Spinach Cheese Squares

Thanks to our Sew Mama Sew apron winner I have a new recipe for everyone to add to their holiday table.  So many of the dishes entered into the contest sounded supper yummy, but in the end Victoria's spinach cheese squares won me over.  Not only are they easy to make, but the ingredients can be found anywhere, and that's super important to me because we move a lot and certain ingredients become hard to find in different regions and countries.

Click on the photo to download a printable copy of the recipe

Spinach Cheese Squares are moist, cheesy, and delicious.  I made this batch faithfully to Victoria's recipe, but I could see using this as a base and adding other items like onion, garlic, or other vegetables too.

You will need:

375-400°F

1 lb Monterey jack cheese (grate it or buy 2 8oz packages grated at the grocery)

2 packages chopped frozen spinach (defrosted, squeezed dry, and cut through with a knife a few time) OR about 1/2 pound of fresh spinach, rinsed, dried, stems removed.

1/2 cup flour (I have made this with as little as one tablespoon of flour)

1 cup milk

4 eggs lightly beaten

1/2 - 1 stick of butter 

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp white pepper (opt.)

1/2 tsp salt (opt.)

Directions:

1. Prepare the spinach.

2. Grate the cheese.

3.Melt the butter in a 9 x 13 glass casserole dish in the oven as it preheats to 375-400°F degrees. Make sure it does not get too brown or burn. Take it out and set aside when melted.

4. Mix the baking powder/salt/pepper into the flour with a fork until evenly distributed

5. Mix the flour mixture into the beaten eggs and slowly mix in the milk to make the custard.

6. Pour in the cheese and the spinach and mix WITH A FORK.

7. Pour the lumpy mixture into the baking dish on top of the melted butter. Gently distribute it in the pan without patting it down. The heat of the oven will spread it out.

8. Bake 35 - 40 minutes until the center is baked, slightly raised, and the edges are crispy with the melted butter.

9. Cool a few minutes (it will flatten a bit) before cutting into individual servings.


That's it.  Easy and delicious.  Next time, I think that I'm going to go with a bit less flour and butter as Victoria suggested, and I might add some garlic just because we love garlic in this house :)

Thanks again to everyone who entered their recipe ideas.  I hope you enjoy making Victoria's spinach cheese squares in the near future.

To download and save an easy print, text version of this recipe, click here.

Dandelion Flower Jelly

Last week we finally got a taste of spring here in Germany.  The flowers bloomed, the birds sang, the squirrel discovered our bird feeder; yes, all was right with the world.  Alas, it did not last and we are back to sweater weather here.  But, while the weather was nice I decided to get out Big Blue here and do some early canning.

Big Blue, is my huge vintage immersion canner that I picked up very reasonably last season.  I love being able to put food by for the winter months.  There is something very satisfying about opening a jar of cherry pie filling at Christmas and having the cherries actually taste like cherries and not red colored flavorless canned glop.

I didn't have to go far to find our first fresh produce of the season.  In fact, I just had to look outside my door to see the wonderful harvest awaiting all those little helper hands.

If the post title didn't give it away, my first jelly of the year is dandelion jelly.  

I love dandelions!  I love seeing a yard full of these beauties rather than a nice manicured lawn.  

So, the kids and I started the season by gathering buckets of dandelion flowers in order to make tea and jelly.  The best way to gather flowers is when they are in full bloom around the noon hours.  Trust me, they just taste better this way.  

For those of you who are concerned about eating Dandelions, don't be.  They are completely edible from root to flower.  I personally love dandelion greens, dandelion root tea, and dandelion flower tea (although the root and flower taste different and have different uses).  Just make sure that you harvest your flowers, roots, and leaves from a site where they have not sprayed with herbicides or pesticides, and also avoid harvesting near the side of a road.

To make dandelion jelly you first need to gather at least half a pitcher of dandelion flowers (about 4 cups).

  

I've got a lot more than four cups in my colander because I made a double batch, but four cups is enough for a single batch.  If you have a little more or a little less, it is fine.  More flowers just means that you are making a stronger "tea" base for your jelly.  Now you need to clean and de-stem your flowers for the tea. 

There seems to be some debate in the dandelion jelly world about if you should leave the green base on your flower or not.  Really, it's just a matter of taste.  Leave it on for a jelly with a bit of good bitterness to it or take it off for a lighter flavor.  I like it both ways, and so I make both versions.  Dandelion Jelly tastes a lot like honey.  It is very sweet and the kids just love it.  

To clean your flowers you need to rinse them well in luke warm water.  Not hot, not cold, but room temperature.  This is so the flowers do not completely close while you're rinsing them.  It's much harder to de-stem closed dandelion flowers.

I've seen instructions for de-steming dandelion flowers that involves scissors, knives, and even tweezers to get every bit for green off, but honestly the easiest way to do it is just with your own two hands.

Gently pinch the petals in one hand and grip the green base in the other.

Pinch the green base and pull the two sides apart.

Seriously, it's that easy. You might have to give it a little twist and adjust where you hold the base, but after about 4 flowers you'll find a rhythm.

Don't worry if you don't remove every speck of greenery from the petals.  It will not ruin your jelly or drastically change the flavor.

