I know this is kind of late, but happy father’s day! My dad is the best dad in the world. There is no if and or but about it:-) For him I made dinner, because he makes dinner for us every night and i thought it would be a nice break for him to relax. The menu consisted of Salmon patties, macaroni bake and his favorite strawberry milk shakes. I didn’t do a picture of the ingredients because of how much time I had. It ended up being very delicious.
Macaroni Bake
Ingredients
1/2 pound elbow macaroni
3 tablespoons butter
3 tablespoons flour
1 tablespoon powdered mustard
3 cups milk
1/2 cup yellow onion, finely diced
1 bay leaf
1/2 teaspoon paprika
1 large egg
12 ounces sharp cheddar, shredded
1 teaspoon kosher salt
Fresh black pepper
Topping:
3 tablespoons butter
1 cup panko bread crumbs
Directions
In a large pot of boiling, salted water cook the pasta to al dente.
While the pasta is cooking, in a separate pot, melt the butter.
Whisk in the flour and mustard and keep it moving for about five minutes. Make sure it's free of lumps.
Stir in the milk, onion, bay leaf, and paprika. Simmer for ten minutes and remove the bay leaf.
Temper in the egg. Which means to add a little of the mixture to the egg. This will keep the egg from cooking.
Stir in 3/4 of the cheese.
Season with salt and pepper. Fold the macaroni into the mix and pour into a 2-quart casserole dish.
Top with remaining cheese.
Melt the butter in a saute pan and toss the bread
crumbs to coat. Top the macaroni with the bread crumbs. Bake for 30 minutes. Remove from oven and rest for five minutes before serving.
Preheat oven to 450°F. Coat a baking sheet with cooking spray.
Heat 1 1/2 teaspoons oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add onion and celery; cook, stirring, until softened, about 3 minutes. Stir in parsley; remove from the heat.
Place salmon in a medium bowl.
Flake apart with a fork.
Remove any bones and skin. (I found
Add egg and mustard; mix well.
Add the onion mixture, breadcrumbs and pepper; mix well. Shape the mixture into 8 patties, about 2 1/2 inches wide. Heat remaining 1 1/2 teaspoons oil in the pan over medium heat. Add 4 patties and cook until the undersides are golden, 2 to 3 minutes.
Using a wide spatula, turn them over onto the prepared baking sheet. Repeat with the remaining patties. Bake the salmon cakes until golden on top and heated through, 15 to 20 minutes.
Strawberry Shakes
Ingredients
½ cup boiling water
1 package of strawberry jell-o
2 cups vanilla ice cream
1 cup milk
½ crushed ice cubes
Directions
Pour boiling water into blender. Add Gelatin powder and blend for 1 minute. Keep the blender running and add ice cream by large spoonfuls through hole in lid.
Turn of the blender; add milk and ice. Blend for another 30 seconds, or until smooth and thick. Serve immediately.
Menu Overview
The salmon patties were amazing, so were the strawberry milkshakes. I personally didn’t care for the Macaroni Bake. However, my parents liked it. Cooking went without a hitch and it was a lot of fun, but next time I think I will recruit my little brother for some help:-)
For my brother’s birthday party with my mom’s side of the family I made rhubarb bars. In the back far corner of our yard we have a rhubarb plant. And for the first time we decided to use it. I was surprised by how much I liked it. Just remember the flavor is very strong and is best served with vanilla ice cream:-)
The history of an estrange plant
First thing first rhubarb is a vegetable, even though it tastes like a fruit. However even though it is a food, throughout history rhubarb has been used for medical proposes for 5000 years. The food has only existed in culinary for 2 centuries. Ancient China used dried roots as laxatives, and they are still used today for the same reason. Rhubarb was also an ingredient in many ancient Greek and Roman medicines. The 1800s are the first time the tart treat was mentioned in recipes. The shoots were than used for wine and desserts. So far we have learned that the roots are laxatives and the shoots are yummy, but what about the leaves? Rhubarb leaves are toxic and have no safe culinary use for humanity. This is due to high concentrations of oxalic acid, an organic poison and corrosive found in many plants but present in relatively large amounts in rhubarb leaves. Other toxins may also exist. However, based on oxalic acid alone 5 kilograms of the leaves provide a lethal dose to a human. (Although this varies by variety and the phase of growth.) Still, all are well advised not to consume the leaves in any quantity whatsoever, on the contrary the eatable parts a full of nutrition.
