Mushroom Scallop with Roasted Buttercup Squash

Day 175

I've already posted this meal once before, back in January, so this one will be more brief.

Mushroom Scallop with Roasted Buttercup Squash

Mushroom Scallop

I used our homemade cream of mushroom soup for this recipe. I also used a mandolin to slice the potatoes, which makes this a pretty quick meal to make. You wouldn't believe the amount of time that thing saves.

Mandolin

Ingredients
6 potatoes, peeled and sliced
3 or 4 slices raw onion, separated into rings
8 oz sautéed mushrooms (I reserved extra when making the soup)
2 cups cream of mushroom soup
Salt & pepper

Directions
This is made by layering: potatoes, onions, mushrooms, cream of mushroom soup, salt & pepper. I make 2 or 3 layers until the dish is full, with the last layer just potatoes and soup.

Mushroom potato scallop layering process

Baked mushroom potato scallop

Roasted Buttercup Squash

Buttercup squash

Cut squash in half, deseed and depulp and place the halves with the inside down in a roast pan. Add 2 or 3 cups of water and roast for 45 minutes at 350 degrees F.

Halved buttercup squash

Remove the rind from the cooked squash.

Roasted butternut squash

Whip the squash with a tablespoon or two of butter. You can add a tablespoon of brown sugar if your squash isn't a real sweet one. I hardly ever do, but today I did.

Whipped butternut squash

Mushroom potato scallop with buttercup squash

Reviews/Comments

I rate this meal an 8 or 9. It was not quite as good as it was last time. I think I used too many onions in it or something. It was still good though, and I'm looking forward to having leftovers for lunch tomorrow.

Laura: Squash was cold but still delicious. Would have been better hot and with more butter added. The casserole was perfect 10.

Cream of Mushroom Soup

Day 174

Cream of mushroom has been a favorite of mine all my life. Plus, it's one of those foods that serves as an ingredient in so many other dishes. Some of the things we like to use cream of mushroom soup in are pasta and rice casseroles, potato scallop and green bean casserole.

Cream of Mushroom Soup

Cream of Mushroom Soup

I made a double batch of this soup today. I make it a lot, but I don't think I posted the directions for it yet.

Ingredients
28 oz organic white mushrooms
8 oz shitake mushrooms
4 oz portobello mushrooms
2 yellow onions
1 shallot
2 tbsp butter
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp black pepper
1/2 tsp salt
2 boxes vegetable broth
2 cups coffee cream

Directions
You can make this with any kind of mushrooms. I got a bunch of different kinds each of which contribute in their own way: Shitake for health. White mushrooms for bulk. Portobello for flavor.

Packaged mushrooms

Portobello mushrooms

Shitake mushrooms

Organic white mushrooms

Minced shallot

Wash and chop the mushrooms and onions and sauté them in the butter and seasonings in a large pot until most of the liquid is cooked out. Tip: Salting them will quicken this process.

Mushrooms & onions sautéing

Set aside about 1 1/2 cup of the mushroom/onion mixture.

Add the remaining mushroom/onion mixture to the blender in batches, adding a cup or two of the veggie broth with each batch. Return the pureed mushrooms to the soup pot, and add the reserved mushrooms and the rest of the vegetable broth.

Mushroom soup (before adding cream)

Heat until it comes to a boil, then turn heat to low and add the coffee cream.

Cream of mushroom soup

If you like canned cream of mushroom soup, you'll love this stuff.

We served some of this soup with wheat rolls. The rest will be used for the above-mentioned casseroles, etc later this week.

Cream of mushroom soup with roll

Reviews/Comments

I give this a 10. Laura gives it a 9. She thought the shitakes should all have been pureed (none reserved) because they're a bit tougher than the other kinds.

Sausage Gravy & Biscuits

Day 173

Laura's idea. Sounded good and we already had everything to make the gravy and the biscuits. We did need to go out for potatoes and a side veggie though.

Sausage Gravy & Biscuits with Potatoes & Beans

Sausage Gravy

4 Yves breakfast "sausage" patties
2 tbsp EVOO
4 oz mushrooms, chopped fine
1 small shallot, chopped fine
2 tbsp butter
3 tbsp flour
2 cups vegetable broth
Pinch of crushed chilies
Sea salt & fresh ground pepper to taste

I heated the EVOO and crumbled the sausage patties in with it. As they started to brown, I added the shallots then the mushrooms and let them all cook about 10 minutes on low.

Fried "sausage"

Frying "sausage", shallot & mushrooms

Laura removed them from the pan and set aside in a bowl while she made the roux with the butter and flour.

Roux

Sausage/mushroom/shallot mixture

Then she added the vegetable broth and sausage/mushroom/shallot mixture and cooked a couple minutes until it was thick and bubbling.

Sausage gravy

We served it over the potatoes and biscuits.

Laura's Fluffy Biscuits

Original recipe here
3 cups flour
1 tbsp and 1-1/2 tsp baking powder
1-1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp and 1-1/2 tsp white sugar
1/2 cup shortening
1-1/2 cups almond milk

The usual directions. Mix the dry ingredients together and cut the shortening in. Laura uses her hands for this. Once you have a crumbly mixture, add milk until it's the perfect dough.

