Mennonite Monday - Ham and Noodle Casserole

Mennonite Monday started because I wanted to make recipes from the Bethesda Mennonite Church Cookbooks (both the yellow and the white cookbook for those of you who own them). I also wanted to take pictures of each recipe that I made, so I would know for future reference what the recipe should look like. I am by no means a great cook, but I think it will be fun to try new and different recipes each week. Not all of these recipes are for ethnic Mennonite food, but the women from Henderson know how to cook, so I can safely say that these recipes will be good. Check back each Monday for a new recipe and feel free to leave a comment if you have a favorite recipe from these cookbooks, or if you have some tips on what I should make and how I should make it.

~

Today you get a good Mennonite recipe, which is a honorable substitute for Verenika and much easier to make. Okay, I have never actually made Verenika before (it will happen before December 1), so I don't know from experience that it is easier to make ham and noodle casserole, but I will assume it is a pretty safe guest. This recipe comes from the white church cookbook on page 158. I have been using it for two years without even knowing it came from the church cookbook. I received the recipe in a cookbook from my mother-in-law and I was very pleased to find that it was actually in the church cookbook, so I would share it with you.

Ham and Noodle Casserole
3 cups noodles
3/4 tsp salt
1 cup sour cream
Cubed fried ham
1 tbl flour
1/4 tsp pepper
1 cup creamed cottage cheese

Homemade noodles make for the best casserole in my opinion.

Cook noodles in boiling water till tender. Drain and rinse well.

Fry your ham cubs in the skillet if they haven't been fried already. I have been buying processed pre-diced ham to make it easier because I'm not very good at cooking pork. So I have been putting this ham in my casserole for two years and for the first time last week Mike told me the casserole was good, but it would be better with real ham. All this time I thought he couldn't tell the difference. I guess I know what I will be changing next time.

Mix flour and seasonings. Add sour cream and stir till smooth. Fold in cottage cheese. This time I forgot to fold in the cottage cheese. I just added it right away and it turned out fine.

Add to fried ham and ham drippings. Add noodles and mix well. Since I used processed ham, I didn't have drippings so I mixed in some ham base to add a little flavor. My ham base comes is in a 16oz. container, which my mother-in-law gave to me. I have been told that if you are going to make a lot of Mennonite food, you will need ham base. I have no idea if you can get it at most grocery store because I have never looked. If you know where you can buy ham base leave a comment, so we can all learn.

Put into a casserole, I used a 9 x 13 glass dish, and bake for 20 minutes at 350 degrees. I did not bake the casserole right away. I covered it and put it in the refrigerator, to be cooked at a later time. When you do this, you need to allow a little more baking time because the casserole is starting out colder than it would have otherwise.

A few days later I baked the casserole until it was bubbling. I also left the tinfoil over the casserole while it was baking so it would not get dried out. (This is something I have learned over time, plus my mom has told me to do this with lasagna, so i figured it would work with this too.)

Buy a Big Bright Purse - Check

I had been looking at big bright purses all summer, but couldn't find the one I wanted. Finally I found a purse I liked that was big and bright at the Nebraska State Fair. Every time I tell someone I found it at the State Fair they say, "The state fair? Really?" Yes it is true, I found this purse at the state fair of all places. I had a hard time choosing between the same purse in pink, green, yellow or blue, but eventually blue was my choice because I don't own a blue purse, and it will go with most outfits.

With this purchase, I am happy to mark another item of my list.

Since I have owned this purse for over a month, I have learned one thing about big purses. The bigger your purse the more stuff you carry around. To illustrate, I thought I would show everything that is in my purse. I didn't edit the content of my purse before taking this picture, this is exactly what I carry around on a day-to-day basis.


Make sure you click on this picture to enlarge it and see all of the items. I would say the weirdest item in my purse is the Cheesecake Factory Menu. The nearest Cheesecake Factory is almost 2 hours away, but the next time we eat there I can study the menu on the way.

What is the weirdest thing you carry in your purse. Sorry, no prizes for comments, but you should let us know what crazy item is in your purse anyway.

Sew Something - Check

Ever since we got our new couch, I have been wanting to add a little more color into our living room because there is too much brown.

