Your houseguests will return | Ham and Cheese Stuff’n Puff

If you want your houseguests to stay with you again, pull this hot, melty ham and cheese dish out of your oven in the morning and they’ll be planning their next overnight trip.

Chances are, they’ll ask you for the recipe so be prepared to either A.) write it on a recipe card and pretend it’s your own, or B.) send them this link to the KRAFT Stove Top recipe.

The first time I made this breakfast was the same weekend I made my ex-sister-in-law’s cauliflower broccoli salad for my future in-laws. I left out the broccoli in the egg dish because I wasn’t sure if everyone in Betsy’s family liked broccoli, and I know Jason doesn’t like it, so I added extra ham instead. The ham I use is Hormel^® Cure 81 diced boneless ham which is available at our local Hy-Vee.

Another way I’ve made it is with fresh, diced celery instead of broccoli and we really liked that. I’ve also made it exactly as the recipe states but no one in my family likes broccoli (except for me). You could easily turn this into a delightful vegetarian brunch by substituting fresh vegetables for the meat.

Since I’m not vegetarian and I love pork, I may add or substitute bacon, sausage, or even Canadian bacon next time.

Maybe if you’re lucky, it will be on your houseguest’s brunch menu the next time you visit them. Rise ‘n shine!

Ham and Cheese Stuff’n Puff

5 large eggs

1/2 cup sour cream

1 cup milk (I use skim milk because that’s mostly what I buy, but anything up to whole milk is good.)

1-1/4 cups chopped fresh broccoli, washed and drained (Substitute any fresh vegetables you like. The recipe calls for frozen vegetables so you could go that way too.)

1 package (6 ounce) STOVE TOP stuffing mix (The recipe calls for the chicken flavor but I’ve also used the cornbread style and like it.)

3/4 cup diced ham (You could use chopped ham from your Easter leftovers.)

1 cup shredded cheddar cheese, divided into two (1/2 cup) measurements (You could use any variety of cheese you like. I’ve only used cheddar so far.)

Get your oven to a piping hot 375˚.

In a really big bowl, whisk the eggs. Add the sour cream and whisk until combined. Add the milk and whisk until everything is blended. Gently stir in the broccoli, stuffing mix, ham, and 1/2 cup shredded cheese.

Pour into a greased 9×9 pan, 9-inch tart pan, or a 2-quart casserole dish. Cover loosely with foil. I like the non-stick kind so the egg mixture doesn’t stick to it.

Bake one hour, or until completely heated through the middle. Remove from the oven, remove the foil, and sprinkle the remaining 1/2 cup shredded cheese over the top. Bake uncovered another 5 minutes, or just until the cheese is melted and slightly browning.

Remove from the oven and serve immediately.

Disclaimer: Here I am again, just writing about what I love and the stuff I use every day. This post is NOT sponsored or paid by Hormel, KRAFT, or Hy-Vee.

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{To-live-for Pumpkin Butterscotch Coffee Cake}

I brought this cake to work in celebration of Kari’s birthday. On Monday, Mary sent me an email with the subject line “to die for”. She wrote: “The pumpkin brown sugar cake/coffee cake/whatever it is called was extremely delicious. I told Paige that my plan to just eat half and save the rest for the next day worked for about 12 seconds. I checked your blog but didn’t see the recipe there. Please share!”

So this one’s for you, Mary! And for those of you who have thrown out all your muffin recipes except the butterscotch muffins I made for the cops, this is very similar so your recipe box is getting even lighter.

The aroma of this cake baking in the oven is intoxicating. It is THE cake you want to bake if you have guests coming, your house is on the market and you’re holding an open house, or you can’t get the smell of your kid’s hockey bag out of the back entry.

1 cup butterscotch chips

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 3/4 cup white sugar

1 Tablespoon baking powder

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice

1 teaspoon salt

1 cup pure pumpkin

1/2 cup vegetable oil

3 large eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Streusel

1/2 cup packed brown sugar

1/4 cup chopped pecans

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice

Top the cake with a sprinkling of powdered sugar.

Make it:

Preheat oven to 350°. Grease a regular-sized Bundt pan. Melt 1 cup of butterscotch chips over low heat on the stove or in the microwave, stirring until smooth. Remove from heat and set aside to cool.

In a large bowl, mix together the flour, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice and salt. In a smaller bowl, whisk together the pumpkin, oil, eggs, vanilla and melted (and cooled to room temperature) butterscotch chips. Gradually stir the pumpkin mixture into the flour mixture, stirring until well combined.

For the streusel, in a small bowl, mix the brown sugar, chopped pecans, cinnamon, and pumpkin pie spice.

