What's for supper? Chicken tortilla bake

Tonight's dinner menu:

Chicken Tortilla Bake, made from (browned) ground chicken, torn-up whole wheat tortillas, a can of green chilies, some cheese, and homemade enchilada sauce.  Layer in casserole, bake covered till bubbly and tortillas are soft.  Let sit a few minutes before serving.  Serve with choice of Tex-Mex toppings (I like sliced olives).

Reheated rice, broccoli

Vanilla microwave cake, vanilla ice cream, and warm sauce made from frozen raspberries and apple butter.

Our apple butter (photo post)

The slow cooker full of apples was started at 8:30 in the morning (a slight change from the original plan) and it took until about 9:00 that night until it was thick enough...not quite as thick as some commercial apple butter, but still spreadable. We used 2 1/2 cups of sugar plus cinnamon, cloves, and salt as per the recipe.

We got 12 125 ml (half-cup) jars out of the 5 1/2 pounds of apples (19 apples, to be exact), plus a bowlful for the fridge. The bowlful is already gone--Mama Squirrel used it in a batch of muffins and in apple crisp (a cupful mixed with the chopped apples).

Jar labels and photographs: Ponytails.

In apple butter time

See our apple butter photos here.

The HeadGirl at The Common Room posted a link to a Crockpot apple butter recipe (plus a nice photo of her peeled apples waiting to get cut up). (Here's the recipe she used.) Cents to Get Debt Free posted a recipe for it last year too.

I mentioned that the HG might like the Apple Butter Pie we've posted about here.

And then I noticed that there's an Apple Butter Cake Roll linked at the Penny Pinching Party.

It's definitely that time of year.

Crockpot Apple Butter

Cents to Get Debt-Free shows us how.

Apple Butter Pie...or Pumpkin Butter Pie

I made one of these old-fashioned pies last night for a dinnertime treat...I had wanted to make apple pie but most of the apples had gotten eaten (need to stock up at the farm stand), so this was a good second choice. If you don't have apple butter (which is thicker and sweeter than applesauce--it's like cider cooked down to a spreadable consistency), you can use homemade pumpkin butter for a different taste.

Lotvarrick Pie (Apple Butter Pie), from Food That Really Schmecks by Edna Staebler

Pastry for a 9-inch pie (pat-in pastry works fine)
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup apple butter
2 eggs, beaten
4 tbsp. butter, melted (I used margarine)
1 tbsp. flour
1/4 tsp. cream of tartar
1/4 tsp. baking soda
2 cups milk
1/4 tsp. nutmeg for sprinkling

Mix the sugar, flour, soda and cream of tartar; blend in the melted butter, add the beaten eggs, apple butter, then the milk. Pour carefully into the pie shell and sprinkle with the nutmeg. Bake 10 minutes at 425 degress, then about 40 minutes at 350 degrees or until the custard is set (check with a paring knife). Although it's pretty when it comes out all puffed up, the pie is actually better if it's allowed to chill for awhile or even if you can make it the day before--like some pumpkin pies, it seems to slice better once it's had time to set.

Now a couple of warnings, from my own experience. First of all, this amount of filling will fill a good-sized deep-dish shell. If you have a small 9-inch pie pan, you might consider making two crusts and dividing the filling to avoid overflow. Another good idea is to put the whole thing on a cookie sheet before filling, just in case.

Also, if the filling does swish around the crust too much, you might end up with a bit of too-dark pie around the edges. Just slice off any black edge, and savour the rest--maybe with a small blob of whipped cream on top.