Cheese Stuffed Meatballs with Zoodles

Zucchini Enchiladas

I probably have more zucchini recipes than any other category on this site, but I'm not apologizing.  Using zucchini when you live in Utah could be compared to wandering in the wilderness for 40 years and dealing with manna.  It's a gift that is given freely and you need to learn to use it up!

Of all the zucchini recipes I've tried, this one has to be among my favorite.  I made it several times last summer.  I love how the moist zucchini softens the tortillas and combines with the flavors so well.  The enchilada sauce is not from a can, but is so simple to make yourself.  It simmers slowly while you assemble everything, then smothers it all in a rich red sauce.  (If you're serving children, you might cut down the amounts of cumin and chili powder slightly).

You could also use chicken or pork with good results.  But good old ground beef couldn't be easier.  I prefer flour tortillas, as they don't disintegrate as they bake.  But corn tortillas work also - just lessen your baking time slightly.

Zucchini Enchiladas

Ingredients:

12 flour tortillas (or corn, if desired)

1 lb ground beef (or cooked shredded chicken, or shredded pork)

1/2 onion, diced

2-3 cups shredded zucchini

Grated cheese (I use Mexican three-cheese blend, or Colby/Jack) - use at least 1 lb, or more as desired.

Salt & pepper (and other seasoning) to taste

Enchilada Sauce:

1/2 cup vegetable or canola oil

1/4 cup flour

1/4 cup chili powder

1 15-oz can tomato sauce

3 cups chicken broth

1 tsp ground cumin

1 tsp garlic powder

1 tsp onion salt

1/2 tsp salt

Directions: 

Begin with enchilada sauce:  

Heat oil in saucepan, then whisk in flour and chili powder.  Brown slightly, then add in tomato sauce, broth, cumin, garlic powder, onion salt, and salt.  Stir until smooth and continue simmering over medium heat about 10 minutes, or until slightly thickened.  Use immediately, or refrigerate up to 3 days.  (Recipe from recipegirl.com)  Allow sauce to stay warm as you assemble.

Brown ground beef with onion, then add zucchini and cook slightly until zucchini becomes limp.  Remove meat/zucchini mixture to a strainer to allow excess moisture/fat to drain off.    Season meat mixture if desired.

Pour enough enchilada sauce into baking dish to cover bottom.  

Cover each tortilla with cheese, then add enough meat/zucchini mixture to cover.  Roll loosely.  Line up on top of enchilada sauce in baking pan, pressing them into each other so they do not collapse.  

Sprinkle generously with additional cheese.  Add remaining enchilada sauce, covering completely.  Garnish with cilantro if desired.

Bake at 350° (UN-covered, as zucchini will keep it very moist) until bubbling and hot - at least 45 minutes for a large batch.  Serve with guacamole and sour cream.  

Old Standby Hamburger Soup

EVERY family has a version of a hamburger soup in their recipe file - and this one is ours.  It couldn’t be easier - the hardest thing is remembering to thaw out a pound of ground beef.  We love the texture, which is right in between a broth and a creamy tomato - which is accomplished by two little tricks.

My grown kids are getting too accustomed to having this blog at their fingertips.  I know that because they occasionally call me and ask “Mom... WHY isn’t ________ on your BLOG?  I had to look it up in the cookbook!”  (the equivalent to having to watch a VHS tape?)  All I reply to that is “Life is hard!”  

There are many recipes that most of us just have memorized.  Then there are others that we make often, but not often enough to remember all the proportions.  This is one of those.  So now I’m posting it so those kids don't have to 'look it up'.  

Hamburger soup is what I would call a “just good soup” recipe.  I always made this when I had warm bread coming out of the oven at dinnertime.  My kids used to enjoy breaking up slices of cheese in the soup, giving it a little stir, and then “finding” the melted cheese as they ate.  Funny how you remember little things like that...

The two little tricks I always used to keep the soup between broth-y and creamy are these...  1) Boil the macaroni JUST until it starts to soften, and then keep part of the water you boiled it in to add to the soup (details are in the recipe).  2) Use a plain old can of condensed tomato soup - undiluted of course.

I use my home-canned tomatoes and dice them before adding to the soup.  I love finding those chunks of tomatoes amongst the macaroni and beef.  

So... on those cold evenings when you have nowhere to go, and don’t necessarily care to “wow” your family - you can’t go wrong with this great standby soup. 

For the recipe, go to:
www.changeabletable.com 

Stacked Enchilada Dutch Oven Pie

Use your less-than-perfect garden tomatoes in an quick & easy blender enchilada sauce.  That sauce will be the perfect touch to make this stacked main dish - and it’s even better in a dutch oven.  Don’t worry though - no coals required.  Simply bake it in your oven - turns out fabulous.

