Intro: Welcome everybody to another episode of Let’s Make Dinner, your audio library of amazing dinner recipes you can always get on the table. I’m your host, Susie Weinrich. 

Susie Weinrich: Again, I’m going to say to you guys, I really try hard not to date these episodes. So I like to keep them pretty universal for the entire year. However, we are right at the holidays and there’s a lot of recipes that are so specific to the holiday season or to winter, and this is one of them. Today we are making a Pumpkin Trifle that is so impressive and so delicious. If you’re not a pie person and pumpkin pie is coming out for Thanksgiving, this is an excellent alternative to making pie.

You’re still going to get all the flavors, the pumpkin, the whipped cream, but in more of like a mousse special dessert feeling. So if you’ve never made a trifle before, it’s basically a layered dessert. I think it’s a traditional English dessert. It’s generally layers of pudding or whipped cream and cake. It’s also served in what’s called a trifle bowl, so that’s usually a stemmed bowl that has tall sides and it’s just round. Of course, I will link a trifle bowl in the show notes for you so you can check that out and see exactly what you need. 

For this dessert, you could absolutely make it in individual cups as well, if that’s something you want to do. If you want to just serve individual cups, that totally works. But for a really knockout presentation, that Trifle bowl is so great. So the flavored layers here are not going to be pudding and cake. Instead, what we’re doing is we’re layering biscoff cookies, which I’ll explain later, and then a cream cheese pumpkin mousse and whipped cream and then you’re going to top it all off with these toffee chocolate bits. It’s just the most perfect, delicious mixture ever.

Tips and Tricks: Let’s get into a few tips for this recipe before we go through all of the instructions and the ingredients. This is a recipe that you’ll want to plan ahead for. So after you make it, it needs to refrigerate for four to 24 hours to set up and get a little bit firmer so you can scoop it out and serve it in the layers.

Then let’s talk about a couple of the ingredients. Number one, the Biscoff cookies. It sounds like an exotic ingredient, I guess not one that you’re probably buying every day, but you can absolutely find them in the cookie aisle of your grocery store. It comes in a red package. They’re called Biscoff Cookies, and it’s like a really thick graham cracker that has a cinnamon brown sugar kind of molasses flavor. So it pairs perfectly with the pumpkin.

I think if biscoff cookies are not your jam, you could absolutely sub in ginger snap cookies could work in this place, especially because they’re kind of firm. So when they soak up the liquid from that pumpkin mousse, they would soften just a little bit. So that could work too. 

During the holiday season, usually in the baking aisle, near the chocolate chips, you can find something called Heath milk chocolate English Toffee Bits. If you know what a Heath candy bar is, it’s basically that, but crumbled up into bits. That is the perfect topping for this recipe. Now, if you go to your grocery store and they don’t have those, then you can absolutely just buy two or three Heath candy bars and just crush them up. That will work perfectly fine.

All right. One last ingredient I want to talk about is the pumpkin. There are two options in the grocery store when you’re buying pumpkin puree. There’s going to be a pumpkin pie puree, and a hundred percent pumpkin puree. You want to make sure that you’re buying a hundred percent pumpkin puree. It doesn’t have all the extra spices and seasonings, so it’s what you want for this recipe.

Pumpkin Trifle Recipe: All right, so I think the rest of my tips will come out during the making of this recipe. So let’s go ahead and get started. There are a couple pieces of equipment that you’ll want to have to make this recipe. Number one is the trifle bowl, if you are going to use that. Then you’ll want to have either a stand mixer with a paddle attachment or a handheld mixer with just two beaters. Then you’re going to need two gallon size Ziploc baggies. So once you have all that, then you can go ahead and get started. 

In the stand mixer or in a bowl, you want to beat the cream cheese until it’s completely fluffy. You need two eight ounce packages of cream cheese that are completely softened. When I say completely softened, I mean all the way through to the middle. So you want that cream cheese to be really soft so that when it blends up, there are no lumps or pieces left. You want it to be completely smooth. Actually cream cheese softens pretty quickly at room temperature and to speed up that process a little bit more, if you didn’t think about that ahead of time, you can actually cut your cream cheese into small one inch cubes and it should soften very quickly.

So you’re going to go ahead and beat those two eight ounce packages of softened cream cheese until they’re nice and fluffy. This could take a couple minutes, and that’s okay. Now you want to gradually add in one cup of brown sugar and mix that until it’s completely smooth and incorporated. Finally, you’re going to add in one 15 ounce can of a hundred percent pure pumpkin puree. Again, don’t get the pumpkin pie filling. Two teaspoons of vanilla extract, one and a half teaspoons of ground cinnamon, one teaspoon of ground ginger, a quarter teaspoon of ground nutmeg, a pinch of ground clove. I love clove, so I probably put in a super healthy pinch and then an eighth of a teaspoon of kosher salt.

Go ahead and mix that up together until it’s fully combined. At this point, you can set that aside, and now we’re going to make the whipped cream. So when you are whipping cream, if it is very cold and the bowl is very cold, it’ll whip up faster and creamier. So I like to make sure that the cream stays in the fridge until it’s time to whip. So what you’ll want to do is take 16 ounces of heavy whipping cream, so that’ll be about two cups very cold. Go ahead and whip that either with your handheld mixer or the stand mixer and take that until about a soft peak forms. So a soft peak is when you can pull the beater out of the whipped cream and it will make a peak and just dissolve right back in pretty quickly.

Now you’re going to gradually beat in a third a cup of powdered sugar. You want to continue to beat the whipped cream until about a medium stiff peak forms. So when you pull the beater out, it will make a little peak or like a little wave, and it will stay there for a good amount of time. That’s when you know that your whipped cream is done but you haven’t created butter. You don’t want to take it past the whipped cream stage into butter. 

All right, so once that’s done, you can set that aside and now what we’re going to do is get to the Biscoff cookies. So you want to unwrap all of the Biscoff cookies. You’re going to need two 12.3 ounce packages. So usually they come in the 12.3 ounce packages, so you just need to buy two at the grocery store. Unwrap all of those. Put one package in one Ziploc bag, put the other package in the other Ziploc bag. It will just make it easier for when it’s time to assemble. So either with a meat mallet or a gosh, what’s it called? A rolling pin. Name escapes me. Go ahead and smash all of those Biscoff cookies until they’re just tiny bite size pieces. You don’t want to crush it into powder, but you also don’t want really big pieces. Somewhere in the middle is really good, just like a bite size. Now that you have all of the pieces created, it’s time to actually assemble your trifle. So grab the trifle bowl and what you’re going to do is start with one of the Ziploc bags of biscoff cookies, pour it into the bottom of the trifle bowl and spread it evenly across the bottom.

Then you’re going to top those cookies with half of that pumpkin cream cheese mixture and spread it so that it’s a really nice, even big layer across those cookies. Then you’re going to top the pumpkin with half of the whipped cream mixture. Again, spreading it all the way to the edges so that you have a nice smooth layer. Then you’re going to repeat that. You’re going to top that with the crushed biscoff cookies, then the rest of the pumpkin, then the rest of the whipped cream, and then you’re going to finish by sprinkling on a third cup of those toffee bits that we talked about, right over top, and those are super, super delicious.

