Mongolian Venison (Or Beef)...You decide

So, I've been going a little blog reading crazy! My Pinterest boards have been feelings the effects of it as well! There are just SO many recipes that I want to try, I have no idea how I'll get them all done. I stumbled upon this little blog, Tracey's Culinary Adventures, and fell head over heels for her recipes! I quickly pinned as many recipes as possible, before her Mongolian Beef recipe popped off the page! She uses skirt steak, I used hind steaks (venison), you can take your pick! The smell alone, got DJ out of bed and ready for work without any snooze button!! (Just so you know, I didn't fix this for breakfast! When schedules are crazy you eat an early "dinner" a lot.) But, before we get started on this crazy awesome dinner, I want to introduce to you to my new niece and nephew!

Meet Malachi! Such a sweet little man and full of so much spirit!

Meet Morgan! She is such a cutie pie!

Okay, I won't gush...even though I REALLY want to! I just wanted ya'll to see how much more fun and exciting our lives just got!! 

Now, let's get started on this recipe! Here are the ingredients you will need:

Ingredients

1 lb. skirt steak-thin sliced against the grain (I used venison hind steaks)

1/4 c cornstarch

1/2 c water

1/2 c soy sauce (low sodium)

1/4 c packed brown sugar

1/2 tsp. red pepper flakes

3 tsp canola oil--divided

1/2 tsp. grated ginger

1 TB garlic 

Scallions or green onion to top off (I didn't have either, used a white onion...tasted great)

To start off, you're going to want to take a paper towel and pat the steaks dry and then place them in a resealable bag. Add the cornstarch and give a good shake, shake, shake to move it all around! Once the pieces are coated, pour out onto a strainer and get rid of any excess cornstarch! In a small bowl, whisk together the water, soy sauce, brown sugar and red pepper flakes. Set aside for later!

Before they got thin sliced and coated in cornstarch

Now take 1 1/2 teaspoon fulls of the oil and heat it in a pan over med/high heat. Add the ginger and garlic and saute for 15-30 seconds. Add the sauce to the pan and heat through another 2 minutes. Transfer this back to the bowl.

My new cutting board I got from my sister! Love it :)

Turn your heat on high and measure out the remaining 1 1/2 teaspoons of oil. Add the beef (or venison) and cook until browned on all sides. Add the sauce back to the pan and turn down the heat. Allow to simmer until your sauce has it's desired consistency.

Getting ready to be cooked! 

Ready to add the sauce back now

Simmering away...Smelling DELICIOUS

All finished! I snapped this photo and then devoured it! It's truly that good!

We served this over white rice, and it was really delicious! Great, quick meal for that left-over meat in your freezer! Thank you all for the visits to my page!! Can't wait to give you an update on the cutie pies!! Until then...

~Happy Eating~

Country Cooking-Spinach Cannelloni

After reading through my new cookbook some more, (Country Recipes), I decided to make spinach cannelloni. Her description of this recipe will make you feel like you're in Italy with her! She talks about friends and family sharing recipes and meals together, and how fresh everything was that they cooked with. Even though the recipe seemed long and tedious (just by looking at it), it was much easier than I expected! The only difference was that when we went to the grocery store, I thought I remembered someone (DJ) saying in the isle that spaghetti sauce was in the cart. I think I must have dreamed that, and didn't even enough supplies to make my own. However, we did have Alfredo sauce in the pantry, so I used that. You make your own white sauce in this recipe so ours was very creamy and delicious! I will probably make it again and use the red sauce just to see what the difference in the flavor is. So let's get started with the ingredients you will need for this:

Ingredients
3 TBS olive oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 medium onion, minced
2 cups cooked spinach, squeezed dry and chopped
1 TBS butter (I used about 1 1/2)
1 pound ground sirloin (we used venison)
2 TBS chopped fresh parsley (store was out, I used dried-and used only about half)
2 TBS chopped fresh oregano (store was out, I used dried-and used only about half)
1 TBS basil
1 large egg, beaten
2/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese
2 TBS light cream
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
1/4 tsp salt
freshly ground pepper
12 cooked manicotti tubes (or pasta sheets--I used manicotti)
4-5 cups Italian Tomato Sauce (forgot this--we used Alfredo)