Ingredients
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 cup butter
2 eggs
2 tablespoons milk
5 cups sliced fresh or frozen rhubarb
1 (3 ounce) package strawberry flavored gelatin
2 cups white sugar
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup butter
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Grease a 10x15 inch jellyroll pan.
In a large bowl, stir together 2 cups of flour and baking powder.
Cut in 1/2 cup of butter by pinching between your fingers or using a fork or pastry cutter until the mixture is crumbly.
Stir in the egg and milk just until the mixture is moistened.
Pat into the bottom of the prepared pan.
Spread rhubarb over the crust in an even layer,
then sprinkle the dry gelatin powder over the rhubarb.
Prepare the topping by stirring together 2 cups white sugar and 1 cup flour. Cut in 1/2 cup of butter as you did for the crust. Sprinkle the topping evenly over the rhubarb.
Bake in the preheated oven until the topping is golden brown and the rhubarb is tender enough to easily pierce with a fork, about 45 minutes. Cool and then cut into bars to serve.
êêCritics Reviewêê
Me êêêê Mom êêê Dad êêêêê Paulêêêêê
Would I make them again…
Maybe, I will for sure make something with rhubarb again. I think I want to try a crisp instead of bars because it was Paul’s birthday I let him choose which he wanted, and obviously he selected bars.
What would I change…
I would add about a ¼ cup of sugar on top along with the jell-o to cut down on the tartness a bit.
North Dakota. To many it is a state of nothing, but corn fields and on long straight road. To me it is a feeling of family. Every year my family, along with my aunt and her family, and two of my dad’s cousins (brother and sister) and their families, get together for an extended weekend. With a total of 17 people it can be crazy. The good kind of crazy, the crazy that tells you, that you are exactly where you are meant to be. (Does that make any sense?) Each family takes a turns hosting it. This year my dad’s cousin, Paula hosted it. This means that we drove 7 hours to Beulah, ND. My dad was born there, same with my grandpa and my grandma was born in the next town over.
The population of Beulah is 3,121.It is the 14th largest town in North Dakota. Beulah was founded in 1913. It was named after Beulah Stinchcombe, the niece of a local land developer. When my grandfather grew up it was a German town, and still many people there are still from German descent.
Enough about the town, lets talk about one of my personal favorites about family reunions, the food.Below are my 5 favorite foods. You are going to have to wait two more years until you get a whole menu because that is when our turn is to host.
1st fleischkuekle
It is a German food, but most commonly found in the homes of North Dakota. It was carried over by German/ Russian /Polish immigrants. Flieschkuekle is my all time favorite food and I have made it 3 times before. However, we buy them frozen and then deep fry them at the Get Together because making them is a day’s event. This is one of the only foods we make every year. Also, in case if you were curious as to how many Calories fleisch has. It has 1200, but that doesn’t stop us from eating for supper, breakfast the next morning and for some carrying it in to lunch.
2nd Buster bar dessert
Paula is a marvelous cook. One of the desserts she made was a buster bar dessert. Don’t know much about it, other than it was AMAZING!
3rd Slush the kiddy version a.k.a nonalcoholic
Slush is a frozen drink that includes orange juice, ginger ale and other juices(?) it is frozen and when you want it you scrap away at it with a spoon put it in your cup and pour in lemon lime pop. Paula also makes an adult slush and so far no kids have gotten confused as to what was what.
4th Veggie pizza
This was another fabulous food. It uses a crescent roll crust with a cream cheese sauce and topped with vegetables. It is a nice health option to down all the calories, and junk floating in our systems.
5th blueberry and peach kuechen
Kuechen is another traditional food for us. However this is the first year that I have liked it. It means cake in German. Even though it means cake, we eat it for breakfast.