You have it all layered and it’s ready to go. You’re going to cover it just with a little plastic wrap or whatever, and refrigerate it for at least four hours up to 24 hours. Then when it’s time to serve, you can bring the whole trifle bowl to the table, bring a serving spoon and plates for people. Like I said, that little extra bowl of those toffee bits is just that extra little touch of deliciousness.

So I hope you enjoy this pumpkin trifle during your holiday season or whenever you’re craving a little pumpkin dessert. This is perfect. So of course I will link all of the recipes that I talked about in this episode right in the show notes for you. I’m also going to link to my Thanksgiving recipe category so you can find all of the Thanksgiving and holiday recipes when you need them.

Here’s my only request for you. I would love to have you out there, rate and review the show in your preferred podcast player. As a newer show, it just helps other people find Let’s Make Dinner and love all of the recipes that you’re loving. 

Outro: So until next time, I hope this episode of Let’s Make Dinner, make your dinner time a little easier. See ya.

Susie Weinrich: What’s up everybody? This is Susie with Let’s Make Dinner, and I wanted to come on before this episode starts and give you a little disclaimer. 

So normally when I start these episodes, I do a lot of starting and stopping and I’m checking my audio. Tonight I am recording this late and I just went straight through, recorded the whole thing, and then realized at the end that it actually did not record with my microphone. It was recorded with my computer. Which is significantly lesser quality audio. So I just want to give you a heads up with this episode that it’s not my usual audio quality, but we are going to move forward with it and hope that it sounds okay. So enjoy this episode everyone. 

Intro: Happy holidays. Welcome everybody to another episode of Let’s Make Dinner, your audio library of amazing dinner recipes you can get on the table any night of the week. I’m your host, Susie Weinrich. 

Susie Weinrich: You guys, happy holidays! So normally I try not to date my episodes and I try to keep it pretty neutral, but today we’re talking about Sausage Stuffing, and that’s pretty much as holiday as you can get. We’re talking about the traditional side dish for Thanksgiving, but we’re adding a little mix of flavor here by adding some sage Sausage stuffing. That’s a mouthful. So we’re adding some sage sausage and some cranberries and fresh herbs. This stuffing is super pillowy and buttery and soft on the inside with just a ton of flavor and texture. Then the top is golden and crispy. It is the best of both worlds. It’s exactly what you want. I’m going to share the full recipe with you here on this episode. 

Tips and Tricks: So first of course, we’re going to talk about a few tips for this recipe. The very first thing that I want to talk about is the bread that you’re going to use for your stuffing. So if your bakery has large cubes of dried out bread, you can absolutely buy that. Now, if you’re going to buy the pre-packaged like Peppered Farm stuffing bread cubes, those tend to be so tiny. Some of it even crumbles into a powder. It just isn’t exactly what you want if stuffing is really important to you. What I recommend is buying really quality bread. So we like to use, I believe it’s Pepperidge Farm Hearty White, or the Sara Lee Artesano White Bread, and then I’ll cut it into one inch cubes and then you dry it out. So basically you’re removing the liquid from your bread so that when you add back the liquid, it’s the flavor of the stuffing, it doesn’t turn the bread into mush. 

So there are two different ways that you can dry out the bread after you’ve cubed it. The first way is the overnight method. So take the bread, lay it out on big rimmed baking sheets, and just put it on the countertop and let it sit out. Definitely overnight, maybe for a day and a half even. The other option is to turn your oven onto a low temperature of 250. Again, lay those cut bread cubes onto a rimmed baking sheet and just let them dry out in that oven for about 30 minutes. You’re going to toss them every five or 10 minutes so that it doesn’t actually brown. You just want to dry it out. You don’t want to actually brown it. So those are the two methods for drying out bread and making sure that you are getting a really quality stuffing. 

The other ingredient tip is to make sure that you’re using fresh herbs. Dried herbs are not going to give you the same flavor profile as these fresh herbs are. So for this recipe, you’re going to use fresh sage, rosemary, and Italian parsley. There’s also something in the recipe called poultry seasoning, and that is a dried seasoning that you’ll just buy in the spice aisle. But everything else is fresh. 

Okay. The other ingredient that I want to talk about before we get started with the full recipe is the pork sausage. So for this recipe, if you can find it, Jimmy Dean makes a great pork sausage called sage pork sausage. It will come in the tube or the roll. Sometimes it’s frozen and that’s something that you want to look for early. Because right around Thanksgiving or Christmas that goes like hot cakes. So if you can find that sage pork sausage, grab that for sure. Otherwise any of those Jimmy Dean rolled pork sausages will work really well. 

One last thing before we get to this recipe. Don’t be trying to save calories when you’re making your stuffing people. It calls for a lot of butter and there’s a good reason for it. It adds a ton of flavor. It gives you the right texture, and it gives you that crispy topping. It’s the holidays. Nobody’s trying to save calories during the holidays, Ok?

Sausage Stuffing Recipe: All right, so let’s get on to making this full recipe for sausage and herb stuffing. It also has cranberries in it. It’s delicious. So this is going to be made in a nine by nine baking dish, and it’s going to serve about eight people. You can absolutely, if you’re having a bigger Thanksgiving or Christmas or holiday celebration, you can double this recipe and make it in a nine by 13 dish. The baking time should still be roughly the same. 

So what you want to do is of course, make your breadcrumbs stale. However, you’re going to do that. That is step number one. Step number two. You’re going to preheat your oven to 350 degrees, and then you’re going to prep that baking dish by rubbing it with one tablespoon of softened butter.

That will just make sure that the bread and all the yummy stuffing bits don’t bake to your pan. You want them to bake together. All right, so then in a large skillet, you’re going to melt an entire stick of butter. Again, do not skimp on the butter. You want all of that flavor. So just do that over medium low heat because you don’t want to brown the butter.

Then you’re going to add one large onion that has been chopped and one cup of celery that has been chopped. This isn’t a mince, but it’s definitely a rough chop into bite size pieces, so you’re not biting into a big piece of celery in the middle of the stuffing. You just want it to be mixed in there.

So you’re going to saute that in butter until it’s softened. This is going to take like 10 to 15 minutes. Once that is nice and softened, you will go ahead and add that one pound of the bulk pork sausage. There is a tool that you can buy and I will link it in the show notes for you, but it is, I think the actual name of this is Meat Masher. What it is, it’s on a handle and then it’s a bunch of Xs, like spatula Xs that make it really easy for you to crumble meat, especially pork sausage that is super sticky. If you work with a lot of Turkey, like ground Turkey or ground pork, it’s a great tool to have in your kitchen. 

So go ahead and add that pork sausage and break it up so that it’s crumbled in the pan and that it is cooked through and no longer pink. Now at this point, if you have a ton of extra grease in the pan, you want to drain any excess grease.