Besciamella (White Sauce)
4 TBS butter
4 TBS all-purpose flour
2 cups light cream or half-and-half
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg

First, I got my water boiling for the manicotti noodles. Then, in a large skillet, you're going to heat the oil and add the garlic and onion to the oil and saute. You are not wanting to brown the garlic and onion, just cook until they are translucent. Next you're going to add the spinach and cook about 5 minutes until the mixture becomes dry. Remove everything from the skillet, and place in a large bowl. In the same skillet, you are going to melt the butter and brown the meat.  Once the meat no longer pink, add the meat, oregano, egg, parsley, basil, cream, 1/3 cup of Parmesan, salt and pepper to taste, and the nutmeg to the bowl and mix well!
Don't forget about your manicotti! You're going to want to cook them al dente and make sure they are not "too done" because they will fall apart on you while you're trying to stuff them.

 Before the oven

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees and stuff each tube of manicotti with the meat mixture. Pour your red sauce (in our case white) on the bottom of the pan (just a thin layer). Next add the stuffed manicotti and then layer with the red sauce again, and then a layer of the Besciamella (white sauce), and then finish it off with Parmesan cheese! Pop it in the oven for about 40 minutes, or until the cheese and bubbly and brown! Serve and enjoy!

After we dug in! Yummy

If you're interested in purchasing the wonderful cookbook you can find it here! It's $18.95 on Amazon!

Stay tuned for more recipes and

~Happy Eating~

Ronald Reagan's Hamburger Soup

I decided it was time for some hearty soup with the falling leaves, and colder nights! I'm so bad about cooking soups in the summer because it's one of those things that warms your bones and when it's 110 degrees outside, it's hard to get in the mood for that! So, I looked through Tasteful Traditions cookbook put together by Fellowship Bible Church here in Tulsa, and found this recipe which was submitted by Connie Athens.

It is delicious, it is hearty, and it is easy....so here we go!

The ingredients you will need for this are as follows:
2 lbs. ground beef (we used venison)
2 T butter
2 cloves chopped garlic
1/4 tsp pepper
1 (10 oz) can Hominy (I used white hominy)
1 c diced green peppers
12 c beef broth or water with bouillon cubes (I used 10 cups of water (because I ran out of room in my pot) and 10 bouillon cubes)
16 oz Chopped tomatoes, canned or fresh (I used petite diced)

The portions of this I omitted are:
1 1/2 c sliced carrots
2 c celery
Only because I couldn't wrap my brain around carrots, and celery on a hamburger. The hominy....well, I just love hominy! So it stayed!!

You are going to brown the beef in a 6 quart sauce pan (I used an over-sized skillet) in the 2 T butter.
Next you will add onions, garlic and green peppers-Cover and simmer for about 10 minutes. Next add your beef broth or water with bouillon cubes. Then add the chopped tomatoes (I drained mine first), and the pepper. Simmer the soup on low for 35 minutes and then add the hominy and bring the soup back to a boil for another 10 minutes. (I boiled it for 10 minutes and then I put it back on low/warm and covered it until Dee Jay got home about 30 mins later).

To top off our bowls we added a small handful of shredded Cheddar cheese (so I guess we actually had cheeseburger soup) and that really put it over the top on the greatness scale!

If you're looking for a quick meal, I had most of these ingredients in my pantry already! 

The only thing I would have to leave out was the hominy (::sigh::) but use what you have and get creative! We hope everyone is having a great week so far (it's almost over)!! Stay tuned! 

New recipes are coming soon!! 

~Happy Eating~

Stew for those colder Fall nights

Well, I don't know about where you are, but here at home the nights are getting pretty chilly outside! It's so nice to finally have some crisp, cool air to make us forget about those sweltering summer days! We had some leftover stew meat in the freezer before all the new venison got added to the mix, so we decided to try out a new recipe I have in my new cookbook I got from a friend for my birthday! You can find the cookbook here! I must admit, I have already sat down and began to read this cookbook like a book! It is chalked full of great ideas for almost anything you want/need in your kitchen! So, thanks to Martha Storey (author) and her friends, we got to work on her venison stew! Again, if you don't have wild game meat on hand you can always substitute it for whichever stew meat tickles your fancy!

