Homemade Pretzels

 

For this next dish, I really have no claim to the recipe. I am a follower of one blogger who is most intriguing. My husband and I were home on a sunday afternoon, looking for something to do. We ended up in the kitchen doing my favorite hobby. Making food. He is such a sweetheart. We decided that pretzels would be fun to make. You can find the recipe at
http://smittenkitchen.com/2007/02/knotted-and-stacked-disappearing-acts/
Seriously. You are going to love these things. We took them over to my brother and sister in-laws house and ate them with warmed marinara sauce and a cheese dip. My cheese dip was super easy. All you need is:
3/4 cup of milk
1 Tbsp of melted butter
4 Tbsp of flour
                                                      1/2 cup of shredded cheese of your choice (I used pepper jack for this)
                                                       Salt and pepper to taste

In a small sauce pot, heat the milk and butter until warm. Do not boil. slowly stir in the flour until a smooth rue forms.  Once the flour is dissolved slowly stir in the cheese allowing it to melt into the sauce as you go. Once all of the cheese is melted and incorporated, add salt and pepper to taste.

Breakfast Potato's with Eggs Benedict Redone

Saturday morning is the time for fun breakfast. I remember that when I was a kid. Saturday morning was the time that my Dad took over the kitchen and made a scrumptious breakfast. Usually it consisted of eggs, bacon, toast, potato's etc. It was always one of my favorite meals of the week. Now that I have my own home I have tried to start to incorporate meal traditions into our family. One of them will be scrumptious, cholesterol filled, and delicious Saturday morning breakfast. This week I tried to make one of my personal favorite breakfasts: Eggs Benedict. I have had many eggs benedict meals at many different restaurants and everyone does it a little different. One of the main components of Eggs Benedict is the Hollandaise Sauce. Be warned. This was my first time making Hollandaise Sauce so I am by no means an expert. I found a recipe and through it sounded good so I tried it. If you know how to make it better or have tips for me that I could improve on what I have done then please let me know.

Ok enough chatter. Let's get to it.

Eggs Benedict:
2 large eggs
1 tomato, sliced
4 slices of bacon
2 english muffins or other kind of toast-able bread
butter for spreading on the toast
2 T of vinegar (any kind)

Hollandaise Sauce:
3 egg yolks
1 tablespoon of freshly squeezed lemon juice
1/3 cup of melted butter
pinch of cilli powder
pinch of salt

For the Hollandaise Sauce:
1. put the egg yolks and the lemon juice into a bowl and whisk together until the yolks become thick and   doubled in volume. About 5 min or so.
2. Get a small sauce pan and put about an inch of water in the bottom and turn  on low. Take the whisked eggs and lemon juice and put them over the saucepan in a metal bowl. The bottom of the bowl should not touch the water. Whisk the mixture and add the butter. Whisking until it thickens further and doubles in size. Be careful not to let it get too hot or else the eggs will scramble.
3. Remove from the heat and add the chili powder and the salt. Mix in. Store in a warm place until you are ready to use it.

Eggs and Bacon:
1. Get a small pot to poach you eggs in.  Fill with water and heat until it boils and then reduce to a simmer. Add the vinegar and a pinch of salt to the water.
2. On the side take a bowl and put ice and water in it. This will be used to blanch the eggs after they are done poaching.

3. Crack the eggs, one at a time into a small bowl and then slowly and gently place the egg into the pot of water. Let it poach for about 4 min. Depending on how you like your eggs you can cook longer or shorter. Very carefully remove from the pot with a spoon and place in a bowl of ice water.
4. Let it sit here for about a min and then remove with a spoon and place on a plate with paper towels to let it dry off.
5. Repeat with the other egg.
6. Toast the Bread
7. Cook the bacon on the stove top and save the bacon grease.

The Benedict:
1. Preheat the oven to Broil
2. Assemble the sandwich by buttering the bread, then place the sliced tomato, the poached egg, bacon and finally the Hollandaise Sauce on top.
3. Place on a baking sheet covered with aluminum foil or parchment paper (so you don't have to wash the baking sheet) and put in the oven for about 3 min.  You just want to heat the sandwich a little to melt the hollandaise over the sandwich and heat the tomatoes.

Breakfast Potatoes:

1 large yukon potato or 2 small potatoes of your choice
Rock salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
Chili Powder
2 Tbsp of olive oil
Leftover bacon grease

1. Cut the potato into small, square, equal size pieces.
2. While on the cutting board, add salt, pepper, chili powder and olive oil. Move it around the potatoes with your hands to spread out the oil and seasoning.
3. Fry in the bacon grease over medium heat. About 8-10 min until potatoes are cooked and crispy.