All right, so remove that pan from the heat, and then you’re going to stir in four large garlic cloves that are finely chopped, one and a half teaspoons of kosher salt. Half a teaspoon of black pepper, one teaspoon of that poultry seasoning that we talked about at the beginning. You can find that in the spice aisle of your grocery store. Then two tablespoons of chopped fresh sage, one tablespoon of fresh chopped rosemary and a quarter cup of fresh chopped parsley. You can use Italian or curly. Both will totally work. Then you’re going to finish that by stirring in one cup of dried cranberries. So we’re talking about the sweetened dried cranberries. A popular brand is Ocean Spray, who makes Craisins. So that’s what you want to use here. So stir that all together, make it a nice little delicious mixture, and go ahead and set that to the side. 

Then to a really big bowl, you want to add your 12 cups of dried bread cubes, and then you want to pour that sausage, onion, celery, herb mixture over top of the breadcrumbs, and then give it a really good stir to coat everything. You’re going to set that aside. Then in a liquid measuring cup, if you have one, if you don’t have one, just use a bowl, whisk the chicken broth and the eggs together. You’re going to need two large eggs and one and a half cups of chicken broth or stock. The difference between broth and stock – broth is made generally just from the meat. The stock is made from the bones and the meat, and your stock will have more flavor than the broth. Take that mixture of the chicken broth and the eggs and pour that evenly over the bread cube mixture, and then toss everything again so that everything is moistened and it’s just barely holding together.

So then you’re going to transfer what is now your stuffing to the prepared nine by nine pan. At this point, you’ll have two tablespoons of butter left over. You’ll want to cut that into eight even cubes, and then pop that on top of the stuffing. Now at this point, if you want, you can cover it and refrigerate this stuffing for 24 hours, and then you can pop it in the oven when you’re ready to have dinner. When you’re ready to have your holiday dinner. Or you can go ahead and cover the stuffing with foil and bake it for 30 minutes. Then you’re going to remove the foil and bake for an additional 20 minutes, and that’s it. Your stuffing is done. 

However, if you want a more golden, crispy top and edges, you can absolutely turn the broiler on for the last minute or two. That’s it. That’s the full recipe. Now what I do want to tell you is that this is a stuffing with meat. If you want more of a traditional stuffing recipe, I have one of those as well on momsdinner.net, and I will link that for you in the show notes so you can check that out. I will also link to my full Thanksgiving category so you can check out all the recipes and make sure that your Thanksgiving holiday, Christmas, whatever you’re celebrating. This is a great side dish, so make sure that it’s delicious and on your table. 

So that does it for today. Like I said, I will link all of the recipes and the equipment that I talked about in this episode right in the show notes for you. 

As always, I would love it if you guys would subscribe or follow this show in your preferred podcast player. Then also, tell somebody about this show and about the Mom’s Dinner recipes. I would absolutely appreciate it. It would really be a present for me. So thank you in advance. 

Outro: Until next time, I hope this episode of Let’s Make Dinner makes your dinner time a little easier. See ya. Happy holidays. Happy holidays to you. .

Intro: Welcome, welcome everybody to another episode of Let’s Make Dinner, your audio library of amazing dinner recipes you can always get on the table. I’m your host, Susie Weinrich. 

Susie Weinrich: All right, let’s read a little, what do I want to call it? A comment, five star comment from this recipe that we’re making today. “Very delicious period. No leftovers.” I think that’s a good sign. 

Super good, super delicious, super balanced flavors. We are making a savory mashed sweet potato recipe today. I think that we’re all used to the really sickly sweet mashed sweet potatoes that are loaded with brown sugar topped with marshmallows. It can taste a little bit more like dessert than a savory dish that you would serve with dinner, and so I set out to create something that was super balanced and really rounds out the flavor of the sweet potatoes. I’ll tell you, this recipe accomplishes it in spades. I absolutely love this recipe. I will tell you I’m not even a huge, sweet potato fan, but I absolutely love this recipe.

Savory Mashed Sweet Potatoes Recipe: So no tips today. We’re just going to get straight into it and go over everything, how to make your savory mashed sweet potatoes. One difference with this recipe. A lot of mashed sweet potato recipes out there call for you to boil the sweet potatoes. We’re not doing that. We are going to develop their natural sweetness and their really deep, beautiful flavor by roasting the sweet potatoes first before mashing.

So, what you want to do is preheat your oven to 400 degrees and you’re going to grab a nine by 13 or larger baking dish, or a rimmed baking sheet. What you’re going to do is cut your sweet potatoes in half lengthwise, lay them cut side up on that roasting pan, and then you’re going to drizzle them with about three tablespoons of olive oil. You could also use canola oil here. So some type of, you know, just neutral oil will. 

Then on that same tray, you’re going to take a small head of garlic, not one clove. We want a whole entire head of garlic. You just need a small one. You’re going to trim the very top of that head of garlic off, discard the top. Then you’ll take a small piece of foil, hold it in your hand, put that whole entire head of garlic cut side up in the foil, drizzle just about a teaspoon of olive oil over the top, and then close it up so that it makes a nice little pouch for your garlic. What you’re doing is roasting that garlic and we’re going to add it to the mashed sweet potatoes, which is, Ooh, so good. If you love garlic, you’re going to love these. So pop that in the oven and you’re going to let that roast for about 15 minutes. Pull the sweet potatoes out, flip them over, and this is going to help caramelize the top of the sweet potatoes, which is so delicious. Pop them back in the oven for about another 20 minutes.

Now after that’s done, you’re going to want to make sure that your potatoes are cooked through. So take a fork and just poke it into one of the sweet potatoes. If it just goes in without any resistance, except for of course the skin, then they’re done. If you meet any resistance, you’re going to want to pop them back in the oven for five minute increments. However, before you do that, take the garlic off of the tray because you do not want to burn your garlic. So once they’re cooked all the way, you just want to let them cool for a little bit because you’re going to actually handle them with your hands or with a towel and you don’t want them to be smoking hot. 

So as soon as they’re cool enough to handle, what I usually like to do is take a towel, like a clean kitchen towel and put it in my hand, and then I’ll pick up a potato and then over a bowl where I’m going to mash the potatoes, I squeeze the inside of the potato, out of the potato skin. It usually works perfectly. Now, of course, if you don’t want to do it that way, you can just hold the potato in your hand, take a large spoon, and scrape all of the sweet potato out of the skin of the potato. Put it into just a large bowl, and then repeat that with all of the sweet potatoes.

Then you want to take that head of garlic, take it out of the foil packet, turn it upside down over those sweet potatoes, and just give it a squeeze. All of the roasted garlic should squeeze right out, and it will be so yummy. It will smell so good. So when you roast garlic, It becomes kind of sweet, but still savory and really takes off that bite of the garlic and so you can add an entire head into your sweet potatoes.

Now, here’s where we’re going to round some of the flavors out. You’re also going to add one tablespoon of brown sugar. That’s going to enhance the natural sweetness of the sweet potato, so it rounds that sweetness out. You’re going to add four tablespoons of salted butter, one tablespoon of milk, or half and half, and one teaspoon of kosher salt.

