Cafe Rio House Dressing

Cafe Rio House Cilantro dressing

1 pack Hidden Valley Ranch (not buttermilk kind)
1 cup mayo
1 cup buttermilk
2 tomatillos
1/2 bunch cilantro
clove of garlic or garlic powder
Juice of 1 lime
1 jalapeno

Put in blender and mix for delicious dressing.  So good, especially with the Cafe Rio pork recipe of Maren's.

BBQ Chicken Pizza

I love this recipe from here. Of course I changed things up a bit for my liking. I hope you enjoy!

BBQ Chicken Pizza

Ingredients

• 1 whole Recipe For Pizza Crust (mine Makes Two Crusts) I bought a store pizza crust as I didn't have time to make one from scratch...it was a really good whole wheat crust. In so doing you only need about 1/2 of everything listed here.
  
• 2 whole Boneless, Skinless Chicken Breasts
• ½ cups Barbecue Sauce
• Olive Oil, For Drizzling
• Salt For Sprinkling
• 16 ounces, weight Fresh Mozzarella Cheese, Sliced Thinly
• ½ whole Red Onion, Cut In Half And Sliced Very Thin
• Chopped Cilantro, to taste I don't like cilantro unless it is a little bit so you could add a little to the top or you could just forget about it like I did. The pizza is good either way.
  

Preparation Instructions

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Salt chicken breasts on both sides, then place in an ovenproof dish. Pour BBQ sauce over the breasts and turn them over to coat. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes, or until chicken is done. Remove from oven and cut into a fine dice. Set aside.

Increase oven temperature to 500 degrees.

Roll/stretch out one pizza crust. Lay it on a sheet pan drizzled with olive oil. Drizzle a little olive oil on the crust, then sprinkle on a little salt.

Spoon a couple of tablespoons of extra BBQ sauce on the crust and spread it evenly. Top sauce with half the sliced mozzarella. Sprinkle on half the diced chicken and thinly sliced red onion.

Sprinkle again with a little salt, then bake for 15 to 17 minutes, or until crust is golden brown and toppings are bubbly.

Remove from the oven and sprinkle on plenty of chopped cilantro. Cut into squares and serve immediately. Repeat with other crust and other ingredients, or save for another time.

Here is how I changed it. I didn't buy my own crust as

Basic Pizza Crust

Ingredients

• 1 teaspoon Instant Or Active Dry Yeast
• 1-½ cup Warm Water
• 4 cups All-purpose Flour
• 1 teaspoon Kosher Salt
• ⅓ cups Olive Oil

Preparation Instructions

Sprinkle yeast over 1 1/2 cups warm (not lukewarm) water. Let stand for a few minutes.

In a mixer, combine flour and salt. With the mixer running on low speed (with paddle attachment), drizzle in olive oil until combined with flour. Next, pour in yeast/water mixture and mix until just combined, and the dough comes together in a sticky mass.

Coat a separate mixing bowl with a light drizzle of olive oil, and form the dough into a ball. Toss to coat dough in olive oil, then cover the bowl tightly with plastic wrap and set it aside for 1 to 2 hours, or store in the fridge until you need it.

Note: it’s best to make the dough at least 24 hours in advance, and 3 or 4 days is even better.

When you are ready to make the pizza, grab HALF the pizza dough (recipe makes 2 crusts) and squeeze the dough toward the bottom to form a nice, tight, pulled ball. You can roll out the pizza with a rolling pin if you’d like, but sometimes it’s just as easy to throw it around and pull and stretch till it feels right. And when the crust is nice and thin, lay it on an oiled baking sheet or pizza pan. Drizzle a little olive oil on the dough and spread it with your fingers. Very lightly sprinkle some salt on the crust.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Top your crust with your toppings of choice. Then bake for 15 to 17 minutes, or until crust is golden brown and toppings are bubbly.

Snickerdoodles

This Snickerdoodle recipe is dynamite. If you don't believe me, let me know and I will send you a dozen or so. You'll love them.

