3 cheese alfredo pasta with shrimp

It's been a while since I posted a food blog, but I just made an awesome dinner from scratch using only ingredients that I already had in my kitchen (a rarity for me) so I thought I'd share.

First, the inspiration:

• Becca went on vacation and left some Gorgonzola up for grabs. Yummm Gorgonzola...
• I had a really nice Asiago cheese with rosemary and olive oil from Trader Joe's that I purchased for no particular reason other than it looked delicious 
• I had a pack of frozen baby shrimp that I got at Albertson's for a dollar. A DOLLAR!
• I had some leftover shredded Parmesan from something else I made last week.

Becca also left some Alfredo sauce, so I originally thought I'd just borrow some of that and make a shrimp Alfredo and add a bit of cheese. And then I realized, "hey, I have all this really nice cheese! Why ruin it by throwing it into some store-bought Alfredo?" So I made my own!

Ingredients: (word of caution: I threw this together so amounts of cheese and spices are somewhat of an estimation. Sorry! I'll actually record them next time. Also it only makes about 2 servings so double it if you're feeding a family)

2 tablespoons flour
2 tablespoons butter
1 cup milk
3 tablespoons shredded Asiago cheese
3 tablespoons Gorgonzola cheese
1/4 cup Parmesan cheese
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp Italian herb seasoning (could sub oregano)
pinch of salt
2 cups cooked noodles (I used spaghetti because that's what I had on hand)
1 cup cooked shrimp (could use chicken or other meat)

Cook noodles according to package directions. Set aside and keep warm.
Melt butter in small sauce pan over medium heat. Whisk in flour until blended. Whisk in milk and keep whisking until thick. Add cheeses and stir until melted and slightly bubbly. Add spices. Add shrimp and keep on low heat until heated through.

Pour shrimpy sauce over noodles and top with extra Parmesan if needed.

Super easy and yummy!

crockpot chicken curry, cucumber salad, stuffed date appetizer

My boss brought dates to the office. I ate one and it was good, but I couldn't help thinking that it would be better stuffed with goat cheese and wrapped in bacon.  What does that have to do with curry? Well...

I posted this to my facebook

And received these responses...

Feeling thus affirmed in my desire to eat bacon-wrapped dates for dinner, I decided to do it soon. Then my mom called to say that she and my dad wanted to come visit on Saturday. And so, I hatched a daring plot to make a full dinner with bacon-wrapped dates as only an appetizer. The result:

Dates, stuffed with goat cheese, wrapped in bacon

Ingredients

• Some dates
• Chevre with herbs (you could use any goat cheese, and you could use plain goat cheese and add the herbs yourself)
• Pre-cooked bacon (you could use uncooked bacon, you would just need to be more finicky about your cooking times than I was)

Select as many dates as you want to make. Use a knife to make a slit in the top of each and pull out the pits. Stuff with a generous spoonful of cheese. Wrap each date with half a strip of bacon and secure with a toothpick. Place on a cookie sheet and bacon on 450 for about 5 minutes or until bacon is crispy but not burned. Serve hot

 

Crock pot curry (adapted from a Real Simple recipe)

This is really easy to make and inexpensive, but the secret is having a good Indian spice blend. I used vindaloo that I bought here. The original recipe called for garam masala. I'm not sure if they often have this type of spice in the regular grocery store (I haven't looked).

Ingredients

• 1 14-ounce can diced tomatoes
• 1 medium onion, chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, chopped
• 2 tablespoons tomato paste
• 2 teaspoons vindaloo or other Indian spice
• 1/2 teaspoon salt and dash of pepper
• 3 good-sized boneless chicken breasts. Mine were frozen and worked great
• 1/2 cup cream or coconut milk

Dump all ingredients except the cream into crock pot. Cook on low for about 8 hours. Add cream before serving

Cucumber salad

Chop up one small cucumber. Add a couple tablespoons of chopped fresh cilantro. Toss in 1 tablespoon lemon juice and season to taste with salt and pepper. 



Serve the curry over rice, or naan with the salad on the side (the flavors blend nicely together). The bacon-wrapped dates are more of an anomaly but still good.

Easy, cheesy, veggie quiche

Quiche is a lot easier to make than I thought! I will make this again someday with bacon or something.

Frozen ready-to-bake pie crust
1/2 cup chopped red onion
1/4 cup chopped red bell pepper
1/4 cup chopped yellow bell pepper
1 zucchini, cut into bite-sized pieces
1 or 2 tablespoons olive oil
2 large eggs
4 1/2 fluid ounces cream
1/2 cup grated swiss cheese
1/2 cup grated cheddar cheese
1 tsp dried basil
Salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 400F

Toss vegetables in oil and bake put on a cookie sheet. Roast for 25 minutes or until slightly charred.

Reduce oven temperature to 350F

Combine cheddar and swiss cheese. Set aside 1/4 cup. Whisk eggs and cream. Whisk in 3/4 cup cheese, basil, salt and pepper to taste.

