Chicken Melt Sandwich

Several restaurants/grills offer a chicken melt.  And if you have a favorite, like the one at Leo’s Sports Bar in Mazeppa, MN you might want to try & adapt a homemade version.  This is a copy cat recipe …developed by a home cook (Tupps) to taste similar! Sometimes it's difficult to exactly duplicate a restaurant recipe at home without all the amenities of a commercial kitchen, but this recipe does its best to copy the same flavors & visual appeal as Leos’s!

Chicken Melt Sandwich ~Leo’s Sports Bar

Recipe& Directions (our best guess):

Step 1:  Chicken Melt Ingredients: 

Boneless, skinless chicken breast, slices of rye bread, white American cheese slices, canned mushrooms & onion

Step 2:  How to make a Chicken Melt: 

Grill the chicken over medium heat until cooked, while the chicken is cooking, slice the onion & sauté with mushrooms.  Butter 1 side of each slice of bread & when the chicken is cooked, assemble the ingredients on the rye bread.  Put the sandwich in a frying pan on medium for 3-5 minutes per side or until golden, grilled brown.

Step 3:  Chicken Melt Variations:

 A chicken melt can be varied for different flavor and taste by changing the method of cooking the chicken, the type of bread, or the topping ingredients, but I think we did our best in the copy cat of the Leo’s Chicken Melt!

Tupps Tidbits ~ layer the sandwich, bread, cheese, mushroom, onion and then chicken, so that when the cheese melts it will hold the onion and mushrooms in place

DEFINITELY A KEEPER whether we eat one at home or at Leo’s!

Peaches and Cream Muffins

We picked up – Best of the Best from Minnesota Cookbook.  It offers selected recipes from Minnesota’s favorite cookbooks. The Peaches & Cream Muffins, which originally came from the recipe book - Recipes from the Flock sounded so yummy to both of us we had to try them. The book states the Recipes from the Flock is a collection of recipes submitted by women of Tonseth Lutheran Church in rural Erhard.  It is tried and true recipes passed down from generation to generation of church members.  Earlier in the blog we froze peaches so we are bringing them back out for this recipe.  The recipe does not state how many it makes but I am guessing they will be delicious so the more the better!

Peaches and Cream Muffins

~Recipes from the Flock

 ½ cup butter

½ cup white sugar

1 tsp vanilla

½ cup sour cream

1 egg, room temperature

1 ½ cups flour

1 ½ tsp baking powder

1 cup chopped peaches (fresh, frozen, or canned, drained well)

1 cup chopped pecans (optional)

Cream butter & sugars.  Beat vanilla and sour cream into creamed mixture.  Add egg.  Combine flour and baking powder; add creamed mixture.  Chop peaches and fold into muffin batter. Add pecans if desire; mix to blend only.  Grease muffin tins.  Spoon batter, filling 2/3 full.  Bake at 350 for 30 minutes.

 Tupps Tidbits ~ instead of greasing the muffin tins, you can use liners and they will bake just the same

It ended up making 12 muffins exactly and they came out perfect. I would definitely recommend making them again.  KEEPER! 

No Flour Cloud Bread

For our Gluten Free followers out there,  we thought we would try this no flour bread recipe.

It seemed simple enough & they are carbohydrate-free, gluten free & high in protein.

No Flour Cloud Bread

www.myownlabels.com

6 Jumbo eggs, separated

6 Tbs. of full-fat (at least 4% milk fat) cottage cheese

1 Tbs. sweetener (splenda)

½ tsp. cream of tartar

Cooking spray

Tools:

Hand-mixer

Parchment paper

2 large mixing bowls

• Separate the egg yolks from the egg whites, putting the yolks in one large bowl and the white in the other. Set the egg whites in the fridge to chill. 
• With the hand mixer, mix the cottage cheese, sweetener, and egg yolks until it is silky as you can achieve.  Small lumps of the cottage cheese are ok and not noticeable in your batch.  Trade this bowl with the egg-white bowl in the fridge. 
•  Line & paper 3 cookie sheets.  Try and use all cookie sheets at the same time, this batter does not sit well.
• Preheat oven to 300. 
• Add cream of tartar to the egg whites; beat the eggs until they form stiff peaks.
• Use a large spoon to gently fold the yolk mixture into the egg white meringue. 
• Using the same spoon, scoop dollops onto the cookies sheets, leaving 1 inch between each. 
• Place all cookie sheets into the oven at the same time.  The bread rounds will bake between 20 – 30 minutes.  Bake them to be light golden color for softer bread, and darker to be crisper.

Tupps Tidbits ~ 3 cookie sheets did not fit in our oven, we opt to make ½ this recipe and use 2 cookie sheets

We found that you definitely would want to bake them the full 30 minutes, if not more time, till they are brown on top…they come out light and fluffy. I would like to try them again & add flavors such as onion powder or cinnamon-sugar or maybe fresh thyme & oregano.  They also might turn out better if you spread the bread out onto the full baking sheet, then cutting into loaf-like squares. Verdict is still out if they are KEEPER OR NOT A KEEPER. They are definately NOT a KEEPER in our house but we are checking with our Gluten Free expert! 
UPDATE:  from the Gluten Free expert  "Cloud bread is questionable, I would not recommend it." 

Velveeta Tex-Mex Beef & Potatoes

I was first introduced to this recipe when Karla brought in her leftovers for lunch.  She handed me a spoonful and it was so yummy we had to make it ourselves.  It was a hearty Mexican hot dish that warmed the tummy.  She recommended adding black beans & a little less corn.  Also, for a healthier version you could replace the ground beef with ground turkey & the hashbrowns with rice.  We ended up following the Kraft recipe (as listed below)  but took Karla’s recommendation on adding the beans.  If you need to feed a hungry family quick…this tasty dish can be on the table pretty quickly!

Velveeta Tex-Mex Beef & Potatoes

~ Kraftrecipes.com & Karla Hamilton

1 lb ground beef

1 red pepper, chopped

1 onion, chopped

1 pkg. (1-1/4 oz.) Taco Seasoning Mix

½ cup water

4 cups frozen Southern style hash browns

1 pkg (10 oz.)  frozen corn

½ lb (8 oz) Velveeta, cut into ½-inch cubes

• Heat oven to 350 F
• Brown meat with peppers & onions in large skillet; drain, return to skillet
• Stir in taco mix & water.  Add potatoes & corn; cover, cook 5 to 7 min. until potatoes are tender
•  Stir in Velveeta & mix well.  Cook uncovered until melted & well blended.
• Spoon into 13X9 baking dish; cover
• Bake 20 min; stir. Bake uncovered, 15 min. or until heated through

                                                  

Tupps Tidbits ~ Be sure to use the cubed Southern style hash browns in this recipe, not the shredded

Well just as I thought, it was delicious. We only made ½ the above recipe & placed it in a 9 x 9 pan & ate the whole thing in one sitting. It does need a little extra spice, a good addition would be green chilies or red pepper flakes....either way, we should have made the full recipe because we did not have leftovers for lunch the next day…..DEFINITELY A KEEPER!  THANKS KARLA!