With the Governor of North Carolina's stay at home order going into effect, all Keystone staff are now working remotely. We're extremely happy to be able to continue you providing the support and services you have come to expect from us even during this challenging time. Our past few blog posts have been focused on tips and tricks to help you continue working and providing as many books to your patrons as possible depending on your library's current status. This week we'd like to share something a bit lighter, so here's some recipes from Keystone staff we like to cook when we're stuck at home.
Read on for our Keystone Quarantine Kitchen Recipes including:
- Sour Cream Pound Cake
- Margon's Brownies
- Crawfish Etouffee
- Homemade Chex Mix
- Mac & Cheese Pizza
- Sweet Potato biscuits
- Greek meatballs, burgers, or meatloaf
- Butternut squash and sausage soup
From Nancy Underwood Honeycutt, Manager, Customer Support
Nancy shared her recipes saying, "My brother just asked for my mom's recipe for pound cake. Turns out it is the same as what Paula Deen uses. I figure mom cut it out of the newspaper or magazine. I'll also send a bonus recipe for brownies."
Sour Cream Pound Cake
2 sticks butter
3 C sugar
6 eggs
1 tsp - 1 tbs vanilla
3 C flour
1 C sour cream
1/2 tsp baking soda
Cream butter and sugar with mixer.
Add eggs and beat, followed with the rest of the ingredients
Bake in greased tub or bundt pan at 300 until knife inserted comes out clean and top is brown - about 1 1/2 hours.
Margon's brownies
(from family friends. We assume Margon was a relative in Nebraska)
3/4 C butter
3 squares chocolate
2 C sugar
3 eggs
1 3/4 C flour
vanilla
optional -nuts
Melt chocolate and butter. Add to sugar and eggs and mix. Add flour, vanilla & nuts
13x 9 pan
250 degree oven
1 hour.
The top of the brownies gets a nice crust on it.
From Brian White, Senior Developer
Crawfish Etouffee
It's hard to beat Crawfish Etouffee. Since the frozen crawfish are available at WalMarts everywhere, it should be doable for most customers.
Emeril's recipe will suit just fine - https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/emeril-lagasse/crawfish-etouffee-1-3645763
From Mitake Burts, Vice President, Products & Technology
Homemade Check Mix
This page has a number of different Chex Party Mix Recipes: https://www.chex.com/recipes/?chex-mix
Mitake says, "The advantage of making your own is that you can decide that cashews are vastly superior to mixed nuts, and not have to pick around the parts you don’t like."
From Katy Patrick, Technical Writer
Mac & Cheese Pizza
My family's favorite comfort food is Mac & Cheese Pizza.
Cook Mac & Cheese according to the box
Add a large egg and stir
Spread into foil-lined pizza pan. Or use a pie pan for a thicker "crust".
Bake at 350 for 15 minutes
Remove from oven, cover in pizza sauce, and add your favorite pizza toppings
Put back in the oven until the extra cheese is melted. I like to turn the broiler on at the end for a little extra crispness to the toppings!
From Marion Campbell, Customer Service Representative
Sweet Potato Biscuits
Here's what's cookin': Sweet Potatoe Biscuits
From the kitchen of: Dorothy Wright
4 cups packed of sweet potatoes
1 cup Crisco
1 cup of sugar
4 cups of self-rising flour
Peel sweet potatoes and boil until done.
While hot mash and add to them Crisco, sugar, and flour.
Mix good.
Work into biscuits.
More flour is sometimes needed. Depends on wetness of potatoe to be able to handle the mixture.
Bake at 350* for 20-30 minutes. Depending on size of biscuits.
Mix handles better if cooled.
Bake on greased cookie sheet.
From Drea Callicutt, Marketing, Sales & Communications Coordinator
Greek Meatballs
1 lb. ground turkey
1 package feta cheese
1 10-ounce box frozen spinach, thawed
1 raw egg
Greek Seasoning (I prefer Cavender's )
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 of a small red onion, diced
Italian Bread Crumbs
Oregano
Salt (I prefer Kosher Salt)
Black Pepper (I prefer Fresh Ground)
1 tbsp Olive Oil
1 tbsp Butter
Cookie Sheet
Preheat Oven to 350 degrees F.
Heat a large nonstick skillet over medium-low heat. Add the olive oil and the butter. When the butter melts, add the chopped red onion and chopped garlic and cook for 5 minutes. Transfer the onion and garlic to a large bowl to cool.
Add ground turkey, feta, greek seasoning, egg, garlic, onions, and spinach to a large mixing bowl. Then add the Greek Seasoning, Oregano, Salt & pepper to taste.
Get your hands dirty. Take off your jewelry and stick your hands in the bowl and start mixing it all together. The bread crumbs you add incrementally until you get a good consistency. You want to mixture to be moist but not runny. If you add too many bread crumbs, you can always add another egg for more moisture.
Wipe a cookie sheet down with Olive Oil.
Roll meatballs together between your palms and place on the cookie sheet approximately 2" apart.
Bake for 30 minutes and 350 degrees.
Notes: I use this same recipe to make burgers, meatloaf and meatballs. For the burgers, I can get 3-4 from 1 lb. of ground turkey and will either pan cook them in some olive oil, or grill them. For meatloaf, I place the whole mixture in a loaf pan greased with a bit of olive oil and then cook it at 350 for approximately 1 hour. Meatballs can either be pan fried or baked. I prefer baked cause it helps to reduce the amount of fat.
Butternut squash sausage soup
8 cups vegetable or chicken stock
3 carrots chopped
3 stalks celery chopped
1 onion chopped
1 butternut squash
3 cloves minced garlic
Olive oil
Salt & pepper
Sage
Tarragon
Parsley
Ginger
8 oz Cream cheese
1 lb sausage
Preheat oven to 400*F.
Half butternut squash lengthwise and put in a casserole dish.
Brush with olive oil and sprinkle with salt & pepper.
Cook at 400* for approximately 45 minutes or until you can easily spear it with a fork.
Remove squash and set aside.
In a large pot sautée onions and garlic in olive oil on medium heat.
Season with salt & pepper.
Add stock, carrots, and celery.
Add sage, tarragon, parsley, and ginger to taste.
Scrape roasted squash out of skin and transfer to the pot.
Bring to a boil.
Reduce heat to low, put lid on pot and let simmer for 2 hours.
Use immersion blender to combine vegetables until smooth.
Add cream cheese and blend again.
Brown sausage and transfer to pot.
Cook for another 20-30 minutes.
Serve.
