Lately: 10/3/13

Haloti chased this poor little groundhog up into a tree at our house yesterday, around 3 pm. The poor little groundhog was so scared, he didn't come down until the middle of the night. I kept checking on him all afternoon yesterday, but he didn't move a muscle. He sat like this all day yesterday. I'm happy to say that when I went to check on him this morning, he was gone. Thank goodness. I was having nightmares of trying to get him down after Googling "getting a groundhog out of a tree video". Watch the video. So glad we don't have to do that :)

Retail Value: $127.10
Paid: $45.30
Savings: 64%

Crispy Chicken BLT Salad.

The hubby got me some gorgeous fall flowers last week.

The vacuum scares the beejeezus out of Gizmo. Somehow, he managed to score a ride-along to stay safe from that evil, noisy machine.

Made a batch of lunch burritos to freeze for the hubby.

Fall is upon us, and in this house that means breaking out the heating pad for the pups to share.

Haloti stays true to his namesake, and supports those Duckies!

My shirt for Huntington's Path to the Cure.

After putting in 3 miles on a sunny fall morning last week.

Spaghetti with Toasted Breadcrumbs, Swiss Chard, and Poached Eggs.

One day closer to the weekend! Happy Thursday everyone!

Shrimp Nicoise Salad

I meant to be blogging about this yesterday. Yesterday was house-cleaning day. The kind of house-cleaning you only do once every 6 weeks or so. You know, more than the perfunctory cleaning, but less than quarterly cleaning. For me, this includes polishing my stainless steel appliances. I recently ran out of my favorite polish, and was forced to try a competitors brand. To say that it didn't live up to my expectations would be an understatement. I had been buffing my fridge for an hour (an outrageous amount of time to be buffing the damn fridge). I was furious and dripping in sweat, trying to buff the streaks out of the fridge. No matter what I did, the streaks would not budge. My temper steadily began to rise at an exponential rate.

I have a temper.  A crazy, mean, boisterous temper. It was out-of-control when I was a kid, but I've learned to remain calm in most situations. Yesterday was not "most situations", as it turned out. I had a full-fledged temper tantrum- stomping my feet, eyes bulging, face tomato-red, spittle flying extraneously.  It was not pretty, I'm so glad I was home alone. I was beyond incensed . My fridge looked better before I decided to clean it. I should have just left it alone. As any extreme outburst of emotion will do, I immediately felt better upon calming down. Not calm enough to sit down and type without throwing the computer at the wall, mind you, but calmer.

So that was yesterday, and of course, I'm sitting here thinking about how childish I acted. So my fridge has some smudges until I receive my old polish (which I feverishly ordered 3 bottles of!) from Amazon. Big deal. I'll live. As for this salad, perhaps I should have made this last night to calm me down. Shrimp and potatoes are two of my favorite comfort foods. Without further ado, here's how to make this delicious, traditionally French salad-

Ingredients (serves 2):

4 tbsp olive oil, divided
6 small red potatoes, quartered
salt and pepper
15-20 haricot verts
16 large shrimp, peeled
1 tsp red wine vinegar
1 tsp anchovy paste
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 tsp dijon mustard
4 cups romaine lettuce, chopped
2 hard-boiled eggs, peeled and chopped
1/2 cup cherry tomatoes, halved
1/4 cup kalamata olives, halved

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400º. Spray a cookie sheet with cooking spray.
2. Combine 1 tbsp oil, potatoes, and salt and pepper to taste in a bowl. Toss to combine. Place potatoes in a single layer on cookie sheet. Roast in oven 20-25 minutes, or until potatoes are tender and browned. Set aside.
3. Bring a pot of water to boil. Place haricot verts in boiling water, cook for 1 minute.  Drain beans, then plunge into a ice bath. Swirl the beans around, remove from water when cool. Set aside.
4. Preheat grill to high heat. Season shrimp with salt and pepper, then thread shrimp on skewers. Turn grill down to medium-low heat. Grill shrimp 1 minute on each side, remove from heat. Set skewers aside.
5. In a small bowl, combine 3 tbsp olive oil with vinegar, anchovy paste, garlic, and mustard. Whisk thoroughly to emulsify.
6. On a plate, combine 2 cups lettuce, 1 hard-boiled egg, 1/4 cup cherry tomatoes, 1/8 cup kalamata olives, 1 skewer of shrimp, and half of potatoes and beans. Drizzle with oil dressing, serve immediately.

