Roasted Garlic Jelly on ciabatta

Roasted Garlic Jelly on ciabatta, originally uploaded by Adventures of Pam & Frank.

This week's Recipe of the Week isn't so much of a recipe but more of an interesting food idea. Why not pick up some interesting food from a local farmers market this summer? How about a jar of locally made jam from one vendor and a loaf of bread from another?

The idea came from Pam & Frank, who commented:

This would be a neat idea for a Pass It On Plate. I found this jam in a little Italian gift shop and plan to put it on a Pass It On Plate with some ciabatta bread for a gift.

Frank got garlic jelly one year for Christmas. He's a huge garlic freak and often gets something garlicky. For whatever reason, this jar ended up in the back of the cupboard and it was forgotten. Not too long ago, during a cupboard clean out it was re-discovered, opened, and thoroughly enjoyed.

Here it is spread over butter on half a ciabatta roll. Mmm. So so good.
I'm going to have to find a recipe for it and make more.

0803835

This is a Pass It On Plate.
It travels from friend to friend, carrying treats and telling a story as it travels.

Click "comments" below to read a special message left for you. When you're ready to pass the plate on to another friend, load it up with treats, leave a message for your friend in this plate diary, and pass it on again.

Have fun!

0803048

This is a Pass It On Plate.
It travels from friend to friend, carrying treats and telling a story as it travels.

Click "comments" below to read a special message left for you. When you're ready to pass the plate on to another friend, load it up with treats, leave a message for your friend in this plate diary, and pass it on again.

Have fun!

0803046

This is a Pass It On Plate.
It travels from friend to friend, carrying treats and telling a story as it travels.

Click "comments" below to read a special message left for you. When you're ready to pass the plate on to another friend, load it up with treats, leave a message for your friend in this plate diary, and pass it on again.

Have fun!

0803831

This is a Pass It On Plate.
It travels from friend to friend, carrying treats and telling a story as it travels.

Click "comments" below to read a special message left for you. When you're ready to pass the plate on to another friend, load it up with treats, leave a message for your friend in this plate diary, and pass it on again.

Have fun!

0803051

This is a Pass It On Plate.
It travels from friend to friend, carrying treats and telling a story as it travels.

Click "comments" below to read a special message left for you. When you're ready to pass the plate on to another friend, load it up with treats, leave a message for your friend in this plate diary, and pass it on again.

Have fun!

0803045

This is a Pass It On Plate.
It travels from friend to friend, carrying treats and telling a story as it travels.

Click "comments" below to read a special message left for you. When you're ready to pass the plate on to another friend, load it up with treats, leave a message for your friend in this plate diary, and pass it on again.

Have fun!

Our May Plate Diary Dollars Report

Our Plate Diary Dollars have been calculated for May 2009, where there were 6 Plate Diary comments. Pass It On Plates donated $1 per comment to FeedingAmerica.org

This $6 donation was matched by Kraft Foods and provided 192 bowls of food to hungry people in the US. That's amazing!

Let's keep those plates moving and see how much more we can donate for June.

Remember, there's no charge for you give a Pass It On Plate to anyone, and you will not be asked to pay anything or donate any money.

Meatballs

Meatball scoop, originally uploaded by Adventures of Pam & Frank.

Who says you have to put sweets on your Pass It On Plate? Why not a mound of meatballs?

This would be perfect for a neighborhood pot luck or summer party hostess gift. You could include a bag of little pretzel sticks so everyone can poke a pretzel into a meatball to pick it up - instead of using toothpicks or forks - then they can eat the pretzel. Less dishes to wash and less trash to throw out.

This Recipe of the Week is from Pam & Frank at Pass It On Plates. Pam says:

We had meatballs the other night. I used to make lousy meatballs but finally figured it out. We don't use pre-made mixes or dry soup blends because we want to avoid sugar and MSG in our food. Here's my recipe:

1 lb ground beef
1 lb ground turkey, pork, or lamb
1 c dry bread crumbs (or if you're on the Atkins diet like we are, substitute crushed pork rinds)
1 egg
1 tbs worchestershire sauce or anchovy paste
1 tbs yellow mustard
salt and pepper to taste

Don't forget to add seasoning such as:
Italian - rosemary-oregano-basil-garlic powder-fennel seeds
Tex Mex - oregano-lime juice-onion powder-garlic powder-cumin-dried red pepper-chili powder
French - oregano-rosemary-tarragon-thyme-lavender
Swedish - nutmeg
BBQ - garlic powder-onion powder-celery seed-chili powder-honey or molasses (just a tbs)
Middle Eastern - garlic powder-onion powder-ginger-shawirma (if you can find it)

Mix together gently with your fingers. Don't squish with your hands or they'll be little rock meatballs. Form into balls on a large baking sheet and bake for 30 minutes at 350.

Add your favorite sauce...

Also, we love this commercial style scoop for making the meatballs. It makes the meatballs all uniform and cook up great. Also perfect for portion control if you're dieting or serving lots of people at a party. This little scoop makes 2 doz meatballs per lb of ground meat.

Here is a photo of how nice and uniform they all look on the pan: www.flickr.com/photos/adventurespf/3274671619/

Mincemeat & Marzipan Teabread

Mincemeat & Marzipan Teabread, originally uploaded by ginparis2002.

Mmmm, can you almost smell this yummy teabread? This recipe was submitted by ginparis2002 to our Recipe of the Week photo group.

ginparis2002's notes in the recipe say:

I added vanilla essence and a few dried cranberries to the following recipe. Apologies to any Americans wanting to bake this - the recipe is in metric measurements. I've had to learn to adjust since moving to Europe and you know what? I like this way of measuring better!

Mincemeat & Marzipan Teabread

Seves 12.
Well-wrapped, keeps for 4 to 5 days

200g/8oz self rising flour
100g/4oz cold butter, cut into pieces, plus extra for greasing
85g/3 oz light muscovado sugar (or brown sugar or raw sugar)
85g/3oz marzipan, cut into 1/2 inch cubes
2 eggs
300g/10oz mincemeat (from a jar)
2 tbsp flaked almonds
powdered sugar for dusting (optional)

1. Heat oven to 180 degrees C. Butter a 1kg/2lb loaf tin and line the base with wax paper. Tip the flour into a bowl, add cold butter and rub until mixture forms fine crumbs. Stir in the sugar and marzipan.

2. In another bowl, lightly whisk the eggs, then stir in the mincemeat. Stir this into the flour mixture until evenly combined. Spoon into the prepared loaf tin, smooth the top, then sprinkle the flaked almonds over. Bake for 1 hour until the teabread has risen and is golden brown, or a skewer inserted comes out clean. If you like, you can lightly dust the teabrad with icing sugar while it is still hot.

3. Allow to cool in the tin for 10 minutes, then tip on to a wire rack to cool completely. Peel off the lining paper and cut into slices - it's very good spread with butter.

Uploaded by ginparis2002