Monday Meals: Comfort Food--Mac N Cheese, Burrata and Apple Sauce Cake (39/60)

It's been a gray chilly day after a super busy foody weekend. So we've gone to our old favorite

Mac N Cheese

1 pk of elbow macaroni

(Cook according to directions)

Cheese sauce:

1/4 c butter melted in a medium size sauce pan

Add: 1/4 and 2 tbsp Flour

Mix until it's a roux (like play dough)

then add: 1 cup milk

Stir until it's thickened.

Add 1 more cup of milk and mix until thickened.

Add:

1 tsp salt

1 cup of graded cheddar cheese.

Stir in until melted and saucy

Place drained noodles in a 9 by 13 inch GREASED pan, pour the cheese sauce over the noodles and stir.

Sprinkle an extra 1 or 1 1/2 c of graded cheese over the top.

Cook at 350 for 35-40 minutes. Until bubbly and melted and browned.

And here is our favorite: Burrata with delicious tomatoes.

Slice thin white bread and place on a cookie sheet.

1/3 c olive oil with 1 tsp minced garlic. Let sit for 10 minutes

With a pastry brush, brush the bread with the olive oil and garlic . . . bake in oven at 350 for 15 minutes

Cook until it's golden and crispy . .. but not brown (like so . . . )

Tomatoes . . .

4 large tomatoes, diced

1 tbsp white balsamic vinegar

1 tbsp olive oil

1/2 tsp minced garlic

1/2 tsp sea salt

3 tbsp sugar

Mix all ingredients together and let sit for 5-10 minutes

Place the burrata (the white stuff on the pink plate) on a plate and slice open

Serve with the bread, burrata cheese and tomatoes ---bread, spread the cheese like butter, then dribble tomatoes over them all (you will become addicted)

And if you want . . . what I want . . . I don't that much bread, so I put the cheese and the tomatoes over a bed of lettuce. It's delicious!

And most important part of the meal . . . the dessert!

Grandma's Apple Sauce Cake

2 c apple sauce

2 tsp baking soda

2 tsp cinnamon

2 eggs

1 c sugar

2 c flour

1 c oil

Combine all ingredients and mix on medium high for 2 minutes.

Bake at 350 for 40-50 minutes in a bundt pan (in regular pan, 25-35 minutes)

It comes out like this . . . Sigh . . . Cool

Then frost with Carmel Frosting

1/2 cup butter melted in a medium sized sauce pan

1 cup brown sugar

Stir until combined. Once it comes to a small boil, boil for 2 minutes.

Add 1/4 c evaporated milk or half and half

Bring back to a boil and then remove from heat.

Add 2 c powdered sugar and stir like crazy until it's smooth and combined.

Then immediately pour over the cooled cake (it coats it like a beautiful delicious ribbon)

And now . . . I'm going to go eat this cake.

I hope your Monday was calm and comforting and delicious . . .

Comments

Forced Frugality

We are going on ten months of looking for a job. Last September, after a rather horrid ten months, John got the boot. It was oddly and rather unfairly done, but a great relief to all of us. Working at that company had become a puzzle that grew harder and harder each day until it was in fact, impossible. The stress of it took a wild toll on John's mental and physical health. By the end, he was neither eating nor sleeping. He had strange episodes of racing heart and an inability to tell what was real and what was imagined. I sat him down and told him I would use up every penny of our retirement and sell the house if it meant he could stop working in that environment. And it may take all that. And I still won't regret it. When I feel rather sorry for myself, I remember what life was like for him a year ago and then I don't feel sad that I am once again digging through my closet to find a new way to wear old things. In fact, there is part of me (small though it

The Best Kind of Tired

My often daily life . . . (John is two feet away—I can’t do all of them by myself) Last week, every single time I sat down, I almost instantly fell asleep. I kept telling John, I have the sleeping disease. What is going on? Am I getting old? Is it the covid after effects? What on earth? He didn’t have any answers for me because he was doing the same thing. We didn’t really do anything for seven days straights. And our kids joined us in the sleepy, do nothing, lazy slug bug state. It wasn’t until this morning as I was looking over the pictures of the summer that I realized why. . . We literally haven’t stopped ALL summer long—one awesome amazing trip/visit/fun after the other. It’s like we are making up for last years “staycations.” Holy hannah have we ever made up for it. Just about did ourselves in playing and hugging and kissing and caring for babies. Highlights of the summer (in no particular order): Cousin sleepovers have resumed (most missed activity since the pandem

Midlife-Cri-sis

It's been a year. I'll sum it up by saying that food no longer tastes good to me. The last time that happened, I had lost three pregnancies in a row and John had lost and found a job and we had moved three times. The feeling is very similar. There have a been a lot of losses or near losses. Enough that when the phone pings with a text or vibrates with a call (I long ago turned off the ringer), I take a deep breath and think, you can do this . More times than not, I need that deep breath. I am probably in the second half of my life and I feel it. 47. My children are nearly grown. My house is established. Our bank accounts don't fluctuate like they used to. I don't go to the store and dream of being able to buy things. I walk into my closet and wonder what I can do without. I feel the finality of my existence and I wonder . . . what do I really want out of all this? For book club, we read A Million Miles in a Thousand Years . It's about re-writing o

The Phoenix: Epicuriousmothering Rising

Search This Blog