Recipe courtesy of Bev Cooks

Crème Brûlée

Ok, let's be honest. Crème brûlée always makes me think of "My Best Friend's Wedding". I love that movie! There's a scene near the end where Julia Roberts and Cameron Diaz are having a conversation, seemingly about dessert. Cameron Diaz's fiance has called off their wedding, and Julia Roberts is trying to explain to Cameron Diaz why. Roberts explains that Diaz's fiance is looking for a simple woman, for which she inexplicably uses "jello" as a metaphor. Roberts consoles Diaz that she is "crème brûlée", not "jello". Diaz sobs that she wants to be jello, but Roberts assures her that crème brûlée can never be jello.

I agree with Julia Roberts on this one. Crème brûlée can never be jello. Thank goodness, because crème brûlée is exceedingly heavenly. This is one of my favorite desserts, and it is the hubby's favorite dessert. I tried to be such a good wife on our anniversary, and make crème brûlée for dessert. The only problem? No cream on hand. I soldiered ahead, determined to sub milk for cream. Bad idea. I learned that you use cream for crème brûlée due to the fat content. I used milk and added an extra egg yolk for more fat, but to no avail. The crème brûlée never set, and was a runny, nasty mess.

Crème brûlée fail!

Well, you know me. If at first you don't succeed, try, try again. And I did. To be real people, this dessert sounds elegant and hard, but there's only 5 ingredients. It's actually a cinch to make. Try it peeps! This is a great skill to keep under your belt :)

Ingredients (makes 3 custards):

2 cups heavy cream
1/2 vanilla bean
5 egg yolks
3/8 cup sugar
Baking sugar

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 325º. Bring a large pot of water to boil on the stove.
2. Pour heavy cream into a pot. Scrape seeds from vanilla bean into the cream, place pod in cream. Infuse cream over medium-high heat (heat over burner just until tiny bubbles appear around the edge of the cream). Remove from heat and allow to set for 15 minutes. Remove vanilla pod from cream, discard. Pour cream through a fine strainer to remove any lumps. Set aside.
3. In a large bowl, cream egg yolks and sugar together for a few minutes until thick, pale yellow, and creamy. Slowly drizzle one cup of cream into eggs as you are whisking to temper the eggs. Slowly incorporate the rest of the cream. Pour mixture into a pourable container.
4. Place ramekins in a large, wide-sided pan. Divide cream mixture among ramekins. Place boiling water into a pourable container. Pour water into the wide-sided pan until water is halfway up the ramekins. Be careful not to get any water into the ramekins.
5. Carefully place water bath in the preheated oven. Bake for 40-45 minutes, or until custards are just baked through. They are done when a slight jiggle of the pan doesn't jiggle the custard. Remove from oven. Using a large spatula, remove the custards from the water bath, and allow to cool on the counter for 30-60 minutes. Cover, then chill in the fridge for at least 2 hours.
6. Before serving, sprinkle a thin layer of baking sugar on top of the custard. Using a blowtorch, toast the top of the custard until it's brown and crispy. Let sit for 30 minutes before serving.

*Recipe adapted from The Pioneer Woman*

Cheesy Egg White Scramble with Peppers and Spinach

Summer has arrived!

It's going to be our first 90° day of the year! I knew this to be true when the temperature was 77° at 9 am. I took the dogs out about 1 pm (86°) , and Gizmo promptly collapsed in a panting heap after his usual romp around the yard. I love when he pants. So cute. Anyhoo, this sunny weather has given me some extra pep in my step, knowing I need to step-up my workouts to have tank-top ready arms. And half the battle is eating correctly...

I'm always shocked by how much food you can eat when it's healthy! I was looking at this whole scramble, comparable in size to maybe a piece of pizza. Maybe bigger than a piece of pizza. One piece of pizza from Papa John's with "the works" is 330 calories. This whole scramble is 176 calories! I had this for lunch, topped with guacamole, and with a cup of strawberries. Lunch for under 300 calories. With 18 grams of protein, 118% of my daily Vitamin A, and 134% of my daily Vitamin C. I'm feeling pretty satisfied :)

Ingredients:

1 tsp olive oil
1/4 cup onion, chopped
1/4 cup peppers, chopped (I used red, yellow, and orange peppers)
1 cup spinach
6 tbsp egg whites
salt and pepper to taste
1 oz part skim mozzarella cheese

Directions:

1. Heat olive oil in a skillet over medium-high heat.
2. Add onion and peppers to skillet, saute 3-5 minutes or until tender. Add spinach to pan, and saute just until spinach is wilted, 30 seconds.
3. Turn heat down to medium. Add egg whites to pan. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Start to scramble egg whites, pushing the edges of the whites towards the center. Continue pushing edges to the center until egg whites are cooked all the way through.
4. Remove from heat and sprinkle with mozzarella cheese. Let cheese melt, scrape scramble from pan onto a plate, and serve immediately.

