Grilled Chicken Salad with Raspberry Vinaigrette #SundayFunday

We have enjoyed a lot of Main Dish Salad Suppers this summer and a great way to change them up and keep your Weekly Menu exciting is by making new and delicious homemade dressings.

I took this Grilled Chicken Salad to new heights in just minutes by whisking together a dressing of fresh raspberries and fresh basil from my garden.

Gauguin Gnocchi, served up with a Book Review

Quite a while back, I ordered up one of the Nook deals that occasionally pop up on my e-reader.  This deal gave you the first three books in a series by Estelle Ryan.  The novel I'm sharing with you today is the first in that series, The Gauguin Connection.

These novels sat on my e-reader for nearly a year (maybe longer) before I finally got around to opening this one.  Now I am kicking myself for waiting so long and for wasting so much time.  I read this on the airplane while traveling to California.  The trip went by in a flash, so engrossed was I with this well written novel and the characters portrayed.

The protagonist is Genevieve Lenard, an extremely intelligent woman who suffers from high functioning autism.  Doctor Lenard is an unparalleled expert at reading non verbal cues and as such has been hired by an insurance company to study footage of clients who are making multi million dollar claims.

The novel starts with Dr. Lenard meeting a police detective who is a friend of her boss and mentor, Phillip.  Phillip is the closest thing to a "friend" that Genevieve has.  There is mutual respect and trust so when Phillip asks Genevieve to work with this detective, Manny, she forces herself to listen and agrees to work with him in a limited capacity.

The best laid plans......Dr. Lenard soon finds herself surrounded by "criminals" who insinuate themselves into her life.  There is Colin, the handsome and charming art thief and forger.  Vinnie his huge, intimidating and loveable body guard and Francine a fashion model type beauty who can hack into any computer system around.

This unlikely crew all end up working together to solve the mystery of who is having forgeries of great works of art created and then killing those young artists that they have hired to paint the forgeries.  

Vinnie, as big and as intimidating as he is, has a very maternal streak in him and spends his time, while guarding others, cooking and cleaning.  One of the meals he served was his grandmother's recipe for Gnocchi.

I had never made Gnocchi before but this scene in the book made me want to give it a shot.  I found this recipe over at Taste of Home and served it up today for Meatless Monday.  This is also a great recipe if you are abstaining from meat the Lenten Season.

Every nationality has it's version of dumplings.  These "little pillows", as tenderly referred to in Italy, are their version.  I thought they were very similar in technique to Pelmini that I have made with my Russian daughter, Marina.  They are even more similar to Lazy Pierogi, that we make using Frank's Mom's recipe.

I learned a couple of things when making this tonight.  First, I needed about a cup more flour than the original recipe to make my dough able to be worked.  Second, the smaller dumplings were tastier than the large, so I will take better care next to use consistency.  

I used pesto to dress my gnocchi but you can use a marinara sauce, ragu or just toss it with olive oil or butter and salt and pepper.

I am linking up with Foodies Read where my friends and I meet up to see what the others are cooking, reading and eating.  Stop by and find some great reads and recipes.

Gnocchi

adapted from Taste of Home

4 large, waxy, golden potatoes, peeled and quartered

1 egg

salt and pepper, to taste

2-3 c. flour

Sauce of choice

Place the potatoes into a pot and cover with water.  Add salt and bring to a boil.  Lower heat, cover and simmer for 15-20 minutes, until easily pierced with a fork.  Drain and spread onto a baking sheet to dry and cool a bit.

Mash the potatoes.  Place 2 cups of the potatoes into the bowl of a stand mixer.  Reserve any remaining potatoes for another use.  Season with salt and pepper.  Place the dough hook onto the mixer and stir in the egg and the flour, a half cup at a time, until it is firm and elastic.  Let knead for a couple of minutes and then turn onto a floured surface.

Using a pastry knife cut the dough into pieces and roll into ropes.  Cut each rope into 1" pieces. Place each piece onto a fork, time sides up, and press with your thumb, creating little pillows with ridges on one side and an indentation on the other.

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil.  Add the gnocchi in small batches and cook until they float to the surface, about 7 minutes.  Remove with a slotted spoon to a wire rack placed over parchment.  When ready to serve, toss with heated sauce of your choosing.  Print Recipe

Easiest Ever Apple Sauce #AppleWeek

Wow, where did this week go?!  Apple Week is nearly over.  Only two more days of fabulous recipes, over 100 recipes will be shared in all.   That is huge!!  Thanks so much Carlee of Cooking with Carlee, for all of your hard work.

Yesterday, I recapped what I had made up until today.   I have been having so much fun and have loved seeing all the great recipes at the bottom of each post.  I have been spending a lot of time, reading posts, marking and pinning recipes that I want to put on my dining table in the future.

Speaking of the future.....your opportunity to win one of the great prizes offered by our sponsors is nearly gone.  Only today and tomorrow....so you better head right over to my Welcome Post and enter to win, right now.

I want to take this opportunity to say Thank you to #AppleWeek Sponsors: Rodelle, Dreamfarm, Casabella, Flahavan's Irish Oatmeal, Pryex, Chicago Cutlery, Rainier Fruit, and Veggie Wash for providing prizes for #AppleWeek free of charge. These companies also provided the bloggers with samples and product to use for #AppleWeek. All opinions are my own.

Today we are getting down to basics.  You cannot have apple week without celebrating the most common way of eating them off season. Yep, today we are making applesauce and the recipe I am giving you is so easy peasy that you may never buy applesauce again.