Add vegetables to pie crust and pour over the egg mixture. Sprinkle the rest of the cheese on top. 

Bake for 35 minutes. 

Tipsy Banana Bread

The original recipe was "jacked-up" banana bread. It had bourbon in it. We didn't have any Jack Daniels, so we used rum.  You can't taste the alcohol, but it seems to make it more moist--I figure it's not drunk--just a bit tipsy. I love cold banana bread with butter, but this is tasty enough to eat plain.

3 large (or 4 smaller) ripe bananas, mashed up. Frozen bananas work great because they are already mushy.
1/3 cup melted butter
1 cup brown sugar
1 beaten egg
1 tsp vanilla
1 tablespoon rum
1 tsp baking soda
Pinch of salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
Pinch of ground cloves
1 1/2 cup flour

Preheat the oven to 350. Mix butter and bananas in a big  mixing bowl. Mix in the sugar, egg, vanilla, rum, and spices. Add baking soda and salt. Lastly, mix in the flour. Pour the mixture into a greased loaf pan. Bake for about 50 minutes or until a fork comes out clean.

Toasted Caprese Sandwich with Garlic Basil Mayo

I typically blog when I make a full-fledged recipe. Something fancy, that I had to go out and buy 10 specific ingredients for and involved multiple stages of preparation. Gotta be honest, not my typical night. Since this is now a general food blog and not a cooking blog, I can come clean that a typical dinner for me probably consists of something like:

• a bean and cheese burrito
• Tuna and cheese sandwich with tomato soup
• scrambled eggs and toast
• makeshift Greek chicken salad
• Trader Joe's premade pizza
• Okay...Trader Joe's premade anything...

What I'm driving at here is that few people I know have the time to cook a full-fledged recipe every night, but we still cook by piecing things together. It's not all TV dinners and frozen pizza (although the Trader Joe's version of TV dinners and frozen pizzas are pretty delish...I digress...). And the happy news is that meals that are pieced together can be pretty darn yummy! 

Earlier this week I made bruschetta so when I opened my fridge tonight, I saw that I still had some fresh mozzarella, fresh basil, and cherry tomatoes, so I decided to make a caprese sandwich. Sadly, the crusty bread was all gone, so I just used boring old regular bread. I've made this before with rolls and it was even better, so if copy the recipe, I'd recommend splurging on better bread. But regular bread was fine. 

Ingredients

• Bread or rolls. It might be good on flatbread too, but I haven't tried that!
• Tomatoes. (I used cherry, which is not ideal, but I don't believe in grocery store tomatoes unless they are cherry and don't have anything growing in my garden sooooo...)
• Mozzarella cheese (fresh is best, but regular is fine)
• Fresh basil (I supposed dried basil would be fine, but fresh is so good!)
• Mayonnaise
• Garlic salt, or garlic powder and salt

Instructions (for 2 sandwiches)

1. Toast 4 slices of bread in your toaster (to keep it from getting soggy later)

2. Thinly slice up tomatoes

3. Cut off several thick slices of mozzarella

4. Combine about 2 TBSP Mayo with 4 finely chopped basil leaves (or 1 tsp dried basil) and a teaspoon of garlic salt.  (You might want to taste it and then play around with the quantities)

5. Spread the mayo on two slices of bread and set aside

6. Put the other two slices of bread on a cookie sheet and top with tomatoes and mozzarella

7. Put in the oven and broil for 5-10 minutes, just until cheese is melted. 

8. Top each sandwich with more basil leaves and a mayoed slice of bread.

Voila! 10 minutes dinner.  Forgive the sloppy mayo job in my picture below.

Being beautiful

Awesome article on "skinny bashing," referenced below. I completely agree that beauty is not about size. Really beauty, as cliche as it is, is about what's inside not what's outside. However, if we want to discuss outer beauty, we should be talking about health, not stereotypes. It's not healthy to be obese, OR ridiculously skinny. But there are beautiful, healthy men and women of all shapes and sizes. That's what matters.

Skinny bashing and fat bashing reflect our society's unhealthy, appearance-based, value system. And I think that women perpetuate this MORE than men do. So let's quit it. Stop worrying about ideal sizes and instead enjoy food and exercise for the sake of being healthy, not being skinny. 

http://girliegirlarmy.com/lifestyle/20120120/the-problem-with-skinny-bashing/

The new and the old

I love food--I find it endlessly fun and interesting. For a while now, I've been toying with the idea of creating a blog that explores life and the world through the lens of food and dining. So--I did it! I migrated my old cooking blog into this one to create an even more extensive dining experience.
Here you will find:

• Recipes
• Restaurant reviews
• Links and useful articles
• Discussion about food, health, and fitness
• Occasional boring commentary about what I ate today
• Anything else I feel like throwing your way

Philosophy of Food: I believe that in food, in health, and in life, all things are good in moderation. I'll eat anything, but I also believe in healthy eating and living. I am hoping the explore these ideas more and further develop my food philosophy, hopefully with lots of great input and discussion from you!