To make the tea pour 6.5 cups of boiling water over your prepared flowers (or your whole flower heads if you chose not to separate the petals).  Cover your pot, bowl, or other container (not plastic), with a lid and let it steep for a few hours or even overnight.

Strain the tea using a jelly bag or a strainer so that you remove the petals.  You'll need 6 cups of tea.  If you don't have enough, just add water until you do.

Dandelion Jelly recipe:

6 cups dandelion tea

5 cups white sugar

2 pkgs of pectin

The juice of 1 medium lemon (or 3T pkged lemon juice)

*1/2 of a finely grated lemon rind or orange rind

*optional

Cooking:

At this point I'm assuming that you've canned before.  If not, please look up more detailed instructions on sterilizing your jars and lids and just a good overview of the ins and outs of immersion canning.  Put a few saucers in the freezer now so they will be cold enough to test the set of your jelly later.

In large pot add dandelion tea, sugar, and lemon juice and *grated rinds.  Heat until it comes to a full boil that can't be stirred down (around 8-10 minutes).  At this point add your pectin.  Because all brands of pectin are a bit different, how much you need is going to depend on your type.  I use 2 packs of gelfix 2:1, which is a European brand that I have not seen in the states.  I think a good US equivalent would be a less sugar pectin like sure-jell's.  Add pectin and stir for 4 minutes (for best results, check your pectin's recommended cooking time and adjust accordingly).  Test the set of your jelly with a frozen plate.  If it's not set enough, cook the jelly a bit longer and retest.  If it's still not setting, you may need to add a bit more pectin to the batch.  

Once the jelly is ready, pour it into your jars leaving a 1/4 inch head space and process them for ten minutes (higher and lower altitudes will need to check the recommended processing times on their pectin packages).

Let your jars cool down and check to make sure that they all sealed.  Your jelly should be the color of honey.  Make sure that you leave out a jar for the family to sample and hide the rest otherwise you'll find empty jars and crumbs in odd places around the house :)

Don't forget to add a nice label to your jars listing all the vital jelly information that you'll want to remember.  I've been having a lot of fun designing my own labels this year.  

        

I hope that you found this post helpful, and I would love to hear if you decided to make some dandelion jelly using my recipe.  

Next it's watermelon jelly!

What jams and jellies are you planning to make this season.

Jam and Jelly Time

This has to be my favorite time of year in Germany. The roadside stands are full of fresh local produce. My favorite are the cherries, but my middle child loves the fresh strawberries. He eats them by the bowl full. It's also the time of year to put some of this fruit by for the winter. Thus, I've been making some jams and jelly for us to have during the year, but I mainly can for friends and family. I love to make fresh bread to go along with the jams as Christmas gifts.
My first batch of jam this year was strawberry. It's nice to start off with a classic. We went out to the strawberry field behind our house and picked 2kgs of strawberries. I'm not sure what type of strawberry these are, but they were beautiful and very sweet.

I've never seen such blood red strawberries before this. They were that same true red all the way through the fruit.

So far I've done Peach and Strawberry fruit jams. I want to do some apricot, maybe blueberry, and some cherry pie filling too.

My favorite though has got to be the Jalapeno Jelly that I did yesterday. Love it! I found the best recipe from the Texas homestead blog. It is the best Jalapeno jelly that I have ever made. This recipe is a true jalapeno jelly and not one that is mostly bell pepper with just one token jalapeno. You can find the recipe at the Texas Homesteader site.

The only changes that I made were to use powdered pectin and half of a finely chopped red bell pepper (just for some added color). I added the bell pepper half way through the cooking process so that the small chunks wouldn't disintegrate. I also did not add any food color (really, I think the natural color is so pretty that it doesn't need any food color, but to each his own.

 This jelly goes great with meat like pork chops or chicken; It's also nice on a meat sandwich. I also serve it as an appetizer with cream cheese and jelly on crackers. Yum!!!

Sunday Dinner Recipe

Nothing goes better with the cold wet weather than a nice bowl of soup.  One of my favorite soups is Butternut Squash.  I have found ready made butternut squash soup at the grocery store, but it is a bit too heavy on potatoes for my taste, plus it has a lot more fat and salt than it really needs.  So I decided I was going to make a nice big batch of soup for dinner.  I can freeze the left overs and reheat them next time I want a good soup.  This is a slightly different version of my normal butternut squash soup because instead of turnips, parsnips, or potatoes it uses celery root.  I love celery root; it has a medium strong flavor and gives the soup a nice base.

 

Butternut Squash and Celery Root Soup 

Tools:

1 large pot

1 hand blender

Ingredients:

2 small or 1 large butternut squash

1 Celery root

3 onions

2 whole carrots
3 cloves garlic

1T dried parsley

4 C. water

generous dash of salt

Cooking spray or butter

Skin and chop up all your vegetables.  Spray cooking spray or add butter to your pot on medium high heat.  Add onions and garlic and cook until tender.  Add the butternut squash, celery root, carrots, parsley, and 4 cups water.  Turn down to medium heat, cover,  and continue cooking until all the vegetables are very tender.  Take your hand blender and puree the soup until it is the consistency that you desire.  You may need to add water at this point if the soup is too thick.  This soup tastes great topped with grated cheese.