Now this is the part that I absolutely love. You’re going to add two teaspoons of balsamic vinegar in with those potatoes and that just adds that high note that the sweet potatoes need. Sweet potatoes have a very flat flavor, and when you add that tangy balsamic vinegar, it just is perfect. 

Now, either with a potato masher or with a handheld mixer, you can mix everything together. I will tell you the handheld mix works really, really well. So mix those all up until they are at your desired consistency. 

Now, of course, before you serve this dish, you want to give it a taste. So taste it, see if you like a little more balsamic vinegar. See if you want them a little sweeter. Do you want some more salt, whatever’s going to make them right for you, add just a little dash of whatever it needs. 

One thing that I do love to do when I serve these. I’ll put them in a shallow serving dish, take the back of a spoon and make some swooshes and some divots in there. Put a pat or two of butter on top so that it melts over top and keeps it looking super delicious. Then I will take some flaky sea salt. In my kitchen I have Maldon flake sea salt, and actually in the recipe card and in the show notes, I will link that product for you. It’s literally flakes of salt that are kind of crispy, and that makes such a wonderful garnish on top of these sweet potatoes, you’re going to love it.

Now you don’t need any gravy. You don’t need anything or any marshmallows or whatever topping for these sweet potatoes. So you can serve these right alongside any protein, roast, holiday table, wherever you need a starchy side dish. These savory mashed sweet potatoes will work perfectly. 

So that does it for today’s episode of Let’s Make Dinner. Of course, I will link all of the recipes and products that I talked about right in the show notes for you so you can save it, pin it, make it whatever you need when you are ready. 

Always my request, I would love to have you guys subscribe or follow in your preferred podcast player and then also share this podcast and the Mom’s Dinner recipe with your friends, your family, a loved one. I would appreciate it. 

Outro: Until next time, I hope this episode of Let’s Make Dinner, make your dinner time a little easier. See ya.

Intro: Welcome everybody to another episode of Let’s Make Dinner, your audio library of amazing dinner recipes you can get on the table any night of the week. Hi, I’m your host, Susie Weinrich.

Susie Weinrich: I’m super pumped about this recipe today. We are making a no dripping gravy and if I had to categorize this recipe on my site, I think I would put it under the heading helpful content. I guess I have that top of mind because Google just did an update where they said, if your content is not helpful, we do not want to show it. So hey Google, this is super helpful content. You know, you have the holidays and let’s say you roasted the Turkey or the chickens and now it’s time to make the gravy, and you’re supposed to make the gravy out of the drippings. What if you don’t have sufficient drippings? Or what if you have a really heavy mix of greasy drippings and now how do you separate it? What do you do with it? What tools do you need? Sometimes making gravy can be extremely stressful and you don’t want to end up with lumpy gravy. There are so many levels of gravy stress, I can’t even tell. But this recipe for no drippings gravy, it’s consistent. You know how much you’re going to get. It’s not lumpy, it’s crazy flavorful. You can change the flavorings depending on what you’re serving it with. If you want a chicken gravy, a brown gravy, if you want Turkey gravy, you can totally change it up to suit the dinner that you’re making the gravy for.

I also just recently made this recipe on PinTV, so I will link in the show notes for you where I make Instant Pot Mashed Potatoes, and then I finish with making this no dripping gravy. So besides just listening to this recipe, you can actually also watch me make this recipe on PinTV.

Gravy Recipe: Usually at this point in the audio recipe, I will go over some tips to share with you about the recipe. But I think I’m going to do that while I’m going through making the actual recipe so you can hear how things work out as you’re making this. One thing I will say is that this recipe does take a little bit of time. So of course you could just make gravy with butter, flour, and chicken stock. Sure. You’ll have fine gravy, but we’re not making fine gravy. We’re making outstanding gravy. So we’re going to develop layers of flavor before we add the broth and really punch up the flavor of your gravy. To start off, you need a large, high sided skillet and you’re going to place that over medium low heat. You need one full stick of butter, so eight tablespoons of butter, and get that melting on the stove top.

Now, you want to take yellow onions. It is preferred here, it’s a little bit sweeter, so grab a yellow onion if you have it, and slice it into about quarter inch thick slices. Place that in the butter. Here’s where we’re going to take our time. You’re going to caramelize the onions. So if you pump the heat up, you’re going to burn the butter, you’re going to burn the onions, and the flavor is not going to be the same. Keep it on medium, low to maybe a medium, and you’re just going to let the onions sit and caramelize. Stir it about every five minutes. Keep an eye on the pan, but you can also just let it do its thing. 

The onions will start to get a golden brown color around the edges, maybe about 15 to 20 minutes in. This is where you’re going to add one full sprig of rosemary. There’s no need to chop it. Actually it’s better if you don’t chop it, because we’re going to remove that later. So one full sprig of rosemary, and if rosemary is not your jam, you can absolutely sub thyme here. Or you can do both. I’ve even added a sprig of sage, and that’s delicious.

So pop that in there. Then you want to crack three garlic cloves. You’re not mincing it, you’re not chopping it. Just crack them open so that they can release their oils and their flavor into the gravy. But you’re not going to end up with pieces of garlic in the gravy. 

Now let that saute and simmer and caramelize for about another 15 minutes over that medium low heat. That’s your flavor base of heaven. I’m telling you, it will smell so good. That’s the flavor you’re infusing into your gravy. Next you’re going to add another big flavor punch. So there’s something at the grocery store called Chicken Base. It’s going to be by the Bouillon, but it’s like a grownup version of Bouillon. It comes usually in a jar or a tub, and it’s a paste form. It makes this gravy stand out. So you’re going to add one and a half teaspoons of chicken base. I personally like the Better than Bouillon brand. It seems to be just a true, really good flavor without being overly salty. 

Now, if it’s during the holidays, you can absolutely add a dash of ground sage and ground poultry seasoning at this point, just to punch up the flavor a little bit. Stir that chicken base in, and it should just melt right into the onions and right along with that butter. 

Also, this is where you can change up the flavor profile. The better than Bouillon Brand has, just about every base from lobster to ham. Everything you need. If you want beef, Turkey, chicken, whatever you want your gravy to match, then change up the base that you’re adding here.

Alright, now you’re going to add in one third cup of all-purpose flour. This is making a roux. A roux is basically flour mixed with a fat that thickens a sauce or a liquid. Stir that flour into that butter mixture and just stir it around the pan for about one minute so that you get rid of that raw flour flavor.

Next, you’re going to slowly whisk in three cups of stock or broth. Again, this is where you can change up your flavor profile. So if you’re using chicken, beef, Turkey, change up the broth or stock to match what you’re serving. Once that is completely whisked in and everything looks smooth, it’s going to look really liquidy. Don’t be nervous. What you’re going to do is crank the heat up to medium high and let that simmer just for a few minutes until it thickens up perfectly. If you want to make it extra. Luscious and shiny and delicious. You can stir in a little bit of heavy cream at this point, or add another pat or two of butter.

