Easy Mini Quiches

I love Quiche and I love to cook Quiche except the fact that when I cook them I cook a lot of them. It is like Pot Pie from scratch. If you are going to put that much effort into cooking something then you might as well make it worth it. The last time I cooked Quiche I made about a dozen. Okay so I have some OCD issues and that is why it has been 6 years since I have cooked Quiche. I got the idea somewhere that there had to be a recipe for mini quiches and I searched and found a bunch. This one works real well.

 

Origin: http://www.allrecipes.com/

Ingredients

• 6 slices of bacon, chopped
• 1 onion, chopped
• 3 eggs
• 3/4 cup buttermilk baking mix (Bisquick)
• 1 1/2 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley
• 2 cups shredded American Cheese

1. Preheat oven to 350F.  Grease muffin pans with spray oil or whatever you have.  In a large skillet over medium heat, fry the bacon and onion together for about 5 minutes or until bacon is crisp.  Drain and Set aside.
2. In a medium bowl, beat eggs.  Stir in baking mix, parsley, shredded cheese, bacon and onion.  Spoon into greased muffin cups. 
3. Bake of 10 to 15 minutes in a preheate oven, or until tops are lightly browned.

So a few notes.  I don't eat pork so turkey bacon it is.  Turkey bacon does not really get crisp so play it by ear.  If you ever make the mistake of buying generic Bisquick this is a great place for it.

This good stuff.  Not the real thing but nice and quick and full of quichey goodness.  Rae loves it and has asked for it to be added to the weekly menu.  This makes it worthy of the Recipe Book.

Mexican Stir Fry

One day I had nothing planned and was kind of missing any inpiration on what to make.  So I hit the freezer and kind of stared for a while till something hit me in the toe.  This is what came out.
Origin: Duff's head

Ingredients:

1. 1 cup frozen corn
2. 1/2 bag of frozen tater tots or hash browns
3. 1 can of refried beans
4. 1/4-1/2 cup milk
5. 1 can cooked chicken
6. shredded cheese
7. sour cream

In a frying pan cook tater tots and corn with your oil of choice.  A little taco seasoning or chili powder can't hurt.  Once cooked where the tater tots are soft add the refried beans and milk and cook till thoroughly mixed.  Add chicken (undrained) to mixture and cook for several more minutes. 
Serve in a bowl or torilla with cheese and/or sour cream.

This was a mind bender at the time but is is amazingly simple and really quick.  It is full of nutritional goodness with a good balance of carbs and protein.  It is missing the greens but you can put it on top of a salad and make it a Mexican Stir Fry Tostada.  Eitherway, Rae did not aske for seconds she told me she was getting seconds shortly after her first bite.  What a complement.

Duff's Recipe Book

Well, I was thinking a while ago... "Duff you do a lot of cooking and though some of it is old standbys alot of it is new stuff or modified stuff. It would be nice to actually put some of those recipes into a book." At this point I started looking into a recipe book to put this stuff into and came up mostly disappointed. There did not seem to be much. I saw recipe card holders and spiral bound notebooks that may work but were not really the thing I was looking for. I could have gone for a 3-ring binder and a set of Avery sleeves but there had to be something more suited to what I was looking for.

First off I needed something to collect the recipes that I print out but have not been made because I run across tons of stuff as I am looking for something else. Allrecipes.com and Kraft.com are great sites for ideas. Honestly, not everything made was going into the book. It was just the stuff that was worthy of being made again. Well, new print outs need a pocket and after they were made and found delicious then they were to be added in some orderly fashion. So that meant some dividers for entrees, soups, appetizers, etc. Let be honest though I am a one dish meal kind of guy so most of it was going to be entree. On top of it I was looking for some recipe cards. Something that has a place for: ingredients, instructions, modifications, etc.

Well this seemed like a tall order for one device and at one point I was hitting a wall. I searched the book stores and stayed away from the cooking stores. I googled stuff like "diy cookbook" and still nothing.

Then it hit me "Recipe Organizer" I googled and Jackpot. There it was, like third on the list but it was there. It was three ringed. It had pockets for the recipes that had not been made yet. It had cards/pages designed for recipes and it had conversions on the inside. What a marvel and here it is.

So when Rae asked me what I wanted for Christmas I told her. She is such a sweet girl and she asked Santa for me. Like I said it is awesome. Look inside the "Cath Kidston Recipe Organizer."

Well, I got it and have already started with putting some recipes into the book as you can see. Along with this new book of mine I hope to present some of my recipes and creations here. I plan to include even the formulas that may not make the book. It will be an interesting ride.

Of course if you try any of this stuff please let me know your thoughts and if you have any recipes that you think I should try pass them along. (Simple recipes are best since I have to cook around Rae's swim team practice, girl scouts, and my running) Nutrition is a good thing to consider as well.

On a side note: I know the flowers are a little girly but I do not believe the publishers of the recipe organizer had guys in mind. If I find a camouflage pocket I will get it in there. Till then some of my guitar hero stickers may have to be applied.