Lots of veggies and Leftovers

Every now and then, we have a night of random leftovers in the fridge, so I try to do something with them to finish them up :)  I usually turn them into a stir fry dish of some sort and so last night, that's exactly what I did.  We always have a bag of frozen mixed vegetables from Costco in the freezer for just these occasions and I always have ingredients on hand to make a stir fry sauce with.  I posted about this sauce before, but if you didn't read that blog, I've added the link to it below.  I love the sauce that's made with this shrimp and broccoli recipe from Pinterest and it's my go-to sauce for most Asian dishes I make (regardless of what the recipe calls for).

Here's the Pinterest recipe for the sauce:
http://damndelicious.net/2015/01/16/easy-shrimp-broccoli-stir-fry/

Now tonight, we also didn't have much left for dinner and I had made a tuna salad this morning for my hubby to take for lunch with him as a wrap and so I decided to make a pasta salad to go with it.  I learned this pasta salad recipe from the lead teacher at a daycare center I was working at while I was in college back in Arizona and it has also been my go-to recipe for years!  The secret ingredients are red onions, black olives, and it MUST be Wishbone Italian salad dressing.  They used to make one called Zesty Italian, but I haven't been able to find it in a while and so now I use the one called Robusto Italian instead.  I take this pasta salad with me to dinner parties and picnics.  It's SUPER easy and can be made with ANY veggies you have in the refrigerator.

Pasta Salad - I used what I had in the fridge: carrots, cherry tomatoes, yellow zucchini, broccoli, black olives, and red peppers.  The tricolor pasta is a MUST!

Salad dressing for Pasta Salad

Here are some pics of my stir fry:

My 2 year old's portion for dinner :)

 I also decided to try a stuffed mushroom recipe that turned out AMAZINGLY!  Here's the link to the Pinterest recipe I used:
http://www.thebusybaker.ca/2016/04/spinach-and-ricotta-stuffed-mushrooms.html

Stuffed mushrooms before going into the oven

Capped mushrooms and cheese blend before stuffing the mushrooms

Mushrooms out of the oven

Rice and Peas

Every Sunday in my home is "cooking day" as I like to call it...lol.  My husband grew up in a household that had a hearty, home cooked meal EVERY Sunday and so we continue that tradition in our home today.  I, on the other hand, have no recollection of a specific day where food was cooked and we all sat down for a proper meal.  I feel like when the food ran out, my mom cooked another meal and that was it.  Because I grew up that way, that's how I cooked too!  I always just made a meal regardless of the day of the week, but that all changed when I met my husband!  It has been a joking (and not so joking) point of contention in our marriage because I never saw the point of "MUST cook on a Sunday", but because it matters so much to him, I've tried to continue the tradition.  All that being said, my husband has started taking my 2 year old to swimming lessons every Sunday morning which now gives me some time to be alone with baby and to actually cook a thought out meal :)  This Sunday, I went traditional caribbean for him and made some rice and peas, callilou, roasted yam, and chicken wings.  I got lots of compliments on how the meal turned out in such a short amount of time!

Here's how everything turned out:

Baked chicken wings with my secret BBQ sauce (Diane's BBQ sauce brought in from Canada) 

Oven roasted yam

Rice and Red Kidney beans "Rice and Peas"

Callalou - in the same family as Spinach, brought up straight from Grenada and made with Denielle's mom's recipe :) It's a mix of okra, onions, garlic, thyme, salt, pepper, pumpkin, coconut milk, and I put a small piece of salt fish in it for body. After boiling it all down, I put it in the food processor for a few seconds to make it into more of a soup.

This is what my 2 year old had for dinner.  I just mixed the Callalou up with the rice and peas for her.

Here's the recipe I use from the book below.  If you like Caribbean food and don't have this cookbook, you MUST get it. 

My friend Celine got this cook book for me from Trinidad and I use it ALL the time!

Singapore Noodle

Last night I felt like having an old favorite of mine!  My old school back in NYC was across the street from a Chinese food restaurant called Panda House.  A colleague of mine (Eileen) turned me on to Singapore Noodles years ago and I've loved it ever since!!!!  There are tons of Pinterest recipes on how to make this, with lots of different add ins, to me they all seem similar.

Here's the one I chose to loosely follow:
http://www.cilantroandcitronella.com/vegetable-singapore-noodles/
I like to add shrimp to my noodles and I also use whatever stir fry veggies I have available.  The recipe's author also makes their own curry, but I just use the store bought curry powder and only put 3 tablespoons in instead of the 4 tablespoons the recipe calls for.  I made it too spicy last time and my 2 year old couldn't have any :(


Here's how mine turned out :)

Just fyi - my 2 year old also LOVES this recipe!

