Foods For Thanksgiving

We had lots of foods last Thanksgiving Day. Stacy and Sherry cooked ham, dressing (stuffing), green bean casserole, baked sweet potato with marsmallows, dinner rolls, and lots and lots of desserts like pecan pie, pumpkin pie, banana and pistachio pudding. I also cooked lumpia of course. But the lumpia were gone before we started our lunch. We enjoyed eating and the foods lasted until Saturday. Below are some of the photos of the foods that we had. They're yummy!!!

pecan pie
pumpkin pie
banana pudding
pistachio pudding
ham
dressing (stuffing)

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

My hubby and I will be out of town this afternoon until the weekend. We gonna spend Thanksgiving with the kids and grand kids. I'm pretty sure my stepdaughters Stacy and Sherry will be preparing delicious foods tomorrow. I will not be able to update my blogs for a few days or visit any other blogs until we get back. Just leave your messages here and I'll get back to all of you soon. Happy Thanksgiving everybody!!!

Lumpia For Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is just 2 days away and I need to prepare something for the said occasion. My hubby and I will be going to Alvarado and spend Thanksgiving Day with the kids and grandkids. This afternoon I prepared the meat filling for my lumpia. The kids love it so I will make some and take it with us when we go to their place. I will wrap it after I'm done blogging. For sure my step kids would be glad to eat my lumpia again.

Blueberry Muffins

I baked blueberry muffins but this time it was a ready made mix from the box. I used to bake muffins from scratch but I just got lazy this time. My hubby and I just love to eat muffins and every time I baked he ate most of it. Sometimes I give away to my friends. I just love to give something to my friends especially my friends in the church. Hubby knows this trait of mine. I want to bless other people with the foods that I cooked and it makes me happy to see other people happy whenever I give them something to eat. I think I got this from my grandma who when she was still alive, she loved to bless other people by sharing whatever foods she had to our kins who were poor. It's really good to be a channel of blessings to other people.

I Cooked My Squash

As I mentioned in my previous post, I cooked one of the squash from my garden last night. I just mixed it with other veggies from my garden like okra, ampalaya and tomatoes. I just added a little ground beef, onions and garlic and liquid aminos. I really enjoyed it. I still have some leftover from last night and I will eat it again tonight with rice. Yummy, it would surely fill my tummy!!!

INGREDIENTS:
1 squash, peeled and cubed
10 pcs okra
2 pcs ampalaya, sliced
3 pcs tomatoes, sliced
salt or fish sauce (I used liquid aminos)
cooking oil
ground beef
1 onion
3 cloves garlic
1 1/2 cup water

DIRECTIONS:
Pout the cooking oil and sautee the garlic and onion. Put the ground beef and brown it. Add water and let it simmer. Add salt or fish sauce, and all the vegetables. Cook until the vegetables are soft. Serve with rice.

Squash From My Garden

I harvested a lot of squash from my garden this year. The above photo of squash is just the leftover because I had given away one dozen of squash to my friends. My Filipina friends told me why not sell it to the Asian store here in our place. I was not sure if Lyn, the store owner would want to buy my squash. My hubby told me that I better give the squash away to my friends who would want it. But I have already given all of them and they don't want it no more. Yesterday, hubby and I went to the Asian store to buy lumpia wrappers, munggo beans and coconut cream. I asked Lyn if she wants to buy my squash because I have a lot of it. She said to bring it to her and she will see what kind of squash do I have. Hubby and I brought the squash to her, about 6 pieces and she paid me $11 for it. Not that much but better than just let it stay in our house and rot. Lyn asked if I have more and she will buy it. I told her no more because I gave away a bunch to my friends. Had I known that she would want to buy my squash, I could have sold it all to her and made more money. Oh well, I'm also happy that I shared my squash to my friends and made them happy. One of them cooked the squash I gave her and she gave me some of the squash that she cooked with coconut cream. I still have 4 squash left in our house. I cooked one last night and mixed it with okra, ampalaya, eggplant, tomatoes and ground beef. It was good. I ate it with rice.

