Do you have any idea how difficult it is to make meat-free dishes that are filling?  Do you know how hard it is to find meat-free dishes that are warm and ARE NOT soup?  You have to work for a reduced-meat life.

My aim right now is twice a week.  If I can have two days a week where dinner is meat-free, I’m happy.  If I can have three days a week be devoid of red meat, I am VERY happy.  It’s all in working towards a healthier life for me and my family.

You know a great way to have a filling meat-free meal that isn’t soup or freaking salad?  Egg rolls and spring rolls.  LOVE.

Soy Dipping Sauce for Spring Rolls or Egg Rolls

My Recipe

1/2 cup soy sauce

1 tsp. chili paste

1 scallion, sliced

Dark sesame oil-just a drop or two

black pepper to taste

Put the soy sauce into a small sauce pan and bring to a boil.  Remove from heat and immediately add chili paste, scallion, sesame oil and pepper.  Stir and allow to come to room temperature.

Easy.  For some variations, add two Tablespoons smooth peanut butter OR 1 Tablespoon of honey and a teaspoon of white wine.

I buy the chili paste that has ground up garlic in it and it really adds a lot of flavor.  When it comes to looking for chili paste, I always consult the Asian aisle at my supermarket.

Now for the egg rolls….

Vegetable Egg Rolls

My Recipe

Egg roll wrappers (it’s a pastry you find in the produce aisle)

Assorted vegetables such as cabbage, scallions, carrots, fennel, bell peppers, or hot peppers, all cut into thin strips

I used fennel, carrots, scallion and orange bell pepper.  Just make sure that they are thinly cut into slices so that they’ll get a little soft during cooking.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.

Cover a sheet pan with aluminum foil and spray the foil with nonstick cooking spray.

Lay your egg roll wrapper out and place the assorted vegetables in a thin line in the middle.

If you like, sprinkle the vegetables with a scant amount of salt and pepper before wrapping.

Bring the bottom corner of the wrapper up and wrap the vegetables with the corner.

Tuck the sides in around the vegetables.

And finish rolling.

Line the egg rolls up on the prepared sheet pan.  Brush the tops with a beaten egg if you like to ensure a brown glossy finish.  I did this because I’m not deep frying the egg rolls.  It made for loveliness.

Bake for 10-12 minutes and serve hot with dipping sauce.

They were delicious.  The fennel made them very fragrant and the salt and pepper on the inside kept the vegetables from tasting bland and the dipping sauce added a note of heat.  A very nice meat-free dinner if I do say so myself.

Enjoy!

But you know what?  As I get older and a bit more mellow, I get it.  Maybe I’m not someone who’s going to go through a lot of trouble for this day, but I’m not disgusted by it anymore.  The whole argument about needing to let your loved ones know they’re loved YEAR ‘ROUND and not just on one day?  I absolutely agree, but stuff happens, you know?  So having a day where the entire country gets really annoying and washed in red and pink with hearts EVERYWHERE can be a nice reminder to stop and look at those around you who make you whole.  I mean, we’re supposed to let our parents know year ’round that we love and appreciate them, but they get their own days.

The one thing about Valentine’s Day that I can’t seem to accept is heart-shaped food.  It annoys the HELL out of me.  And because of the internet and Pinterest in particular, I have to put up with a LOT of cutesy stuff.  Most of it I can just brush off and forget about and sometimes I can even appreciate it.  Heart-shaped foods?  ANNOYING.

I do like all of the red food that people come up with, however. If you cornered me and made me admit to a signature color, I would say that color for me is red.  I’m not really a fan of pink, but I love red.  I wear as much red as I can on this day.

Today, I wanted to make something special for my family to eat.  I decided on spaghetti for dinner because both of my children like it and it was the meal most likely to bring about a relaxing and “together” kind of setting.  But for dessert?  Oh the choices.  My first thought was to make red velvet cupcakes and pipe a heart of icing on top.  But you know what?  While my family loves cupcakes, we never eat a whole batch and they go to waste unless we have help eating them.  Brownies?  Chocolate is certainly a big thing on this day.

The one dessert in my house that goes super fast is cookies.  When I make a batch of cookies, they last two days tops.  Peanut butter cookies are the favorite of this house.

Around Christmas, I had wanted to make peanut butter cookie snowman cookies dipped in white chocolate, but because of being sick I wasn’t able to get much baking done.  That was it.

All I did was make just a standard peanut butter cookie (I used the Better Homes and Gardens recipe).  Once they were cool, I made a white chocolate ganache and iced them.

The white chocolate ganache was incredibly simple.  I put together 1 bag of white chocolate chips, 1 tsp. of canola oil (keeps it shiny), and 1/4 cup of milk and put it over a double boiler.  Once the chocolate was melted, I added red food coloring.  I like the gel kind because I find that I get deeper and more complete coloring.  Then I spooned the chocolate over the cookies and added sprinkles.