Laura divided the dough made four plain biscuits and kneaded the following into the rest:

• Fresh marjoram
• Fresh chives
• Fresh garlic chives
• Fresh oregano
• Fresh sage
• Fresh green onion

Select herbs

Laura's herbs were all grown indoors over the winter. They took awhile to establish, but they're well on their way now. I love having these on hand!

Fresh herbs

After rolling the dough out, she used a fancy biscuit cutter (drinking glass) to cut the biscuits out, and then brushed them with butter before baking. She baked for about 15 minutes in 425 degrees F oven.

Mashed Potatoes

As usual, we used our favorite Eco-Spuds. I peeled 5-ish potatoes, boiled them in salted water, drained and mashed with some butter and almond milk. Seasoned with sea salt and pepper. So good! My Irish blood constantly craves them.

Mashed potatoes

Green Beans

These were a package of microwavable green beans with the option to boil instead. Which is good, since we don't have a microwave. Made for a nice lazy way to have beans, since they were already washed...thrice.

Compliments green beans

Sausage gravy & biscuits with mashed potatoes & green beans

Strawberry Shortcake

The other half of the biscuit dough was used to make plain biscuits for the strawberry shortcake. The berries are just washed then sliced with about a tablespoon of sugar added. Dessert was topped with coconut whipped cream, which is like whipped dairy cream only more delicious.

Stemmed strawberries

Coconut whipped cream

Strawberry Shortcake

Reviews/Comments

Yummm. Gets a 10 from me. Laura's biscuits are amazing!

Laura: I'm so full I could die- but at least will die happy. OMG that was so good. 10. Only thing I would do differently is use a bit more crushed chilies or spicier sausage.

Open-Faced Cheese & Tomato with Greek Salad

Day 172

We ate dinner out at Mike's Bar last night and it didn't once occur to me to take a pic. Derrrrr

Greek Salad

I ordered a big pile of fried stuff and Laura had a Greek salad. She is so much wiser than I. I actually felt really ill later on - way too much fat.

We had them bag up our leftovers and had the rest of her Greek salad with the leftover Boston Bib lettuce from Tuesday.

Open-Faced Cheese & Tomato with Greek Salad

Open-Faced Cheese & Tomato

For good measure, I made us each a couple of open-faced cheese and tomato sandwiches to have with the salad.

Reviews/Comments

All in all, not bad. I give it a 7.

Me: How was supper?
She: Good.
Me: Rating?
She: Hmmm...8

Vegetarian Tacos

Day 170

Taco Tuesday!

This meal comes together quickly, which, for me, was the main temptation. It's also pretty tasty.

Vegetarian Tacos

Taco Kit

I grabbed an El Paso taco kit because it was on sale. Is there one brand better than another? I also didn't spend an extra $0.70 for the flat bottomed ones.

El Paso taco kit

The veggie ground really doesn't need to cook, only heat up, so I added the water and taco seasoning to it right from the start, then heated it all up for a few minutes.

Yves Veggie Ground

Taco filling

Toppings

Boston Bib lettuce
Assorted cherry & grape tomatoes
Grated old cheddar
Sour cream
Sliced avocado

Wash the lettuce and tomatoes and cut or slice into bite-sized pieces. Grate the cheese. Slice the avocado. 

Washing the lettuce

Taco toppings

Heat the shells. 350 degrees  for 5 minutes.

Taco shells

Assemble the tacos in the usual way. :)

Vegetarian tacos

Reviews/Comments

I thought they were good, as tacos go. I give the meal a 7. Not my favorite, but it was tasty and I'm full and satisfied.

Laura: Was delicious...a 9! Wish I hadn't used sour cream - would have been a 10.

Szechuan Vegetable Noodles

Day 164

This meal was created based on a recipe Laura found last night but couldn't find again. So, based on what we remembered of it, I just winged it. Wung it?

Szechuan Vegetable Noodles

Ingredients

1 lb broccoli
1 lb mushrooms
2 good-sized onions
1/4 cup almonds
4 tbsp olive oil

Stir-fry veggies

Chop the veggies into coarse pieces. Stir-fry on medium-high heat in the olive oil.

Sauce

I'm sorry, but these amounts are only estimates. I failed to measure so if you try making this, just make it to taste.

Garlic & ginger

1/3 cup rice vinegar
1/3 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/8 cup Hoisin sauce
Pinch of crushed red chilies
3 cloves garlic, minced
Piece of ginger, twice the size of a big, fat thumb, grated
(ugh! Made me visualize grating my thumb)
2 tbsp corn starch
1/4 cup cold water

Mix all ingredients into a bowl except the starch and water. Mix those into a separate bowl until smooth, then add the mixture to the rest of the sauce.

Szechuan sauce

Pour the sauce over the stir-fried vegetables and cook another 5 or 20 minutes until thickened.

Szechuan vegetables

Serve over fettuccine noodles. You won't regret it.

Noodles

4 liters water
1 package fettuccine
1 tsp salt
2 tbsp olive oil

Fettuccine

Bring water and salt to a boil. Add the oil, then the noodles. Cook about 10 minutes. Finito.

Garnish

Toasted sesame seeds
Chopped scallions

Szechuan Vegetable Noodles

Reviews/Comments

Laura: This gets a 10.
Missy: I'll give it a 9.
Me: I'll take a 9. I give it a 10.