Here are the ingredients we decided to use:
1/2 c (+ 3 TBS) all-purpose flour
1 tsp salt
1/8 tsp freshly ground black pepper
2-3 lbs. venison coast (cut into 1 inch cubes) or ready to go stew meat
1/4 c vegetable oil
2 c boiling water
1 bay leaf
2 beef bouillon cubes
1/2 lg onion, diced (recipe calls for 12 small whole onions cut into chunks but we both prefer onions in our stew a little smaller) 
5-6 small carrots thin sliced, (recipe calls for 6 medium carrots, cut into chunks but I'm not a carrot person)
1/2 c of cold water
1 lg. green pepper diced (again it called for 2 large green peppers cut into rings...I don't like a lot of "chunky" vegetables in my stew)
3 small potatoes sliced into rounds, then quarter each round (we added this)
Note: We left out the frozen package of lima beans (again...not a fan)

Here's what you're going to do with all these fantastic ingredients:
1) Mix the 1/2 c flour with the salt and pepper. Take the meat and cover (dredge) the meat in the flour mixture. Make sure each piece is coated on all sides. Place the coated pieces aside on a plate.
2) We used a large skillet and added the 1/4 c of vegetable oil, then browned the meat on all sides.

3) Add the boiling water and bay leaf to the skillet with the meat. Cover it up and let it simmer for about 30 minutes!
4) Discard the bay leaf and add the bouillon cubes. (NOTE: We added 2 cubes to the water that we were boiling and then added one more cube after we put it all in the skillet.)
5) After it has simmered for half an hour add the onions and carrots (and potatoes if you so wish). 
6) Simmer for another 45 minutes or so. I think we left ours on there about an hour!
7) Serve in a bowl and ENJOY!

We left out a part of the original recipe where you remove the meat and vegetables and thicken the sauce with the left-over flour and cold water. We wanted more of "liquid soup" instead of something thick! It turned out just as hearty and we both loved it!

You'll see in the picture which I forgot to add that when we added the vegetables 

we added a can of fire roasted tomatoes to give it a kick. 

And seriously...I couldn't make stew without adding tomatoes :)

I hope ya'll had a great weekend! 

December will be here in just a few short days, and I can't wait to cookin'!!

~Happy Eating~

 

 andertoons.com

Venison (or beef) Stuffed Peppers

Sadly, I have come to the end of ground venison from last hunting season. This is one of the last recipes I was able to pull off with what we had in the freezer! Good thing hunting season is just around the corner! So I pulled this off a friend's Pinterest site and went to work! You know it's good when your man takes one bite and looks up to say, "You can feel free to make this anytime you want". I totally agree!! The thing about cooking with venison vs. cooking with beef is no matter how "lean" you buy the beef, you still always get grease! When I popped these in the crock-pot, there was almost no grease at all which made the peppers very yummy and not soggy. If you make it with beef, let me know how it turns out! We wondered where all the grease would go. Here is how to fix up these delicious peppers...


First you are going to start with 4 bell peppers. (Any color will do...I used red, green and orange). Cut off the tops of the peppers and remove the stem and seeds. Save the tops because you're going to want to dice them up to throw back in! Dice half of a yellow onion, then pour one cup of enchilada sauce over the onion in a bowl and microwave for about 5 minutes. Pour 1/3 cup of water into the bottom of your crock-pot, then nestle the bell peppers in. In a large bowl you are going to combine one pound of meat, the sauce and onion mixture, the chopped up bell pepper tops, one cup of shredded cheese, 3/4 cup of cooked rice, one and half teaspoons of salt and a half of a teaspoon of pepper. Now spoon mixture into the the peppers and top it off with more shredded cheese. Cook these yummy peppers on low for 6 hours (I actually didn't have six hours so I cooked mine on high for about 4 hours). Remove them from the crock-pot and eat up! I served it up with some homemade guacamole and chips and they were a hit!

Happy Green Pepper on a Plate

You can find the original recipe on a cute little blog titled no. 2 pencil 

Here is the run down:

4 bell peppers
1 pound of 85 percent lean ground beef
1/2 of a yellow onion, diced
1 cup of canned enchilada sauce
1 1/4 cup of shredded jack cheese
3/4 cup of cooked Mexican rice
salt and pepper
sour cream and diced green onion for toppings

Finely dice the onion place in a bowl and cover it with enchilada sauce. Heat in the microwave for 5 minutes.

