Tomato Soup, Grilled Cheese and Puppy Pics!

Geesh, last night it was Monday, and we all know Monday's suck right?

So what to make?

Grilled cheese of course, with some canned tomato soup.

So off I run to the local market, I grab American  cheese, Swiss cheese, and a loaf of Sourdough Italian.

Came home, fried up some bacon for the sammies, went to make the soup and whoops!

I forgot to buy canned tomato soup, which is easy to make on a Monday, because Monday's suck!

Alright, it's decision time-Do I run back to the store or make some homemade tomato soup?

You guessed right- I Googled Quick Tomato Soup and here's what I found.

Quick Tomato Soup-Click Here!

 I cut most of the recipe in half. But played a lot.

Here's the original recipe.

• 1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
• 3 cloves garlic, minced (about 1 tablespoon)
• 1 teaspoon dried herbs, such as thyme, oregano, rosemary or basil
• 1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper (optional)
• 2 (28-ounce) cans crushed tomatoes
• 1 cup water
• 2 teaspoons sugar
• 2 cups nonfat or low-fat milk

 What I Did

-Splashed the Evoo into the pot

-I can of crushed tomatoes

-5 or 6 cloves of garlic

 -Crumbled upsome dried basil from our garden, a couple of leaves

-Sprinkled in crushed red pepper flakes

 -1/2 cup of water

-Sprinkled in some sugar

-1 cup of 1% lowfat milk

-Salt and pepper to taste

(I'd be remiss if I didn't say I added some crumbled, (really crumbled, fried crisp) bacon to the soup)

Simmered it for about an hour, after all it was "Quick" soup.

So I cut some of the recipe ingredients in half and I eyeballed other stuff. 

That's the cool thing about cooking a lot- you get more intuitive about what works for you.

The soup was pretty good. Lends itself to modifications, but for a quick soup and a means to dunk the grilled cheese it was perfect.

Here's the evidence.

Not bad, IMHO.

Grilled cheese were basic- 

-Freihoffer's Italian Sourdough-butter side down on the pan

-1 slice American

-Bacon slices on top of the American

- A slice of Swiss Cheese

-Another buttered slice of bread on top

Cook the Sammies until they look right-that's a personal choice, my choice is like the above pic.

The soup and sammies were perfect for a Monday, and we all know...... Mondays .......

P.S. Here's the Puppy Pics!

Sit! Stay!

OK Daddy, this is getting old!

Stay Hungry My Friends!

KA Bread.........

A while back I found the book that accompanies KitchenAids when they're sold.

Instructions and Recipes.

Our KA is about 25 years old so the book had been shoved aside.  Thumbing through it there are a lot of recipes.

So what the heck, yesterday was wet and cold, good day to bake.

I decided to make a loaf of Basic White Bread and a loaf of Cinnamon Bread.

Gotta love the illustrations where it shows you how to shape you loaf.

I still screwed mine up-need practice!

Basic it was, easy to make, took about 40 minutes to bake.

I used two different pans-The cinnamon bread was cooked in a silicone pan which is longer explaing the disparity in size.

Both were very tasty-the white is gone and a little chunk of cinnamon is left.

I'd do 'em again.

Stay hungry my friends!

Greed and Coporate America...

I could rant for an hour or two about corporate America, instead I'll just share this link.

It's stomach turning and scary.

Click Here for the link!

(Pic Courtesy of  Mother Jones)

Steak & Bacon Calzone.....

Syracuse was hosting West Virginia last night at the Dome, so  had to make some gametime food.

The wife vetoed pizza, because I made it the night before, so I said, "Self, make a calzone, she'll like that!"

I had a piece of leftover sirloin from a couple of nights before which I sliced up into little bitty pieces.

I cooked down a package of our frozen homegrown tomatoes to which I added basil, salt , pepper and garlic.

The dough I made from a recipe right out of the KitchenAid cookbook, quick, easy and tasty.

