My Husband's Favorites: Cowboy Mac'n'Cheese

Since I shared with you my seasoning mix made with sweet onions, celery, bell peppers and parsley, I wanted to share with you another recipe that uses it.  It also features mild chili peppers, another vegetable that I grow in my garden.

This recipe got me thinking that I should dice up mild green chili peppers and freeze them in small batches for use in Tex-Mex inspired meals.

The biggest surprise for me with this meal is how much my husband loves it.  My hubby says he doesn't like mac 'n' cheese, but I made this and my hubby couldn't get enough of it.  He also loves my Turkey, Broccoli Mac and Cheese recipe.

Let me know if your hubby loves this recipe too!

Cowboy Mac'n'Cheese

serves 6

2 cans condensed cheddar cheese soup
3 cups water
2 cups beef broth
2 Tablespoons Tex-Mex chili seasoning
2 teaspoons chopped garlic
1 16 oz. container Trader Joe's Pulled Beef Brisket in Smoky BBQ Sauce
1 16 oz. box or bag of dried elbow macaroni
2 cups Mexican shredded cheese
3/4 cup frozen seasoning mix
1/4 cup diced mild green chiles

Coat a 6 quart slow cooker liner with cooking spray.

Whisk together until smooth the cheddar cheese soup, water, beef broth, chili season and chopped garlic in the slow cooker.

Add the barbecue beef, elbow macaroni, shredded cheese, seasoning mix and green chilies to the slow cooker and stir to combine.

Cover and cook on LOW for 2 1/2 to 3 1/2 hours.  Check at 2 1/2 hours as the macaroni cooks surprisingly quickly in a slow cooker. 

Getting Started Saving Seeds

Now that I know that the Pizza My Heart container peppers won't be available from Renee's Garden during the upcoming year due to crop failures, I have started looking in earnest for information about saving seeds from my garden.

Fortunately for me, I still have peppers coming ripe on the plants in my garden and probably will until a real cold snap hits.  That might not be for a few months yet here in Los Angeles!

While home gardeners have traditionally saved seeds from their gardens, there are some rules you need to follow to do so successfully.  The main ones are:

1. Knowing that saving seeds from F 1 hybrid plants will probably not result in the same plant.
2. Keeping different types of the same crop separated from each other so that there is no cross-breeding. 

Know Your Hybrid Plants

When you intentionally cross two inbred plants together you get a hybrid.  Commercial seed growers do this because the resulting seeds produce plants that are more vigorous and disease resistant with fruits that are more uniform.

The seeds these hybrids plants produce will not be the same seed you planted in the ground however.  Because of how genetics works, the seeds from hybrid plants can produce plants that look like the "mother" plant, the "father" plant or a combination of the two.  There is no way to predicted just from looking at the seeds what you will get when you plant them.

So if the plants you started from seed say F 1 hybrid on the package, chances are you'll be disappointed with the crop you will grow from these seeds you save from these plants.  To get the plants you want, you'll need to keep purchasing the seeds from the person who owns the parent plants.

Interesting Fact:  Most corn seed you buy is F 1 hybrid seed.

Make Them Keep Their Distance

There are several ways that plants get their seeds pollinated, from self-pollination (tomatoes) and insects (peppers), to air-borne pollination (corn).  Then there are the biennial plants, which do not produce seed stalks and seeds until a second growing season.  Onions are an example of a biennial plant.

The best bet for saving seeds are saving ones from plants that are self-pollinators.

My Pizza My Heart peppers are pollinated by insects, so for successful seed saving I needed to plant them 1/4 mile away from other peppers.  Needless to say, I didn't do that.

Air-borne pollinated corn, on the other hand, needs to be planted 1 mile away from other corn crops.

Even though I wasn't able to follow these pollination guidelines, I am still going to try and save the pepper seeds anyway.  Which means I might wind up with seeds crossed with the Baby Bell Mini Salad Peppers, regular green bell peppers or Tam mild jalapenos I also planted.

But at this point, if I want a chance at getting Pizza My Heart peppers in my garden next year, this is my only option.

There is more to seed saving that just these basics.  I got the information I shared with you today from the Colorado State University Extension website.  They have a complete list of all the garden vegetables that are self-pollinators, insect pollinated, air-borne pollinated and biennials.  Look at the top of their page for the handy Print This Fact Sheet link and you can save it to your computer as a paperless PDF file.

 

 

 

Related articles

• Harvest Spotlight: Pizza My Heart Peppers (theseatedgardener.com)

About Seasoning Mixes & Mac 'n' Cheese

Yesterday I spoke of my love for Pizza My Heart container peppers and how I used them to create a seasoning mix of onions, celery, parsley and peppers.

Seasoning mixes, like the one I created, have been staples in world cuisine for ages.  Some other variations include:

• Puerto Rico's sofrito containing onions, hot peppers, garlic, cilantro, culantro and plum tomatoes
• France's mirepoix containing celery or celeriac, onions, and carrots
• Italy's soffritto containing olive oil , water or wine, onion, garlic, carrot, celery, salt and pepper
•  Cajun cuisine's "holy trinity" containing onions, celery and bell peppers

In celebration of seasoning mixes, I want to share the recipe below that uses the seasoning mix I created.  Enjoy!

Turkey, Broccoli Mac and Cheese

serves 6

non-stick cooking spray
3 cups chicken broth
1 can (10 ounce) cream of broccoli soup
1 cup evaporated milk
1 packet (1.5 ounce) four cheese sauce mix
12 ounces dried elbow macaroni
2 cups shredded sharp cheddar cheese
1 1/4 pounds ground turkey
4 cups fresh broccoli florets
1 cup seasoning mix
1 tablespoon chopped garlic

1. Coat a 5 quart slow cooker liner with non-stick cooking spray.

2. Pour the chicken broth, cream of broccoli soup, evaporated milk and four cheese sauce mix into the slow cooker liner and whisk together until smooth. Add the elbow macaroni and shredded cheese and stir until combined.