Weekend Wrap-Up: Cinco de Mayo

Cinco de Mayo is one of my most favorite holidays. Mexican food is beloved by me, I look for any excuse to make it, eat it, drink it... Margaritas= amazing! My plan to make chicken enchiladas was derailed last night (by Kroger, those rat finks), but I made Mexican-inspired rice, as well as a Mexican-inspired salad. I will be making enchiladas in the near future however, now that I've got enchiladas on the brain.

The hubby worked quite hard in the yard this weekend. He put in underground pipes to funnel water away from the house. This turned out to be quite a laborious task as he had to rent a trencher, dig trenches for the pipes, and then shovel dirt on top of the trenches. Mission accomplished on the pipes! He was also able to sprinkle grass seed on the side yard, and cover it with straw. We are on our way to having a mud-free yard!

Gizmo watched intently from his watch post, whining every so often because he could see the hubby right in front of him, he just couldn't get to him.

Reunited at last!

I did some small, indulgent couponing deals this week. I picked this up at CVS for a grand total of $3.99. Pretty good for a $30 product! It's going straight to the top of my "testing" pile :)

I got a ton of nail polish at Rite Aid for a total out-of-pocket expense of... $2.74. I really love these Covergirl nail polishes right now. The brush is easy to use, the formulas are easy to use, they have a wide variety of colors, and the polish is pretty chip-resistent. I can't wait to try the glittery taupe I bought!

These Sally Hansens' were also included in my Rite Aid haul. I'm excited to try all the shades.

So, how did Kroger ruin my Cinco de Mayo dinner? Their rotisserie chickens (I was going to shred the meat, and put it in my enchiladas) looked like crap. Total crap. I couldn't bring myself to pay for what looked like tiny, roasted hamsters. I was steamed. I picked up a fresh chicken, and decided to try my hand again at roasting a chicken.

I finally got it right. 4th time. Phew. The hubby said it was by far the best chicken I'd ever cooked. Anyways, by the time the chicken was done roasting, it was too late to go through the whole dog-and-pony show of making enchilada sauce, making the filling, stuffing tortillas, and baking the whole she-bang.

But, at least the chicken was stellar :)

It made for some delicious-smelling homemade chicken broth.

Starting Monday off on the right note. The hubby is out of town all week in Nashville, so Mama is cooking for 1. Started off the day with an egg white scramble with peppers and onions, a smidge of mozzarella cheese, and a smattering of salsa. With strawberries on the side, of course. So good!

I'm off to do some cleaning, laundry, and then make big batches of Quinoa Taco Salad (lunches this week) and Vegetable Soup with Pasta and Kale (dinners this week).

I hope everyone had a fantastic Cinco de Mayo!

Banana Cake with Vanilla Bean Frosting

I told you I'd be back with more vanilla bean recipes. Well, here I am. Still loving my vanilla beans. My soft, pliable, delightfully aromatic vanilla beans. It has crossed my mind to try eating a vanilla bean. They smell so freakin' amazing, why wouldn't they taste good? But then, I remember the time I tried a sip of vanilla extract. Talk about a wolf in sheep's clothes. So I've refrained.

Has anyone else tried a bite of a vanilla bean? Just curious, that's all :)

It has also crossed my mind that I might purposefully hoard overripe bananas, just so I can put them in baked goods. The jury's still out on that one. What the jury's not still out on is this cake! So moist, fluffy, and delicious. I tweaked my frosting recipe to include vanilla bean, and yum! If you really like frosting, you might want to double the frosting recipe. I'm that weirdo that only likes a little bit of frosting.

I think overripe bananas are going to be making even more appearances on my counter. That's saying something, as I always have an illustrious amount of overripe bananas.

