This mushroom barley risotto is definitely one for the keeper file. We love barley and this earthy combination is a Winner. You can mix it up and use a variety of mushrooms or stick with white or cremini mushrooms. For a main meal you could add in some sauteed prosciutto or pancetta to satisfy the meat lover.
Pearl Barley – One of the most common types available, pearl barley has had the outer husks and bran layer removed by being polished or “pearled” essentially whitening the kernel. It is an ancient grain that cooks fast.
Pot Barley – Has also been pearled to remove the inedible hull and bran layer, while polishing the kernel. It can be used interchangeably in recipes, however will take slightly longer to cook.
Hulled Barley – Not as popular as the other two, whole grain hulled barley has only had the outer husk removed. This grain takes longer to cook.
If you made this recipe tag Wanda Baker on Instagram and hashtag it #bakersbeans or #wandabaker and please comment below!
A simple marinade before barbecuing infuses these Grilled Pork Chops with Pineapple Salsa creating a flavourful, delicious bite!
I’ve learned through my cooking journey that whenever you can marinade meat, you will end up with a more well rounded flavour. I respect the meat purists who prefer to grill with a little salt and pepper keeping it simple, but I do love a good marinade.
Here we’ve combined lime juice (always fresh), soy sauce, ginger and garlic. A short marinade is good but a little longer, like 30 minutes up to 60 minutes will add even more flavour.
Served with a fresh pineapple salsa, and your favourite grilled vegetables, these pork chops are a keeper.
There’s nothing more annoying and satisfying at the same time as walking outside of your house and immediately being hit with the aroma of a neighbour’s BBQ grilling up something fabulous. Makes you want to run back in, find some meat and slap it on the BBQ.
Pork is a lean meat that is versatile, lends itself well to marinades and depending on the cut grills up fairly quickly.
When we grew up your plate needed to consist of a protein, starch and vegetable. Long gone are those silly days! We aim for half your plate of veggies or salad and a protein. Sometimes a starch thrown in but rarely. Here’s how we enjoy pork chops.
I like to make extra pork chops so I have leftovers the next day. And a delicious way to use them up is to cut leftover pork chops into thin slices and put them into a wrap. You could add a little BBQ sauce, and some leftover pineapple salsa for a delicious lunch.
If you made this recipe tag Wanda Baker on Instagram and hashtag it #bakersbeans or #wandabaker
I remember eating puffed wheat as a wee child, but do not remember puffed wheat squares. Husband does on the other hand and has requested them more than one time. And so like a good wifey I am making Puffed Wheat Squares for my man but with the addition of cinnamon!
Creamy and full of flavour, our Mushroom Ham and Carrot Linguine uses leftover baked ham, earthy fresh mushrooms and summer sweet carrots!
Roast ham is one of my favourite things to eat. In fact in the early days before kids, we would go camping and cook a ham before we left ensuring we had leftovers to eat the entire time creating a new meal with ham each day. Full of flavour from the mushrooms and ham, we added in carrots to offer a sweet note.
This kind of pasta dish is meant to be eaten hot, therefore serve immediately. Plus it will come together quickly as long as you have everything prepped and ready to go.
This is a pasta recipe that started out as a simple mushroom and ham pasta dish.
Wanting to use up a bunch of carrots from the garden, I peeled and sliced some and tossed them in. The sweet crispness was pleasantly surprising adding another flavour profile to the pasta. Today this is how we make our pasta.
If you made this recipe tag Wanda Baker on Instagram and hashtag it #bakersbeans or #wandabaker
I grew up eating roasts that had been over cooked and had absolutely no flavour. I remember covering it with HP Sauce and trying to choke it down since I was “forced” to eat it. Two things came from this; A) I am not a huge Roast Beef fan, and B) I will never force my children to eat something they do not like.
I am however someone who loves to cook and is married to a Carnivore of English decent (think beef & potatoes). Plus I want my kids to grow up enjoying a wide range of foods. And so we/I cook Roasts several different ways (indirect grilling, rotisserie, slow cooker, dutch oven) and it always has to have a ton of flavour for me to eat it.
I came across this recipe awhile ago and have adapted it for our family making with vodka, red wine and more recently Cointreau. If you can not find shiitake mushrooms use white or cremini mushrooms, they work just as well and may be preferable for those not used to the texture of a shiitake mushroom.
Tip: You can make this recipe and/or any crockpot recipe the night before. Assemble all your ingredients in the stoneware the evening before and place covered stoneware in fridge. The next morning pull it out, plop it into it’s home, plug it in and get on with your day knowing supper will be ready when you get home. I did this a lot when I worked outside of the house and my first born was in a dayhome.