But the very final step you want to do is strain the gravy. So you still have some onion pieces in there. You still have the garlic chunks, and you have the rosemary or the herbs that you added in. You want to strain all of that out. So what you’ll do is take a fine mesh colander, place it over a large bowl and strain all of those solids out. So I usually just pour it all right into that colander and then take my whisk and stir it around in there. Make sure you scrape all of the gravy off the bottom of the colandar so that you get every last bit. Give it a taste. See if you want more salt, see if you want more cream. If it gets too thick, you can pour in a little extra broth. If it’s not thick enough, you can put it back on and simmer it for a little bit longer. Right in the post I have all of the troubleshooting things that you need to make sure that your gravy is absolutely perfect. Because for some people they say that mashed potatoes are just the vessel to carry the gravy. So you want to make sure it’s perfect and delicious. 

So that does it for today’s episode of Let’s Make Dinner. Of course, I will link the recipe for no drippings gravy right in the show notes for you, as well as a couple really killer mashed potato recipes that you can use to carry your gravy. That’s it.

So I would love to have you guys follow and subscribe to your preferred podcast player and also tell a friend, a loved one, a family member about this show and about the Mom’s Dinner recipes. I would appreciate it. 

Outro: Until next time, I hope this episode of Let’s Make Dinner makes your dinner time a little easier. See ya.

Intro: Welcome to another episode of Let’s Make Dinner, your audio library of amazing dinner recipes you can get on the table. I’m your host, Susie Weinrich.

Susie Weinrich: You guys, I am so excited to be recording this episode. So last night, which I’m going to date this episode, it was November 8th. I did a PinTV live making these Instant Pot Mashed Potatoes, and it went so well. So within the show notes of this episode, I will also put a link to that PinTV episode so you can actually watch these Instant Pot Mashed Potatoes being made as well as listen to the full recipe here on this podcast episode.

Obviously we’re in November when I’m recording this, so Thanksgiving is right around the corner and mashed potatoes can sometimes be the star of the table. For me, it’s the mashed potatoes, the stuffing, the corn casserole, and the cranberries. Those are the things that I want to eat at Thanksgiving. Turkey, it’s fine, right? Turkey’s just okay in my mind. I love ham. I actually might make a ham this year, but enough about Thanksgiving. This is not supposed to be a Thanksgiving episode. It’s just on my mind because here we are. But you can make these Instant Pot Mashed Potatoes year round. They go great with burgers. They go great with pot roast. They go great with Swedish meatballs. Anything that calls for a mashed potato side dish, these are knockout. They are not your traditional butter and milk mashed potatoes. This recipe has cream cheese, sour cream, butter, kosher salt, a little raw garlic, and it is just knockout. They do not need any gravy. But if you want to make gravy, I have a great no dripping gravy recipe that I will link in the show notes for you. 

Tips and Tricks: So let’s go over a couple tips when you’re making these Instant Pot Mashed Potatoes. Number one, the recipe calls for Russet potatoes. You could try to make it with Yukon gold potatoes, but that is such a different potato compared to a Russet. The recipe was really written for Russet potatoes because what you end up with is, the Russets are a very nice starchy, sturdy potato. They hold up to the instant pot. Then the amount of liquid and cream and butter and sour cream. Everything that you’re adding makes them this just velvety texture where they’re still thick enough so they hold up to all of those mix-ins. So I would highly recommend this recipe, you stick with the Russets. However, I do have a recipe for Yukon Gold mashed potatoes. They’re not made in the Instant Pot, but they’re made on the stove top and I will link that recipe for you as well if you want to check that one out too. 

At the very end of this recipe, you add raw garlic. The recipe is made with three pounds of potatoes and you’re adding one raw garlic clove. Don’t be scared that the raw garlic is going to take over the entire dish. It does not. It’s just the right amount to flavor the mashed potatoes with the most delicious garlic flavor. It is perfect. 

Two other add-ins that we are adding. Well, actually three other things we’re adding. We’re only adding a half a cup of water, so these mashed potatoes are no drain mashed potatoes, which is amazing. You don’t have to use a colander. Everything’s done in one pot. Another add-in is your sour cream. Use full fat sour cream. It’s just going to make things creamier and more delicious. You could maybe get away, maybe, I don’t know. You could maybe get away with using a Greek yogurt, but sour cream is really where it’s at. 

The other add-in is your cream cheese. You want the cream cheese to be slightly softened, so leave it at room temperature for a while while the Instant Pot is coming to pressure and cooking the potatoes. If you leave it out at room temperature, it’s going to soften just enough so that that cream cheese mixes in with the mashed potatoes really well, and you don’t end up with clumps of cream cheese, which wouldn’t be terrible, right? But it’s better if it’s nice and mixed in, nice and smooth. Those are all my tips for your Instant Pot Mashed Potatoes. Let’s get on to making this recipe. 

Instant Pot Mashed Potatoes Recipe: I think I have this recipe actually memorized, so I’m not even going to open up a recipe card to move through this with you. What you’re going to do is start with three pounds of recipe potatoes. You’re going to get those peeled up washed. Here’s another little tip for you actually. I’m going to sprinkle a few tips throughout this recipe. If you’re making these for the holidays and you need to get your potatoes done ahead of time, you can absolutely peel your Russet potatoes a couple hours ahead of time and just put them in a cool water bath and they’ll stay fine and ready for you to use in a couple hours. That water will keep your potatoes from browning, so that’s a great tip anytime you have to make mashed potatoes and you have to peel a lot of potatoes. 

So you’re going to start with those three pounds of Russets, peel them up, and then you’re going to cut them into two to three inch pieces. What that’s doing is making sure that all of your potatoes have an even cooking time in the instant pot. Pop all of those into your instant pot, and then you’re going to pour in half a cup of water, and then you’re going to sprinkle in two teaspoons of kosher salt. It’s going to sound like a lot of salt, but potatoes require quite a bit of salt and butter and flavor to be delicious. So that’s where we’re starting with this one. You’re going to pop the lid of the instant pot on, turn that pressure valve to seal and set it to cook manual setting. So manual pressure, normal heat, high pressure for 11 minutes. Let it do its thing, and then finish with a natural release.

Once all that pressure is released, you’re going to open up the Instant pot. Your potatoes are going to be cooked perfectly. Like I said before, there’s no need to drain. You only put a half a cup of water in there and you can leave it in. You’re going to mix it in with the potatoes. Now you’re going to add your mix-ins. You’re going to add four tablespoons of butter, half a cup of sour and four ounces of cream cheese. Now it’s time to mix them up. So you can use a handheld potato masher, but what I like to do is use my handheld mixer just with the two beaters and whip the potatoes up. It whips them perfectly smooth and creamy. After that’s all mixed up, what you’re going to do next is chop up one raw garlic clove. Give it a really good mince so it mixes throughout the potatoes. Add two tablespoons of milk or half and half. Give it one last mix and your potatoes are ready. 

Guys, it’s the easiest recipe ever, and I’m telling you, you don’t need gravy. You don’t need extra butter, you don’t need anything. They are super, super delicious, just as is. 

