Thursday, December 22, 2011

Biscuit Breakfast

My hubby loves biscuits for breakfast. 
Every time we go home to Little Rock or his Momma comes to visit he makes his request:  Biscuits and Gravy for breakfast.  Grammie doesn't have a recipe... She just makes the same biscuits and gravy she has always made and her Mom, Granny, makes too (I refuse to comment on whose are better:)  I have developed the same admiration for Grammie's biscuits and gravy that my husband has... it is an ar,t and the woman has mastered it!  My point:  I am not competing.  I think sometimes you have to appreciate perfection and find your own thing.  So we request our favorites when we go to visit and I try new stuff to hold the Hubby over until his next trip home!  This was one attempt... and it worked!  We all loved it!  We adapted the original recipe a little adding bacon and green onions.... Why not?

So here is the recipe... it would be a great Christmas Morning fix!  Easy, filling, and Yummy! 

Biscuit Breakfast Casserole

adapted from Plain Chicken

Printable Version


1 lb breakfast sausage (you can buy precooked sausage crumbles)
crumbled bacon (you can buy pre cooked bacon pieces)
7 eggs
1 cup milk
1 cup heavy cream
1 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper
8 frozen buttermilk biscuits, slightly thawed, halved
2 cups shredded cheddar cheese, divided
green onions

Preheat oven to 375. Lightly spray a 7x11-inch dish with cooking spray.

Brown sausage in pan, breaking into chunks. Drain fat. (or just sprinkle pre cooked sausage)
Cook bacon in pan and crumble. (or sprinkle pre cooked bacon pieces)
**we use these cheats a lot to make things nice and easy**

Whisk together eggs, milk, cream, salt and pepper in a large measuring cup. Set aside.

Slice each biscuit in half with serrated knife (they need to be a little thawed, but not much for this step). Place biscuit bottoms in baking dish. Sprinkle half of cooked sausage and bacon over biscuits and top with half of the cheese. Place remaining biscuits on top of cheese and cover with remaining sausage. Pour egg mixture over biscuits. (Can cover and refrigerate at this point)

Bake 30 minutes. Sprinkle remaining cheese and green onions over casserole and bake until eggs are set, about 20 minutes (check middle biscuits are not doughy). Let casserole stand 10 minutes before serving.
Enjoy:)
The Mom

Thursday, December 15, 2011

Santa Time


We went to see Santa again. 
The little guy was not a happy camper. 
The difference a year makes.


Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas!



Wednesday, December 14, 2011

Breakfast Pizza


I made this for my guys a few weekends ago.  I will be making it again this weekend when we visit The Hubby's family in north Louisiana for their annual Christmas get together. 
I loved this.  It was my sort of breakfast.  Easy and with all my favorite ingredients. 
I like it when both my guys love something I make.  The big guy liked it and so did the little guy.  This will be in our permanent Saturday morning rotation.  I adapted a little for our taste from the original recipe I found over at Fake Ginger.  Hope you like as much as we did!


Breakfast Pizza
adapted from fakeginger.com



Ingredients
  • 1 homemade or store-bought pizza dough
  • bacon pieces (fry your own or buy)
  • sausage crumbles (ground your own or buy)
  • 1 cup grated Parmesan
  • 1 cups grated mozzarella
  • 4-5 eggs
  • salt and pepper
  • 2 tablespoons minced chives
  • olive oil, for brushing
Instructions
  1. Preheat the oven to 500F or follow package instruction.
  2. Stretch your pizza dough out onto your lightly greased baking sheet
  3. Sprinkle with Parmesan, mozzarella, sausage and bacon. Crack eggs over top and season with salt and pepper. Brush the exposed crust with olive oil.
  4. Bake for 10 – 12 minutes or until eggs are cooked through and crust is golden brown. Sprinkle chives over top.


Enjoy:)
The Mom

Prosciutto Bread

Our Little Family celebrated our Christmas this past weekend.
We will be traveling through the Holiday so we wanted to celebrate in our home with the new traditions we are starting for our family.  Some of our traditions are new, some of them are old. 
So Friday night we had a Christmas Eve dinner.  I made schnitzel and vegetables and prosciutto bread.  All of it was wonderful and it felt wonderful to cook a big meal for my little family and sit down at the table together and and celebrate our most favorite season. 

I loved the dinner food, but for me the star of the show was the bread.  It was ridiculously easy and tasted as good as it looked.  We snapped a few pictures.  I am disappointed I didnt get the really good final picture, but I hope they will at least give you the idea.  We love bread in our house... If you do too you should not miss out on trying this recipe sometime.




