Feeling Under the Weather and Back-to-School Recipes

Sorry I missed posting recipes last Friday, but, unfortunately, I was in the hospital all day.  I’ve been experiencing shortness of breath and tightness in my chest and neck for the past couple of weeks.  On Friday morning. I wasn’t sure if I was having a heart attack or what, so my hubby took me to the emergency room.  After a couple of normal EKG’s and a couple rounds of blood work that determined my cardiac enzymes were normal, they sent me home.  On Wednesday, I went for a stress test and the cardiologist said everything looked fine other than my blood pressure was a little high.  One of my sisters (who is a nurse) has asthma and said my symptoms sounded like that’s what it could be.  I went to my family doctor yesterday (actually, the nurse practitioner) and she said that it could be different reasons and that we’d have to weed out the possibilities.   If I had asthma or panic attacks, that could cause the shortness of breath and raise my blood pressure.  Since the medication for panic attacks would take a couple of weeks to work and my blood pressure was borderline, she gave me a prescription for an inhaler to start off with and see if that helps.  So far it has!  Thank goodness!!  It is so scary not being able to breath, especially when you’re at home by yourself!!  I have to go back in a week to have blood work done to check my thyroid  and to have my blood pressure checked again.  Hopefully, we’ll get this figured out!!  Boy, it’s tough getting old!!!   LOL

I’ll hopefully be back to posting on a more regular basis soon!  I hadn’t been feeling too well to feel like making any projects, let alone having the desire to do any tweaking or even finish my fall decorating.  And that’s not good!!   LOL

Here’s a couple more family favorites!!  The soup recipe comes from Food Network’s Barefoot Contessa and the bread recipe is an old Pampered Chef recipe. 

Roasted Tomato Basil Soup

3 lbs. plum tomatoes, cut in half

1/4 c. plus 2 T. olive oil

1 T. kosher salt

1 1/2 tsp. freshly ground black pepper

2 c. yellow onions, chopped

6 garlic cloves, minced

2 T. butter

1/4 tsp. crushed red pepper flakes

1 (28 oz.) can plum tomatoes, with their juice

4 c. fresh basil leaves

1 tsp. fresh thyme leaves

1 qt. chicken stock or water

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.  Toss together the tomatoes, 1/4 c. olive oil, salt and pepper.  Spread the tomatoes in 1 layer on a baking sheet and roast for 45 minutes.

In an 8-quart stockpot over medium heat, sauté onions and garlic with 2 T. of olive oil, the butter and red pepper flakes for 10 minutes, until the onions start to brown.  Add the canned tomatoes, basil, thyme and chicken stock.  Add the oven-roasted tomatoes, including the liquid on the baking sheet.  Bring to a boil and simmer uncovered for 40 minutes.  Pass through a food mill fitted with the coarsest blade.  Taste for seasonings.  Serve hot or cold.

** I used a hand-held blender. 

My hubby took the bread out of the pan right after it came out of the oven instead of letting it cool for a bit, so it fell apart a little and I couldn’t get a very good picture.  But, it’s really good – even cold!!

Antipasto Bread

1 (16 1/2 oz.) jar marinated artichoke hearts, drained

1/3 c. hard salami, chopped

1/3 c. red bell pepper, chopped

1/2 c. pitted ripe olives, sliced

2 garlic cloves, pressed

1/4 c. butter or margarine, melted

1 c. parmesan cheese

2 pkgs. refrigerated dinner rolls

Preheat oven 375 degrees.

Spray Bundt pan with nonstick cooking spray.

Chop artichokes, salami and red pepper.   Mix altogether with olives and garlic.  Set aside.

Cut each dinner roll into 4 pieces. (64 pieces total).

Dip 16 pieces in melted butter then in parmesan cheese.  Arrange evenly in pan.  Sprinkle with 1/3 artichoke mixture.  Repeat twice.  Top layer ending with dough/parmesan cheese.  Sprinkle with any remaining cheese.

Bake 27-30 minutes.

Pillsbury Dinner Rolls have changed since this recipe came out.  They are difficult to pull apart to get even pieces, so I use my kitchen shears and cut them into 8 rolls, using the seam marks as a guide. Then cut each roll into 4 pieces.

Also, instead of rolling each dough piece in butter then in parmesan cheese, I sprinkle the cheese first, then add buttered dough pieces, then sprinkle more cheese on top.  Easier and less messy!

 

As always, if you’d like to participate or see who else has recipes to share, click on the picture below to go to Colleen’s (andbabymakes5) blog.

I wanted to share a couple of pics of my scarecrows that I made a couple of years ago using clothes I bought at Goodwill and light-up pumpkins.

 

Until Next Time . . . .Kris