Brunch Pie with a Twist

Temperatures remain cold here - 3°F with a wind chill of -15°F this morning.

I follow the blog Mennonites Can Cook, and they recently shared a recipe for Brunch Pie.  I can easily get distracted with new recipes, or they can inspire me to use up what I have (so I did).

I used canned mushrooms (we do need a lot of that vitamin D in the winter).  I need to dehydrate more next winter.  

Although the sun was shining for a few days, I'm not always out in it long enough.

I decided to try it next, but I swapped out the frozen hashbrowns with frozen rutabagas, that I froze last year.  

Also, from the freezer, I used my garden green onions, (I had fresh bell pepper) and added frozen and cooked watercress greens and a pinch of homemade fire powder.  Hot peppers are a good source for a lot of goodness for our health.

Not to forget about all the condiments I canned last year, we topped the breakfast with some home canned cowboy candy too.  

We added a side of fruit.

Brunch Pie with a Twist © Jan 2024 by Kristina at Pioneer Woman at Heart

Kitchen-ness

 I picked up some local orchard apples, so I baked us an apple pie.  Not the healthiest way to start the new year, but I did.

I freeze my pie crust crumbles, so all I have to do is add the ice water and roll the dough (recipe is online with King Flour's website).

The recipe is from a very old book of mine - Farm Journal's Complete Pie Book, printed in 1965.  I haven't bake an apple pie in a long, long time.  I used to can apple pie filling when all the kids still lived here.  The pie was not a pretty thing, but tasted okay.  I have only baked Dutch apple pies if I remember correctly.  I will bake it again, but not too soon, and tweak the recipe. 

I also realized, I only have one pie cookbook on my homesteading bookshelf.  Do you have a favorite pie recipe book that you use?  Do you have a good old fashioned apple pie recipe?

I have gotten tired of breakfast sausage and bacon lately, so I switched things up, dug into the freezer, and baked us a breakfast pie. I tossed this together with eggs, Canadian bacon, mushrooms, and a few more ingredients.  There are no potatoes in this, so it's healthy, and we won't be eating it for 3 days, like our scramble breakfast.  We are due for some greens on our breakfast soon too.

As you can see, the news around here is a bit boring.  The rain left us, but the colder air is with us.  

It doesn't look like much, but I finally got around to using some thawed spaghetti squash.  If you follow my blog, I roasted all of our garden spaghetti squash and froze it.  I tested it out with a combination of healthy ingredients.  I call it chicken spaghetti.

What's in it?  When it's sort of like the recipes I found online for using an instant pot (don't have one), but I baked it in the oven.  If you google for recipes, you will find many recipes to give you ideas.

I cooked the chicken the day prior in my crock pot, and shredded it.  I thawed 4 cups of frozen spaghetti squash, added tomatoes, cooked onion and garlic, seasoned it all, added some sliced bunching onions from the herb garden, tossed in some cheeses and baked it.  

It turned out very good, although, we both were him-hawing on adding some flavor to it.  Maybe some jalapenos, possibly some "fire powder" or even homemade taco or fajita seasoning.   I may add some black olives too next time.

I have written it all down, to also tweak, but we are very happy with the thawed spaghetti squash in this vs. pasta.  I am also happy with the thawed spaghetti squash.  I didn't have a lot of liquid in it, as I drained it prior to freezing it.  Overall, happy I froze it the spaghetti squash.

Kitchen-ness © Jan 2024 by Kristina at Pioneer Woman at Heart