So, of course you can find the full recipe on my website momsdinner.net, and I will put a link right in the show notes that can take you directly to that recipe. You can print it out, you can pin it, save it, make it, whatever you need to do.

So that does it for today’s episode of Let’s Make Dinner. If you’re enjoying these episodes and these recipes, I would love to have you follow and subscribe to your preferred podcast player as well as tell a friend or a family member or a loved one about this podcast and about the Mom’s Dinner recipes. I would love you for it.

Outro: Until next time, I hope this episode of Let’s Make Dinner makes your dinner time a little easier. See ya. 

Okay, you guys, one tip that I totally forgot to add in the episode, so we’re just going to add it here at the end. We’re just going to keep it casual. When you are serving mashed potatoes, you want to plan to make half a pound of potatoes per person. So in this recipe, we’re using three pounds of potatoes. You’re going to get six servings. All right, use that tip. See you guys later.

Intro: Hello, hello everybody. Welcome to another episode of Let’s Make Dinner, your audio library of amazing dinner recipes and holiday recipes that you can get on the table any night of the week. I’m your host, Susie Weinrich. 

Susie Weinrich: Ooh, you guys. Cuddle up. Let’s talk about the holidays a little bit. I’m super excited. So I’m recording just before Thanksgiving. So we’ve got all of the traditional holiday recipes on the top of our minds, and one that I absolutely love that is always a pop out for me are the cranberries. So it was just, to me, the cranberries, of course when I was little, I hated them. Like how disgusting were cranberries when you were little. But as an adult, it is such a flavor balancer for the holiday dinner. So everything is super rich. You know, you have potatoes and gravy and Turkey or ham and stuffing. Everything is so heavy. Then you put those tart, fresh, cold cranberries on your plate and it just balances everything out. It’s like the palate cleanser you can keep coming back to after you’re like, okay, I’ve eaten all the mashed potatoes. Okay, let me take a few bites of those cranberries. It’s cold, it’s refreshing. So good. 

So if you’ve never made cranberries before, of course there’s a few different options that you can go here. You can just buy jellied cranberries from the grocery store. It’s what you think of when you think of EW cranberries, the whole thing dumps out in one piece. You can still see the ribs of the can on it. You slice it into slices and for some people that is what cranberries are, and it’s traditional. It’s kind of funny. People love it. However, there’s another option in the canned variety. You can buy whole cranberry, cranberry sauce. That’s what we’re going to talk about today. Of course, you can make cranberries with fresh cranberries, which is great. But if your grocery store is out of fresh cranberries and you need to make cranberry sauce, go to the canned aisle and grab a can of whole berry cranberry sauce. We love the Ocean Spray brand, but use whatever they have available at your store.

What this is going to be are basically whole cranberries. There’s still going to be pieces and whole round cranberries within the jellied cranberry sauce. The thing that this lacks is depth of flavor and multiple layers of texture. So you can take two cans of whole berry cranberry sauce from the grocery store and zhuzh it up and make it so incredibly delicious. So let’s just jump right into this recipe. 

Tips and Tricks: I don’t have a ton of tips around this recipe. It’s really just an easy way to have super delicious cranberry sauce at your holiday table. Here are the ingredients you need to make your canned cranberry sauce recipe. You need two 14 ounce cans of whole berry cranberry sauce, an eight ounce can of crushed pineapple in juice. You want to make sure that you buy the one in a hundred percent juice and not a crushed pineapple in syrup. Then you’ll need one navel orange, just a fresh orange, medium, or large size. You’ll need some ground cinnamon and then some ground clove. 

Canned Cranberry Sauce Recipe: All right, so what you’re going to do is you’re going to take a large saucepan and put it over low heat. You’re going to pour in the two whole berry cranberry sauce cans, the whole can of eight ounce crushed pineapple and juice, the zest of one full orange, then a quarter teaspoon of ground cinnamon and a really healthy pinch of ground clove. You just warm that together for about 10 minutes over low heat, and you want to give it a stir occasionally, and that’s it.

Susie Weinrich: Now the key here is, tasting for your preference. If you like your cranberry super sweet, you can absolutely add in a little brown sugar, a little white sugar. Give it a stir, let it melt in. Now, if you like your cranberries a little more tart like I do, then you can squeeze in just a little bit of lemon juice. Of course, taste as you go because once it’s in there, you can’t take it out. If you added too much lemon juice and now it’s a little too tart, sprinkle a little sugar in and it should balance out perfectly. 

You’ll remove this from the heat and let it cool for about 15 to 20 minutes. It’s up to your personal preference if you want to serve your cranberries warm, or if you want to make them ahead, you can make them up to three days ahead, pop them in the fridge, and then serve them cold. 

So during the holidays when you’re making all of those dishes, I highly recommend making your cranberries a couple days ahead so that you don’t even have to worry about it. It’s already done. If you have some cranberries left over after the holidays, try eating this cranberry sauce over vanilla ice cream. I’m telling you guys, it is such a delicious treat. I know the tradition is to put it on Turkey sandwiches, but just give it a try over vanilla ice cream and let me know what you think.

You can always connect with me in the comment section of the actual recipe on momsdinner.net. So if you have anything to say about it. That’s where you need to meet me. 

That does it for this episode of Let’s Make Dinner. Of course, I will link all of the recipes that I talked about right in the show notes so you can find them, make them, save them, pin them, whatever you need.

I would also love it if you would subscribe or follow in your preferred podcast player or tell a friend, a loved one, a family member about this show and about Mom’s Dinner recipes. I would absolutely love you for that. 

Outro: So until next time, I hope this episode of Let’s Make Dinner Makes your dinner time a little easier. Happy holidays, everyone.

Intro: Welcome, welcome everybody to another episode of Let’s Make Dinner, your audio library of amazing dinner recipes you can always get on the table. I’m your host, Susie Weinrich. 

Susie Weinrich: Oh my gosh, I’m so excited you guys are here. We are going to be making a super classic dinner, Coca-Cola Classic. We’re making meatloaf muffin cups. So meatloaf is a super traditional, Sunday family dinner recipe, eighties, seventies, yummy. Something that I grew up eating. We are going to put a little modern spin on meatloaf. It’s still going to have all of your classic flavors, you know, onion, tomato, with a ketchup topping. But it’s just going to be made a little bit easier by baking them in a muffin tin so that it bakes faster.

Sometimes meatloaf can take an hour and a half to bake if you make a really big, solid meatloaf. So if you cut it down into smaller little individual portions, it’s ready in a flash. Which we’re all busy, okay? We need minimum effort, maximum flavor. Maybe that should be the name of my podcast. Minimum Effort, maximum flavor, let’s make dinner. 

Tips and Tricks: Okay, let’s get into a couple tips with this recipe. So we’re making ground beef muffin cups. With ground beef, there’s lots of different fat ratios that you can buy for ground beef and different fat ratios work for different things. So if you’re cooking something made with ground beef in its own juices, like a meatball or a meatloaf, or a casserole or a chili, something where the beef and the fat are contained, you want something that is not quite as fatty as an 80/20. 85/15 is excellent. If you want to go, if you can find a 90/10, wonderful. You could go 93/7. That’s getting a little bit lean, but you could certainly use that. 80/20 is going to be great for burgers or something that you’re cooking where the beef is not cooking in its own fat. Because the fat is good. I mean, it adds flavor, but it also makes things greasy. So you want to avoid that. 