Yes, I used sprinkles.  This is a special occasion, after all and sprinkles add a sense of occasion, don’t they?

It’s not a fancy dessert, but I have two small children and they’re not going to be impressed with meringues with berry sauce (although that sounds lovely).  They’re peanut butter cookies with white chocolate smooshed on top.  But it’s different and the cookies were completely yummy.

P.S. If I were making a special dinner for just myself and my husband, I would look at these recipes:

Brandied Cornish Game Hens

Mustard and Herb Crusted Pork Roast

Red Wine Marinated London Broil

Cheese Fondue

Pesto Cheese Fondue

I hope you give some of these a try.  And I hope a nice day was had, even if you’re a grouch about Valentine’s!

Ramen is cheap.  Super cheap.

No duh, right?

Ok, so you want to downsize the food budget a bit.  It’s absolutely smart of you to eyeball the ramen noodles in favor of saving some money.  But, gah, they are so salty and gross.

My friends, you can beef up your ramen.  YES YOU CAN.  And it will still be a cheap meal AND your kids will eat it.  Well, at least mine do.

My kids are carbophiles.  By that I mean that they scoff at eating anything and everything unless it’s bread or pasta.  My children love NOODLES.  I remember eating ramen as a kid, so it was an obvious choice to try to get them to eat something, ANYTHING.  I hesitated at the thought of just basically giving them a bowl of noodles in salty “flavor” water.

I always keep a healthy stash of chicken stock in my freezer and I made a big batch of vegetable stock once or twice a year.  Use those instead of water.

OR

Go easy on yourself and do what I do.

Now, before we go any further, let me caution you against looking for JUST noodles.  Why would you do that?  They make packaged single serving noodles for you!  And they’re cheap!

In case you’ve forgotten what they look like!

Just throw away that infernal “flavor” packet.

My children will split a packet between them and my husband and I usually eat a packet each.

Children’s Veggie Ramen

My Recipe

1 packet ramen noodles (flavor does not matter as the flavor packet will be discarded)

1 cup water

1 Tblsp. ketchup

1/3 cup carrot sticks

1/4 cup celery sticks

Note: carrots and celery should be cut into matchsticks like this

Put the water and vegetables in medium saucepan and put over high heat.  Bring to a boil and cook for 3 minutes.  Add noodles.  Cook 1 minute.  Add ketchup.  Serve.  Makes 2 child-sized servings.

I’m not even kidding with this.  It takes longer to chop the vegetables than it does for this to cook.  I serve it in special bowls that we only use for noodles (my kids love a sense of occasion) and my kids go to town on this.

The noodle bowl that my children eat is different from the one I make for my husband and myself.

When we were in college at WVU, there was a little hole in the wall Japanese place called Yama.  We used to love going to Yama’s in the winter and getting these huge bowls of miso ramen.  It was cheap, it was hot, and it was delicious.  Of course, after we left WV I had to learn to make that fabulous dish.

This is a bit of a bastardized form, but it’s quick, warming, and quite yummy.

Miso Veggie Ramen

My Recipe

1 packet ramen noodles

1-1/2 cups water

1/2 cup matchstick carrots

1/3 cup matchstick celery

1/4 cup thinly sliced spring onion (or just regular onion, the world won’t explode if you use a yellow onion)

1-1/2 Tblsp. white miso paste

1 egg (optional)

salt and pepper to taste

Place water and vegetables in a medium saucepan and bring to a boil. Add salt and pepper.  Cook for 2 minutes.  Add noodles.  Cook for 1 minute.  Add miso paste and stir until dissolved.  Add egg.  Cook for 1 more minute, leaving the egg whole.  If you don’t want a runny yolk, cook longer.  Serve.  Makes 1 adult serving.

It may seems annoying that this only makes one serving, but really it takes mere minutes to whip up another bowl.  So while my husband’s bowl of noodles is cooling, mine if cooking and we can still eat together.

I quite like this dish and it works beautifully on days where I don’t want to eat or serve meat.  However, meat can very easily be added.  Leftover chicken can be shredded and added to this with gusto.

I do hope you try this.  It’s a super cheap meal that is very filling and it’s fast and easy to make.

Enjoy!

It came, nonetheless.

Day 5 this year was steak.

I LOVE a good steak.  But it has to be a GOOD steak.  I’m rather curmudgeony about the whole thing, actually.  If you’re going to give me a cheap piece of gristle-riddled meat, or you’re going to put weird seasonings and toppings on it or you’re not going to cook it right, then for the love of all that is good, FORGET IT.  I’ll eat a damned salad!

Steak is an indulgence for me because I am so picky about it.  They aren’t cheap and they aren’t exactly something I want to be eating all that often.  But when I do, it HAS to be good.

My preferred cut of meat is usually the ribeye or a Delmonico.  The meat is not quite as tender as a filet, but the flavor is absolutely wonderful.

