Freezer Egg McMuffins and Calzones

My poor poor freezer co-op group gets to be the guinea pig right along with my family these days.  I always said I wouldn't spring an "un-tried" recipe on the entire group, but let's just say that didn't last very long!  I wanted to tackle smaller quantities of two different individual items for our group this month so I made Egg McMuffins and individually sized Pepperoni Calzones.

For the Egg McMuffins, I cooked the eggs in muffin tins.  They took about 20 minutes at 350.  I am going to seek out some jumbo muffin tins as I think they might be a better fit on the english muffins.  I toasted the split english muffins while my eggs were cooking just on a rack below the eggs.  I also used good ol' Kraft American singles as my cheese to keep with the "authentic-y" McDonald's flavor.  I wrapped in a square of wax paper and then placed 4 in a gallon sized ziploc.  To reheat, I would wrap them in a moist paper towel and cook for maybe 20-30 seconds then I would toast the english muffin and then cook the insides a little more in the micro and re-assemble, but I'm kinda weard about soggy bread that way.  :)

For the Calzones, I bought the frozen loaves of bread.  I used one loaf per family to make 4 calzones.  I mixed 2 packages of regular pepperoni, 2 packages of turkey pepperoni, 8 cups of mozzarella cheese, and about 2 cups of marinara sauce for the filling.  I put the loaves in my "bread proof" setting on my oven and we watched them rise and rise and rise. 

I took out one loaf at a time, rolled it out, cut into fourths, put an ice cream scooper worth of goo in the middle, and did my best to form some sort of calzone-ish shape.  It was a bit of a mess.  :)  I brushed with a little italian seasoning and canola oil and put them in the oven to par-bake them at 350.  To re-heat, I thawed them in the fridge and then microwaved them for 30 seconds and then stuck them in the toaster oven (see weird bread sogginess issues above).

In case you can't tell by now, I suck at all things "recipe."  I'm not a baker because I don't like to measure.  I'm the queen of the improvise which makes for a terrible food-blogger.  :(



Homemade Hot Pockets

I am not sure that you would call these "Hot Pockets," but that is what I am going to call them.

1 lb ground beef
1 can Mexicorn
Cheese
Jumbo butter biscuits - ideally you want somewhere between 24 and 30 biscuits

Cook ground beef and season to taste (I used dried onions and beef fajita seasoning); drain the grease; drain the Mexicorn; place cooked ground beef in a bowl with the Mexicorn; combine; set aside.

Flatten the biscuits into round, flat circles; place approximately 1/4 cup of the ground beef/Mexicorn mixture in center of the flattened biscuit; top with cheese; cover with another flattened biscuit; press the edges to seal shut; use a fork to score the biscuits all the way around.

If you are going to freeze these, freeze them in a single layer. When you are ready to cook, take the desired number out of the freezer and ensure that the biscuits are completely defrosted; bake as directed on the biscuits.

The biscuits I used bake at 375 for 11 to 15 minutes.

Brown Bag Burritos

Our family loves this recipe because it is very versitile.  You can eat them room temperature (thus the Brown Bag title), heated up, or even cold (they actually are really good cold!).  You can eat them for lunch or spruced up with sour cream, avocado and salsa for dinner with some rice.  Just thaw them out over night (or in the microwave) and heat them up... either in the oven or the microwave. I am posting the actual recipe, and then putting what I did (I kind of doubled the recipe to make more) in red.

2 lb. ground beef (I used 4.5lbs of 93%lean turkey)

2 cans refried beans (5 cans of fat free refried beans)

1 1/3 c. enchilada sauce (3 cans)

1/2 c. water (1 cup water)

1/3 c. minced onion (2/3 c dried minced onion)

1 Tbsp. chili powder (2 Tbsp)

1 Tbsp. garlic powder (2 Tbsp)

1 tsp. salt (2 tsp)

1 tsp. dried oregano (2 tsp)

3 c. shredded cheese (5 cups cheddar cheese)

20 flour tortillas (60 tortillas)

Brown ground beef; drain. Add remaining ingredients (except tortillas). Bring to a boil. Reduce heat; cover and simmer for 20 minutes. 

Heat 3-4 tortillas at a time (will make them easier to roll). Spoon 1/4 c. beef mixture down the side of each tortilla.

Roll up. Wrap each burrito in a paper towel, then wrap in foil. (I only wrapped in foil as I find the paper towels unnecessary)

When ready to eat, remove foil and microwave for about a minute. The paper towel keeps the burritos moist. If you don’t use a microwave, skip the paper towel and just wrap in foil. Then heat burritos in the oven with foil. For a sit down meal they are nice topped with lettuce, cheese, salsa, and sour cream. If you’re eating on the run, though, just grab and go!