Chili

Well it is officially football season. The NFL has started their preseason games and today is the home opener here in

Poland, Ohio! Go Bulldogs!

What better way to kick off the football season then with Chili!

Marco and the guys have there tickets for the game ready and we have our bulldog t-shirts ready to go. To give them a little taste for the season I will be making an amazing chili meal that the cookbook will be able to share with you.

Chili is the dish of choice this evening. When you think of chili or when you taste it, I don't know about you, but I think about the fall season more than anything. Fall is my favorite time of year. So when I get the urge to make some chili I know it is just around the corner.

When you make this recipe you can do it one of two ways. You can either cook it all on the stove in a big pot or you can cook it in a slow cooker on low for about 4 hours.

If you cook it in your slow cooker, I would suggest cooking the meat on the stove first with your onion and garlic just to brown the meat a little and season it. Then I would transfer the meat mixture to your slow cooker along with all the beans and sauces that it calls for.

Today I am going to use my slow cooker. This way I can have it all ready for later and while it is cooking I can do some other things I need to do.

Using a slow cooker for me is the best. Especially on my nights I have to work.

You can use all the beans that the recipe calls for or you can take some out or even add some if you would like.

Remember the only can of beans that you do not drain out are the Chili Beans!!

To add a little more hotness to your chili you can use Hungarian hot peppers.

MAKE SURE YOU WASH YOUR HANDS RIGHT AFTER YOU WORK WITH THE HOT PEPPERS-THE SEEDS ARE HOT!!

Once everything is all combined in one large pot or your slow cooker, let it simmer.

Once the chili is complete you can get your shredded cheddar ready and top each dish with some cheese and if you like you can throw some oyster crackers on as well to top it off!

Just a little advice:

Grilled Cheese is a great add on with Chili!

I hope you enjoy and Go Bulldogs!!

and Dolphins of course!!!

Rummage Sale!!

I have taken a few days off in the kitchen. I will be back on Thursday, due to traveling back and forth to the Falls! I hope you are all enjoying the sneak peak to the cookbook and we are getting really excited for the soon to be release date!

Did you see the Newspaper!!!

Thanks to the Niagara Gazette, they have done a lot of advertising for A Stir in the Mist!

Taste-testing the new Niagara Falls Cookbook

NIAGARA FALLS GAZETTE ARTICLE—
     The ladies helping to create the newest Niagara Falls cookbook had to try hundreds of recipes.At every meeting volunteers each brought many of the recipes being considered for the book and everybody tasted and critiqued. It was, as they say, a hard job, but someone had to do it.
    “I just didn’t want it to end,” said Maria Brown, city comptroller, who is volunteering her accounting skills to the committee and attended the many food tastings.
“The food was outstanding,” she said. “It was so much fun I’m going to miss seeing the other members on a regular basis.”
Well, it had to end sooner or later. The final 350 recipes have been selected from nearly 800 contributions and those involved say these are the very best offerings from the cooks and chefs in the region.“It’s beyond our expectations,” said Rita Majka, Boys and Girls Club director of development who has been leading the effort to immortalize some of the area’s best recipes.“We want people to know the book will be ready for the holidays,” she said. The cost, with taxes, is $25 and the committee plans to print about 3,000 copies in the first run.The book is a hardcover and embellished with the Niagara Falls based art by local artist Kath Schifano of Grand Island. It includes recipes from many local cultures as well as favorites from local restaurants. Many of the pages include history of the region.The committee has raised over $20,000 for the first run of the book. They will need about $29,000 to go to press, she said, and the hope is that once the initial costs of the first printing are paid, reprinting will be much less costly and the book can raise money for the club for many years to come.
The cookbook committee is having a rummage sale to collect the final few thousand required for the first printing of the book. The sale is being held at the Boys and Girls Club of Niagara Falls from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Aug. 28 and 29.When the book is printed it will be sold in area tourist shops and at the Boys and Girls Club.Committee members are currently meeting with major retailers such as Wegmans in hopes of getting more exposure in the community. Those who would like to pre-order can send a check for $25 to the Boys and Girls Club of Niagara Falls, 725 17th St., Niagara Falls, NY 14301.

