Johnson Family Adventures

Ok, So i have been VERY negligent in posting the continuing yumminess that is what happens when you cook a PW recipe. :) So here is an update :) Eggs in a basket. So easy, so simple. So fun! Buttered toast, yummy egg...great for any meal! Pineapple Upside Down Cake. Was a bit skeptical about this one...even tho I really like all the basic ingredients. Well, as usual it is DELISH!! Here are the basics. Melt butter in a pan with brown sugar. Tell me this: how could it POSSIBLY be bad with this as the foundation????????? Then you put the pineapple on top...then pour in your batter and bake. Highly recommend a deeper skillet due to overrun...HOORAY for a cookie sheet underneath to rescue my oven! ;) Yes, it is as gooey and delicious as it looks :) Flat Apple Pie - super easy way to make apple pie for a family on the run. You can literally cut a slice out and carry it around...not that I let my wee ones do that, but someday I could see that it might be a possibility in our world :) Appl...

 YUM. That is all I have to say about these meatballs. I generally like meatballs, and these are SIMPLE, and have a step I've never heard of before....you actually flour and fry them before baking them. I know, seems ridiculous, I mean, who fries meatballs??? PW :) She got the recipe from a friend when she had just given birth to their 3rd child and was nursing...maybe that's why I like them so much!! Ha ha ...  Simple ingredients. Oatmeal, salt, pepper, milk, onion. And my beautiful helper. In this picture, she was making "soup" from food coloring and water...she was so so so excited for Daddy to wake up so that he could eat his soup too...we all had a bowl at lunch :) Someday she will be an amazing cook, I'm telling you! HOORAY! So then you chill them...to help them set up, I think.  Flour them, and fry them...apparently I didn't take a picture of that step. Use your imagination. Its pretty exciting. The sauce - so YUMMY. Probably what ensure they are...

Ok so this blog is about food I wouldn't actually CHOOSE to make...on my own. I'm not so much a fan of shrimp, scum-sucking bottom dwellers that they are LOL...and I honestly don't think fried chicken tastes good enough to merit the calories :) But since we are cooking thru PW's cookbook, I will be making lots of things I wouldn't normally make. Like Burgundy mushrooms. Ew. But we will make them, and we will try them...but will make them on a night when we invite friends over who actually LIKE mushrooms :)  So these are the ingredients for Penne ala Betsy. Betsy is PW's little sister.  Shrimp, basil, parsley, onion, chicken stock, cream, tomatoes...that is pretty much all. Cooking...noodles and onions and spices... Making the yummmmmmy sauce... I don't usually cook with cream, but man, is it tasty!! And apparently I was having a cooking day b/c I decided to try my hand at Challah bread - b/c the picture in my cookbook looked so cool :) it was pretty tasty......

Oh YUMMMMMM As usual, PW shows up with great flavor and yumminess in her lasagna. Instead of ricotta she uses cottage cheese - a lb of mozz, a full cup of Parmesan, and 2.5 lbs of meat. :) How could you go wrong? One lb breakfast sausage - HOT- and 1.5 lbs of meat. YUM!!  HOw could you go wrong with this much creaminess??? We fed the final product to 3 other adults and 2 other children - and still had 3 HUGE portions of leftovers. And everyone gave it a THUMBS UP even the pickiest wee eater :)

I love homemade pizza. Even tho it can be a lot of work, it is so worth the effort. PW has a GREAT, super easy pizza crust recipe - it has 4 ingredients - flour, yeast, EVOO, and Kosher salt, oh and water, so I guess that makes 5 ingredients. :) Simple, DELICIOUS. I've never cooked anything at 500 before! didn't even know my oven went that high!!! So the toppings were not a PW recipe, just our favorite s- Pesto, cheese, pizza sauce and pepperoni. But the crust delivered! thin and just the right texture. As usual, fabulous :) Ok so the PW Roasted Corn Salad is SUPER YUMMMMMMMMY. It is filled with FRESH, delicious ingredients - red onion, red bell pepper, lots and lots of corn (8 ears!),  yellow squash, and fresh basil.  You drizzle the veggies in EVOO (extra virgin olive oil) and grill them till they are nice and brown w/o any burn. Yum. Chuck was busy with the kids so I actually did the grilling inside in my Pampered Chef grill pan - it worked quite well!  Simple y...