Eggless Sweet Potato Casserole

I just love sweet potato casserole. This is one of my favorite desserts. You might want to try this recipe and I'm pretty sure you would enjoy it. This sweet potato casserole is topped with brown sugar and pecans. A family favorite!

INGREDIENTS

* 6 sweet potato -- cooked, peeled and mashed
* 1/4 cup evaporated milk
* 1/4 cup orange juice
* 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
* 1/2 cup white sugar
* 1/2 teaspoon salt
* 3 tablespoons butter, melted
* 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
* 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
*
* 1/3 cup butter, melted
* 3/4 cup packed brown sugar
* 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
* 3/4 cup chopped pecans


DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease one 2 quart casserole dish and set aside.
2. Blend together the sweet potatoes, evaporated milk, orange juice, vanilla, sugar, salt, 3 tablespoons butter, nutmeg and cinnamon. Pour into prepared casserole dish.
3. Prepare the topping by mixing together the 1/3 cup butter, brown sugar, flour and pecans. Sprinkle over casserole and bake for 45 minutes or until hot.

Palitao (Rice Patties with Sesame and Coconut)

We used to make this rice cake in the Philippines whenever there were birthdays or just ordinary days. I remember when my mom was still alive, she used to make these for our snacks. It's so easy to make and it doesn't need a lot of ingredients too.

Ingredients
1 cup sweet rice four
3/4 cups water
3 cups fresh coconut
2 cups toasted sesame seeds
2 cups sugar

Directions
In a mixing bowl, combine the sweet rice four and water to make a smooth dough. With floured hands, shape the dough into small patties, 3 inches in diameter and 1/2 inch thick.
Bring water in a saucepan to a boil and drop in the patties. When they float to the top, scoop them out and coat with grated coconut. Sprinkle with sesame
seeds and sugar and serve immediately.

Sweet Potato Bake

In the Philippines, we cook sweet potatoes by boiling, grilling or making camote cue. It's only when I got here in the US that I got to taste the sweet potato bake. Oh my, it was so good! I really love it so I searched for the recipe and I tried to cook it. I first tried to cook sweet potato bake last year after I harvested my sweet potatoes. I had lots of it from my garden so I cooked sweet potato bake. It turned out good. My hubby and I enjoyed it.


INGREDIENTS

* 3 cups cold mashed sweet potatoes (without added milk and butter)
* 1/2 cup milk
* 1/4 cup butter, softened
* 3 eggs
* 1 teaspoon salt
* 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
* TOPPING:
* 1 cup packed brown sugar
* 1/2 cup chopped pecans
* 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
* 2 tablespoons cold butter

DIRECTIONS

1. In a mixing bowl, beat sweet potatoes, sugar, milk, butter, eggs, salt and vanilla until smooth. Transfer to a greased 2-qt. baking dish. In a small bowl, combine brown sugar, pecans and flour; cut in butter until crumbly. Sprinkle over potato mixture. Bake, uncovered, at 325 degrees F for 45-50 minutes or until golden brown.

My Bottle Gourd

I harvested my last bottle gourd a few days ago from my garden. I cooked it for our lunch and me and my hubby love it. My bottle gourd had made only 3 bottle gourds this time so I cooked it with ground beef.

Ingredients:

* 2 tbsps cooking oil
* a cup (200 grams) ground beef
* 4 cloves garlic, finely crushed
* 2 medium onions, minced
* 1 large (1.8 kg) bottle gourd, cut into 1"x 1/8" cubes
* 3 tbsps fish sauce
* 3/4 tsp ground black pepper
* knorr beef cubes

Procedure:

In a large wok, over medium-high fire. Put the oil and ground beef. Stir-fry until beef is lightly brown. Remove from pan the ground beef. Retain the oil. Put the garlic. Saute until golden brown. Follow with onions. Saute until soft. Put the bottle gourd. Stir-fry for a minute. Add in the fish sauce. Sprinkle the pepper. Mix. Cook until aromatic. Put the beef cube and fried ground beef. Mix well. Cover. Cook until veggie is soft.