I used dutch ovens (a LOT) when I had a young family and we left late in the day to find a camping spot.  I always used my own (kitchen) oven to bake a dutch oven meal, and then I’d wrap it in newspaper & blankets in a big cardboard box.  We would put it in the back of the van and drive hours before arriving.  After setting up the tent trailer and getting things situated - our meal was hot and ready to eat as it got dark.  Good memories.

A lot of people are traveling this weekend, being Labor Day.  This would be a great meal to start in the afternoon, wrap up to travel, and enjoy late in the day.

The best thing about this is the sauce.  I have a bunch of tomatoes all trying to ripen at different stages right now in my garden.  There are never quite enough to bottle all at once, however.  That’s a bit irritating, because (really) how much taco salad can you eat during August and September?  I hate to have them go to waste, and all my neighbors are trying to give theirs away too.  So... this sauce was born.  I’m really happy with it - and I used up all my ugly tomatoes.  You know what I’m talking about - the ones with blossom end rot, that split halfway open, or were hidden under all the others with half the tomato soft & unusable.  

I would imagine any blender could accomplish this, but I used my high-power one.  I didn’t blanch them or remove the skin, just the bad parts.  I threw them in - skin, seeds, and all.  I used the “whole juice” setting and it ended up a bright red tomato juice.  From there I adjusted the recipe for Enchilada Sauce (minus the can)  Running it through the “soups” cycle a few times - it came out hot, thickened, and ready to use.  Awesome!

From there, I used a 12” dutch oven to brown the meat & onion.  If you don’t have a standard dutch oven, use any heavy pan with that diameter.  It’s great you don’t have to clean out the pan - just remove the browned meat and it has enough fat coating the bottom that it’s ready to stack the pie at this point.  

I tried this with layered corn tortillas, and it was really good.  I prefer using flour tortillas because they don’t fall apart and disappear into the pie.  As you can see from the photos, flour tortillas keep the pie in one piece to easily slice and serve.

This really exceeded my expectations...  An easy, one-pot meal - and uses your garden tomatoes as a bonus.  You'll find the complete recipe at:
www.changeabletable.com
  

Honey BBQ Meatloaf

Meatloaf has always been a winter comfort food in my book.  But this meatloaf takes on the taste of summer with BBQ sauce, honey, and dijon mustard.  It’s a nice change of pace from spending time outside slaving over the BBQ grill - dodging the smoke, bugs, wind, and heat.

I always love BBQ season, but when the weather turns oppressively hot - I’m inside all the way.  Lately there have been very few days that are just right for outdoor barbecuing.  So, last week, on a really HOT Sunday afternoon - I tried this recipe.  

It was fast to put together, and called for ingredients I already had on hand.  After trying it, I decided next time I would double the glaze ingredients.  The glaze is what makes it really shine.  It's delicious, and you’ll want enough to spoon over the slices on your plate.

For the recipe, go to:

www.changeabletable.com

Old Fashioned Meatloaf

This most basic of recipes yields a meatloaf that is moist, full of flavor, and topped with a sauce that will make you leave the ketchup in the refrigerator.  It uses ingredients that most of us have in the kitchen all the time (with the exception of bell pepper, which you don’t really need to add)  Delicious and tender.

Any recipe title that has “Old Fashioned” in it tells a few things about it.  Number one:  you won’t like it if you’re a food-snob.  Number two:  it has passed the test of time.  Number three:  it’s satisfying and comforting.  Number four:  you’ll love it if you’re over the age of 50 (that’s me...)

As the Pioneer Woman has said - any meat recipe that has the word “loaf” in it, instantly raises suspicion and doubt.  But think of it this way... these are meatballs in loaf form.  Meatloaf is convenient, not fussy to prepare, and serves easily.  You can also make it go further by slicing it thinner.  

Because this is so moist when mixed, it doesn’t stand up and salute when you form it in the pan for baking.  It will turn out fairly flat, which makes it easy to serve.  It also gives you more surface area for the sauce to settle into.

I love it because it is so moist - it doesn’t take more than a fork to cut it.  It bakes up in about an hour, so it’s fast to put on the table.  

The little chunks of tomato and pepper make it interesting, and you will never know oatmeal is what binds it all together.  It won’t win a beauty pageant (for meatloaf) - but it’s not meant to...

I have another recipe for meatloaf that I love just as much - it’s called Judy’s Meatloaf, and the link is HERE.  This is a close second, and it’s a keeper for those busier-than-average Sunday dinners.