Cookie Monsters R US…or so it seems. Enter our Nutty Date Cookies. I needed a recipe to use up some frozen egg yolks that had been in the freezer for a while..when I stumbled upon this one and decided to change it up to suit our tastes.
I chopped the nuts & dates pretty small to try and disguise them and it worked. The family loves them. They are an ooey gooey crunchy deliciousness in your mouth.
I haven’t experimented too much with cassoulet’s, but it’s good comfort Fall & Winter food and I’m all about getting more of that into us. A cassoulet is a rich, slow-cooked casserole originating in the south of France, containing any kind of meat and layering it with beans.
This simplified version is made in the slowcooker and is delicious apres ski, fireside, after a building snowmen, snowshoeing, an afternoon skate or a walk in the crisp Fall leaves. This dish warms your soul.
I love my crockpot. Nothing better then smelling the aroma of supper cooking on a cold day…or a day where there are evening activities and not much time to cook. Hmmm come to think of it any day I smell supper simmering away is a good day!
This casserole is surprisingly delightful. We love barley and this dish a perfect accompaniment to pork or ham….although husband indicated it would be great with ice cream!
As this is a kid friendly recipe consider getting the kids involved with helping…they can dice, slice and toss into the slow cooker!
Ham and Cheese Breakfast Strudels are made with cooked ham, grated old cheddar cheese and scrambled eggs all rolled in phyllo pastry, topped with parmesan and baked until golden brown!
When I was a kid my mom, who is French, German and Romanian, used to make apple strudel all the time. She would occasionally branch out and make plum and pear strudel but apple was always our favourite.
We used to eat strudel for breakfast, I mean why not?
So taking the basic concept of strudel and stuffing it with savoury ingredients like ham, eggs and cheese seemed like a natural progression. Essentially you can stuff almost anything, not to liquidy into phyllo pastry making it the perfect vessel for a tasty bite.
Filo Pastry is paper-thin sheets of pastry dough used to make flaky, buttery desserts both sweet and savoury. It is very common in European baking and includes notable dishes like spanakopita, baklava, tarts, strudels, borek and more.
Using filo can be a little bit intimidating as it’s very delicate. You join layers together while working with it using melted butter or oil.
If you are using filo pastry for the first time, it’s good to know a few things about the dough before you begin.
I have worked with filo a lot and sum it up as a love hate relationship!
I love to eat anything made with filo however, I have had challenges working with it so here’s a few tips I’ve learned along the way.
If you made this recipe tag Wanda Baker on Instagram and hashtag it #bakersbeans or #wandabaker
These Beer and Pretzel Burgers are made with coarsely chopped pretzels, your favourite non light beer and a little pizza sauce making them a delicious choice on burger night!
There are so many combinations of burgers out there and so many to try at home, it’s nearly impossible to get bored eating burgers!
My husband likes craft beer, I like craft beer, so we are always sampling different local varieties of beer. Beer goes with pretzels and mustard. Our beer and pretzel burger combines all these ingredients and more making them extremely flavourful!
Here’s what you need to plan on when making these burgers.
Ground Beef Burger – go with an 80/20 blend if you can find it to ensure there is a little fat in the burgers.
Beer – choose a beer with flavour, light beer offers nothing in these burgers.
Pretzels – smaller is easier for crushing and retaining some texture.
Mustard – we use plain every day yellow mustard, however use whatever you have on hand.
Pizza Sauce – any will do!
Seasonings – coarse salt, fresh ground black pepper.
Buns – choose your favourite burger buns. Pretzel buns are delicious too!
Cheese – sometimes we like an old cheddar, gouda or smoked cheese, other times we go for something a little spicer.
If you made this recipe tag Wanda Baker on Instagram and hashtag it #bakersbeans
Along with cooler weather and beautiful landscapes, for me Fall also means baking, comfort food and, well, all things pumpkin.
Summer ends quickly around here, September rolls in and it’s back to school followed by preparations by Canadians everywhere getting ready for Canadian Thanksgiving in October. Pumpkin recipes, photos and pumpkin spice everything start to flood social media giving me the warm fuzzies.
We created this recipe based on our love for any kind of bundt cake plus having some leftover canned pumpkin and pecans needing to be used up. Serve it with a sprinkle of icing sugar, dollop or whipped cream, or even mascarpone.
Tips: Try roasted walnuts or hazelnuts in place of pecans. Make sure you have a bundt pan for this cake.
I thought the amount of maple syrup in this recipe would make it quite sweet so we cut it back a little and were pleasantly surprised at how nicely the vinegar, stock and maple syrup fused together to create a very delish sauce. The addition of the toasted walnuts further enhanced the overall dish and it was scrumptious. We initially did boneless, skinless thighs but next time we may try bone in/skin on thighs.