3. In a microwave-safe 2 quart casserole dish place the ground turkey. Cover with a lid and microwave on HIGH for 5 to 6 minutes until the meat is cooked and the juices run clear. Drain off excess fat and break meat into clumps. Pour the cooked ground turkey into the crockpot liner.

4.  Add the broccoli, seasoning mix and garlic into casserole dish and stir until combined.   Microwave covered for 2 to 3 minutes until the broccoli is tender crisp.  Pour vegetables into the crockpot liner.  Stir to combine with the other ingredients.

5. Place the liner into the slow cooker and cook on LOW for 3 1/2 to 4 1/2 hours, until macaroni is tender.

VARIATIONS: Try using cheddar cheese soup in place of the cream of broccoli for a stronger cheese flavor. Replace the ground turkey, with ground chicken, ground beef or vegetarian meat crumbles. No broccoli? Add some of your other favorite veggies, like carrot and/or zucchini circles, green beans, sugar snap peas, chopped greens, etc.

Harvest Spotlight: Pizza My Heart Peppers

Bell peppers are easy to grow in containers, especially when you buy a variety the flourishes in small spaces. That why I love Pizza My Heart container sweet peppers from Renee's Garden.

Now these aren't your typical bell pepper.  They look more like hot chili peppers!  But you'll be in for a surprise when you take a bite, because they are mild and sweet.  Every once in a while you get one that is a bit more spicy, but never to the level of a chili pepper.

As the name implies, they are great cut into circles and placed on a pizza. They are also good in salads or eaten whole, as is, as a snack. I use them in recipes as well, like ratatouille, but you'll need to use 3 to 5 of them to equal the amount you'd get from a standard bell pepper.

As with many other veggies that I grow in my garden, bumper crops can be frozen for later use.  Just wash the peppers and dry thoroughly, then slice or dice and place in freezer bags for later use.

I made a batch of seasoning mix using these peppers, which also includes sweet onions, parsley and celery as well.

PLEASE NOTE:  While I was writing this story I have learned some bad news!  My dearly loved Pizza My Heart container sweet peppers from Renee's Garden are currently not available!  According to the staff at Renee's Garden, pepper crop failures over the past several seasons are the reason for this problem.  I truly hope that this is a temporary situation and they return to the Renee's Garden catalog.

In the meantime, I need to save the seeds from these pepper (in the picture above) so I can continue to grow them in my garden.   Maybe I can even start a seed exchange for them too.

Here is the link for these seeds which is current not working: http://www.reneesgarden.com/seeds/packpg/veg/pepper-pizza.htm

My Grilled Tuscan Tomato Eggplant Medley

 It's hard to believe that I am still getting some harvests of summer vegetables from my garden...at the beginning of November!  Yet I go out there and continue to find eggplants and bell peppers ready for eating.

Since the weather is still nice here, we also continue to barbecue outside every once in a while.  So I decided to grill these vegetables along with a couple of steaks the other night.

Here is how I prepared them:

 I sliced 3 to 4 Japanese eggplants into coins about 1/2 inch in thickness.  I left the skin on the eggplant since these eggplants don't taste bitter, but if you are using another variety of eggplant you can peel the eggplant before cutting it.  Then I diced one medium bell pepper finely.  I also diced a quarter of a white onion.

I placed the prepared vegetables onto a sheet of heavy duty aluminum foil. The I drizzled Lawry's Tuscan Sun-Dried Tomato Marinade with Minced Garlic and Olive Oil all over the vegetables.  Then I folded the aluminum foil up, making a foil packet*. I placed the packet on the my gas grill and cooked the eggplant mixture over high heat for 15 to 18 minutes.  You could also bake this packet in the oven at 400 degrees for the same amount of time.

It made a tangy and savory side dish for the steaks.

* Be sure to visit the link on how to make a foil packet above for more quick and easy foil packet cooking recipes. 

Tomato Week: Yellow Salsa

Mixing the ingredients for my yellow salsa in the crock pot

You can't think of tomatoes without thinking about salsa, at least here in Los Angeles.  

I can find a plethora of salsa recipes just by doing a quick search on the Internet, but with an overabundance of tomatoes, I wanted a recipe that allowed me to freeze the end result so I could enjoy it later. 


Most of the recipes I found involved canning, which I have never done and which I just don't have the energy to do.  That's because the hardest part of attempting any kind of cooking that involves the stove top is standing, which for this sick chick is hard to do.


So on a whim, I searched for salsa that I could make in my favorite cooking appliance: the slow cooker.  I struck gold.  This recipe yields a lively and tasty condiment that tastes good fresh and after being frozen.  I decided to add a twist by using yellow tomatoes for a sunny change of pace.

Easy Crock Pot Salsa

8 cups cherry tomatoes, cut in half 
( I used my yellow pear cherry tomatoes)
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 large onion, chopped
4 jalapeno peppers, stems removed and chopped (remove seeds for a milder salsa)
1 bunch cilantro leaves, finely chopped
1 tsp. sea salt


Place tomatoes, garlic, onions, jalapenos and cilantro into the crock pot.  

Stir to mix the ingredients.

Cover and cook on high for approximately 2 1/2 to 3 hours or until the vegetables are soft.
 
When cool, combine the tomato mixture and salt in a blender or food processor and process until smooth.

Refrigerate or freeze to enjoy later.