I add the shrimp to the recipe after all the veggies have been mixed in with the curry powder for a few minutes

Frying the veggies in some sesame oil before adding the curry powder

Chopped green onion, onion, garlic, and ginger.  I also added some fresh okra from my garden to the recipe

My mother in law brings up some passion fruit pulp from Grenada for us and this is the last of the bag we had in the freezer!  I made some fresh passion fruit juice with dinner tonight! Yum!

Mmmmmmm Salmon!

Every now and then, we run out of our bulk supplies and have to make a Costco run.  We did so earlier this week and were very pleasantly surprised to find that they were carrying wild caught salmon!  My husband refuses to buy anything that was farm raised (for health reasons and because we've seen way too many documentaries...) and so we were happy to find a wild caught salmon fillet!  I made a SUPER simple meal that turned out great!  Made some plain, white rice, steamed a bunch of veggies, and marinated the salmon in that great Soyaki sauce we get from Trader Joe's (I've mentioned this sauce in several posts!!!!).

Here's how it turned out:

My plate of food!  I also love to put a little sweet chili sauce (found in the Asian section of the grocery store) to the top of my plain rice! 

For anyone wondering about how I feed my 2 year old, here are her portions.  The larger plate is what she had for dinner and I always just pack her a lunch for the next day whenever I cook.  The smaller container has her lunch for the next day.  I just have to heat it up and give it to her.  Makes my life easier!

Salmon straight out of the oven.  I cut up some chives and rosemary from the garden and sliced some lemons to put over it before putting it in the oven.

Simple steamed veggies tossed in some butter, salt, and pepper.

Pinterest Repin

I always get notifications that other people repin some of the "pins" I have on Pinterest.  Last night 2 people repinned this mushroom and sundried tomato recipe I've tried in the past and I decided to try it again last night!  I realized that I didn't have any mushrooms, so I just made it with sundried tomatoes and some sauteed red onion and garlic instead.  I also didn't have the half and half or the heavy cream and just used whole milk instead (we ALWAYS have whole milk in the fridge for my 2 year old!).  I had some left over shredded parmesan from the eggplant roll up dish the night before, and so, that made the recipe doable!

I also decided to grill some asparagus on the side using my cast iron grill pan on the stovetop.  Everything turned out great!  My husband and 2 year old loved it :)

Here's the Pinterest recipe I loosely followed:
http://juliasalbum.com/2014/02/sun-dried-tomato-and-mushroom-pasta/


Here's how dinner turned out last night!

I didn't have any fettuccine and instead I used an egg noodle I had in the pantry!

Grilled asparagus

We got hungry later that night and I decided to make a caprese salad!  Costco just happened to have some great mozzerella and I bought amazing tomatoes from Publix earlier in the week.  Topped it with some fresh basil from my herb garden and some olive oil and balsamic......mmmmmm.

Eggplant Roll Up!

My husband has been trying to consume less meat in a quest to be more healthy and take better care of our bodies.  So I keep trying new "meatless" recipes and to my surprise, most have them have been really good!  I found an eggplant roll up recipe on Facebook via the Tasty page as I was scrolling one night and thought I would try it.  Of course, when I went back to find the recipe, I couldn't and so I just typed Eggplant Roll Up in Pinterest and found tons of recipes!

Here's the link to the Pinterest recipe I used.  I also added onion powder, garlic powder, and fresh cilantro to my cheese mix!  After salting my eggplant slices to allow it to sweat (this takes the bitterness out of the eggplant), I pan fried them to brown them and allow them to soften.  The recipe says to put them in the oven, so I guess you could do either one!

https://www.buzzfeed.com/merleoneal/heres-how-to-make-lasagna-roll-ups-with-egg-plant?bffbtasty&ref=bffbtasty&utm_term=.em4APdEzN#.hpnGAgnp9


Here's how mine turned out!

Eggplant rollup after baking

Before baking in the oven

Eggplant rolled up before adding final topping

Ricotta cheese blend

Pan fried eggplant slices

Nana's in town!

I haven't posted in a few days because my mom's been in town and has been cooking up a storm!  Below are some of my most favorite Egyptian dishes!  My mom is an amazing cook, but doesn't use any kind of recipes or measuring.  For years, I have been sitting next to her trying to record measurements and make recipes out of the great Egyptian dishes she cooks and I've come close to getting most of them right! My 2 year old, my husband, and I have been indulging in the good cooking for the past few days :)

Kufta (ground beef mixed with herbs and spices)

Cabbage rolls stuffed with rice (mixed with herbs, spices, and tomato sauce)

This is what the rice blend looks like before being stuffed in the cabbage or grape leaves

Macarona bil bechamel (Macaroni and ground beef in a bechamel sauce)

Yogurt chicken.  It's hard to see but underneath the layer of yogurt, ground onion, parsley, and tomato paste is a layer of chicken....mmmmmmm!