These are Paula’s hot pads. I really like them and will probably be making some in the near future.
Now on to the actual trip. Something many people don’t know about me is that I LOVE to pack. Kind of strange, nevertheless it is how it has always been. And I have gotten quite good at it over the years. The picture below is everything I brought. I do this for every trip I take so I know what I brought in case if something goes missing. The duffle bag I made a few weeks back because I didn’t like any that I have seen, so I made up my own pattern and made my dad and brother take me to Joanne Fabrics on the first day of summer break.
The drive is over 7 hours and not much happened. Paul slept, the road was partially flooded and I watched the series premier of Smallville on my iPod.
James town giant bison.
When we got there everything fell into place as if we never had a day without each other. Minus the fact my foster cousin S.T. grew about a foot and my 2nd cousin Sophie has turned in to a beautiful young lady. As for the rest of us kids: Paul, Sarah, Alec, Amy and I(in order by grade starting at 6th ending with 10th) were back to laughing, playing kickball and night games, staying up way to late, and planning pranks on the adults. Summer was in full swing.
Sophie and ST
Nothing really happened on Friday. Just hanging out, this is my favorite part about the Get Together:) we did how ever have fleischkuekle that night, and the men went golfing at the Beulah Black Sands golf course. It gets the name Black Sands from… well… you probably guessed it, the sand traps are black. Instead of using sand they use ground up coal.
Saturday we went to the Garrison Dam. My dad’s cousin Brian volunteered to drive the kid car. I don’t know what possessed him to do it, considering he was the only adult in a car of six kids. Who were singing “99 bottles of Beer on the Wall” doing a Kentucky Fried Chicken remix form last year (see above) and making dam jokes. Then again now I understand why, because what did the adults do discus, stocks? The Garrison Dam is the longest land dam in the world, and is at a record high water level. They had to start releasing water on spill way so the dam won’t over flow. This has only happened one other time.
What it usually looks like….
An empty piece of cement
What it looked like when I was their…
150 gallons of water rushing out of each gate every second.
May not be exciting to you, but I thought it was neat.
Then we stopped at this small (about the size of my living room) BBQ restaurant/ dinner and we got ice cream. I didn’t get a picture of it, but they had 24 different flavors of soft served ice cream. Personally I have only had chocolate and vanilla soft served. It was really yummy and refreshing. We then went to the Beulah pool. It has a tube slide and I was honored that Sophie wanted to go on her first tube slide with me on it. That night my 2nd cousin Jessie brought out a CD of the 100 most popular television theme songs. We had to guess trying to beat the other team, or in our case the boys. It was a lot of fun even though I did not know no many of the songs, however I got Full House, Scooby doo and Happy Days. I only got Happy Days because it is on every day after Bonanza on TV land. (Yes that’s right I watch bonanza, I blame it on my dad’s family for taking me to the ponderosa ranch when I was three. Now I am a diehard fan, don’t judge) Also I was very disappointed that Bonanza was not one of the songs, I mean everyone knows it that is over the age of 30! And most others have heard it before.
The next day was time to leave feeling like the shortest of all 10 get together. As tears welled up in every one’s eyes, we made a slow descent down the Battest’s front porch steps and to our car. Knowing all too well we most likely won’t see each other for another year. By that time I will have my license with only 2 years of school left. Amy will have completed a year in high school and be a fully fledged teenager. Alec will be entering high school and his voice will have finally cracked for the last time. Sarah will be an amazing magician and getting wittier every day. Paul will have reached puberty and grow like a weed. And Sophie will have be late elementary, no longer the baby I use to hold and pretend I was her mom. Megan will be in collage and Jessie will be closer to finishing it. The adults …well … I don’t know…I guess they will be just that much older (no offence to any of you reading this) all I am saying is instead of going around telling people you are 25 you might need to change it to 29:-)
As we drove up the drive way and down the road, they gave us my great grandma Rose’s wave. Waving until we were out of sight. Reminding us that family isn't about the blood that we share, but the moments that we share♥