For the recipe, go to:

www.changeabletable.com

Bubble Up Enchilada Bake

Sometimes I like to jump on the (recipe) bandwagon and find out what all the noise is about.  This recipe has seen a lot of traffic - and it’s hard to find the original source.  It’s quick, easy, filling, and (really!) pretty delicious.  The only criticism I can give is that it uses a lot of processed foods.  But I can compromise when I’m in a hurry.

Friday night we decided to go check out the Salt Lake County Fair Demolition Derby (I know, I know... pretty sketchy!)  I went to my first one in Logan, Utah a year ago - and I hate to admit that I loved it.  Dirt flying, smoke everywhere, and twisted metal - sometimes I just need a different kind of chaos than what I’m used to on a daily basis.

Two of my married kids (& spouses) were meeting here to hurry through a quick meal before we went to save our seats - so we didn’t have time for a sit-down meal (my excuse for poor photos)  I’ve wanted to try this for a while, so this was a good chance to see how quick it really was.  

I thought I gave up on food like this once my kids left home - but it’s fun to indulge in a little convenience food occasionally.  I had this on the table in less than an hour (including prep and baking).  

The biscuits help it live up to the “bubble up” in the title.  They were still flaky - not soggy at all.  I found a few differences in the web versions out there - but next time I’ll temper the taco seasoning a little.  I might even leave it out completely - depending on the age of the kids at the table.  

We dropped on a dollop of sour cream and guacamole - and later I thought it would even be better with a little jarred salsa to spice it up a bit.  This will save you on one of “those nights” when you barely have time to walk in the door before heading out to the next event.

For this (fast) recipe - go to:

www.changeabletable.com

3 or 4 Packet Roast

I am fiercely loyal to my favorite roast recipe.  That said, while this is not my all-time favorite way to make a fine roast - it is a close second.  This would be awesome on a hot summer day in the crockpot.  Lots of flavor and plenty of gravy make this a good family stand-by for days when time is short and you can’t be tied to your kitchen to watch the roast beef. 

This ‘recipe’ has been traveling the blog world since 2004, but I recently paid more attention to it when I saw it on sisterscafe.com.  It caught my eye, and I added all those “packets” to my shopping list so I could try it later.

As I’ve mentioned before, I rarely use seasoning packets - with the exception of Taco, Ranch, and Italian dressing mixes, which I like mainly for convenience.  I was a little suspicious of the brown gravy mix, and I’ve stopped using onion soup mix because of the amount of salt.  But - I decided to give this a try.

I decided to make it in my oven - baking it for over 6 hours, although the recipe directs you to use a crockpot.  It makes a delicious roast and a hearty gravy, but I felt it was a little salty for my preference.  The aroma greeting you after coming home from church is certainly inviting.  

My take on this recipe is this:  Use it on a busy, hot summer day (in a crockpot) when you don’t want to take the time to measure out individual spices & ingredients.  If you use it in the middle of winter, it is even better in a heavy ceramic baking dish covered tightly with foil.  The gravy turns out a little thicker and the flavor richer than the crockpot version.

For the adapted recipe, photos, and links to the source(s) - go to:

www.changeabletable.com

Mom's Legendary Meatballs in Gravy

Do you remember the favorite meal you would ask for on your birthday as a child?  I didn’t have to work hard at remembering... this is IT.  I’ve tried to duplicate this so many times, and (after years) I think I’m finally getting close.  These are so tender swimming in the rich sour cream gravy over rice or noodles.

This recipe came from my paternal grandmother - Mary Zella Larsen Pendleton.  She was a legendary cook - and my mother’s wish was to duplicate her dishes (which she HAS...)

In my early attempts to make these, I was trying to be frugal - and skipped the ground pork.  The bread crumbs (soaked in milk) are also non-negotiable, since they make the meatballs so tender they almost fall apart (unlike the frozen, bagged meatballs from a warehouse store).  Another ingredient adding a unique taste is poultry seasoning - something I would have never suspected in meatballs.  

I like to make these a day or two ahead, store in ziploc bags, and bring out to re-warm on the day I need them.  The sauce could also be pre-made - utilizing the pan drippings for the best flavor.  

If this recipe seems a bit time-intensive for your day - save it for later and try “Less-Stress, No-Mess Swedish Meatballs” (link is HERE)

Childhood memories are usually every-day life - just idealized in my mind with the passage of time.  But who knows - you may find these as delicious as I do.

The recipe, instructions, and photos can be found at:

www.changeabletable.com