This is one of the easiest recipes ever to make, and being that Quinoa is a super food and super healthy for you, I say you should give this one a try! Start off by bringing your quinoa up to a boil in salted water. It will of course vary on how much you are making, but anywhere from 4-6 servings would take about 15-20 to cook through. I roasted one green and one red bell pepper and then small diced them. I also took about 5 scallions and small diced them as well as one cucumber that also got small diced. You only need 3-4 ounces of each of these ingredients if that helps. I also had some dried apricots that I small diced for a little sweet component. Then I made a very light dressing that was just lemon juice, olive oil, salt, pepper and sugar and a little fresh parsley and tossed the salad mixture in that. For presentation I served it in a piece of raddichio lettuce and topped it with a pinch of micro greens and one quartered tomato. Super easy, super delicious and so pretty to look at!
I have always been a fan of Sushi, never really thought or in all honesty even wanted to make it home! Thanks to this international cuisine class I just had to make it. It was my first time working with Nori which was pretty interesting. Being pregnant it of course sucked the fun out of having any real Sushi, but I still made an attempt with an all veggie one. I made several mistakes, one of which, my rice was a bit too tacky and made it a little difficult to work with. Another problem stemming from that was when I went to spread it on the Nori sheet, it was hard to get it to spread evenly, so I wound up with having a bit too much rice for my roll. Rolling it with the bamboo pad was actually quite easy, I can see with more practice I would be able to be much better at it. As with anything else. My Nori sheet didn't connect around the first time, there was a gap so I had to try to roll it again and tighter. Needless to say I had to man handle it a bit so it didn't come out the most beautiful! I decided to try to make up for lack of technique with giving it a nice presentation. My chef said it made him want to eat it so hopefully it does the same for you!
This past Sunday the 27th was an all around wonderful and lazy day. I got to sleep in with my loved one which is very rare, literally didn't even get out of bed until a little after noon. With a baby girl arriving in no more than a months time, I am going to cherish all those little moments while I can still get them! Anyway, we walked to a diner up the street called Clark's that is on Damen, they are open 24 hours and have a little bit of everything. All we really cared about was being able to have breakfast food even though we made no attempt to be awake during breakfast hours. We shared some pancakes and I got a skillet with potatoes, chicken and cheese. It was good, quick and cheap. Which sometimes is really all you need. ;) We came home and literally just lounged with our dogs for hours, watched Sunday programming on TV and really was just lazy. We decided to try a place called Bangers and Lace on Division that a friend of mine bartends at. Their menu is a lot of home made sausages and what seemed to be really good bar food. We headed over and made it there a little after 10 P.M and they had already stopped serving food, so no Bangers and Lace for us. We did pass a BBQ joint walking to Bangers and Lace, so we looked at all of our options that were still open and serving food and settled for some BBQ. I had never eaten at Smoke Daddy's before, he had several times, one of which being when he first moved to the city almost 10 years ago. We shared their Jalapeno Beer Cheese for an appetizer, and it was really quite tasty. We both had a pretty big appetite for having only ate once earlier in the day, so having a cheese spread wasn't too filling, if you aren't terribly hungry I might not suggest it as a starter. I got the Pulled Pork Sandwich with Collard Greens and Mac and Cheese and he got a Half Slab with Collard Greens and Mac and Cheese. The sandwich was great, BBQ always seems to hit the spot. I will say this though, their Collard Greens and Mac and Cheese does not have Lillie's Q beat at all! Sorry Smoke Daddy, you are good, but you are not that good!! Either way if you like BBQ I would give it a thumbs up and say go check it out. I had to work Memorial Day, our kitchen was slammed as well so I didn't eat at work. Once home, I was complaining to the boyfriend about being hungry but not wanting to put forth the effort to actually make something. I was wishing for a box of Kraft mac and cheese to save the day but I didn't have any. He had the wonderful idea to make it home made and he would help if I taught him how. So, 2 A.M and we are standing in the kitchen making a roux, explaining how to make a textbook bechamel and both wondering how our leftover cheddar and american cheese slices leftover from a BBQ we had was going to work. Let me just say folks, it worked great. Some of the best mac and cheese I've had in a while! (I am eating the leftovers right now and I'm not usually big on re-heated mac and cheese.. so that says something!) So, needless to say, my holiday weekend was just wonderful! Couldn't have asked for a better, lazier, more stress free time!
I would like to start off by saying, Yes I made this! The recipe for the batter for these Blinis was very time consuming. I had to first make a "sponge" out of yeast and milk that sat for about an hour and a half, after that was done, I added the rest of the ingredients to the "sponge" to then make a smoother, pourable batter that also had to sit and double in size after combining. All in all it took a little over two hours to just make the batter! Sheesh!! Could you imagine if pancake batter took that long?? These little blinis looked just like little silver dollar pancakes, but tasted more just like a bread. They were not sweet at all which I think surprised some people who were expecting that by the look of them. The salmon was very simple, I cut small filet's and just made a stove top smoker, it maybe took half an hour from the start of setting it up til the final product. I think this was a great and tasty little snack but I couldn't fathom spending that much time on it on a regular basis! I'm sure it becomes easier with time and practice of making it, either way it was tons of fun to make something I had never made or ate before!!
I am in an International Cuisine class at school right now which I am thoroughly enjoying!! So far we have made things I have heard of, well mostly, a few I haven't. I definitely have not made them!! Its all things that I would enjoy making, but either the ingredients are hard to come by or I don't have the time to go searching for them. On Thursday I made Lamb kebobs with onion and zucchini, and an African flatbread. I thought overall those things served together would be a bit dry so I made a sauce out of yogurt, cucumber, lemon juice, toasted and ground cumin seed, salt/pepper and dill. It all worked so well together!! The African flatbread was a very easy dough to make, it didn't take long either and turned out a beautiful color and had a great texture! I will be making this again at home for a BBQ or really any meal because I feel like it would go with a variety of foods.