Prosciutto Bread
adapted from Food Network Magazine
Ingredients:
1 tube refrigerated French Bread Dough
1 package (8-10 slices) prosciutto
Ground black pepper
Olive Oil
Directions:
Preheat oven to 375
Unroll the french bread dough onto counter sprinkled with flour
Use rolling pin to flatten it out just a bit
Use pepper grinder to sprinkle surface with pepper
Cover surface of dough with slices of prosciutto
 
Starting on one end of the dough tightly roll the dough up to form it back into a long cylinder
On a parchment paper lined baking sheet place the dough in a circle and press the ends together well so they will not seperate.
 
Bake 20 minutes then remove, coat in olive oil, and bake 5 minutes more.
 
Enjoy:)

Monday, December 5, 2011

Chicken and Rice

Yesterday was rainy. We were thanking God for the covered drop up by the nursery at church. Then we were thanking God for the amazing message delivered by Carrie McDonnall.  The little guy was not feeling the nursery, but came out snuggly (for a few minutes) so we were able to watch on the tv's in the church lobby.  I am always amazed by stories like the one Carrie shared with us of her missions and her life in the Middle East.  She has faced tragedy and triumph and has the strength to share.  Click on her name above if you are interested. 

So we got home unscathed by the downpour and I put a yummy little Sunday lunch in the oven.  This is another find from Plain Chicken.  I just love her stuff.  This is so ridiculously easy and equally yummy.
So if you are in the mood... Here you go!
(and I got fancy... there is now a printable link... yay me)





 
Chicken and Rice
originally from Plain Chicken


Ingredients:
1 box chicken flavor Rice-A-Roni
1 can cream of chicken soup
1 cup sour cream
3-4 cups cooked, chopped chicken (we used one whole rotisserie)
1 (6 oz) can French fried onions
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 F.

Prepare Rice-A-Roni according to package directions.
Add soup, sour cream and chicken.
Stir to combine.
Spread rice mixture in a lightly sprayed 9x13 pan.
Top rice with fried onions.
Bake uncovered for 30 minutes.
 

Enjoy!




Thursday, December 1, 2011

Our Family Ornament

I am a Christmas person.  Some people are, and some people are not.  You know who you are.  I have accepted this about myself. Thankfully, I married another Christmas person.  I love the music, the spirit, the lights, the shopping, wrapping gifts, cooking special things for special people, the crisp cold (or cool in Texas) weather, friends, family, camaraderie and mostly the Reason for the Season. 
The birth of our savior Jesus Christ.  What an amazing reason to celebrate. 

For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
Isaiah 9:6

We have a little family tradition from the Arnold family.  Every year we get a new Christmas ornament.  My Mom would get my brother and I one every year,  my Arnold grandparents would also get each of us one (and Leah, don't wanna leave out the super cousin:)  My Mom would always select something for us based off what we were liking that year or just special ones when we were younger.  My Grandma Arnold typically got each of us a German hand blown ornament.  I love how those delicate tiny little ornaments can remind me so much of my heritage and the strongest most amazing little 81 year old lady on the planet.  I hit the jackpot with my two sets of grandparents.

Back on topic. I digress. A LOT!
That is a little shot at the ornament that started my collection.  Its my favorite one to hang every year.
So when I moved away from home my Momma let me pick out all of my ornaments and take them right along with me. I had my own tree with my own ornaments all through college, pre-marriage, and now. Come to find out The Hub had his own collection. His Dad and Mom had done the same thing. So The Hub and I have a big lot of ornaments that are each special to us and we are doing the same thing for our Little Man. This year he got a little nutbrown hare ornament. If you know who that is,  you know it says "I love you right up to the moon, and back".

We decided to make a family ornament. I had an idea from something else I had seen. I had all the supplies on hand. So we got busy with some hands and some paint. Ill give you the story through pictures.






So we used green paint for Dad who went first, then red for Mom who went second, then silvery white for the Little Man who went last.  I then paint penned 2011 in the middle of his little hand print.  It was an interesting little experiment.  We had fun together as a family.  Especially trying to get the 1 year old to participate at all or not so much:)  You understand, right!

I had this idea of three layered hand prints.  Big one from Dad, Smaller from Mom, and tiny from the little guy.  It didn't come out perfect as you can tell.  I am a bit Type A, maybe, but I told Craig I had this idea of what it should look like.... Our looks not much like that at all... The big hands didn't press well.  The palms were at the bottom because of our big hands.  The little guy hand print is squishy and not very realistic.  
Then I started thinking:  It was cute... We had fun... Who cares if its perfect.  We certainly are not.  Far from it... Just like our Christmas ornament.  
So I love our family ornament... Ill love putting it on the tree for years to come and remember the moment in all its imperfection.
Love,
The Mom