Cooking Day is a little different this time around. Ten women are involved and each will assemble three meals at home before exchanging them in a few weeks. I’m a little consumed by this project right now; there are visions of 60 chicken breasts, 15lb of hamburger and 100+ eggs dancing in my head. I enjoy the communal aspect of our regular Cooking Day — preparing a ton of meals amongst a ton of women has a certain appeal — so I’m not sure I’ll like doing the prep part by myself. However, the night of the exchange involves margaritas, so I think it’ll all work out nicely in the end. Not to mention the fact that my freezer will be stuffed full of 30 meals for my family.

Here’s what I’m preparing… The first two recipes our on our usual list of meals; the last is one I’m introducing.

Italian Chicken Marinade

Italian dressing
Soy sauce
Garlic
6 chicken breasts

Mix and bag it. Freeze.

Thaw and cook on grill/oven/stovetop until done.

Salisbury Steak

2 Eggs
3T crackers
2T onion
1 t salt
1 t pepper
1/2 t rubbed sage
1 1/2 lb hamburger
1 can mushrooms
4 T Butter
6 T Flour
4 beef bouillon cubes
6 servings instant mashed potatoes

Combine egg, cracker, onion, salt, pepper and sage. Add beef and mix, then shape into patties. Bag it. Put mush, butter, and bouillon in small bag. Place potatoes in another small bag labeled with instructions. Freeze.

Thaw. Sautee mush bag and all 6 T of flour then add 3 1/2 cup water cook and stir until smooth and thickened. Brown patties, a few minutes on each side, then add to gravy and cook for another 10 min or until no longer pink. Serve on mashed potatoes.

Breakfast Casserole

1/2 lb pork sausage
1 pkg (8oz) crescent rolls
8 eggs, beaten
1/2 C milk
1 C mozzerella
1 C cheddar
1 t dried oregano

Brown sausage, drain and cool. Place in small bag. Beat eggs, add cheeses and oregano, then pour into gallon bag. Double bag to prevent leaks. Freeze.

Thaw. Preheat oven to 350. Lightly spray of 9×13 pan, then roll out crescents
on the bottom. Bake for 4-5 minutes. Place sausage over rolls, then pour egg mixture over the top. Bake 35-30 minutes or until set.

Cinnamon Chip Applesauce Coffeecake

1 C (2 sticks) butter, softened
1 C sugar
2 eggs
1/2 t vanilla
3/4 C applesauce
2 1/2 C flour
1 t baking soda
1/2 t salt
1 pkg (10oz) Hershey’s Cinnamon Chips
1 C chopped pecans (opt)
Sugar glaze or powdered sugar

Heat oven to 350. Lightly grease 9×13″ pan. Beat butter and sugar in large bowl on med speed until well blended. Beat in eggs and vanilla. Mix in applesauce. Combine flour, baking soda and salt; gradually add to butter mixture, beating until well blended. Stir in cinnamon chips and pecans, if desired. Spread into prepared pan. Bake 30-35 minutes, or until done. Cool. Sprinkle with powdered sugar or drizzle with sugar glaze. (Sugar glaze: Stir together 3/4 C powdered sugar and 1-2 T of warm water to desired consistency.)

**Recipe from back of the cinnamon chip bag, courtesy of Hershey’s Kitchens. This is a fabulous recipe, found by way of one Mrs. Karen Choi and dutifully passed on to many other Zion women. I’m posting it here for easy reference (and just in case Hershey’s no longer prints this recipe on the chip bag).

1 lb pork sausage
1 pkg (8oz) crescent rolls
8 eggs, beaten
2 C mozzerella
2 C cheddar
1 t dried oregano

Heat oven to 350. Lightly grease a 9×13″ pan. Unroll crescents and place on bottom of pan, bake for 5 minutes or so, then remove from oven. Brown sausage, drain, and place evenly over crescent rolls. In a large bowl, mix beaten eggs, cheeses and oregano; pour over sausage and rolls. Bake 25-30 minutes or until the center is set.

**I found this very simple, very tasty breakfast casserole recipe from Allrecipes.com some time ago. It’s no longer there or else it has been adapted recently. I’ve used a variety of cheeses and meats in this one — it’s hard to go wrong with this versatile recipe.

Butternut squash soup sounds perfect for fall, right? The soup should have been delightful — thick, buttery and creamy, not difficult to make, and healthy to boot. I suppose my heart wanted to love this soup, but my tastebuds just didn’t agree the the sweet squash flavor. Though I tried to get past the odd taste, I couldn’t do it. Jeremy and I both agreed this soup is best eaten in small amounts. However, a boatload of folks over at AllRecipes.com disagreed and this recipe has received rave reviews.

6 tablespoons chopped onion
4 tablespoons margarine
6 cups peeled and cubed butternut squash
3 cups water
4 cubes chicken bouillon
1/2 teaspoon dried marjoram
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
1/8 teaspoon ground cayenne pepper
2 (8 ounce) packages cream cheese

DIRECTIONS:
In a large saucepan, saute onions in margarine until tender. Add squash, water, bouillon, marjoram, black pepper and cayenne pepper. Bring to boil; cook 20 minutes, or until squash is tender.

Puree squash and cream cheese in a blender or food processor in batches until smooth. Return to saucepan, and heat through. Do not allow to boil.

**I substituted minced dried onion for the real thing and included only one package of cream cheese, per others’ recommendations.

My mom and I made this recipe last Thursday and it yielded a really delicious fall soup (or “stoup” as Rachael Ray terms her recipes that are somewhere between a stew and a soup). I found the recipe in the chef’s 30-minute Get Real Meals book.

2 TB vegetable oil
2 TB butter, cut into pats
3 knockwursts, diced into 1-inch cubes
3 bratwursts, diced into 1-inch cubes
1 red onion, quartered and thinly sliced
2 lb red cabbage, quartered and shredded
1 t caraway seeds
salt & pepper
1 12oz bottle dark beer
1 qt veal or chicken stock
2 C tomato sauce
2 TB Worcestershire sauce
1 bay leaf, fresh or dried
3 TB finely chopped flat-leaf parsley
2 Red or Golden Delicious apples, peeled and diced
juice of 1/2 lemon

Heat a big soup pot over med-high heat. Add 1 TB of vegetable oil and half the butter. When the butter melts into the oil, add the cubed worsts and brown them on all sides, 5 minutes. Remove the browned sausages and add the remaining tablespoon each of oil and butter. When the butter melts into the oil, add the onion and cook for 2 minutes. Add the cabbage and caraway, season with salt and pepper, and stir. Cook the cabbage for 10 minutes, stirring frequently. Add the beer and cook down 1 minute. Add the stock, tomato sauce, Worcestershire, and bay leaf and stir to combine. Add the wurst back to the pot. Cover the pot and bring the stoup up to a boil, 2 or 3 minutes. Remove the lid and simmer for 5-10 minutes longer, until the cabbage is tender. Remove the bay leaf. Combine the parsley, apple, and lemon juice in a small bowl. Ladle the stoup into shallow bowls and top with generous spoonfuls of the flavored apples to stir into the stoup as you eat it.

**We used Emeril’s Chicken & Apple Sausage in place of the wursts simply because it’s what we had on hand. In retrospect, we should have added these fully cooked sausages at the end of cooking. Also, it took longer than 10 minutes to produce tender cabbage. Nonetheless, the stoup made for an unusual and delicious dinner!