Grilled Sword Fish

My husband loves thick, steak-like fish and so we recently bought some frozen Sword Fish from Publix.  I much prefer soft, white, flaky fish, but I decided to make his fish tonight.  After thawing it, I marinated it in that amazing Soyaki sauce from Trader Joe's that I posted about before and then grilled it in my cast iron grill pan.  I used some olive oil and then grilled the fish on one side and then added some fresh mushroom, sliced onions, and sugar snap peas.  I added some salt, pepper, and vegetable seasoning and left it for a few minutes and then grilled the other side.  I also made some wild rice and steamed some Bok Choy and fresh Okra from our garden!

I have to say, that normally I DON'T like this type of fish, but it actually was very tasty and I ate my entire piece!

Here's how it turned out:

Grilled fish and veggies

Wild Rice

Bok Choy and Okra

Pelau!!!!

If you're looking for a VERY tasty one-pot wonder, then you should try to make Pelau!  This authentic Caribbean rice dish is made lots of different ways throughout the Caribbean, but this is the method that I've adopted for our family and it's one of our favorites!

I like to use my deep dish Calphalon pan to make my Pelau in.  Nothing sticks to it and it's the perfect size for us to have dinner and leftovers in for the next day!  If you've never "browned" chicken, then you should definitely look up how to do it (burning brown sugar in some vegetable oil and then throwing the chicken in over it to get that deep "brown" coloring) or you can even buy "browning" in a jar at a local West Indian shop!  Even Publix here in Jacksonville now has an "International Foods" aisle that has West Indian products in it.  After browning my chicken (drummettes that were previously seasoned with homemade green seasoning and frozen), I throw in chopped onion and garlic, a couple sprigs of thyme and some green onions from my garden, and a whole can of pigeon peas.  I then add a ton of rice over it and mix it all together to get everything nice and brown for a few minutes.  Then I add half a tin of coconut milk, some chicken broth, and some boiled water, salt, and pepper and turn the stove down to slow cook the rice!  I also add about half a bag of frozen mixed vegetables to the mix!  This pot is the BEST when you add some pepper sauce to it directly, but since I always feed my two year old out of what we eat, we've started putting the pepper sauce over our own plates of food instead.  This recipe is super quick and easy and FILLING for the whole family!

Here's how the Pelau turned out!!!!

Completed plat of Pelau with some tomatoes and cucumbers!

Browned chicken, rice, pigeon peas, and mixed vegetable before adding the liquid

Browned chicken and seasoning with the rice

"Browning" or burning of the brown sugar

Here are the products I use!  Gotta love GOYA!

Chopped onions, garlic, thyme, and green onions

I also made a fresh garden salad to go with the meal and some homemade vinaigrette!  I posted the recipe for the salad dressing in a previous post!  It's really good, you should try it!

Felt Like Baking

I didn't have to cook this evening and decided I wanted something sweet.  I decided to look up an old Pinterest recipe that I tried a few months back for a Peach Upside Down Cake.  I didn't have any peaches and decided to use that recipe for a Pineapple Upside Down Cake instead!  It was so quick and easy to make!  Luckily I had all of the ingredients already and didn't have to make a Publix run :) Just FYI, the Pinterest recipe below is for the Peach cake - which by the way, was phenomenal also if you happen to have peaches!

Pinterest recipe for the Peach Upside Down Cake:
http://flavorite.net/2015/04/28/peach-upside-down-cake/

Completed Pineapple Upside Down Cake

A slice of the cake!

Melted butter and brown sugar in the bottom of the pan

Can of sliced pineapple

After I finished baking the cake, I realized we didn't have enough bread for the weekend and decided to bake some bread!  I already posted this recipe in a previous blog, so look it up if you'd like a quick and easy Kitchen Aid recipe!  Here's how the bread turned out!  Also, on our trip to Canada last week, my cousin Nadine introduced us to this AMAZING fig jam.  We went to a fancy cheese store and got some cheeses and crackers and this jam.  It was sooooooo good, we had to bring the rest of the jar home with us.  If you can get your hands on this fig jam, I highly recommend it!

Amazing Fig Jam!!!!  MUST TRY!!!

My 2 year old helping me bake bread!