Stew Season

The best part of our little hometown is the Brunswick Stew sold at the annual RailRoad Festival. Every year my sister and I make a hurried trip downtown to the vendors selling the "Golden" stuff. We usually wind up buying at least 4 to 5 quarts. After hearing my little grandson ask... "what's in this stuff that makes it so yummy, I knew I had to learn how to make it.

So here we go.... Yummy style Brunswick Stew

Place a small pork roast in the crockpot. Cover with water, add a small sliced onion and about 2 Tbsp. Worcestershire Sauce. Cook on high for about 4 hours. Remove meat and shred.

Boil a whole chicken till tender. Add enough water to cover it. Remove the chicken and shred the meat. Leave water in pan. (You may need to add a little more if it evaporates while cooking). Add 1 chopped onion, 3 medium potatoes, diced, and 1/4 cup diced celery. Cook till veggies are tender. Add 1 bag of frozen white corn (I used Private Selection brand from Kroger), 1 cup baby lima beans. Cook for about 10 to 15 min. Add the shredded chicken and pork and two cans diced tomatoes.

Recipe called for a whole bottle of ketchup but I only added about 1/2 cup. I added tomato juice. I just kept adding it and letting it cook down till it got the consistency I wanted. I also added about 4 to 5 teaspoons apple cider vinegar, about 1 Tbsp Worcestershire Sauce, 2 to 3 drops Liquid Smoke. I also added a pinch of sugar, some salt, pepper, Texas Pete and cayenne pepper to taste. That's about it. You really just have to play around with the spices and tomato juice to get it the way you like it. But according to my daughter and her kids.... It was YUMMY!

Move over Rachel Ray

Last night when I got home from work and took on that nightly question of what's for dinner, I opened the fridge to find smoked sausage calling my name. Now please understand this is NOT my meat of choice and I only buy it to satisfy Billy Head's craving for meat. Okay, now what? What to do with smoked sausage. And grilling was out of the question since it was cold out and I didn't feel like braving the elements. This is where the "Move over Rachel Ray" part comes in.... I grabbed that hunk of sausage, some potatoes, onions and whatever else jumped out at me and I began... my own RECIPE. Yeah, I don't have many original recipes in my arsenal but I guess you have to start somewhere, right?

1 package smoked sausage, cut into bite size pieces
2 medium potatoes, thinly sliced
1 onion, thinly sliced
1 green pepper, cut into strips
1 package grape tomatoes, cut in half
1 tablespoon Mrs. Dash or grill seasoning
1 teaspoon cajun seasoning
1/4 teaspoon garlic salt
salt and pepper to taste
olive oil
Balsamic vinegar

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Place sausage and veggies into a baking dish. Sprinkle with seasonings. Drizzle with olive oil (enough to coat veggies). Cook at 400 degrees for about 25 to 30 minutes or until potatoes are tender. Add a splash of Balsamic vinegar and return to oven for another 5 to 10 minutes.

I wound up broiling the dish for a few minutes to get the sausage crispy. Billy Head likes his meat crispy or sometimes burnt. No problem for me. I like to burn things. He commented that this was very good. Next time I may add some cabbage wedges to the mix.

Halloween Crafts with Nana

I must be getting old.....cause for some strange reason this year I am actually looking forward to Halloween. I even decided to do Halloween crafts with the grandkids. Just so happened that Saturday Greta was not feeling well so I had the kids with me most of the day. To keep them entertained we made ghosts.


See!
Carson wanted hers to have eyelashes.....I guess those are the Girly Girl Ghosts.



And I don't know what Hunter's were.... He just wanted to mark on my place mats.

And this little gobblin, well he just wanted to eat the lollipops. What a sticky mess!!!

With the remaining lollipops we were able to make these.....

Halloween Ghosts

These are super easy to make.

Blow Pop lollipops ( or the big Tootsie Roll Pops)

1 box of tissues (2 for each ghost)

Black, orange and white curling ribbon

A black marker

Take 2 tissues and cover the lollipop, tie the curling ribbon around the neck part of the ghost. Draw a face on the ghost. I purchased some witches pots at Factory Card Outlet and put some green floral foam in the bottom. Then I placed the stick of the ghost into it and filled around the ghosts with some shiney package stuff from the dollar store.