Cookies:
1 cup margarine, room temperature
1-1/3 cup sugar
2 eggs
3 cups all-purpose flour
1-1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 teaspoon baking soda
pinch of salt

Cinnamon sugar coating:
2 tablespoons sugar
1-1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

prepare cinnamon sugar coating; set aside. Preheat oven to 375. In a large bowl, beat together margarine, sugar, and eggs until fluffy. Add flour, cream of tartar, baking soda, and salt, beating until blended. Shape into 1-1/2 inch balls. Roll balls in cinnamon sugar coating. Place on cookie sheets. Bake 8 minutes or until golden. Don't overcook these suckers or they'll be hard and crunchy and no good. Remove from cookie sheets; cool on rack. Enjoy with a cold glass of milk.

Cat Head Biscuits

I know weird name, but they are called this because they are as big as a cat head. One of my favorite restaurants here, Hash House a Go Go, has these killer buttermilk biscuits that they bring out before your meal. They are huge, warm, and drizzled with melted butter and honey. Honestly, they are divine! So imagine my excitement when I opened this month's Cook's Country {fabulous magazine} and saw this recipe for Cat Head Biscuits. And they were crazy good, I may even say just as good as the Hash House ones! So rearrange your menu and make these suckers soon!

1 1/2 cup all purpose flour

1 1/2 cup cake flour {they have a very long explanation why, just make sure you use both!}

1 tbs baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

8 tablespoons unsalted butter cut into 1/2 inch pieces and softened

4 tablespoons vegetable shortening cut into 1/2 inch pieces
1 1/4 cup buttermilk

Adjust the oven rack to upper-middle position and heat oven to 425 degrees. Grease 9 inch cake pan.

Combine flours, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a large bowl. Rub butter and shortening into flour until mixture resembles coarse meal. Stir in buttermilk until combined.

Use a 1/2 cup measure or a large spring loaded ice cream scoop to transfer 6 heaping portions of dough into the prepared pan. 5 on the outside and 1 in the middle.

Bake until puffed and golden brown 20-25 minutes. Cook in pan for 10 minutes then transfer to wire rack.

**I hate to buy buttermilk, you have to buy the huge thing of it and only use about 1 cup. So I have been using the SACO cultured buttermilk blend that you can find in the baking isle and it works wonderfully! I really can't tell the difference and it is really easy to use.

Cottage Cheese Chicken Enchiladas

These enchiladas are delicious. I probably make them every other week because we like them so much. Make them as spicy or as mild as you like. I usually use mild taco seasoning and medium enchilada sauce. I also use low fat cottage cheese and sour cream. They still taste great.

Ingedients:

• 1 Tbs olive oil
• 2 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves (boiled, shredded)
• 1/2 cup chopped onion
• 1 can chopped green chili peppers (7 oz)
• 1 package taco seasoning
• 1/2 cup sour cream
• 2 cups cottage cheese
• 1 tsp salt
• pinch of ground black pepper
• 12 tortillas (6 inch)
• 1 can enchilada sauce (10 0z)
• 2 cups shredded Mexican cheese
  

Directions:

1. Meat Mixture: heat oil in skillet over medium/high heat. Add chicken, onion, green chili peppers. Saute until brown. Then add taco seasoning and prepare as packet instructions direct.

2. Cheese Mixture: in large bowl, combine sour cream and cottage cheese. Season with salt and pepper.

3. Preheat oven to 350 F

4. Assemble: heat tortillas until warm. In each tortilla, spoon meat mixture, cheese mixture, and a bit of shredded cheese. Roll tortillas and place in lightly greased 9x13 inch casserole dish. Top with enchilada sauce and any remaining meat or cheese mixture.

5. Bake for 30 minutes or until cheese is melted and bubbly.

Margarita Spaghetti

This is one of our favorite recipes. If you like spaghetti, you will love this. It makes a lot of food, so I generally half the recipe. Two of us can't eat a pound of spaghetti. Give it a try and let me know what you think.

Ingredients:

• 1 lb spaghetti
• 8 oz fresh mozzarella
• 1/4 cup Romano cheese
• Fresh basil
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp sugar
• 1 tsp garlic salt
• 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
• 1 Tbs butter
• 10 Roma tomatoes (finely chopped)
  

Directions:

1. cook spaghetti
2. In sauce pan, mix and let simmer olive oil, butter, garlic salt, Roma tomatoes, salt, pepper,
sugar
3. Chop basil
4. Cut up mozzarella
5. Gate Romano cheese
6. In large bowl, combine spaghetti, sauce, basil and cheese