Hope you love it!

Meat Free Night

Lately, I have been trying to find ways that my husband and I can eat very healthy but still enjoy good food and even indulge a little from time to time. One of the ways that I have decided to do that is to make sure that I have at LEAST one night a week where we are meat free. For some of you this may be a novelty. For others, you may eat meat free multiple times a week or you may even be vegetarian. Wherever you are coming from, I am going to try to post my meat free meals from time to time just to share with you my ideas. They may not be the most inventive recipes in the world, or, who knows, they may be the most inventive. I got the idea for this recipe from a magazine and added my own twist to it. I thought that the result was tasty, pretty, and, most important, very healthy.

I made a pasta dish with pesto and grape tomatoes. I used my own home made pesto for this which is super easy and fun because you can virtually change any of the ingredients and still make an awesome pesto. I also used whole grain rotini pasta. Whole grain pasta was used because it adds texture and heaviness to the dish along with a little extra protein and fiber. This is good because we are not using meat so the extra protein is nice and will make you feel more full. Rotini is good because the pesto will stick easily to all the swirls. You can use this or any other small pasta noodle. Grape tomatoes are fantastic. Tomatoes are one of my favorite foods by the way, but we will cover that in another post. Grope tomatoes are awesome because they have a condensed flavor and are sweet and add juiciness to the bite. Hmmm, my mouth waters just thinking about it.
Also, I have an easy and yummy salad that I hope you will love.

Here we go

Ingredients:
1 pound of whole grain rotini or other small pasta
1 cup of grape tomatos, cut in half,
1/2 cup of parsley
1 cups of fresh spinach
1/2 cup of basil
1/2 cup of olive oil
1/3 cup of grated parmesan cheese
salt and pepper
1 clove of garlic
1/2 cup of pine nuts
1/2 cup of cashews
1/2 tsp of red pepper flakes

Get a large pot for your pasta and boil the water, once water is boiling, add the pasta and a small hand full of salt. Keep the lid off and let cook for 8-10 minutes or until done. Strain.
In the meantime take 1 cup of the spinach, the parsley, the basil, garlic, cashews, 1/2 tsp of salt, parmesan cheese, and olive oil. If you have a food processor put these ingredients in a food processor and turn on and slowly stream in the olive oil. If you do not have a food processor take all of these ingredients plus the olive oil and put in a large bowl and blend together with an emersion blender. You can adjust the consistency of the sauce by adding more olive oil if you like. Once the pesto is done, combine with the pasta and mix together in a large bowl. Add the cut grape tomatoes. Take the pine nuts and put them in a small frying pan and toast over high heat for about 3-4 min and then put pine nuts over the pasta.
                                                                 Combine. Salt and Pepper

Salad
3 cups of fresh spinach
1 orange
1/4 of a red onion
1/2 cup of white wine vinegar
1/4 cup of lemon juice
1/2 cup of olive oil
salt and pepper to taste.

Put the spinach in your salad bowl. Take the orange and cut the top and the bottom off. Then cut down on all sides of the orange to remove the skin. Cut down the middle and then into bite size pieces. Like such

Take the red onion and slice it into thin bite size pieces. take it and put it into a small bowl and pour 1/4 of a cup of white wine vinegar over it and let it sit for 10-15 min. The vinegar will begin to break down the onion and make it flavorful and not as strong when you eat it raw in the salad. Once it has set, add it to the salad. In a separate bowl, put the remaining vinegar, lemon juice and add some salt and pepper. Whisk in the olive oil. Pour the dressing over the salad. 

  Enjoy!

Panda Redone

Who doesn't love a huge plate of chinese food? All of those unique and salty sweet spices are so pleasing to the pallet. Ordering a huge quantity of chow mien and chicken and sitting on the couch and eating as much as you can is so much fun. I was craving me some panda express last week. Rather than running out and buying a 3 item combo from panda express, I though it would be fun to make my own. There are a ton of different recipes online for orange chicken. I find that if you have the few basic ingredients, you can add whatever you want to make up the rest of the sauce. If you don't have every single thing that I used for my orange chicken recipe, that's ok. THe basic ingredients for the orange chicken sauce are orange juice, orange zest, soy sauce, and corn starch. As long as you have those items, you are good to go. You can add other ingredients to fill in the rest of it. The orange juice and zest are a must because... well... we are making orange chicken! You cannot make this without soy sauce. You will need it to bring out that salty flavor. The corn starch is necessary because it will thicken the sauce and help it stick to the chicken. COrn starch is inexpensive and you can find it at any grocery store. Here is how I made the orange chicken:

