Recipes – Mandy Cooks and Quilts

What a Summer!

Greetings yall!! Its been almost 3 months since my last post. A lot has been going down at my casa that blogging didn’t fit my hectic schedule. But I am back baby! As promised, we will be showing some new finishes and some delicious muffins, and how to process strawberries for freezing and jam.

To begin, if you follow me on Instagram or Facebook you know its been crazy at my house. My husband moved to Maryland before Memorial Day for work. The kids and I are staying here because it just made sense to keep them in a stable, familiar environment. So my home workload has picked up since my sidekick is not here to help me out sometimes. However, the kids are stepping up and helping with age-appropriate tasks.

Right before the 4th of July weekend, part of an old giant tree fell on my house, rupturing a gas line in my attic and causing a lot of damage to my roof, master bedroom, and bathroom. Thankfully no one was hurt. We have been battling with the contractors to get the roof fixed and the inside repaired. The roof was finally repaired this past week. So hopefully, they will begin on the inside soon. I am missing my Tempurpedic mattress. My guest bed mattress hurts my hips.

Work at my job has picked up, so I have had to work mandatory overtime a lot over the last few weeks.

Needless to say, my quilting time has been limited to a few minutes during the week and a few hours on the weekends. I have completed a few projects and keep up with my sew-alongs. I am only behind on my A Quilting Life BOM, but I should be able to catch up on that soon.

Here are some May Finishes. I completed the Sweet Dreams Sew A Long And some patriotic dining room decor along with my Toes in the Sand BOM. I hand-quilted the panel and added a frame to make it look like a picture. I made a pinwheel on point table runner using a Charm Pack called Praire Days by Moda.

Here are my July projects. I participated in Boo Crew by Fat Quater shop. I reversed the color of the Cauldron and Cat colors in the kit because I have never seen an orange Cauldron, and I wanted to pay homage to my evil devil kitty, Mr. Smee, who is an orange tabby you have seen in my pics. I made my sister a birthday quilt. She picked out the layer cake I used called Horsing Around by Bentertex. The pattern is Night Sky by Missouri Star Quilt Company. I love the secondary pattern made by the chevrons. I love the pantograph quilting I chose with horseshoes and stars. The quilter chose the purple thread which I think is perfect.

I am also participating in the Quilted Summer Sew Along by Caliope Quilts. Last year the patterns where baby Elizabeth Hartman and I did the Koala Quilt. I am doing Kidding Around (Goats in Pajamas) this year by ArtEast Quilting. The blocks are very intricate but adorable.

I have two more gift quilts I plan on starting and a Christmas Quilt for me. I also have a Halloween panel and table placemats I plan to get together soon.

Now onto some good eats.

May in my part of Georgia is strawberry season. For the past few years the kids and I go to a local u-pick farm and load up of these delicious gems. I freeze some and make jam. I also make delicious strawberry desserts like this strawberry rhubarb crumble.

Here is a simple recipe for preserving your strawberries for the entire year. I love to pull out a bag from my freezer in the dead of winter and top a big ole slice of angel food cake.

Frozen Strawberries:

As many pints of strawberries you have

Sugar

Slice strawberries into a large bowl. Add the desired amount of sugar. I usually do 1 cup of sugar to 3-4 heaping cups of berries. Stir and let sit for 30-60 minutes until sugar is dissolved. Place in Ziploc freezer bags and freeze. Use within a year. I love how the sugar makes the strawberries have their own sauce.

I love rhubarb and was stoked the local strawberry farm had some this year. So I made this recipe with some of my berries and fresh rhubarb.

https://barefootcontessa.com/recipes/strawberry-rhubarb-crisp

And to celebrate the strawberry season, I also made this strawberry quilt. I call it Strawberry Patch.

I had planned on writing about my delicious banana muffins but can’t find my pictures of them now. But fear not, I have 4 bananas overripening on my counter for a delicious back-to-school breakfast recipe to come later this week. Have a great week yall!

Spring and Easter Designs and Easter Dinner

Hi Yall! It has been a hot minute since I have had the time to sit down and work on the blog. Kids have been busy with their extracurricular activities. We spend 2-3 evenings at the soccer fields. We have been trying to get our garden going and clean up the front yard which gets strangled by weeds this time of year. I know it is past Easter, but I come to you today with some Easter and Spring Decor I have made over the past two years. I also have some recipes from our Easter dinner.

Here are two of my Easter/Spring quilted items. I made the Bunny table runner last year for Easter. I actually made two of these. I gave one to my mom for Easter. I used the Cottontail pattern by Lella Boutique for the blocks. The original pattern was for a quilt but I modified it for a table runner. The quilt on the wall is a Log Cabin Cross wall hanging made from a pattern by Quiltfox that I found on Etsy. I used all Moda Grunge fabrics. I quilted this on my machine using gold thread. I gave this wall hanging to a family member as a gift last weekend.

