Recipe Cards

I love sharing recipes with everyone. The recipes I have made that I love and recipes that I have found and changed a little. The ones I love the most are recipes from loved ones that have been passed down from generations. It is great to have all these incredible recipes but how can one organize them. I organize my recipes on Pinterest. I am actually very proud of my Pinterest boards. I have a board for each type of meat, fish or seafood to cook. I also have baking boards broken down to with types of baked goods. Pinterest works well for people who don't mind keep all of their stuff on the web, but what about the people who want recipe cards in the kitchen. 

I have decided that all the recipes I post will come with a Paper & Pi recipe card for everyone to print out and cut. Each card can be cut to 4" x 6" dimension. They will be the perfect size to put into a recipe box of your choice. Just click on the picture and download the pdf. I will be slowly updating the recipes on the blog and recipe page.

So where are you going to store your Paper & Pi recipe cards? Well, I found some amazing recipe boxes to hold your recipe cards.

Rife Paper Co. has some of my favorites (of course):

One Canoe 2 Letterpress has a wood recipe box also but I really think the berry box is quite interesting:

I wonder if I could convince hubby to make me a wood recipe box? He loves working with wood and handmade gifts are the best. I will let you all know what he says. If he says Yes, I will have him make two so I can give one away to one of my readers. That would be a cute giveaway.

I hope everyone enjoys the Paper & Pi recipe cards. Please let me know if you have any comments or questions.

Talk to you soon,

How to Make the Perfect Steak

Wow what a crazy week we are having in Atlanta.  School was cancelled Monday and Tuesday just in case the weather turned bad.  The only thing it did was rain.  It was not cold enough for it to turn into and make the roads dangerous.  It did get really icy in the North Georgia cities so I am glad they cancelled school just in case.  We all remember last year, when they did not cancel school and children were stuck at school and sleeping on buses.  It is better to be safe than sorry.  Yesterday was freezing the high was 27 degrees and the low was 13 degrees.  Addison said he wished they would have cancelled school yesterday than Monday and Tuesday.  I agree.  It was too cold to do anything.  I don't want to leave the house.  LOL!

Since it has been cold I have been cooking up a storm.  I love to cook when it is cold.  Comfort food is the best.  I made steak for the family Wednesday and I took some pictures and a video to show everyone How to Make the Perfect Steak. I hope you enjoy it.

How to Make the Perfect Steak

1.  Take your steak out of the refrigerator and let it come to room temperature.

2. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

3.  Salt and Pepper your steak.

4.  Heat up about 1 tablespoon of oil and 1 tablespoon of unsalted butter in a cast iron pan on HIGH.

5. Wait until the oil and butter are hot and add steak.

While steak is searing carefully spoon brown butter over the steak.

The steak should sear for about 3-4 minutes.  Flip the steak when the steak has released from the pan. Never pull off a steak from a pan if it has not released on its own.

6.  Spoon the brown butter over the steak while the other side sears.  Sear again for about 3-4 minutes.

7. Remove from heat and place in the oven.  Check the temperature every 5 minutes.  Take steak out when it is 5 degrees below your ideal temperature.  120 degrees for rare.  130 degrees for medium rare.  140 degrees for medium. 150 degrees for medium well.  160 degrees for well.

8. Take the steak out of the oven and out of the pan and let it rest.  Let it rest for about 10 minutes.

9.  Pat yourself on the back and eat you delicious steak.

Fast and Easy Chicken Gumbo

I try to cook at least 3 days a week and also make sure there is enough for leftovers the next day.  Somedays I enjoy braising meat that can take hours.  Other days I just want to make something fast and easy that only takes about an hour.  Last night was a fast and easy night.  The bad thing is most fast and easy recipe end up without a lot of flavor.  Yesterday I wanted a fast chicken recipe so I searched my Pinterest.  I found Martha Stewart's recipe for Half-Hour Chicken Gumbo.  This recipe was fast and easy because the ingredients are a rotisserie chicken and pre-cooked andouille sausage.  I love chicken recipes that call for rotisserie chicken because it cuts the cooking time but still keeps great flavor.