Fresh made pasta sounds so dreamy to me. As much as I’d love to have the time to whip up some fresh pasta, time is not a friend of mine with a busy family. We have 2 kids going in different directions all the time, an International student and my own activities. This recipe for pasta with butternut squash and fresh rosemary is delicious, simple, and easy to make during the busy work week.
With Fall being one of my favourite seasons, I look forward to the harvest vegetables like squash being ready available in all shapes and sizes. Butternut squash is one of those vegetables that plays nice with many other flavours and pairs exceptionally well with fresh rosemary and brown butter.
Use good quality olive oil whenever you can and the freshest rosemary you can find. You can prepare the squash the night before, just reheat a little before adding to pasta.
Garnish with some red pepper flakes if you like and have on hand for a touch of zing, toasted pine nuts, and a bit of shredded Parmesan cheese.
Hailey is the lemonade maker in our family and as such this is Hailey’s Lemonade. Served with a lemon wedge and mint sprig, this is a delish drink on a hot summer day. Also perfect for a lemonade stand.
Grilled Zucchini with Feta is a flavourful side dish, or could be a main when combined with other sides, combining tender crisp, charred zucchini and tangy feta cheese.
Simple and satisfying, Grilled Zucchini with Feta showcases the best of summer produce. Tender crispy grilled zucchini is given extra flavour with a light char and grill marks. A light dressing and tangy feta sprinkled on top creates a light, refreshing summer dish you will want on repeat as long as the zucchini is in season!
Selecting the right zucchini can make a big difference in the taste of your dish. When buying zucchini look for:
The goal is not to over cook the zucchini, otherwise it becomes too soft. Zucchini that retains a bite, somewhere in between mushy and crunchy, is the perfect way to enjoy this summer squash.
If you made this recipe tag Wanda Baker on Instagram and hashtag it #bakersbeans or #wandabaker
Pepperoni Pizza Muffins have been my kids favourite treats for the last several years. A delicious snack or light lunch, these muffins put a new spin on pizza!
With Fall comes back to school and with back to school comes lunches, snacks and easy dinners during the week. Summer has come to an end, routines are starting up again and mornings come way to fast.
I’ve always enjoyed being a school mom. The hustle and bustle each new day brings in the life of kids going to school. The social aspect, getting to know other moms and dads, the community and school involvement. I’ve been fortunate enough to stay at home with them and work from home, a huge sacrifice for our family but a decision that had to be made due to lack of dayhome and/or daycare available. We’ve been on the school after school care list for 7 years but they [the after school care peeps] made it clear they would wipe the list and not really care who was on it and when they were put on it giving no one priority or even a care in the world. But that’s a story for another day.
I’m a planner, although looking at my desk you might scratch your head at that comment, so planning meals comes naturally and really helps us get through the week. I’ve learned appetites come and go depending on the alignment of the moon, sun and stars so it’s always good to have extra snacks on hand or in the freezer. These pepperoni pizza muffins work for breakfast, lunch or an anytime snack. You could change it up and make them ham & pineapple or add in whatever pizza toppings you enjoy. Sausage, mushrooms, and more peppers – go for it.
Freeze them individually for those days you are in a rush and need to pop something in the kids lunches quickly. They will defrost in time to be devoured. Here’s how we do it.
If you made this recipe tag Wanda Baker on Instagram and hashtag it #bakersbeans or #wandabaker
One year ago the idea came to me to create a “recipe only” blog to support my “Foodie” addiction. After many hours of research and fact finding we are finally ready to Rock n Roll and go live with Bakersbeans.
Time has been the challenge of late in getting a new blog up and running all the while not ignoring our current Baker Family Blog. 10 yrs ago I was schooled in HTML editing and one of my titles was IT Assistant to the MIS Consultant and as such I knew my way around websites & computers quite well…but in the years since I have A) moved into new positions and away from MIS and B) married a computer geek therefore allowing him to be the “computer dude” in our house…and my “skills” to fade. Besides I have more important things to do like search for new, exciting and FUN recipes to try!
My interest in food was sparked in the 80’s where a typical Saturday morning would find me watching the PBS and trendsetters Julia Child, The Frugal Gourmet, Jacques Pepin & Wok with Yan. (I use to laugh to myself and think one day there would be a Wok with Wanda). Since my speciality is not Chinese cooking I didn’t feel the name suited the cause.
My passion for food started when I moved to Vancouver in 1989 and was immediately overwhelmed with the selection and variety of foods, markets and tastes that make Vancouver so culturely alive. That is when my culinary adventure began.