What a great article they put in! Please keep following for more information.

August 28-29th from 8am-1pm at the Niagara Falls Boys and Girls Club(725 17th Street)

We will be having a Giant Community Rummage Sale!

All Items Donated to Sell are Welcome!

Stop by and check out the selection, and be sure to tell friends!

Hope to See you there!

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

Well since the last couple recipes that I "stirred" my way through were entrees, I am going to go back to my sweet tooth!

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies, do I have to say anymore. Two for the price of one!

Most of the recipes in the cookbook are perfect for something you may need last minute or just to make to have something in your kitchen in case someone may stop over or for the family to pick on. This recipe for the peanut butter chocolate chip cookies is ideal for something to make last minute. More than likely you will have all the ingredients right in your cupboard waiting to be used!

This recipe you will need a few mixing bowls, because everything will not be mixed at first all together. You will add the dry mixture that you have put together into the other ingredients.

Once you get everything mixing in one bowl, you will notice that it will get a little tougher to blend together. I guess I could have used my Kitchen Aid mixer for this recipe, but I think after my little episode with it last time I will stick to the hand mixer. Make sure the bigger out of the two bowls has the margerine and peanut butter mixtures inside of it. This way once you add your dry mix to the other ingredients you will have everything in a bigger mixing bowl. Before adding the dry mix in, make sure the peanut butter and all the ingredients are blended first and nice and fluffy!

Get your baking sheets ready and pre-heat your oven.

I used a little tablespoon scoop to form my cookies into little balls. You can use your hands, it is totally up to  you.

When you bake them, the recipe calls for 10 minutes. I would do a little less just to make sure if your oven is a little bit hotter than the owner of this recipe. Try and get the top of the cookies a little golden but not real well done. This way when they sit out to cool down they will harden just a little bit more on there own.

This recipe for me made about 4 dozen cookies.

They are perfect little bite size cookies that everyone will love.

I let them sit out a little after baking them for 9 minutes and they are nice and chewy with a little bit golden on top!

You must try these and I hope you have a glass of milk ready because they are good!

Enjoy!

Italian Pasta with Sausage and Zucchini

Growing up in an Italian family for both Marco and I, has made us appreciate Italian cooking and baking so much.

Macaroni/Pasta is our favorite of course. After all the Sunday macaroni dinners growing up, how could it not be your favorite? 

When my mom or grandma used to make "sauce" it was an all day process. Not so much the adding of the ingredients, but the stirring of the sauce every so often until it was done, is what I remember. I actually got volunterred quite a few times when the timer went off.

"Nat, can you stir the sauce!"

My favorite part of making sauce was always when there were a few meatballs that mom would put aside after frying them, before putting them in the sauce. We always got to sample the meatballs with Di Camillo's Italian bread. Mmmmm... Boy do we miss the bread from there. When I was really young we even sometimes got the bread from Trusellos Bakery (to me it was always the "green" place), along with the bread a few slices of pizza.

The key to sauce is to be patient and make sure you keep on stirring and use a good pot. If the heat is to high and you burn just a little of the bottom,
YOU ARE DONE!

I did it once and between the smell in the kitchen and just the thought about throwing a whole pot of sauce away mad me sick.

When you make your sauce always make extra, you can always freeze it for another day. Or use it for another tasty recipe in "A Stir in the Mist."

Today I am making a fresh pot of sauce, this way I have some fresh onions, garlic and spices that will be needed in this recipe.

Italian Pasta with Sausage and Zucchini

is our dinner for tonite.

Once you have your sauce made it is a fairly easy recipe to follow.

You will be using two different types of meat. Sausage and ground beef.

So if you are making sauce or already have sauce frozen, make sure it is meatless otherwise it may be to much meat. I am going to use a mild sausage, you can use something a little spicer if you would like. It is really up to you.

The Zucchini, the sausage, and the ground beef will all be cooked separately, and one at a time. Use the same pan and oil for each meat and zucchini. Once everything is cooked to perfection the ingredients will then be combined into the pasta along with the sauce.