Now the other tip with these meatloaf muffin cups is that we’re going to be adding a panade anytime. I’ve talked about making burgers, making meatballs, anything that’s really made with ground meat, we make a panade to add to it. That’s basically just a mixture of a starch and a liquid that keeps a ground meat recipe juicy.

So for this one, we’re using panko breadcrumbs and milk. It’s the perfect addition for meatloaf. Now let’s talk about the topping. I’ve seen a lot of different toppings for meatloaf. I mean, I’ve seen zhuzh up ketchup, I’ve seen a barbecue sauce, I’ve seen a barbecue ketchup mixture. Lots of different options here. If you have a family favorite, use whatever you like. At my house, we like straight up traditional ketchup. Nothing added in, just ketchup. It’s not going to taste like straight up Heinz ketchup after it comes out of the oven. Something happens. To the ketchup when it’s in the oven, and I think it has to do a lot with the sugar content in ketchup. It caramelizes and really becomes rich in flavor and it’s the perfect topping for these meatloaf muffin cups. So if you trust me and you trust my flavor, then go with just the straight up ketchup. I think that’s all the tips that I have for this recipe. 

Meatloaf Muffins Recipe: So we can just pop right into making the full recipe. You want to start by making sure that you have a 12 cup muffin tin. This recipe’s going to make exactly 12 cups. Get yourself a 12 cup muffin tin. Then the other thing that I recommend is placing that muffin tin on a rimmed baking sheet because the meatloaf muffins will pile a little bit higher than your muffin tin, and you don’t want any grease to bake out and spill in your oven and make a mess. It will make a smoky mess if grease runs out in your oven. 

Okay, let’s get to making these. You’re going to start by preheating your oven to 400. Then you want to spray your 12 count muffin tin with a little non-stick spray baking spray, or you can coat it in some kind of olive oil or canola oil.

Then you can set that aside. In a skillet over medium heat, you’re going to saute one diced onion and three chopped garlic cloves until they’re softened. So this will be like eight to 10 minutes. Then you remove that from the heat and you’re going to stir in two tablespoons of worcestershire sauce, one tablespoon of tomato paste, and one teaspoon of chopped fresh rosemary.

Now, if rosemary is not your jam, then you can absolutely sub in chopped fresh thyme. I think those are probably the two herbs that I would use here. I don’t think I would stray into basil or oregano. I would keep it to that rosemary or thyme, or you could do a combo of the two. That would work as well.

So go ahead and set that mixture aside and let it cool while we make the ground beef mixture. In a large bowl, you’re going to add one cup of Panko breadcrumbs, and a third a cup of milk. You’re going to let that sit for just like a minute or two so that the Panko breadcrumbs can soften in that milk. Then to that, you’re going to add two pounds of ground beef, two eggs that are lightly beaten, one teaspoon of kosher salt, half a teaspoon of black pepper, half a teaspoon of onion powder, and then that sauteed onion mixture.

With clean hands or a fork, you’re going to mix everything together, just until it comes together. You don’t want to overmix it because we’re not trying to make compact little meatballs here. We’re trying to make some nice tender meatloaf cups. Once that is all mixed together, it’s time to grab that prepared muffin tin. With a third a cup, a measuring cup, you want to portion the meatloaf mixture into the muffin tin. So it should be just exactly one third of a cup into the muffin tin. No need to pat it down or make it look perfect. It’s totally fine if it looks kind of craggy on the top and is just messy. Totally fine. 

Next, you want to top each individual little meatloaf cup with about one tablespoon of ketchup and just spread it just a little bit so it’s not all the way to the edge, but so that it covers the surface.

Then you’re going to place that muffin tin on top of the baking sheet, like I said before, to catch any spills. You’re going to bake at 400 degrees for 25 minutes until the center of the meatloaf cups reaches around 160. If you have an instant read thermometer, you can check the internal temperature there. 160 is totally fine. It will climb a couple degrees once you take it out of the ove., and that’s just called carry over cooking. Let them rest for a few minutes and then you can pop them right out of that muffin tin and serve them. Serve them! 

I got really excited about serving my meatloaf cups. Okay, so you’re going to serve one to three meatloaf cups per person. One per kid, right? Maybe three per super hungry person is great. 

As far as side dishes go, keep it classic,okay. It goes great with mashed potatoes and any kind of green veggie; like roasted broccoli, green peas, roasted asparagus, green beans, anything like that is just super classic.

Now if you want to make this recipe with ground Turkey, I actually have a recipe for ground Turkey meatloaf muffin cups that’s wonderful. So I will link that in the show notes for you. I also have a really fun recipe for meatloaf slider sandwiches, you know, like little mini sandwiches. I will link that in the show notes as well, because you can serve your meatloaf muffin cups one night and then a couple nights later you can serve meatloaf sliders if you have leftovers. So a great two for one dinner. 

That does it for today’s episode of Let’s Make Dinner. Of course, I will link all of the recipes that I talked about right in the show notes for you so you can find them when you’re ready to make dinner. 

If you’re enjoying this show, I would love to have you follow or subscribe to your preferred podcast player, as well as let a friend or family member or somebody you love know about this podcast. I would totally appreciate it. 

Outro: Until next time, I hope this episode of Let’s Make Dinner, makes your dinner time a little easier. See ya.

Intro: Welcome everybody to another episode of Let’s Make Dinner, your audio library of amazing dinner recipes you can always get on the table. I’m your host, Susie Weinrich. 

Susie Weinrich: All right, we have a little extra special bonus episode for you today. This is not a dinner recipe. Since we are headed right into winter, I thought I would come on and do a little hot chocolate recipe. I am all for a really good shortcut in the kitchen. Really good marinara sauce, a really good refrigerated pesto, really good refrigerated pico de gallo you can get at the store. Packaged hot chocolate, it’s fine. But if you’ve ever had homemade hot chocolate that has a really rich, deep chocolate flavor and has a thicker texture, it’s almost like drinking chocolate, you won’t go back to the packaged stuff. It’s super, super easy. If you have a well-stocked baking cabinet, most likely you can actually make hot chocolate any day, especially on a snow day. This will be an extra special treat. If you have some teens in your house that maybe are feeling a little bit too old to go make a snowman outside, you can leave them inside and they can make this hot chocolate for everybody. They’ll love it. It’s a great little snow day project for the older kids. 

Tips and Tricks: So there is one ingredient that you may not have in your baking cabinet already, and it’s powdered milk. It’s kind of an odd ingredient, but it definitely makes this hot chocolate recipe extra creamy and rich. You can find powdered milk usually in the baking aisle, and it’s probably going to be on one of the bottom shelves. It will either be in a box or in a canister. The one I have is just from Target. It’s on the bottom shelf. It comes in a box, and then there’s three pouches in the box. So look for that at your store and pick it up, and then you can just keep it in your baking cabinet. When you’re ready to make this hot chocolate, you’ll probably have all the ingredients you need.

