Taco Soup

Cook:
2 lbs ground meat
1 small onion chopped

Add:
1 pkg Taco Seasoning Mix
1 pkg Ranch Dressing Mix
Rotel 1 or 2 cans
Chopped tomatoes
Corn
Hominy

Add your choice of the following kinds of beans (at least 3 cans)
Black Beans
Red Beans
RS Beans
White Beans
Kidney Beans

Chili for a Cold Day!

Brown approximately 2 pounds of ground meat with a small onion finely chopped. Add 2 or 3 cans of tomato sauce, 1 can of Rotel, 1 package of store brand Chili seasoning mix, 1 can of beans of your choice (Kidney, Pinto, Red, or Ranch Style all work well), and liberally sprinkle with chili powder. Dad adds a little bit of brown sugar. If you want it hotter, use a second can of Rotel or buy the hotter version of Rotel. Add enough water to make it the desired consistency and let it simmer for a while. If you get it too thin, you can bring it to a rolling boil and pour in a mixture of flour and cold water. This will thicken the juice.

Thanksgiving Main Dishes

At my house we sort of have 3 main dishes for Thanksgiving most years. Although sometimes when there's not that many people coming I leave off one of them.

So here goes my main dish recipes:

Turkey

I use the Reynolds oven Turkey roasting bag to cook my turkey. I put margarine and salt on the thawed turkey and put it in the bag with the breast side down. The bag gets a little flour in it before the turkey and then bagged turkey goes in a roasting pan. It cooks in a medium hot oven about 4 hours. This is the main dish that most of my family thinks could be skipped. I like turkey though and it just seems like you are supposed to have turkey.

Ham

I like to get a bone in half ham and cook it in the Crockpot with brown sugar and pineapple. Using the Crockpot for the ham saves oven time and its so juicy and sweet and tender.


Chicken Dressing

Now this is the main dish that most people would consider a side dish. But at my house, everyone thinks this is number 1. THIS dish is by far the family favorite and I could never not have this at Thanksgiving. We often have it for Christmas dinner too. It is quite a chore to make it, but it freezes well. It can be made ahead of time and frozen.

Okay on to the recipe:

2 skillets of cornbread (recipe following)
6 eggs
Boiled boned chicken (a baking hen is the best)
Broth from chicken
Salt
Pepper
1 large can evaporated milk
1 C chopped onion
1 C chopped celery
Poultry seasoning to taste
6 slices of toast (or biscuits)
1/2 can cream of chicken broth
Sage (optional)

Cook onion and celery together in water until tender. Crumble cornbread in a large container and add toast or biscuits broken into small pieces. Add milk, broth, eggs, onion and celery with liquid stirring until the bread is lump free. Add salt, pepper, poultry seasoning, and sage to taste. You can adjust the broth and can use additional regular milk or a little water if needed. You want a medium gravy consistency. (This is one of those recipes that you learn how to make watching your Mama make it every year. Then one day, you have to make it.) So then you stir in the chicken pieces and pour into greased large baking dish or dishes. Bake at 375 degrees until done. Usually about an hour.
Serve with giblet gravy.

Giblet gravy
Cut up the liver, gizzard, and other pieces of scrap chicken (or turkey). Add 1/2 can cream of chicken soup and 3 cups chicken broth. Add about 2 Tbsp of uncooked dressing, 2 boiled eggs sliced, pepper, small jar of pimentos.

Skillet Cornbread

1 heaped Cup cornmeal
2/3 cup flour
1 tsp baking pwd
1/2 tsp soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 egg
3/4 Cup (or so) of Buttermilk

Mix together dry ingredients, add egg and milk and stir until you have a pourable batter. Put 2 Tbsp Crisco into a 12'' cast iron skillet and put into 425 degree oven until Crisco is melted and skillet is very hot. Sprinkle skillet with cornmeal and then pour cornbread batter into skillet. Bake till the top is a little brown. You can add a little sugar to the mix if you like sweet cornbread. This is the very best cornbread you will ever eat!!!! And it is the star ingredient in the Dressing recipe above.

Starting my Second Blog

Well, I never thought I'd have one blog much less 2, but, hey, why not!!??

I must start with a funny story about my recipes--

Last night in my advanced income tax accounting class, my teacher returned some homework I had recently turned in. It seems that I had also shared with him a recipe for Meatloaf that he didn't ask for. It was mixed in with the other pieces of paper.

I was embarrassed, but oh well, I guess it was on the printer. Maybe he needed a meatloaf recipe and just didn't know it.

So I'll put recipes on this blog on purpose!