Ingredients:

Cake-
2 tbsp unsalted butter, softened
2/3 cup sugar
1 large egg, room temp
1/2 cup plain Greek yogurt
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 very ripe bananas
1 cup flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt

Frosting-
1/4 cup milk
1/2 vanilla bean
1.25 tbsp flour (that's 1 tbsp and 3/4 tsp)
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup butter, softened
1/4 cup sugar


Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350º. Grease a 8 x 8 pan.
2. For the cake: In a large bowl, cream butter and sugar, until pale and creamy. Beat in egg. Beat in Greek yogurt. Beat in vanilla. Beat in soft bananas. In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, and salt. Add flour mixture to banana mixture, mix until well combined. Pour batter evenly into greased pan. Bake in pre-heated oven 20-25 minutes, or until toothpick comes out clean. Remove from oven, and let cool completely before frosting.
3. For the frosting: Add milk to a small saucepan. Cut vanilla bean in half lengthwise, and scrape seeds into the milk. Add vanilla bean to milk. Heat over medium heat, until small bubbles appear around the edges of the milk. Remove from heat, and let milk sit for 15 minutes. Discard vanilla bean. Add flour to the milk, and heat over medium-high heat, stirring constantly until mixture becomes thick. Stir in the vanilla extract. Remove from heat, and let completely cool. In a large bowl, cream butter and sugar until very pale and creamy (take your time on this, because you don't want your frosting to be grainy from unincorporated sugar). Add flour mixture to the butter mixture, and beat until frosting takes on texture of whip cream (about 5-7 minutes). Chill in fridge for 15 minutes before frosting.
4. Remove cake from the pan. Spread frosting on top the cake. Store cake in the fridge, since the frosting is milk based.

Recipe adapted from ButterYum

Top 10 List: Pasta

It's been a busy week. Doctor's appointments, vet appointments, the hubby had a couple of days off. There's just been no time to blog! Plus, we just got the Internet back after 24 hours without ANY. Gotta love livin' in the country :)

Thanks to Pinterest, I've been seeing a lot of pasta. Pasta makes my world go round. I could eat pasta morning, noon, and night. I love the texture, the way it tastes, its easy versatility, and the fact that almost anything could go with pasta. To that effect, here are my top 10 favorite pasta dishes. Tried and tested. Craved constantly. Delicious.

In no particular order:

Beef and Broccoli Lo Mein

1. Beef and Broccoli Lo Mein- Need I say more? I love Asian food, and this recipe tops the list. I frequently sub the beef for chicken, shrimp, or pork. The sauce is fantastic, and goes with almost any protein.

Bacon Mac

2. I love homemade macaroni and cheese. This is ironic, because when I was a child, I wouldn't touch homemade mac and cheese. I was a blue-box-of-Kraft kind of girl. My taste has pretty much flip-flopped, and now I turn up my nose at the boxed kind. What I like most about this recipe is the flavor that the small amount of bacon lends to the dish. I also love the peas thrown in for some extra color and veg.

Fettucine with Olive Oil and Red Pepper

3. This is one of the simplest recipes you'll find, but it's packed full of flavor. This is my go-to side dish for Chicken Parmigiana.

Gemelli with Broccoli, Bacon, and Chickpeas

4. Another crazy easy dish! Olive oil and pasta were made for each other. I actually prefer an olive oil based sauce, to a cream based sauce.

Shrimp Florentine

5. Umm, I'm sensing a theme here, and it's olive oil and pasta! Shrimp, spinach, and lemon are soooo good together.

Pad Thai

6. Pad thai is such a unique dish, and I love every aspect of it. Crunchy bean sprouts. Bits of fried egg. Salty peanuts. That sauce that is distinctly Pad Thai. Guarantee I will be making this soon, now that I've been thinking about it.

Spaghetti Carbonara

7. Well, I think I've made it crystal clear that I also love the combination of bacon and pasta. This is one of my hubby's favorites, and a go-to, fast, and easy recipe in our house.

Orecchiette with Roasted Peppers, Tomatoes, and Arugula

8. This is a perfect summer dish for when tomatoes, peppers, and arugula are at their peak of freshness. If you've never had orecchiette pasta before, I highly recommend it. The texture is amazing.

Chicken and Mushrooms in Garlic White Wine Sauce

9. Referred to as Chicken Stroganoff in our house, this recipe is tried and true. It's almost impossible to mess it up, and looks downright fancy. It also comes together in a snap.

Ravioli with Roasted Zucchini

10. What would a pasta list be like without some sort of cheese-filled pasta? Not a very good one, in my opinion :) You can make fresh raviolis if you like, or use a pre-made ravioli from the grocery store for a quicker meal.

