My new favorite way to cook bacon...

I got this from About.com

Baking bacon is an easy, mess-proof way to prepare this pork product. You don't have to turn it or deal with spatters.

First, preheat your oven to 400 degrees F. Line a cookie sheet or baking pan with sides with heavy-duty foil. Arrange the bacon on the pan, side-by side, being sure not to overlap the pieces.

Don wrote me and said that to give the bacon that pretty 'ridged' look he wads and unfolds the foil first so it is wavy, then puts the bacon on it. That gives the fat somewhere to go so the bacon isn't sitting in the fat as it cooks and shapes the bacon while baking.

Bake the bacon for 10-15 minutes for thin-cut, or until desired doneness. I myself like my bacon very crisp, so I bake it 15-17 minutes. For thick bacon, add another 4-6 minutes. Carefully remove from the oven, drain on paper towels, and use.

Mushroom Tarts

First, you make the mushrooms:

4 T butter in a large skillet
Add 1/2 C minced onion and cook until translucent.
Add 1.5 lbs mushrooms, coarsely chopped and a few good shakes of dried thyme. Cook 15 minutes, or until brown and dry. This can be refrigerated for up to 2 days, or frozen.

Then, make the tart shells:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
Brush 1/2 C softened butter into the cups of two mini-muffin pans.
Using a 2 1/2" biscuit cutter, cut out circles from two loaves of white bread. Carefully work the bread circles into the cups (so the bread doesn't rip) and then press them firmly into the cups. Bake 10 minutes and cool on a wire rack.

Spoon the mushrooms into the shells and toss on a dollop of sour cream. Good served warm or at room temperature.

Makes about 40.

EdgyK's Spaghetti Sauce

I kind of created this from trying several different recipes. So I didn't come up with it completely on my own. We have spaghetti every Monday night. Now that I make this I don't like the taste of store bought sauce. I canned some last year from the tomatoes I had grown but that was a lot of work for only a few quarts.

1 can diced tomatoes
2 small cans or 1 large can tomato sauce
2 tsp. Italian seasoning*
1/2 cup chopped peppers**
2 tsp. diced garlic
3 Tbsp. dried, minced onion or 1/2 cup finely chopped onion
1/4 tsp. garlic salt
1 tsp. beef bouillon
pepper

Optional:
ground fennel seeds

Mix everything together in a saucepan and let simmer 20 minutes. Add meatballs or ground beef if you want. Serves 6-8 people.

*I use Penzey's Tuscan sunset
**I buy 4 or 5 red and yellow peppers, chop them and freeze them. I like to make my sauce fresh each week.

Christmas Yummies

Somehow I just knew Blogger was going to put my pictures in the wrong order! So in the above picture you see the delicious Christmas dinner we enjoyed. Honey-glazed ham, homemade rolls, and Harvest Green Beans. With Martinelli's to drink, natch.

The picture below shows part of Christmas breakfast. My husband and I have a traditional Christmas breakfast, as I suspect most do. Ours is bacon, eggs & orange juice. We made an addition this year. My husband treated us to the bacon and eggs...

...while I provided the cinnamon rolls. This recipe is very handy as you make the rolls the night before and then pop them in the fridge. Half an hour to warm up in the morning and half an hour to bake and you've got fresh, gooey cinnamon rolls without having to wake up early! The dough is very rich and eggy. Yum! We decided these are now part of our traditional Christmas breakfast.

Pre-frosting.

If you love veggies as much as I do then you'll want to sign up for this contest. I signed up and I hope I win so I can go to Chicago and become a Veggie growing expert!!!