Pour half of the cake batter into the Bundt pan. Toss the streusel mixture evenly over the cake batter. Pour the rest of the cake batter over the streusel. Bake at 350° for 60-65* minutes, or until toothpick or cake tester comes out clean. Remove from oven, turn the Bundt pan upside down onto a cooling rack and let cool for 15 minutes before lifting the pan off the cake. When cake is completely cool, sprinkle with powdered sugar.

*My Bundt pan is the Pampered Chef Stoneware Fluted Pan so the bake time may be longer than what it would take in a metal Bundt pan. You may want to check the cake after 50 minutes of baking time.

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Have you fallen in love with the pumpkin and butterscotch flavor combination?

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{Comfort Food for the Bigfork Construction Crew}

It was a cold and rainy morning when our construction crew arrived for rebuilding day #1. First on their agenda – build us a garage before the sometimes light and fluffy, but usually blinding and brutal, Minnesota snow flies. When I brought the guys warm cinnamon coffee cake straight from the oven, my dad said to them, “You’ll gain 10 pounds working here.” What a great way to be introduced to strangers! I knew we’d picked the right crew when one of the guys commented back, “That’s ok, winter’s almost here!” I just have to be careful not to make them too comfortable or they’ll still be here when the flowers bloom in the spring.

The coffee cake recipe is from Taste of Home. I added a few teaspoons of vanilla to intensify the flavor of the yellow cake, and I didn’t make the icing; not for any particular reason, other than I know the cake is moist and flavorful without it. (You may notice that the recipe on the Taste of Home website says to bake 30-35 minutes but both times I made it this week, I noticed that even in my convection oven, the cake took 45 minutes or so to bake completely.)

The chili is a ”throw in what you like” recipe so you can choose what types of beans and spices you use. This batch, perfect for the slow cooker, makes enough for six hungry guys, one hungry girl, and one serving for later. And because comfort food includes chocolate in my domain, I also made a batch of my Marshmallow Creme Crunch Brownies.

Beginning of rebuilding day #1.

End of rebuilding day #1.

You may be wondering why we are feeding our construction crew. The owner, Lyle Enger, and his crew are from Bigfork, Minnesota which is so many miles from here that they are close to the Canadian border. (As a food blogger, I think it would be awesome to live in a town called Bigfork!) Lyle is a long-time family friend of Jason’s and they know his work well. He owns, and built most of the Maple Ridge Resort on the edge of wilderness in northern Minnesota. (And don’t even get me started on owning a place with the word maple in it. Yum.) The crew is staying in a hotel 10 miles from our house so we felt that the least we could do is feed them lunch each day.  

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Make-it-Your-Way Rainy Day Chili

3 pounds ground beef

1 medium yellow onion, finely chopped

1 (15-ounce) can red beans, drained and rinsed

1 (15-ounce) can chili beans with sauce

2 (15-ounce) cans kidney beans, drained and rinsed

1 (8-ounce) can tomato sauce

1 (46-ounce) can tomato juice

BBQ sauce, approximately 1/4 cup

a few dashes of Worcestershire sauce

a couple tablespoons of prepared yellow mustard

cayenne pepper

salt & pepper

garlic powder

onion powder

ground cumin

hot chili powder

onion salt

1 tablespoon or so of brown sugar

Let’s make the chili!

Season the ground beef with onion salt (to taste) and cook with chopped onion until meat is no longer pink. Drain. Put the beef in the slow cooker and add all the beans and the tomato sauce, BBQ sauce, mustard and Worcestershire (all to taste), stirring to combine. Add the can of tomato juice and then add the spices. This truly is a “make-it-your-way” recipe so add any spices or sauces you like. I’ve also been known to add steak sauce and hot pepper sauce. Stir all the ingredients until well combined. Cook until piping hot. Top with shredded cheese, sour cream, and diced red onions.

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What kinds of beans and spices do you use in your homemade chili?

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{Cake Batter Pancakes from How Sweet It Is}

When Jessica from How Sweet It Is posted her recipe for Cake Batter Pancakes, I saved it in my Favorites so I could make them for my son’s birthday party. He’s a huge fan of pancakes. And what kid doesn’t love sprinkles?! Even though the slumber partiers were up most of the night and didn’t get up until noon, I made these for “breakfast” anyway.

They taste like a cross between pancakes and yellow cupcakes topped with cinnamon roll drizzle and sprinkles. You’ll notice there are three candles on the “cake.” One is for my son, one is for his friend who is also celebrating a birthday, and one is for one of the dads whose birthday was yesterday. Yes, How Sweet indeed.

(Dear parents who entrusted me with their children: I promise they will run off this sugar high before I bring them home! And, if they talk about cereal bar kabobs they had with these, I’m not really sure what they are talking about.)

And were the pancakes a hit? Pictures tell it all:

For the Cake Batter Pancakes recipe and fun step-by-step photos, swing on over to Jessica’s blog. You may find yourself saving it in your Favorites folder too!

Thank you, Jessica, for sharing your wonderful recipe for the world to enjoy.

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