Man, I'm wishing pasta was on the menu tonight :) 

Have a great weekend everyone!

Pioneer Woman's Pasta Carbonara

4 days. 4 more days. 4 more long days. We are sooo close to the finish line of moving out of the rental, I can smell it! I'm beyond ready. Beyond packed? Noooo. Beyond ready? Yesssss.

I've been reduced to prepping and eating on paper plates due to the fact that most of the kitchen is packed. I've left out what I need to cook the basics, but everything else is gone. Packed in a box, and already moved down to the hubby's aunt and uncle's house. I had a few things left in the fridge I needed to use still, being bacon, cream, parmesan cheese, eggs. I still had some frozen peas in the freezer. I saw this recipe on Pioneer Woman's site last week and it totally fit the bill.

The hubby and I thought of packing the entire kitchen, and then just eating out all week. But then we thought back of moving from Oregon to Kentucky, and how we ate fast food for a month. It was... disgusting. We decided as long as we were here, we would make simple meals this week. And this was pretty simple. Frozen peas, minced garlic, and the last lonely onion.

Eggs, grated parmesan cheese, a touch of cream, and black pepper. As with Spaghetti Carbonara, the hot pasta goes immediately into the egg mixture to cook it.

I wished I'd had more bacon, but what I used was enough. And it was all I had. I definitely wanted more bacon in the dish though :)

The cavatappi taking a dip in the egg mixture. Since I didn't defrost my peas, I threw them in the pasta water for the last couple of minutes to warm them up.

After the bacon is cooked crisp and the onions and garlic are sauteed, the pasta/pea mixture is mixed into the dish. Garnish with more parmesan cheese and black pepper. Delish! This was fast and easy, and used up everything I still had laying around. I'll be making this again, with more bacon! :)

Ingredients:
8 oz pasta, cooked to package directions
1 cup frozen peas
3-4 thick cut slices of bacon, diced
1 small onion, diced
1 tbsp garlic, minced
2 eggs
1/3 cup cream
1/2 cup parmesan cheese, grated
1/4 tsp black pepper

Directions:
1. Cook pasta according to package directions. Add frozen peas last 2 minutes of cooking time.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together eggs, cream, cheese, and black pepper. When pasta has finished cooking, drain, and add to bowl. Toss quickly to combine and cook the egg mixture.
3. In a large skillet, saute the bacon until crispy. Remove from pan with a slotted spoon, and place on a plate covered with a paper towel. Add onions and garlic to the pan, saute until the onions are tender. Add pasta/pea mixture to the pan and cook 1-2 minutes. Add the bacon back into the dish. Garnish with more parmesan cheese and black pepper. Serve immediately.

Adapted from Pioneer Woman

Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Bread

I may have packed away most of my baking stuff, but I couldn't resist trying this. It seemed after I had packed everything away that I came across dozens of cookie and cupcake recipes that sounded delicious! I'm blaming Pinterest.

I may have packed up the pantry for the most part, but I haven't packed up the kitchen. This left me access to... my loaf pan! I haven't packed my basics yet either, so I still have flour, sugar, brown sugar, oatmeal at my fingertips. All the things I needed for this bread. Convenient :)

This bread is the perfect marriage of oatmeal and chocolate chips. It's moist and oh-so-good. I had a half-slice for breakfast and I'm trying to keep myself out of the rest of it. Emphasis on the word trying.

By the way, the hubby's aunt keeps changing her mind on how much she wants me to bake. When it was first decided we would stay with them, it was no baking at all while we were there. A couple of weeks go by, and it changed to I could bake twice while I was there. Then it was once a month. She has now arrived at once every 2 weeks. LOL. I'm a little worried about how much I packed up without easy access to. We'll see how that goes :)

Ingredients:
2 cups flour
1 cup oats
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups milk
2 large eggs
1/4 cup butter, melted
2 tsp vanilla
3/4 cup chocolate chips

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. In a large mixing bowl, combine flour through salt. Whisk to combine, set aside.
3. In a separate large mixing bowl, combine milk through vanilla. Beat well. Mix in dry ingredients with a spatula. Stir until just combined. Fold in chocolate chips.
4. Pour batter into a greased loaf pan. Bake in preheated oven 55-110 minutes, until knife inserted into bread comes out clean. Cool in pan 30-45 minutes. Turn out to a cooling rack and let completely cool before storage.

Recipe adapted from Bake or Break