I decided that blue would be a good accent color since red and green are already being used in our house.
When I saw this pillow from Pottery Barn I knew I wanted it for the living room. However, I wasn't too excited about paying $25 for the cover and $12 for the pillow insert.

This made me decide to complete another item on my list by sewing something.

While I am not a seamstress by any means, I did learn to sew from my mom when I was younger and did pretty well in 4-H. For this pillow I didn't use a pattern, I just made it up as I went and I'm very impressed with the result. As an added bonus, I saved some money by making this pillow. If I would have purchased two pillow covers and inserts, it would have cost me $78.81. With my Hobby Lobby fabric for 17.49 and two brown buttons for $2.50 each, I made two pillows, using pillow inserts I already had at home, for $22.49. I saved $56.32.

26

Today Mike turns 26. It is hard to believe that I have been dating Mike since he was 19. The first year we dated, I had the hardest time remembering his birthday. For some reason I always thought it was November 21, not October 21. Seven years later, his birthday is committed to memory.


I know Mike wishes he could be in the field harvesting on his birthday, instead of waiting for the ground to dry. Hopefully, he will be able to find time to relax and do something you enjoy on this special day.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Mennonite Monday - Oven Baked Potatoes

Mennonite Monday started because I wanted to make recipes from the Bethesda Mennonite Church Cookbooks (both the yellow and the white cookbook for those of you who own them). I also wanted to take pictures of each recipe that I made, so I would know for future reference what the recipe should look like. I am by no means a great cook, but I think it will be fun to try new and different recipes each week. Not all of these recipes are for ethnic Mennonite food, but the women from Henderson know how to cook, so I can safely say that these recipes will be good. Check back each Monday for a new recipe and feel free to leave a comment if you have a favorite recipe from these cookbooks, or if you have some tips on what I should make and how I should make it.

~

With harvest almost in full swing, I have been making more for supper since I am feeding three, sometimes four, hungry men. One week I wanted to make a potato recipe that I remember my mother making when I was growing up, so I asked her for the recipe and she was glad to inform me that it was from the white church cookbook on page 223.

Oven Baked Potatoes
6 medium potatoes
1/4 cup flour
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1/8 tsp pepper
3/4 tsp salt
2/3 cup butter, melted

Mix flour, Parmesan, pepper and salt and place in a bag. Since I don't have much time to make a whole meal after work, I put the ingredients in the bag ahead of time, so they were ready.

The recipe says to peel the potatoes and cut them in half, but my mom always did it a different way, so I left the peel on and cut them in slices. I also did this ahead of time. In order of the potatoes to keep overnight, I put them in a bag with water and salt in the refrigerator.

Once you are ready to make your potatoes, heat the oven to 350. While the oven is warming and you are working on the potatoes, put the butter on a large flat pan in the oven, so it can melt.

Put potatoes in the bag with the other ingredients and shake

until your potatoes are covered.

By now your butter should be melted.

Place the potatoes on the pan and bake for 1 hour, flipping them over half way through. My potatoes could have used a little more than an hour to bake because they weren't as crispy as I like them, but wanting crispy potatoes kind of runs in my family.

I cannot say these potatoes are healthy, but they are crunchy on the outside and soft in the middle. What more could you want.

Invite someone over for supper, check

Since it has been raining and Mike hasn't been harvesting, he has had a little extra time on his hands. So, when he called me at work to see if we should have some company over for supper, I wasn't surprised. When he offered to clean the house and make the soup for supper, I agreed to make the dessert when I got home.

We invited our neighbors Ron and Joyce (left) and Ron and Cora (right) over for supper.

Mike made his own recipe of chili, which was a combination of all the chili recipes from our church cookbook.

He also made white chicken chili, which was a recipe we had received from Mike's sister.
For dessert we had Ditzy Blonde Cake, which was a new recipe and it was rich. I think everyone could agree that we ate too much, but it was all so good.

Now I can mark another item off my list 0f things to do before I turn 25. Next week I will have several posts about other items I have marked of my list.

School Kits

On Sunday evening our church had family night. Our project for this evening was to make 1,000 school kits, which will be distributed to children in different countries. We have done this for a few years now and it still amazes me how many people are willing to help and how fast we are able to put that many kits together.