3 boneless skinless chicken breast cut into bite size peices
1 1/2 cups of orange juice
1/3 cup of soy sauce
2 Tbsp of corn starch
Zest from 1 orange
1/2 cup of ketchup
1/2 cup of crushed pineapple
2 Tbsp of orange marmalade or apricot jam
1/4 cup of white vinegar
pinch of hot red pepper flakes
1 cup of plain bread crumbs
2 Tbsp of canola oil

Take the chicken and marinate it in 1/2 a cup of orange juice. Let it sit and marinate while you are making the sauce.
In a small saucepan, put the vinegar and the ketchup. on low heat, stir together until they are combined. add the soy sauce and the remaining orange juice. Stir together until combined. add the orange zest, pineapple, corn starch and the marmalade (or jam).  Crush the red pepper flakes in the palm of your hand and mix into the sauce. Stir occasionally until the sauce starts to thicken. Once it is thick and bubbling, turn off the heat and cover the pot. Set aside.

Take the chicken and lightly coat it with the bread crumbs. The only reason you are using bread crumbs is to give the sauce a little extra something to stick to, so don't use to much on the chicken. Just a light coating. In a frying pan, heat the canola oil over medium high heat and add the chicken. Cook until the chicken is lightly browned and cooked all the way through. put chicken into a separate serving bowl and pour the sauce over the chicken. stir until the chicken is covered with the sauce. hmmmmm Yummy. Your orange chicken is ready to go!

Now it's time for the noodles.

1 pound of pasta (long noodles)
1 red bell pepper, cut into long thin slices
4 shallots, in half lengthwise and then cut into 2-3 inch pieces
1/3 cup of vinegar
1-2 cups of green snap peas (ends cut off)

Sauce:
1/2 cup of soy sauce
1/4 cup of canola oil
1/4 cup of sesame seed oil
2 Tbsp of chili oil (may use more if you like it spicy)
1/4 cup of white vinegar
1 medium piece of Ginger root. Peel it with a paring knife
3 cloves of garlic

In a large pot, bring water to a boil for the pasta. Once it comes to a boil, add the pasta and stir. reduce the heat to medium and let it cook. about 8-10 minutes. Cook to taste and drain noodles and put into a serving bowl. add the red onions. Take the cut shallots and put into a small bowl. Cover them with the vinegar. This will start to break them down a little and make them not quite as strong. Take the snap peas and put into a small pot of boiling water. Cook for 2-3 min and remove from hot water and place in an ice bath. This will stop the cooking process and keep them bright green and crispy. Add the snap peas to the pasta along with the shallots.
In a glass bowl combine the soy sauce, and the white vinegar. Zest in the garlic and the ginger. Slowly add in the canola oil, chili oil and sesame oil while stirring with a whisk. Pour sauce over the pasta and veggies. Combine.

Enjoy!

Pizza

So I have really been into making pizza lately. When most people think of pizza, I think that the first thing they think of "Oh my gosh I don't have time to cook tonight I think I'll order from Domino's". Pizza can actually be a very classy and wonderful dinner. There are so many different things that you can do with it and you can make it as gourmet as you like. My whole pizza fetish started off when I went to my husband and told him that I would make him anything he wanted for dinner. I said "you say it and I'll make it. I will cook you anything you want to eat". I was expecting him to come back and say something like lamb chops or pork and apples or filet minion. I was totally ready for that. But, to my surprise, he looked at me and said "Honey, I would really like some pizza". I then realized that we had not had pizza since we had been married (We had been married for about five months at this time). I then decided that I would attempt to make him the best pizza he had ever had. I don;t want my dear husband to be deprived of anything. I knew that his favorite pizza toppings were pepperoni and pineapple so I went out to the store and bought the ingredients to make the pizza. While I was shopping I realized that I needed to figure out what to do about dough. My mom had made home made pizza when I was a kid but she used a foccacia dough for her pizza. I resorted to buying a pre-made dough and putting the toppings on it and baking it in the oven. My husband loved it and enjoyed it immensely. Over the next few days I did some research on making your own dough and found out that there are hundreds of different ways to make pizza dough. After much research and a few experiments I think that I have found the easiest and best dough. I tried it out again and my husband loved his pizza even more. I now make this dough quite often and leave it in the freezer and pull it out when I don't have time to cook.