Cut off the tops of the peppers and remove the stem and seeds. Finely dice the tops of the peppers and place in large bowl.

Pour 1/3 cup of water into the bottom of your crock-pot and nestle the bell peppers in (It might be a tight fit...it's okay)!

In the bowl with your chopped pepper tops add, meat, sauce and onions, 1 cup of shredded cheese, 3/4 cup of Mxican rice (cooked), 1 1/2 teaspoon of salt, and 1/2 teaspoon of pepper.

Fill peppers and cook on low for 6 hour. Top them with sour cream and green onions and enjoy!

~Happy Eating~ 

Also, if you have a hunter in the family as well and haven't discovered Game and Garden you really need to head on over to Stacy's blog and check it out! We saw her the other day on the outdoor channel and I immediately went out and looked up all the recipes I could find by her, and put her cookbooks (she is releasing a new one) on my WANT list :) She has some great ideas!! I can't wait to try more of her venison recipes once hunting season starts back up and we get more venison! We are getting ready to try one of her fish recipes...check back soon to find out how it turned out!

Venison Stroganoff as requested by Dee Jay

Randomly one evening Dee Jay decided he wanted Stroganoff. I started thinking about it, and looked up some good recipes for this dish that is often forgotten. It's not always the "prettiest" dish, and I must have put it in the back of my mind because I couldn't remember the last time I had it. I finally settled on Paula Deen's Beef Stroganoff Recipe, but instead of beef we used some of our venison stew meat we had frozen from last hunting season. Venison is actually better for you than beef, and you can click here to read more about it on Livestrong.com, which I look at almost daily for fun facts for just about everything I need to know!! So here's how it went down venison style in our kitchen...
Remember you can substitute beef into our version if you don't have venison in your freezer :)

You start out with one to one and half pounds of venison stew meat, a couple of dashes of salt, pepper, and garlic powder.

(You will find her recipe for "House Seasoning" in the link...I just didn't want to make that much of it, so I improvised).  Sprinkle the meat with the seasoning and then dust the meat with flour.

So tender...I know this picture looks real appetizing ya'll...Sorry

 

Then in a large skillet you are going to add two tablespoons of olive oil and three tablespoons of butter. Once that is warmed and ready to go, go ahead and brown the meat on all sides. Once the meat in browned take it out of the pan and reserve the liquids (as in leave everything in the pan but the meat). To the liquid in the skillet you are going to add one medium size onion chopped (we just halved a large onion), and an 8 oz package of mushrooms sliced up!  

 

Saute this around until the onion gets tender (it smelled so fantastic in our kitchen right at about this point)! After the onion is looking tender go ahead and sprinkle a teaspoon of flour in the skillet.

Makes your mouth go mmmm...mmmm....mmmmmm!

Then add the steak back in to the pan with the onions and mushrooms. Now you're going to pour in one (10 3/4 oz) can of beef broth, and one (10 3/4 oz) can of cream of mushroom soup, right in to the skillet and turn the heat down low! You're going to simmer this on low for about 30 minutes and let it soak up all the gravy goodness and do the loosen your pants dance while you get the pasta ready and eat it all up!! Now we used bow-tie pasta but egg noodles work great too, it really came down to the fact of what I saw first in the cabinet! So I cooked the pasta and by the time I had the pasta cooked and drained the meat was ready and we were good to go! (NOTE: Right before you serve it up, add one cup of sour cream to the skillet and stir around and let it warm up). All you do now is place the pasta on a plate or in a bowl and cover with the meat and juices from the gravy in the pan and get ready for a delicious dinner!!

Yummy and hearty! Can't go wrong with that combo

 

So, here is the run-down and the link to Paula Deen's Beef Stroganoff 

~Happy Eating~

 

1 1/2 pounds venison (or beef)
House Seasoning (that's the salt, pepper and onion powder)
All-purpose flour
2 tablespoons olive oil 3 tablespoons butter
1 medium onion, sliced
8 ounces fresh mushrooms, sliced
1 (10 3/4-ounce) can beef broth
1 (10 3/4-ounce) can cream of mushroom soup
Salt and black pepper
1 cup sour cream
Cooked egg noodles

 

Sprinkle house seasoning over the meat then dust with flour. 

Heat up olive oil and butter in a large skillet and brown the meat. Remove meat from skillet (save drippings). 