Fast forward to the present. Today I am a stay at home mom of two and dayhome provider to other little ones who grace me with their presence. This blog represents a collection of tried and true favourite recipes that I can access easily when in a hurry, can share with those that are interested and a legacy of family recipes that will be passed on to my two favourite little people. It’s not uncommon to find me perusing cookbooks & cooking magazines for fun, spending countless hours watching the foodnetwork and searching the WWW for the lastest & greatest Rachael Ray recipes. I LOVE experimenting with new recipes and then sitting back with vino in hand and watching the family’s reactions…..
And so we begin….
Who doesn’t love a good Cinnamon Toast Spread? Loved it as a kid…still love it now. And even better is I have a recipe that makes it healthier and without all the preservatives and artifical additives. I usually double the batch when I make it…about twice a year…..it lasts awhile and can be stored in your pantry.
Cinnamon Toast Spread
1/3 cup – butter
2/3 cup – granulated white sugar
1 tbsp – cinnamon (I always add more)
Measure all three ingredients into a saucepan over medium heat. Stir until butter is melted and ingredients combined. Remove the saucepan from the heat and let mixture cool in the pot. The butter will rise to the top. When cool, stir well and pour into storage container. Makes about 3/4 cup.
Enjoy!
Easy to make Taco Pasta is made with ground beef, pasta, fresh grated cheese, all tossed together to create a tasty variation for taco night!
Whether you enjoy tacos in a crunchy shell, soft shell or authentic Mexican tacos, they are always a welcome dish in most house holds. This dish packs a load of flavour, especially when you mix in all the taco toppings.
It’s an all in one quick meal, however if you have bigger appetites you can serve this taco pasta with a side salad.
Ground beef tacos are the kind many of us grew up with and technically they are not authentic Mexican tacos. I had those for the first time in Tijuana back in the 1970s, but that’s a whole other story!
Ground beef seasoned with spices, pasta cooked just until al dente, and the two combined and topped with all your favourite taco toppers is always well received dish for hungry tummies.
Now that I’ve got your attention, check out our tips and tricks below!
If you made this recipe tag Wanda Baker on Instagram and hashtag it #bakersbeans.
The nights seem crazy busy these days with two events/activities happening on some evenings. And these are the nights I need to have supper ready and on the table early.
I’ve made this dish quite a few times and I love the smokiness the cumin provides and hint of heat from the jalapeno peppers. Like any meat in the slowcooker, if you cook this too long it will lose it’s tenderness, so I’ve learned to keep it at 4-5 hours max. Also add your bacon at the end so it doesn’t get soft.
Serve it with mashed potatoes or buttered egg noodles and a variety of toppings. The toppings (listed in the recipe) pair so nicely with the flavours of the meat. My kids love it all except the beans lol.
Who says being on a food plan has to be boring?!! Good Eats also consist of beans and this Chickpea Salad with Feta will leave you feeling full and satisfied. I made this recipe last year and it fits perfectly into my current meal plan.
So much of the store granola bars & cereal bars are full of things we can’t pronounce and lots of sugar. We work hard at teaching our kids to make better food choices and not fill up on things like juice, junk food and sugar treats.
My girl and I made these bars the other day and they are sticky/gooey, yummy, not very sweet and pretty healthy for the most part. We love them!
Sausage and Swiss Chard Rigatoni combines flavourful Italian sausage, creamy white beans, and subtle tasting swiss chard creating a memorable pasta dish you will put on repeat!
One of my favourite proteins to cook with is sausage as it can be used in many different ways. For the last 19 years we have been buying fresh made sausage from local company Spolumbo’s Fine Foods & Deli. If you follow my blog and recipes, you will note I reference this company a few times as they are the best sausages I’ve had.
This leafy, colourful green is a member of the beet family. It’s an excellent source of vitamin K, vitamin A, magnesium and full of antioxidants. Leaves are firm with a mild, sweet, earthy and slight bitter taste.
It’s delicious in salads, saute with olive oil and lemon, chopped and tossed into soups or mixed into eggs dishes like frittatas, quiche and omelets.
Many of the ingredients in this dish are pantry ingredients with the exception of a couple! These are the main items you will need to make this recipe.
Brown your sausage and add all ingredients through to navy beans to create the sauce. Mix with cooked rigatoni, pour into a greased casserole dish, top with cheese and bake until bubbly. This dish will surprise you, it’s very tasty!
Looking for a glass of vino to enjoy with this pasta, we might recommend a Gamay, Cabernet Sauvignon or Malbec.
If you made this recipe please tag Wanda Baker on Instagram and hashtag it #bakersbeans or #wandabaker! Would love your feedback in the comments section below!
