Dutch Oven and Solar Cooking Weekend!

  Don't forget to enter the give-away here! You will be on your way to making your own Hot Cocoa Bombs!

     Labor Day Weekend was so much fun for us! We started out on Friday Night going to a party for a friend from church who had just been sworn in as an American Citizen! Congrats one more time Amanda!
      On Saturday, we did normal chores and errands, but then that evening, we went over to Mesa to see our newlyweds in their home and have dinner together.  

        We ate paninis  with chicken in them that Lindsey made in the crock pot that was absolutely delicious! (she needs to post about that.)  And I brought a spinach and fruit salad that I found on Spoonful of Flavor.  It is a beautiful and delectable dish that you just have to try! The Strawberry-Mint dressing is incredible.  I could eat just the dressing by the spoonful!  (I might because the salad is all gone but there is a little dressing left over.)  

This is my version layered in a bowl. It has spinach, watermelon, blueberries, strawberries and Havarti cheese. Then, when you spoon your dressing on it, it is a sight to behold!

      On Sunday we had a beautiful day atchurch and getting to see our little grandson afterwards! 

​ Here he is watching The Olympics.  He is so smart and adorable.  He has the longest eyelashes you have ever seen!  I mean, you almost feel like you need to comb them because they are so long, they actually get messy!  I just love him so much!

---

    On Monday, we decided to do some alternative cooking.  I don't think that I have mentioned that we are preppers at heart. We just like to be prepared for emergencies and we like to be self sufficient.  Plus, we also like to camp and cook in unusual ways.  Once, many years ago, we cooked breakfast on a flat rock!  (But, that is another story.)  We also have 2 Eagle Scout sons and 1 who is doing his Eagle project in October.  Glen and I have both been involved in Boy Scouts for a long time.  So, we receive copies of the Scouting magazine.  The September-October issue had an article and web site video about dutch-oven cooking, something we love to do and seeing those recipes gave Glen the urge to do some dutch-oven cooking.  While we were at it, I suggested that we pull out the solar cooker and bake some french bread to go with the dutch-oven lasagna we were making. So we did!  It was a fun day of cooking!  We didn't just make dinner, we started with breakfast! 
(My son, Jacob took some of these outdoor pics for me! I think he did great!)

Here is one of our dutch ovens. We had let Austin and Lindsey borrow the one with the flatter lid to go camping. But this one worked great.

The lid is sitting there on our fire pit. Everything is getting heated up and the coals are getting ready to go!

This is the solar oven. This was given to us by our friends, the Barnes. It is an older model I think, and has some glitches, but we are still learning to use it.

Cheese!

3 colors of peppers!

   Combine those two ingredients with sausage, onions, bread chunks, eggs, milk and dry mustard and you get a breakfast casserole that starts to get eaten so fast you can hardly photograph it first!

A little sour cream and salsa and it is ready to eat! YUM!

     I made my sister Audree''s recipe for french bread.  It makes two loaves.  So, I made one in the solar oven and one in the crock pot.  They both took about 2 1/2 hours to cook.  I will give you the recipe later if my sister says it is okay.  You could also try Tina's recipe from her guest post here. 

This is the solar oven loaf! We got the oven temperature up to about 250 degrees!

Here is the crock pot bread. The texture was so good! The top stayed a little soft though, while the solar oven loaf was crunchy. Neither one browned, although this loaf is brown on the bottom.

       At lunch time, when the bread was starting to be finished, our son, Tyler, (The baby's dad), came over with some venison meatballs in marinara sauce! They were delicious and the bread sopped up the left over sauce nicely!
        Then for dinner, we made the dutch-oven lasagna!  Oh my goodness! It was easy and delicious and let me tell you, you can feed a crowd with this stuff!  This is the recipe, from The Scout's Dutch Oven Cookbook by Tim and Christine Conners.       I  made a few changes in my version because I make my own sauce.

    Scoutmaster's Dutch-Oven Lasagna
 Equipment 
12 " Dutch oven
Medium mixing bowl
foil (if desired to line dutch oven)
Large skillet.

 Ingredients
2 lbs. lean ground beef
1 large onion, chopped
3 cloves of chopped garlic
​salt and pepper to taste
1 T. oregano
1 T. basil
2 tsp. sugar
2  14.5 oz cans diced tomatoes
2  15 oz cans tomato sauce
1  15 oz carton ricotta cheese
1  15 oz carton cottage cheese
2 eggs
1 box lasagna noodles (or other pasta noodles) uncooked
6 cups (or more) mozzarella cheese

Prepare the Dutch oven by lining with foil if desired and spraying with cooking spray.  Meanwhile, in the skillet, crumble the ground beef and put in the chopped onion and garlic. Brown altogether.  Salt and pepper to taste and add the oregano and basil.  Continue on heat briefly, then pour in the diced tomatoes and stir together.  Next, add the tomato sauce and mix together. Blend in the sugar. Take a little taste and see if you need to add any more oregano or basil. Simmer on low while you mix the ricotta cheese, the cottage cheese and eggs in the medium bowl. Set aside.  
  Spread about 1/3 of the sauce and meat mixture in the bottom of the Dutch oven.  Lay the lasagna noodles, or sprinkle penne, on top of the sauce. (I ran out of lasagna noodles, so I used both.)  Cover the pasta with 1/3 of the ricotta mixture.  Top the ricotta with 1/3 of the cheese.  Repeat this order 2 more times until all the ingredients are layered, ending with a layer of mozzarella.  
   Set the Dutch oven over 8 coals.  Put the lid on and use 17 coals on top of the lid.  Cook for about 45 minutes. Refresh coals as needed.  The noodles will be cooked perfectly!

Here is the oven with the coals on it! We are just getting ready to take off the lid!

Oh Wow! What a cheesy sight!

Ready to serve! Bubbling hot!

A little watermelon on the side! Can't resist this color!

      All in all , it was a very tasty Labor Day Weekend!  I hope that your's was equally flavor filled and fun!  I will post more of these recipes later on, and maybe some Dutch oven tips!  If you haven't tried Dutch oven cooking, it is a lot of fun!