Add onion and mushrooms to skillet and saute until the onion is tender (just a couple to three minutes). 

Sprinkle in 2 teaspoons of flour and add meat back in to the skillet. Cover with beef broth and cream of mushroom soup and cover and simmer on low for 30 minutes.

Add sour cream just before serving over a bed of cooked noodles!!

Just a fun side note...I've had a few people send me recipes this week on things they wanted me to share/try out/eat/pig out on etc etc....So, in a week I'm going to be cooking up your recipes!! The ones you have e-mailed me and random recipes I find on my friends Pinterest pages! Stay tuned to see if your recipes are coming up and send me recipes at ShellyHendrix@gmail.com because you know I'm game to try most anything once and love to discover what ya'll are cooking in your kitchens!!!

If you don't know what Someecards are you need to look them up or follow this link here

to go to their Pinterest page where I found this little gem floating around :)

 

 Photo found at someecards.com

 

 

 

 

 

beef and bean burritos - in which, i call the pioneer woman lazy

Leah here. And kids, let's get real: sometimes we just need something easy for dinner. Not "drive thorugh sack" easy, but something that comes together quickly, is filling and the whole family will like it. I've got one for you to try on those days. Pioneer Woman's beef and bean burritos.

I printed this out from her blog months ago from this little series of sixteen-minute meals she did. Then, it showed up in her newest cookbook, "and if it's cookbook worthy," I thought, "cook this, I will." This was scheduled for a Tuesday dinner, a night I jet shortly after noshing to go to a night time fitness class. Boy, was I dissapointed to only have a small portion of this before my workout. TASTY. Simple. And, can I brag here---I did it in fourteen minutes. (booyah.)

As she mentions in her blog post on this burrito, it "isn’t going to win any culinary awards for innovation. But for a sixteen-minute meal, it was pretty darn delicious." Yes.

And, we're off-----

I whip in to the driveway at 5:47 p.m. My husband usually gets home with my daughter around 6 p.m. Whew. A few minutes to get started. I take a look again at the recipe. "Sixteen, minutes, P-Dub?" I shake my head. Remember all those Rachel Ray 30 minute meals? Bunk. Not a one was ever that easy for me. For fun I set my the stopwatch on my phone ready to disprove her.

I pull out super fancy ingredients. A can of this. A can of that. Oh, Best Choice? You haven't heard of this brand. It's.....the best. Obviously. Ok, not too much to work with at least. And only 60 seconds or so have passed.

Immediately (of course) I heard the beep beep of the door alarm and my kiddo and hubs are home. Early. Suddenly, this little face is now underfoot wanting to go "owside, momma. play owside." Sigh. It's hard to pass up this face. I stop the timer. 

But I'm trying to prove P-dub wrong here plus get dinner on the table plus get out the door to my fitness class. I give her a tortilla with butter and she is momentarily pacified. (I make one for myself, too. Mmm..) TIMER ON!

I finely chop the onion and throw it in the pan to brown with the ground turkey. Not sure if it was the pink slime talk or what but I've been choosing ground turkey or chicken a lot lately. I like the blank slate factor. Both can take any seasoning and fit in with any dish. Except hamburgers. I need actual beef for those. Nom. I open the can of refried beans. Plop into the pan. Add shredded cheese, stirring to combine and let it heat through. Open can of enchilada sauce. Pour half on the almost browned meat. Hey! This is coming along fast! Just eight minutes have elapsed. Tug on leg-- "mommy, owside!" I'm drug to the back porch. Timer off. I let things finish heating through.

Kiddo kicks feet at me wanting her shoes off. I find this:

Busy day in the sand pit, huh, kiddo? I give the look to her dad and he helps her with bubbles and chalk on the back porch so I can finish dinner.He's good like that. TIMER ON!

I heat up a few tortillas then layer the beans, meat, a drizzle of enchilada sauce and some shredded cheese on top. It's looking burrito-ish up in here!

I heat each in the microwave then top with salsa and cilantro. Place on table with knives and forks. Water glasses. Check timer:

Huzzah! I've bested P-dub's time. Spent little to no effort. Got to dump sand out of my kid's shoe. I feel like a winner.

The quick, familiar flavored comfort food you might have grabbed through a drive through window.