Here is how to make the dough:
1/4 cup of warm water
1 envelope of active dry yeast
1 tsp of sugar
1/2 tsp salt
4 cups of flour
1 1/4 cups of cold water
1TBSP of olive oil

In a small bowl combine the warm water, the yeast and the sugar. stir and let rest. In a food processor or a stand mixer combine the flour and the salt. Add in the yeast mixture and stir. slowly add in the cold water and oil until a ball forms. do not over mix. Remove from the mixer and knead with hands. Put in an oiled bowl and let it rise for one hour.  Remove from the bowl and divide into 2-4 balls. Let rise for another 30 min.  You can then take the dough balls and wrap them is seran wrap and freeze them or, of course, use it for the pizza right away.
Bake 475 for 12-15 min or until the crust is golden brown on the bottom. Bake on a pizza pan with holes in the bottom or on a pizza stone.
If you are going to freeze it make sure that you let it defrost at room temp before you use it.
It is best to bake the dough when it is at room temp, not when it is chilled.

To spread the dough lay the ball out on your cutting board. Press into it with your hands pushing at the thicker parts of the dough and spreading it outward. Do not worry if you cannot form a perfect circle. make the dough as even and flat as you can.

For toppings: Come on people, this is pizza. Put whatever you want on the top.

Have Fun!

Eggplant Pizza

A few weeks ago I made one of the most amazing pizza's I have ever made before. And surprisingly enough, eggplant was the star of the show. I am not a huge eggplant person but I was experimenting with it and got an amazing result with my pizza. Unfortunately I totally forgot to take pictures :(. What good is a blog post without pictures. I will be making it again soon and when I do you will be the first to know. i will be sure to take lots of pictures and share this amazing recipe with you. Can't wait to eat it again and share it with you.

It's time for some soup!

I was watching one of my favorite Italian cooks on TV. I watched her make this incredible looking soup. I decided to try it and change it up a little based on what my available ingredients are and what I like. Pappa al Pamadoro is what they call it in Italy. For this recipe you will need old bread. I find that it tastes best with old sourdough or french bread. The sourdough bread is good because even when you add it to the soup you can still taste the sourdough part of the bread which is super yummy. You can use any old stale bread for this recipe.
This soup is awesome because it is the entire meal in one bowl. It has plenty of protein and starch from the beans and the cheese I ad gives and extra depth of flavor and completeness to the meal.

Ingredients:
8 cloves of garlic
2 large white onions
28oz can of crushed tomatoes
1 large vine ripe tomato.
4 cups of Chicken stock
1 cup of grated parmesan cheese
small hand full of Fresh basil
1/2 cup of Olive oil
1 tsp of sugar
Salt and fresh ground pepper
16 oz Can of white beans
Loaf of bread (any kind you like, you can use stale bread if you like and sourdough is preferred)
1 cup of ricotta cheese
Sweet Italian Sausage (optional)

Crush, peel and chop garlic. Chop onions. Save about a cup of raw chopped onions on the side.  Put the rest onions in the bottom of the pan preheated with 1/4 cup of olive oil in the bottom. Have the burner on medium heat. Let the onions cook until they are caramelized. Do not burn. Add the garlic and let cook together for about 3 minutes. While the onions and garlic are cooking. Cut your fresh tomato into chunks and add to the garlic and onions. Add salt and pepper. Once the tomato has cooked down pour in the can of crushed tomatoes. add a tsp of sugar (this is used to cut the acidity of the tomatoes). Pour in the chicken stock. Open the can of white beans and drain out the juice and add the white beans to the soup.  Let simmer for at least 15 min. Take the stale bread and cut it into chunks and add to the soup. Let it cook with the other ingredients and absorb the broth. The soup should start to thicken as the bread absorbs the broth. Let it simmer on low heat for another 10 minutes.

Chop the basil into thin slices right before you are ready to eat. Put soup into individual serving bowls. should serve 4-6 people. Once the soup is in the bowl, drop a tablespoon of the ricotta cheese into the soup bowl. Sprinkle the leftover raw onions to the top, add some basil, sprinkle the parmesan cheese and top off with an extra drizzle of olive oil and some fresh ground black pepper. The drizzle of olive oil and the raw onions are key here. This dish cannot be served without it.  I added an italian sweet sausage to the bowl to complete this amazing Italian dinner. Very healthy, and very hearty. I guarantee you will love it. Leave out the sausage for a vegetarian meal. If you want to go vegan, leave out the cheese or substitute it for some soy cheese. 

 

Hope you enjoy as much as I did.