The only problem is I read the comments and people complained that this gumbo was really bland.  I did notice that the only spice in this recipe is 1 teaspoon of oregano, which does not make me think of gumbo.  I thought why couldn't a take a really great gumbo recipe and use rotisserie chicken and pre-cooked andouille sausage.  When we make a Turducken for Christmas we use Chef Paul's Turducken and Stuffing recipe.  He is known for his Louisiana cooking.  I also had leftover Chef Paul seasoning from our Christmas Turducken. I found Chef Paul's Chicken & Smoked Sausage Gumbo.  This recipe has you cooking the chicken and the sausage and takes about 2 hours.  It has you coat and fry the chicken in vegetable oil which is one thing I do not like.  Yes I hate frying.

Fast and Easy Chicken Gumbo

Ingredients

5 cups chicken stock
4 tablespoons vegetable oil

2 teaspoons Chef Paul Prudhomme's Poultry Magic
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
2 red bell peppers (ribs and seeds removed), chopped
1 medium onion, chopped
4 garlic cloves, chopped
Coarse salt and ground pepper
1 package (10 ounces) frozen, cut okra
8 ounces smoked (precooked) andouille sausage, halved lengthwise and sliced 1 inch thick
1 rotisserie chicken (about 2 1/2 pounds), skin and bones removed, meat shredded (about 4 cups)

1/4 teaspoon cheyenne pepeer, to taste
2 cups hot cooked white rice

Directions

In a Dutch oven or heavy-bottomed pot, heat chicken stock over medium. Dice the vegetables. Combine the onions, bell peppers and garlic in a bowl and set aside.  Combine Poultry Magic and flour in a small bowl.

In medium, heavy skillet heat up vegetable oil.  Slowly add seasoned flour.  Cook flour whisking constantly until roux is golden brown, about 4 to 5 minutes. Remove the skillet from heat and add the vegetables.  Stir vegetables with the roux until the roux stops getting dark.  Place skillet over medium heat and cook the vegetables, stirring occasionally, until vegetables are crisp-tender, 10 to 12 minutes.

Add the vegetable mixture to the boiling chicken stock.  Sir until the roux is dissolved. Return to a boil, stirring and scraping the pan bottom often. Reduce the heat to low, stir in the okra and sausage.   Simmer uncovered for 10 to 15 minutes.

While the gumbo is simmering, pull the rotisserie chicken off the bones and shred it.  Stir in shredded chicken into the gumbo.  Warm through for about 2 to 3 minutes. Season with salt, pepper, and cheyenne pepper.  

Serve over rice.

Our Week with Echo

When I first found out about the Amazon Echo, I wondered if we really needed another electronic device. I watched the videos about it and then realized that this would not just be another voice that answered our stupid question.  I realized the more people use it the more people will hack and make new ways to use it.  Turning on/off your lights, turning on/off your burglary alarm, locking your doors, reminding you of tasks, making a grocery list.

Well it doesn't do all of that right now but it does make a to do list and a grocery list.  If only she could go grocery shopping for me.  I hate grocery shopping.  Mostly this week we have asked Alexa to play music and I love music playing throughout the house.  Addison loves to ask Alexa to play a random song.  The funniest time was when he asked her to play "Turn down for what".  She did and we had a little dance party in the den.  I have asked her to play random oldies so I can educated Addison about music.  I have gone to Biz Markie "Just a Friend" to Positive K "I Got a Man" with just the sound of my voice.  This also happened because of Amazon Prime music so I must mention that it his important to have Prime if you don't want to buy a bunch of music from Amazon.  Prime music also doesn't have every song you can think of but there are also some great playlist on Prime that will have you thinking of songs you haven't thought about for years.  Last night Echo played a playlist for dinner a party.  She played a little  bit of jazz and a little bit of soft rock.  I started imagining a dinner party of pasta, wine, great music and friends.

Alexa does not just play music via Amazon Music.  You can also connect it with I Heart Radio.  I have never used I Heart Radio before but in the past days I have listed to some wonderful streaming music from Beatles to Fleetwood Mac.  You can also choose to listen to radio stations from around the world.  I remember 10 years ago I would stream a radio station from London.  This is where I found Lily Allen and Adele for the first time.  I have not streamed radio stations yet but I am excited to use this feature.  You can also stream podcast which I am excited about it. I would love to listen to some interesting podcast while I am cooking and crafting.

I feel like I have only been talking about using Echo for music but she has also helped me set a timer for cooking,  converted ounces to gallons, and set an alarm to wake us up.  We have only had her for a week so I believe we have just scratched the surface.  I promise to blog another review after we have had her for month.  But if you have Amazon prime and have an extra $100, I say Yes you should get Echo.