recipe but more work using the donut pan. I overfilled my donut pans because I wanted them all done in one oven run. As a result, the donuts have a bottom lip. Next time I will be more patient! 

I baked these for 20 minutes, not 13 to 15.

use 2 eggs still to bind the batter.

Oven Flank Steak

Ingredients:

Instructions:

Hot Mama Grade: A

Hot Mama Notes: This recipe was pretty fantastic! I liked it. The kids loved it. Win win! Will definitely make it again! I used my cast iron skillet in the oven. I preheated it for 30 minutes as specified. Next time I will roast veggies in it while it preheats! I didn't think about it this time. I roasted potatoes afterwards. I like the meat more well done so I did 5 minutes on one side and 5 minutes on the other. I took it out and let it rest for 10 minutes. The meat was 2.3ish lbs. I cut it against the grain. There were a few pieces pretty rare on the thick end, so I put them back in the skillet in the cooling oven for 5 minutes to cook them more.

I really liked the garlic and rosemary flavor! I let it sit for 30 minutes at room temp with the rub. Next time I will do full hour, but the timing didn't work out today.