Homemade Green Bean Casserole

One of the most popular side dishes for Thanksgiving is the traditional green bean casserole.  This is usually made with a cream of mushroom soup and dehydrated onions.  I have never found this very appetizing - until I saw the Alton Brown episode where he made a homemade version of this.  I thought it looked really great and much healthier than the traditional recipe.  And it didn't really seem any more difficult.  So I decided to give his recipe a try.  The recipe can be found here.

Homemade Green Bean Casserole

Serves 6.

Ingredients

For the topping:

2 medium onions, thinly sliced
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons bread crumbs (panko recommended, but I used regular)
1 teaspoon salt
Nonstick spray

For beans:

1 pound fresh green beans, rinsed and trimmed
1 gallon water
2 tablespoons salt

For sauce:

2 tablespoons unsalted butter
12 ounces mushrooms, trimmed and cut into 1/2-inch pieces
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 cup chicken broth
1 cup half-and-half

Directions

1.  Preheat the oven to 475 degrees F.

2.  Combine the onions, flour, breadcrumbs and salt in a bowl.  Toss until the onions are coated.  Spray a cookie sheet with the nonstick spray.  Then place the coated onions onto the cookie sheet and arrange in a single layer.  Bake for 30  minutes or until golden brown.  Make sure you turn the onions over approximately every 10 minutes.  You really need to watch that these don't burn.  When the onions are golden brown, remove them from the oven and set aside to cool.

 

 

3.  Turn oven down to 400 degrees F.

4.  Bring a pot of water large enough to cover beans to a boil with the salt.  Cook these for 10 minutes.  Drain in a colander and plunge into a large bowl of ice water to stop the cooking.  Then drain the beans.

5.  Melt the 2 tablespoons of butter in a large nonstick pan.  Add the mushrooms, salt and pepper.  Cook for 4 to 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.  Add the garlic and cook for another minute - make sure you stir so that the garlic doesn't burn.  Now sprinkle the flour over the mixture and stir.  Cook for approximately 1 minute.  Add the broth and stir for 1 minute, making sure to remove any lumps.  Now add the half and half and cook until mixture thickens, about 6 to 8 minutes.

 

6.  Remove the sauce from the stovetop and stir in the green beans and 1/4 of the onions.  Add this to a casserole dish that was sprayed with the nonstick spray.  Top the green bean mixture with the remaining onions.  Bake in the oven until bubbly, about 15 minutes.  Remove from oven and serve warm.

 

My husband gave this two thumbs up and declared it better than the traditional recipe for Green Bean Casserole.  He said it tasted fresher.  I think this would be perfect to try for Thanksgiving to impress you mother-in-law!

Pumpkin Spice Two Layer Cheesecake

This blog is the third in my pumpkin series on ThisChemistCanCook!  I really love cheesecake and thought it would be fun (and delicious) to make a pumpkin cheesecake.  I decided to layer it to make it a little more interesting.  This recipe is for a really quick and easy cheesecake using a regular pie plate.  If you wanted to get more fancy, you could double the recipe and then put it in a springform pan for a thicker cheesecake. I based my recipe on the Kraft recipe for the 3 step cheesecake.

Ingredients

2 packages cream cheese, softened

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

2 eggs

1/2 cup pumpkin (canned or homemade puree - see previous blog post)
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
dash nutmeg
(dash of cloves, if desired)
8 graham cracker blocks, crushed to crumbs (each block is 4 rectangles of crackers)
2 Tablespoons butter, melted
(or instead of the graham crackers and butter, you can use a ready made graham cracker crust)
whipped topping, if desired

Directions:

1.  Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

2.  Take your graham crackers and put them in a big ziplock bag.  Use a meat tenderizer mallet or rolling pin to crush the graham crackers until in crumbs.

  

3.  Mix in the melted butter and stir until moistened.

  

4.  Push the graham cracker mixture onto the bottom of your pie plate.  The amounts that I listed in the ingredient list make a very thin crust.  If you want a thicker graham cracker crust, you could double both the number of cracker blocks and butter.

5.  Beat the cream cheese, sugar and vanilla with a mixer until smooth.  Make sure the cream cheese is softened before you do this!  Add the eggs one at a time, thoroughly mixing in between additions.

6.  Reserve one cup of this cream cheese mixture and set aside.

7.  Pour the remaining cream cheese mixture over the graham cracker crust in the pie plate.

8.  Using the reserved cream cheese mixture, add the pumpkin, cinnamon and nutmeg (and cloves, if using).

 

9.  Pour the pumpkin batter over the plain cheesecake batter in the pie plate.

10.  Bake 40 minutes until center is set.  Cool, then refrigerate at least 3 hours or overnight.  When serving, top with whipped topping, if desired.

 

This recipe was a big hit with my family.  And it was so easy to do!  Sometimes cheesecakes can be so tricky to make with the springform pans and water baths.  But this one is so easy you could make it on a weeknight.  The family has already asked that I make this again soon.