Before the assembly lines started we made bundles of 4 pencils for each kit.

We also had a group of people putting draw strings into the bags for the kits.

Once the assembly process starts everyone works as hard and fast as they can putting 4 notebooks, 1 ruler, 4 pencils, colored pencils and an eraser in each bag.

There were over 150 people that helped with this project.

Unfortunately we ran out of erasers, so we only had around 600 completed school kits. The 400 kits that still need an eraser are assembled and waiting for an eraser, so technically we did make our goal.

Mennonite Monday - Fluffy Waffles & Waffle Sauce

Mennonite Monday started because I wanted to make recipes from the Bethesda Mennonite Church Cookbooks (both the yellow and the white cookbook for those of you who own them). I also wanted to take pictures of each recipe that I made, so I would know for future reference what the recipe should look like. I am by no means a great cook, but I think it will be fun to try new and different recipes each week. Not all of these recipes are for ethnic Mennonite food, but the women from Henderson know how to cook, so I can safely say that these recipes will be good. Check back each Monday for a new recipe and feel free to leave a comment if you have a favorite recipe from these cookbooks, or if you have some tips on what I should make and how I should make it.

~

This is a great recipe for breakfast when you have guests. I made it for Mike and Trevor when they got done hunting this fall. Since it is hard for me to eat waffles without white sauce, I decide to post two recipes from the white church cookbook on page 37. Fluffy Waffles and Waffle Sauce(white sauce). In my family we have waffles and white sauce every year on Christmas morning.


Fluffy Waffles
2 cups flour
3 Tbl sugar
3 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
2 eggs-beat yolks and whites separately
4 Tbl oil or melted butter
1 3/4 cups milk

Sift dry Ingredients into mixing bowl. Beat yolks and milk. Add about half to dry mixture, beat till smooth. Then add remaining milk and egg, beat till smooth. Add oil and then fold in stiffly beaten egg whites.

This is what the batter looks like when everything is mixed in.

This recipe made five big Belgium waffles.

Waffle Sauce
3 cups milk
1 cup prepared waffle batter
1 cup sugar
3/4 tsp vanilla (optional)

Warm milk

Add batter and cook until thickened. We have found that it is very important to have a person continuously stirring while the sauce thickens because it tends to stick to the bottom of your pot if you don't constantly stir it.

Once thick, add sugar and vanilla. Serve on waffles.

This is the finished product. Pretty impressive for relatively little work.

Snow ?

I am so glad I was working outside until 8:30 p.m. last night mowing the lawn and cleaning up the garden. Even though I had to use the lights on the mower it was well worth it because I woke up to this. . .
Snow on October 10. Since when does it snow this early? This is the first time it has snowed before harvest was finished since Mike has been farming and I'm sure it won't be the last. In fact we can't remember the last time it snowed before harvest was over. I know it has snowed during harvest before, but we must have been too young to remember.

Last night they finished up harvesting right before I finished mowing.

Hopefully we can get the rest of our corn harvested before it snows again.

Man in Stripes

During the fall Mike takes a few breaks from harvesting to do his sideline seasonal job, as an official during junior high, junior varsity and varsity football games. Mike is an official for 11-man and 8-man football in classes C and D. He serves mostly as the umpire on his crew, but once in a while he will be the referee (the one with the white hat).

A few weeks ago I went to watch Mike ref a game. I didn't know anyone on either of the teams playing, so my full attention was on the refs. During this particular game Mike was a substitute for a different crew, so he was the umpire the whole game.

As umpire, Mike stood behind the defensive line and linebackers, to watch the blocks made by the offensive line and defenders trying to stop the blocks. He also looked for holding or illegal blocks. Prior to the snap of the ball, he counted to make sure the right number of offensive players were on the field.

As the umpire Mike stands where much of the play's initial action occurs, so he is considered to hold the most dangerous officiating position.

Mike was also in charge of placing the ball on the line of scrimmage and signally what down it was.

Since I wasn't particularly interested in the outcome of the game, I had some time to observe different aspect of the game that I wouldn't normally see. One thing that made me laugh was the large range in body sizes of guys on the team. Since this was a JV game, these boys were probably about the same age, but you wouldn't be able to tell by looking at them.