Once it is all put together you will bake the whole dish just to finish it off. Most of the ingredients will be mixed together in either a roasting dish if you have one, or I used a baking dish myself because that is what I had.

Italian Pasta with Sausage and Zucchini is a recipe that you will love. If you are having company this is a great dish to make or for your whole family. Along with it I served salad but you can really serve anything. This recipe has a blend of Macaroni, Meat Sauce, Sausage and Zucchinni so you will not need much more than that other than an appetite!

Enjoy!

Hope Everyone is Enjoying the recipes!

I hope everyone is enjoying as I blog about these delicious recipes!

The Chicken Divan was a big hit here in the Soffritti house. This dish has so many different flavors that you will not be able to just eat one helping. So make sure if you are having company you have enough for seconds.

Tonite I am taking a night off in the kitchen. Tomorrow I will continue with another Entree.

The one thing I learned after getting married and really enjoying my time in the kitchen. Is that when you take a night off of cooking anything yourself, you truly do appreciate the restaurants around you.

That is one of the many things that I do miss now that we have moved away.

The Food!

It may sound weird but when you have lived somewhere all your life you alway know what restaurants to go to and which restaurants to stay away from. What menu item to order or what menu item not to order.

Niagara Falls is very lucky to have so many great places to eat out at.

A Stir in the Mist is going to be featuring some great recipes from some very well known restaurant businesses in the area. This way you can try out in your own kitchen some of the menu items you may have been curious about for a long time.

See you tomorrow!

"Some people like to paint pictures, or do gardening, or build a boat in the basement. Other people get a tremendous pleasure out of the kitchen, because cooking is just as creative and imaginative an activity as drawing, or wood carving, or music."

 Julia Child

Chicken Divan

Chicken Divan is one of the many delicious recipes out of our entrees section in the cookbook. I have never tried to make this recipe nor have I ever tasted this dish before so I  am looking forward to putting it all together and trying it out for the first time.This recipe calls for a few different ingredients that I never thought would go together well.

Mayonaise, Curry Powder, Broccolli and more.
I got all my ingredients today from the Italian Grocery Store here in Ohio called

Rulli Bros.

For all you Latina lovers, it is similar but it is as big as a large department store.

To get my chicken was a challenge. I guess I should have gotten a head start a little earlier this morning. The women that were waiting were all a little older and they were shopping
like it was Black Friday  in The Fashion Outlets Mall.

I pulled my ticket  at the meat counter and I pulled #44. Come to find out they were on #13. Normally at Wegmans or any other store you usually pull number 3 and they are on number 2. The women that shop there definitely have there shopping system down, get your number first, then do all your shopping and by the time you are done, your number will most likely be called. 

Oh well now I know. I guess when Chicken Breasts are $1.58 per pound you really cannot blame the chaos.

This dish was a quick dish to make. Especially if you prepare it earlier in the day and about 45 minutes before you are looking to have dinner, you can just put it in the oven.
If you are going to get your ingredients together earlier in the day, I would suggest getting the chicken ready at the last minute. The first step you are told to do in this recipe is brown the chicken in oil before actually baking it with all the other ingredients. When browning chicken you are really not totally cooking it through so I suggest that you do not brown the chicken and then store it in the fridge until you are ready to bake.
Just get your sauces ready ahead of time , but the chicken I would cook right before you know you are going to bake it.

When you put everything in the baking dish there is no right or wrong way just put it all in and top with with all the sauces.


The sauces are pretty thick so cover everything the best you can.

While baking Chicken Divan you can prepare a nice rice dish or salad. You really do not need a side of vegetables to serve with this dinner, because of the mushrooms and broccolli that come right in the dish.

After taking the Chicken Divan out of the oven, you get the most mouth watering aroma that fills your kitchen. The top of it actually looks a little carmalized once it is done.

The flavors from the sauce on top of everything just is amazing and the breadcrumbs that are baked on top just add to the wonderful flavor.

This is a Must Try dish that everyone will love!!