I also made three Bunny pillowcases. Above two are pillows that I gave my children. They specifically wanted bunnies that sort of matched their own rabbits, Pickles and Gary. My daughter slept with hers for a solid year.

Gary and Pickles best Christmas gifts ever!

This Easter we had a whole roasted leg of lamb. It was crazy delicious.

Here is the marinade recipe I used:

Marinade

10 cloves of garlic chopped

1 spring of rosemary chopped

1 handful of parsley chopped

1/4 cup olive oil

Salt

Black pepper

Directions: Season lamb all over with salt and pepper. Rub oil, herbs and garlic all over the lamb. Cover and refrigerate overnight. Place lamb in roasting pan on rack and roast at 325 degrees for 5-6 hours until tender and falling off the bone.

We had a very springy dessert for Easter as well. I made a Greek ruffled milk pie. I normally make baklava for Easter but having just got back from vacation I thought I might give my gallbladderless body a reprieve from the buttery deliciousness that is Baklava. Greek ruffled milk pie does have some phyllo dough and butter but not as much. I added lemon and blueberries for a springy touch.

There is a link to a recipe I used to make it here. I would also make this for brunch as it is more eggy than custardy to me but it is awesome to eat anytime. My sous chef is becoming an expert with the phyllo.

Don’t worry most of the berries made it into the pie.

I am still working on my blocks of the month and the Sweet Dreams sew along. I should have the sew along quilt finished by the weekend. My next post is going to have some more delicious recipe ideas including my famous banana muffins and an easy and delicious way to preserve strawberries. See yall later!

Even more cold weather sewing, spanokopita, and cookies!

Hi all! Last weekend it snowed for the first time in the 4 years we have lived in this part of Georgia. It was under an inch but the kids took full advantage and made tiny snowmen. We are used to seeing more copious amounts from our time in New York. But, I am glad we still haven’t had to use the snow shovels for actual snow since we moved here. They are great for scooping leaves in the fall.

It was another cold weekend this weekend as well so I spent most of the weekend working on sewing projects and cooking up some delicious meals.

I worked on finishing my Chicken Quilt. The original pattern did not have a border. I decided to add one. My background is a very pale gray, and the binding is going to be light colors as well. I felt a border would really add definition to the quilt. I like how borders frame a design like a picture. What do you think?

I also completed my first month of the Toes in the Sand Block of the Month.

The first two blocks for Toes in the Sand.

I also completed week 4 of Pat Sloan’s Sweet Dreams sew along.

Block 4 was named chocolate chip cookies. This inspired me to help Danielle make some really large chocolate chip cookies with sea salt.

Cookie monster cookies!!! Nomm Nomm Nommmm!

And now it’s recipe time!!! I made my version of spanakopita. Spanokopita is a Greek pastry filled with spinach and cheese. It is divine. I love all greek food and swear there must be some Greek DNA in my body. Feta is my friend.

This recipe combines two of my favorite recipes for spanakopita Michael Symon’s recipe is filled with goat cheese and herbs. Ina Garten’s recipe is made like a strudel so it’s not making small triangles which can be tedious and time-consuming.

Here is the recipe:

Spanokopita

1/2 box frozen phyllo dough thawed.
1 stick of unsalted butter
1 box of frozen spinach thawed and squeezed dry or 2 large bunched of fresh spinach
1 package 8 oz cream cheese
6 oz of feta crumbled
Garlic salt
1 large onion diced
1/2 cup pank bread crumbs

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Prepare a sheet tray covered in foil.
Cook onions and fresh spinach in olive oil until soft. Drain any excess moisture.
Place spinach/onions in a medium bowl and add softened cream cheese, feta and garlic salt to taste. Mix to combine.
Melt butter in microwave in 30 second increments and let cool slightly.
On a cutting board or piece of foil lay out 1 sheet of phyllo dough and brush with butter. Layer another on top and repeat the brushing with butter. Repeat until you have 10 layers of phyllo dough.
Place 1/2 of the mixture lengthwise down down the middle of the phyllo dough layer. Fold sides together and to make a long rectangle.
Place seam side down on prepared sheet tray and baste with butter.
Repeat with other 10 layers of phyllo dough and other half of the spinach/cheese mixture so that you have 2 rectangles.
Pierce the rectanges in a few places on top with a knife to vent.
Bake until golden brown about 30 minutes.
Slice and serve. This will serve 4 as main dish or 6-8 as a side dish or appetizer