Homemade Hot Chocolate Recipe: To get started, you’re going to need three cups of milk. In the recipe, I recommend whole milk just because it’s extra creamy and rich, but you can definitely use a 2% if that’s what you have. So in a small saucepan, you’re going to get that warming over medium low heat. While that warms together, you’re going to whisk together a quarter cup of powdered milk, a quarter cup of unsweetened cocoa powder and three tablespoons of powdered sugar. Whisk that together until it comes together and there’s no clumps or anything. Then once that milk is warm on the stove top, you’re going to slowly whisk that cocoa mixture into the warm milk and keep whisking until it is smooth and fully combined. Then you’re going to pour in one cup of semi-sweet chocolate chips into that warm milk cocoa mixture and stir until they’re completely melted and incorporated. Remove that from the heat, and that’s it. That is your hot chocolate. It is super simple and is so much better than the package stuff. I hate saying that because it feels snooty, but it really is. It really is better than just the package stuff, I promise. 

So this recipe will fill two mugs completely. Or to be honest, what I find is that when I pour hot cocoa for the kids, they generally don’t drink the whole cup anyway. So I would pour it into three cups, filling it about two thirds of the way full, and then leave the rest of the room for the kids to pour on all their toppings. We’re not having hot cocoa every day, so let them go crazy with their toppings. 

Some of the things that I like to have for the kids to add in are, of course marshmallows, mini marshmallows, whipped cream, maybe some chocolate sauce, maybe some extra cocoa powder or powdered sugar in a little shaker. For the adults you could add a little boozy note to your hot cocoa. So some things that would be really good are Peppermint Schnapps, Baileys, maybe Kahlua. RumChata is probably my favorite. It has a cinnamon and cream flavor to it. You could do whipped cream vodka, marshmallow vodka. Fireball or just a chocolate liqueur to add a little bit more chocolate flavor.

So I hope that this hot cocoa recipe warms up your next snow day. Of course, I will link the full recipe right in the show notes for you so you can find it when you’re ready to make your homemade hot chocolate. 

If you’re enjoying all these episodes of Let’s Make Dinner, I would love to have you subscribe or follow in your preferred podcast player. That just makes it easier for you to find all of our new episodes right in your podcast feed. 

Outro: All right. Usually at the end I say, I hope this recipe makes your dinner time easier, but since this isn’t for dinner, I guess we’ll just see you later.

Intro: Welcome everybody to another episode of Let’s Make Dinner, your audio library of amazing dinner recipes you can always get on the table. I’m your host, Susie Weinrich.

Susie Weinrich: I am super excited to share this recipe with you guys today because if you have picky eaters in your house, they are going to love this recipe. We are making chicken noodle soup for the kids for dinner tonight. This is a perfect kid-friendly dinner. It’s full of flavor so the adults can eat it, but not full of ingredients that your kids are going to hate. Like pieces of onion, pieces of garlic, chopped-up celery, and no green stuff; no parsley, nothing that they’re going to turn their nose up at.

Intro: This is a homemade chicken noodle soup with just a few ingredient adjustments. That makes it a perfect kid-friendly dinner, that is great for your picky eaters. I also will tell you that this recipe is famous adjacent. So Jenna Fisher, who played Pam on The Office, made this recipe for her kids and her family for dinner, and everybody loved it and she shared it on Instagram and the recipe blew up. So you can tell your kids that Pam from the office even likes this recipe. 

Tips and Tricks: All right, so a couple of tips on a few ingredients when you’re making this chicken noodle soup. Number one, the chicken. I always recommend that you take advantage of the rotisserie chicken either at Costco or at your local grocery store.

It’s super tender and juicy chicken that is perfect in any recipe that calls for cooked chicken. The other option would be to roast a chicken breast in the oven at 350 for about 15 to 20 minutes until it reaches 165. Or you could poach a chicken breast in simmering water. I have a great recipe on Mom’s Dinner that I will link in the show notes for you on how to poach chicken breasts. The last option would be just to use the leftover chicken that you have in your fridge. 

Another ingredient I want to chat about is chicken base. So chicken base I always say is like the older, better-looking brother of chicken bouillon. Basically, it’s a paste form of bouillon that has so much more flavor and is so much more delicious. So you will find it in your soup aisle, and I usually purchase the Better Than Bouillon brand. It comes in a jar and it’s a paste form. Definitely do not skip that ingredient. 

The last thing I want to talk about before we get to the full recipe is the noodles traditional. You know, like canned Campbell’s chicken noodle soup has a very specific noodle. It is not spaghetti, it is not a frozen thick egg noodle. It’s something called a kluski noodle, and I believe it’s spelled K L U S K I. They sometimes are also called Swabian Spaetzle noodles, which you’re probably like, yeah, I’m never going to find in my grocery store. But you’ll be surprised. It’s probably going to be called a Kluski Noodle at your grocery store, and most likely it’s going to be maybe in the soup aisle, or it’s going to be on the bottom shelf near the pasta. So definitely look for that. That is the type of noodle that your kids are used to if they’ve had just canned Campbell’s chicken noodle soup. 

Chicken Noodle Soup for Kids Recipe: So let’s get on to making this full recipe. You’re going to start with a large pot over medium, medium-high heat. Add a little bit of olive oil or canola oil. Then you’re going to add in one cup of diced carrots. You can use baby carrots or you can use whole peeled carrots. Whatever you have in your fridge will work just fine. You’re going to let those soften for about three to five minutes, and then you’re going to sprinkle in a quarter teaspoon of garlic powder and onion powder.

I know I said there would be no garlic or onion. This is just a quarter teaspoon, so it’s going to add enough flavor to the soup that they won’t be able to put their finger on. They’re still going to love it. They also sprinkle in an eighth of a teaspoon of kosher salt, celery salt, and turmeric powder. Give that a good stir around the pot. Then you’re going to pour in 32 ounces of chicken broth and one teaspoon of that chicken base that we talked about. Give that a good stir and turn the heat up to medium, medium-high, and bring the pot to a simmer. Once that broth starts to simmer, you’ll add in one cup of cooked chicken that’s diced pretty small. Whatever you think your kids will like, dice it to that size. And one cup up to one and a half cups, if your kids really like noodles of those kluski noodles that we talked about in the ingredient section as well. You’re going to let that simmer for about 12 to 15 minutes until the noodles are cooked through, and the carrots are nice and softened. 

At the end, you want to make sure you taste it for additional seasoning and it’s good to go. Now as far as serving your chicken noodle soup for kids for dinner, we just keep it really simple and we either add some warm, crusty bread on the side, as they would get at Panera or saltine crackers. Then we might mix up some chocolate milk to go with the soup. 

That does it for today’s recipe. As always, I will link all of the recipes I talked about in this episode right in the show notes for you. 

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Outro: Until next time, I hope this episode of Let’s Make Dinner makes your dinner time a little easier.