Oh yeah, I cooked up some bacon just figuring it was a good idea, and it was.

So here's what it looked like, it did suffer a minor blowout.

(At some point I'll remember to roll the dough instead of spreading by hand to avoid the thin spots.)

Dough!

The filling, I also put shredded mozz on this along with parm below the filling.

You can see my lame attempt to patch the inevitable leak.

And, well, I need to roll my dough, I know, I know.....

Ya know what, it tasted great, and the better half liked it.

A little marinara on the side and go watch Syracuse kick West Virginia's ass, which they did 49-23.

I love happy endings!

Stay hungry my friends!

The Kid Is Cute!

Here's our Granddaughter!

Seriously, isn't she cute?

Burger Rolls....

As the weather gets cooler and, well let's be honest, crappier here in Northern New York, I find myself drawn to the kitchen to bake.

Last night I made some burger rolls since we were having burgers.

Makes sense, right?

I found the roll recipe at "a sweet pea chef" one of the many quality food blogs out there.

The recipe is for Hoagie Rolls, which I'm going to replicate, but since burgers were on the menu, burger rolls we made!

Here's the link for the Hoagie Roll Recipe.

Click Here for the Recipe!

I make a lot of yeast bread, and what I liked about this recipe was that it was easy for a work night.

The mixing/kneading was done in the KitchenAid.

We came out with 8 burger rolls, that were dense, tasty and perfect for any burger and toppings you would add.

A good solid yeast roll.

Here's some pics.

I brushed some butter on top while they were cooling.

I like butter.

Split and ready.

Sharp cheddar on the burger, served with homemade sweet potato fries.

And there's the puppy, sleeping right next to the stove, all played out.

Stay Hungry My Friends!

Our New Baby......

So we were down to one dog (Red, The Official Blog Dog of Tupper Cooks!) after all the girls finally moved out and took their dogs with them.

 Here's Red, My first puppy.

She's 5 years old now.

But we didn't want Red to be lonely when we're at work, so this past weekend, we adopted a cute little German Shephard pup.

So here's Ellie,short for Elvira, which is the name of the German woman we adopted her from.

Ellie's sayin', "I wanna play!"

Red says, "OK!"

Or maybe I'll chew on my toy!

That's all for now!

Monday Quote...........

"Read, every day, something no one else is reading. Think, every day, something no one else is thinking. Do, every day, something no one else would be silly enough to do. It is bad for the mind to be always part of unanimity."
       -- Christopher Morley

The Last of the Last......

Sadly, it's fall in the Adirondacks and so we pulled in everything that was left in our garden last week.

It was our first year with a pretty good variety of greens, tomatoes, squash, root veggies and herbs.

Here's a pic of the last pick.

We had a great tomato season, but for some odd reason, this one stands out.

Isn't he cute?

Can't wait for next year!

Homemade Tomato Soup......

If you've read any of my posts below you'll know that we've got a bunch of tomatoes.

So, If life serves you tomatoes, make tomato soup!

I cored and quartered 5 or 6 tomatoes. 

Slice up two yellow onions.

I probably added 5 or 6 cloves of garlic(not sure, but pretty certain-I put garlic in everything but my Cheerios)

Added salt and pepper to taste and drizzled on 1/3 cup of olive oil.

Roasted them at 350 degrees for about 35 minutes.

When they came out, they looked good and smelled better.

Dumped that mixture into a stock pot, added 4 cups of chicken broth and 2  Bay leafs.

Bring it to a boil and let it simmer for 25-30 minutes.

Remove the bay leafs.

Add torn basil and blend.

It called for a 1/4 cup of basil-I think I added a little more......

Then I made Italian Grilled Cheese Sammies ala Rachael Ray

Click Here for the Recipe-It's worth it!

Sammies were awesome, as was the soup.

So for all you out there that think you can't make wicked good tasting food at home from scratch, I say go for it!

Stay hungry my friends!