Hope you enjoy

Bon Appetit!

Tex-Mex

When going to a party or picnic and you want to bring something that the guest will go nuts for.. Bring Tex Mex!

This taco dip is a blend of different layers that give you a taste for more.

The recipe is so easy and quick and it is even really cheap to make.

Most people do not like tomatoes but in this appetizer you can put the tomatoes in I am sure they will eat it either way, it gives it a nice taste.

Just for you curious readers out there. Tex Mex is a blend of blend of Mexican and southwest U.S. cultural elements. It is a Mexican recipe that was made by Texas cooks.

The recipe gives you the order in which you should do your layers. The first two layers are key, I would not change that. The last couple you can flip flop to your liking if you wish but the original way is a hit.

In this recipe you have to do some chopping. I got to put my new Pampered Chef food chopper into use on my olives. That little cooking tool is amazing it saves time and your fingers from chopping food really small. I would highly recommend getting one!

                                                                                          

Once all the layers are into the dish, you are Done!

You can put it into the fridge and let it sit until its party time.

Just a little tip:

1. I would suggest grating the cheese yourself on top, rather than gettting the cheese in a bag already shredded. Just a little tip, that will make a difference.
2. Scoops are the tortilla chip that go best with this dip!
(you can use any type of tortilla chip scoops are just my preference)

Hope you enjoy!

Cookie Dough Brownies

Well I hope you all enjoyed the cherry squares. This next recipe I am going to stick with the desserts. YUM!!

Next week I will start with some entrees and sides. My menu this week for dinner is already made so I will stick to baking some tasty treats.

This dessert I am baking today is probably the 3rd dessert I have ever made in a kitchen. That is including the cherry squares from yesterday. Baking has never been something I have had interest in. I love to cook more than anything. I do not mind following directions but baking you have to follow pretty much every single direction or else things can get screwed up.(If you put regular sugar into a recipe that calls for confectioner sugar things really can get messy.. ha ha.. been there done that..)
 I like going into the kitchen with an open mind, trying a little of this and trying a little of that. If it works it works if it doesnt there is always tomorrow or my wonderful husband who will try anything to make me happy.

Cookie Dough Brownies is the special treat for today. I dont know about you, but cookie dough alone is one of my favorites and browniesss... who could not love them.
There are three different steps to this recipe. I will make the actual brownie then I will top them with a creamy, buttery mix. Finally I will use a chocolaty glaze to finish the top. My mouth is watering as I am typing this.

Well the brownies are made and they are cooling down. I will then move to the next step. I have my ingredients ready for the next two steps in front of me and the one ingredient is just so tempting to taste. Semisweet Chocolate Chips, how can you do all this baking and not have a few of these as you go along.

I mean you want to make sure they are fresh, right?

This recipe is very easy, there are a few more steps and ingredients needed, compared to the cherry squares and regular brownies, but it is well worth the extra steps. If you do need these brownies for a party, picnic or any sort of gathering other than just eating them in the comfort of your own home. I would suggest to start this delicious masterpiece the day before. I made them yesterday, but after each step you want to make sure it cools down completely before you move onto the next step. It is a layered dessert.

When I put my final layer on, I let the brownies sit out through the night, covered of course, and when I woke up this morning I  had the best breakfast any girl would want. A Cookie Dough Brownie and a glass of milk.
Mmmmmmmm....
Wow, these brownies are amazing.
They came out perfect. You get the best of both worlds..
Brownie vs. The cookie Dough!

Hints and Tips:

1.When you do try this recipe, I would suggest the only step that you should put the baking dish in the fridge with the brownies, is when you put the cookie dough layer on. All the other steps just leave it out to cool down and chill out.

2.While eating this delicious dessert a glass of water or milk is a must! If you are a chocolate lover, you will get everything you want and more.

3.This one recipe is enough for quite a few people. You can cut them into regular brownie sizes or into little squares to share with co- workers like I am going to do tonite.

4. Finally... While making the last step if you want to have a volunteer lick the remains off the spoon go for it, I would recommend keeping it to yourself!

Enjoy.