Note: No need to put water because the bottle gourd is watery as it is being cooked.

Cute Blogger Award

Thanks to Selina for this one. I appreciate it very much. Thanks for always thinking of me.

Here are the rules:

1. Each blogger must post these rules.

2. Each blogger starts with ten random facts/habits about themselves.

3. Bloggers that are tagged, need to write ten facts about themselves. You need to choose ten people to tag and list their names.

4. Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they've been tagged and also to read your blog.

Now here are my ten Random facts about me:

1. I am the oldest child in the family of four.

2. I have a sister and 2 younger brothers

4. I was a consistent honor student from elementary up to high school.

5. I had 2 boyfriends before I met my husband.

6. I love gardening, sightseeing, cross-stitching and crocheting.

7. I like to read the Bible and talk to God through prayers.

8. I love eating vegetables, fish and fruits.

9. I like to go window shopping and end up buying things that are on sale.

10.I am generous and helpful to my friends and loved ones.

Now its my time to give this award to : Marly, Sugar and AidiSan.

I Cooked For My Hubby's Birthday

It's my hubby's birthday today so I tried to cook something for our lunch. I usually get lazy cooking so early but since it's my hubby's birthday I cooked his favorite mashed potatoes and I baked chicken leg quarters using the shake and bake mixture from the box. I also cooked collard greens, the last batch from my garden. So when he came home for lunch he ate what I cooked and he likes it. We'll be going out to eat tonight in the restaurant. I still have the 2 gift cards from 2 of the restaurants here in our place that I received as gifts from my church family during my citizenship celebration. We will use one of it tonight to celebrate my hubby's birthday.

Know Me A Bit

This tag came from Selina. Thank you sis.

As you may not know it, I only accept very few tags it's because I feel lazy doing them, sorry friends to be so upfront. This tag below sounds interesting so I thought of doing it with an open heart so my readers or visitors will know a bit about me.

A. Attached or single?~~~married
B. Best friend? ~~~Jesus Christ and my husband.
C. Cake or pie? ~~~cake
D. Day of choice?~~~ any day, but I like Sunday the most
E. Essential item?~~~my PC.
F. Favorite colour?~~~pink
G. Gummy bears or worms?~~~Gummy bears
H. Hometown?~~~Laoac
I. Favorite indulgence?~~~internet, eating, reading God's
J. January or July?~~~January
K. Kids?~~~none but I love kids
L. Life isn’t complete without?~~~God, my husband, family and friends.
M. Marriage date?~~~September 11
N. Number of magazine subscriptions:~~~ none
O. Oranges or apples?~~~both
P. Phobias?~~~heights
Q. Quotes?~~~If God is with us, who can be against us.
R. Reasons to smile?~~~ when I see color white and green opps on my screen.
S. Season of choice?~~~Spring ,Fall
T. Tag 5 people.~~~anybody can just grab this if you want to.
U. Unknown fact about me?~~~I trust my instinct.
V. Vegetable?~~~brocolli, cabbage, and Filipino veggies
W. Worst habit?~~~ staying infront of the PC for hours
X. X-ray or ultrasound?~~~none
Y. Your favorite foods?~~~pinakbet
Z. Zodiac Sign?~~~ Leo

Ground Beef With Potatoes

I wanted a quick and easy meal for me and my hubby so I just thawed the ground beef (from grass-fed cow). Then I peeled and sliced 2 potatoes and also onions and garlic. I saute it using olive oil. It was so good to me.

Ingredients:
1 lb ground beef
2 medium size potatoes, peeled and diced
1 onion
2 cloves garlic
salt and pepper to taste
olive oil

Directions:
Saute the onions and garlic with olive oil. Put the ground beef and cook until brown. Put the diced onions and season with salt and pepper. Cook until it's done about 20 minutes.