Except you've made this cheesy, hearty goodness from fresh (from the can) ingredients in just thirteen minutes and 49.1 seconds.


The enchilda sauce, something I don't cook with, was my favorite part. Spiked with a little jarred salsa--plate-licking good. I filled one of these a little sparsely and rolled it up tight so I could cut smaller bites for my toddler. She ate every bite (including the ground turkey--this never happens) and we had fun calling the "bites" baby burritos while her dad and I knifed and forked our larger ones. She asked for baby burritos the next two nights!

And if either my husband or child asks for seconds, it becomes a keeper recipe at my house. Keeper!




Sixteen  Fourteen Minute Beef and Bean Burritos
slightly adapted from Pioneer Woman

(I halved the recipe with no problem for my family of three)

 Ingredients

• 2 pounds Ground Beef (I used one pound ground turkey)
• 1/2 whole Medium Onion (I used about 1/4)
• 1 can (7 Ounce) Mexican Tomato Sauce Or Enchilada Sauce
• Salt And Pepper, to taste
• Cumin, Oregano, Chili Powder, Garlic To Taste
• 1 can (28 Ounce) Refried Beans (I used fat free)
• 3/4 cups Grated Cheddar Cheese (I used reduced fat pre-shredded mexican cheese)
• 12 whole Burrito-sized Flour Tortillas (I used smaller, taco sized)
• Extra Grated Cheese, For Sprinkling
• Extra Sauce, For Drizzling
• Cilantro Leaves, Optional
• Optional Filling Ingredients: Mexican Rice, Sour Cream, Guacamole, Green Chilies, Pico De Gallo

Preparation InstructionsBrown meet with onion and season to taste. Pour in sauce (I used half can) and simmer over low heat. Add water if mixture gets too dry.

Heat refried beans in a saucepan. Add cheese and stir in till melted. Keep warm.

Heat tortillas in microwave for one minute.

Spread a small amount of beans on each tortilla. Add meat. Fold over ends, then roll up.

Place burritos on a microwave-safe plate. Drizzle red sauce over the top and sprinkle with more grated cheddar. Microwave for one minute, or until cheese is melted and burritos are very hot. Serve immediately.

Company Casserole

I love finding recipe books, especially when they are hand written by my mom!!  I found this particular recipe the other evening in a cookbook I "Borrowed" from my sister (which I am now done pretty much copying the entire thing and will return) and had to cook it. It had me at cottage cheese :) I LOVE cottage cheese! I could eat it everyday...whenever and wherever! So here we go with the Company Casserole!

I cranked up my Nick Drake playlist and got all my ingredients out and entered the cooking zone. As I made this dish, I tried to think of all the times my mom probably made it for church gatherings and company over for dinner. It's fun to cook things when you know how and when they were cooked before. She had noted that this particular casserole serves 6 and was made for church get togethers or easy weeknight meals. We of course have lots of left overs and haven't stopped eating it yet :)

To begin you take 1 8 oz package of spaghetti and cook as the package directs you to. While you have the spaghetti going you will want to take a pound and a half of meat and brown it and drain the grease off. When the meat is cooked, you will add 1 teaspoon of salt and pepper, 1 8 oz can of tomato sauce and simmer this with the meat for about 5 minutes.
NOTE: I added chopped onion to my meat mixture. We love onions :)

When your spaghetti is finished cooking you will want to drain the water and let it cool for a couple of minutes. In a separate bowl you will add 1 cup of cottage cheese, 1 cup of sour cream, a couple of green onions chopped and mix this in with the noodles. I personally would have added a little bit more of each of these just because I love the cottage cheese/sour cream mixture.

To finish this off you layer the meat then the noodle mixture in a casserole dish, and so and so forth until you run out of ingredients. Top the casserole with 3/4 cup of shredded Cheddar cheese and pop it in the oven for 30 minutes at 350.

This is what it looked like before it went in the oven :)

This is what it looked like coming out of the oven :)

~Happy Cooking~

Company Casserole
1 8 oz pkg spaghetti
1 1/2 lb ground beef, browned and drained
1 t. salt
pepper to taste
8 oz can tomato sauce

Combine:
1 cup cottage cheese
1 cup sour cream
1 or 2 green onions, finely chopped

Topping:
3/4 cup shredded Cheddar cheese