I like to use a variety of apples in my sauce.  For this batch I used the Honeycrisp apples provided by Rainier Fruit  along with some tart apples that I had picked up when I went to an orchard here in Michigan. 

One of the reasons this sauce is so easy to make is because you don't have to spend time peeling all those apples.  Since they aren't peeled, it is even more important that they be well cleaned before cooking.  I used Veggie Wash and the fruit/vegetable brush provided by Casabella.

Simply core and quarter your apples.  Place them into a large pot with some apple juice.  I do not put any sugar in with my apples, but I do add a whole cinnamon stick to the pot.

I don't use ground cinnamon in my applesauce as I find that it can sometimes lend a bitter flavor to the sauce. I also add lemon juice to my apples as they cook.  This allows for water bath canning if I am not going to use the applesauce in the next couple of weeks.

It only takes about 15 minutes for the apples to be tender enough to run through the food mill.

A few short moments of turning the handle and the apple has turned to sauce leaving behind all of the skins to be discarded fed to the chickens.

Now is the time to taste and add sugar if you want.  I found that using honeycrisp apples and apple juice is plenty enough sweetness especially if you intend to use it as a side for meats or in your baking where you will be adding additional sugar.

4 pounds of apples provided me with 5 cups of applesauce.  I used 1 1/2 cups immediately in this coffee cake that I baked up in this gorgeous baking dish from Pyrex in their new watercolor collection.  I will be sharing this recipe with you in a couple of weeks so stay tuned for that as well as other recipe using this easy peasy and delicious sauce.

In less time than it would take you to run to the grocers you can have homemade applesauce.  You know exactly what is in the food that you are feeding your family.  You control how much sweetener is included. 

You will be done with this recipe so quickly that you will have tons of time to take a look at the other apple recipes on the bottom of this post!

Easiest Ever Apple Sauce

4 lbs of asst. apples, cored and quartered

1 c. apple juice

1 T. lemon juice

1 cinnamon stick

Place all ingredients into a large pot.  Bring to a boil over high heat.  Reduce heat to a simmer, cover and cook for about 15 minutes until apples are very tender.

Place a food mill over a bowl.  Run the apples through the food mill, allowing the sauce to drop into the bowl and discarding all the peels.  Taste and season with additional sugar, if needed. Print Recipe

More Amazing Apple Recipes

• Appelflappen from Palatable Pastime 
• Apple Butter Cream Cheese Spread from Tip Garden 
• Apple Cinnamon Roll Pie from Corn, Beans, Pigs and Kids 
• Apple Cranberry Galettes with Caramel Drizzle from Family Around the Table 
• Apple Maple Jam from Feeding Big
• Apple Oat Quick Bread with Caramel Sauce from The Chef Next Door 
• Apple Yeast Coffee Cake from Jolene's Recipe Journal 
• Easiest Ever Applesauce from A Day in the Life on the Farm 
• Grilled Apple Butter Pork Tenderloin from Books n' Cooks 
• Grilled Veggie Tacos with Apple Pico de Gallo from Culinary Adventures with Camilla 
• Honeycrisp and Gouda Grilled Cheese from The Redhead Baker 
• Italian Apple and Fig Polenta Torta from All That's Jas 
• Molasses-Mustard Glazed Pork Chops with Apple Butter from Sew You Think You Can Cook 
• Roasted Brussel Sprouts with Bacon and Apples from House of Nash Eats 
• Roasted Pork with Apple Puree from Simple and Savory
• Savory Apple Bacon Pizza from Cooking With Carlee 
• Slow Cooker Honey Apple Pork Roast From Amy's Cooking Adventures

Homemade Cherry Pie Filling

Phew....we finally have a free day.  By that, I mean that there is no place we have to go and nobody is coming over here.  At least, we don't have any plans for anyone to come over....that is always subject to change.  Of course, as soon as I typed this, Amy called and we are now meeting them for dinner tonight.  She and Doug are heading to Ohio for a race on Friday and they wanted to spend time with Larry and Mary before they leave.

We do have our Little Angel Face today so I'm hoping for beautiful weather so we can play in the pool.  Here she was last year.....amazing how quickly they grow.  We are going for Italian with Aunt Amy and Uncle Doug tonight so she can still have her spaghetti fix.

I have a busy blogging week coming up and am trying to get everything done and scheduled before we leave for our Alaskan Cruise......CANNOT WAIT!

Two of the recipes I will be sharing use cherry pie filling.  You can always use canned but if you are lucky enough to have a daughter and son in law with a cherry tree, as we do, then I am going to show you how to make your own cherry pie filling.

Place the cherries, sugar and cornstarch in a dutch oven over med high heat.

Cook and stir until mixture comes to a boil.

Continue to cook, stirring occasionally until the sauce thickens and turns glossy.

Remove to a bowl and let sit until the mixture cools to room temperature.  You can now use it in any recipe calling for cherry pie filling.

This filling can be preserved by canning or freezing.  I chose to freeze mine this year.  Should you choose to freeze it just know that you will have to rewarm it, so that it gets back to the right consistency, prior to using it in your recipe.

Cherry Pie Filling

6 c. tart cherries, pitted
1 1/2 c. sugar
1/3 c. cornstarch

Place the cherries, sugar and cornstarch in a large pot or dutch oven.  Place over med high heat and bring to a boil, stirring occasionally.  Continue to cook and stir at a gentle boil until the sauce thickens and the gel is clear and glossy.  Cool to room temperature before using or packaging for freezing.  Print Recipe

More Recipes using Cherry Pie Filling

Cherry Pie Bars I

Cherry Cheese Braid

Sour Cherry Pie

Sour Cherry Strudel