We had Delmonico steaks (OMG huge ones, at that) with baked potatoes and a simple spinach salad on the side.

A good steak that originates from a good cut of meat doesn’t need much.

Sprinkle with a bit of salt and pepper.  Don’t cook it any more than medium.

Look, if you’re squeamish about pink meat or a bit of red juice, SKIP STEAK because you’re not doing it right and you’re making me nuts over here.  A good steak should be pink and juicy to be enjoyed.  END OF STORY.

If the weather had been mild, I would have thrown the steaks on my outdoor grill, but seeing how it’s the middle of winter and there was snow on the ground, the steaks had to be cooked indoors.

I broiled the steaks.

You have to be careful not to put the meat too close to the heating element, be it a flame or a coil.  The steaks spit and sputter grease in the cooking process and can start a fire.  CAUTION.

Of course, wrap the steaks in foil for 5 minutes after cooking is done so that the juices can redistribute and cooking can finish.

In case you’re wondering, NO I DIDN’T EAT THAT WHOLE STEAK.  I barely at half of it!  That thing is bigger than my children were as newborns!  Besides, I’ve shown you before what to do with leftover steak.  I love that.

The steak was delicious at a warm and juicy medium-rare.  The potato was soft and fluffy and the spinach salad was just the thing to keep the meal from being too heavy.

A simple but decadent meal.

That’s the end of the DoD for 2012.  I’m hoping that next year will be less illness and more merriment.  Either way, I hope the New Year was kind to you and yours and thanks so much for visiting!

For Day 4, I made Spaghetti Carbonara.  This is another DoD regular.  I don’t know why I don’t make this dish more often.  It’s quick, economical, and it’s freaking delicious.  I’ve been married to the same recipe for this dish for a few years and I have no intention of straying.  It comes out perfectly every time and it doesn’t use any cream.

I’m feeling a lot better today.  It’s the day AFTER Christmas, and today was the first day that I was feeling well enough to do some holiday baking.  A few choice words were muttered into thin air as I realized this, but you know what?  I went right ahead and did some baking anyhow.  I’ve promised 6 people goodie bags and I feel just awful that I couldn’t send them out before Christmas.

Oh well.

Everybody getting a goodie bag this year will get:

-My grandmother’s Peanut Butter Candy  (recipe here)

-Candy Cane Fudge

-Peppermint Taffy (homemade taffy is a bit harder than the stuff you buy, but it’s still awesome!)

-Cherry Eggnog Bread (recipe here)

One gentleman requested a couple of other things. So in a couple of the bags being sent to my husband’s coworkers, there will be rum balls, fruit cake, and stollen.  We’ll talk about those maybe next year.  I’m beat.

Happy Holidays, all.

It was a fish tonight.  This fish to be exact.  It’s a white fish with great flavors.  I’ve said it before, I am NOT a huge fan of white fish, but I really like this recipe.

As sides I made risotto and glazed carrots.  If you want to know how I make risotto, look here.  I’ve been making it this way for YEARS and I still can’t resist eating it from the pot while it is molten and in danger of blistering my mouth.  I love it.

Glazed carrots are super easy to make.  Here’s how I do it.

Glazed Carrots

My Recipe

2 cups carrots (either sliced to 1/2-inch thickness or use baby carrots)

3 Tblsp. butter

1 Tblsp. honey

2 Tblsp. brown sugar

Steam the carrots until tender.

In a large skillet or wok, melt the butter, honey and brown sugar together until bubbly.  Add carrots and stir over medium heat until carrots are coated and the glaze is sticky and slightly thickened.

This serves 2 people.

I hope everyone is enjoying lovely food tonight.

Enjoy, my friends!

Because of this, I had to delay the 5 Days of Decadence (heretofore referred to as DoD).  Tonight was night 1.

Brandied Cornish Game Hens and Roasted Butternut Squash and Potatoes

My Recipe

2 Cornish game hens

1/4 cup Brandy

2 Tblsp. butter

1 butternut squash

2 medium potatoes

2 cloves garlic

2 small wedges of lemon

Extra virgin olive oil

salt&pepper

thyme

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.

Peel the butternut squash and potatoes and chop them into 1-inch cubes.  Spread onto a baking sheet and sprinkle with olive oil and salt and pepper.  Put on the bottom rack of the oven.  Cook for 5 minutes.

During this time, prepare the game hens by stuffing the cavities with a small bit of garlic and lemon.  Truss the birds with twine and set them inside of a deep-sided, metal, oven safe pan.  I used a large stainless steel skillet.

Pour the 1/4 cup of brandy over the birds.  Sprinkle the birds with salt and pepper and thyme.  Add butter to the pan.  Turn on medium heat under the pan and heat until butter is melted and liquid is hot.

Put the pan on the top rack of the oven uncovered and cook for 40 minutes.  (The potatoes and butternut squash are to remain in the oven during this time as well).

After the 40 minutes are up, remove the potatoes and butternut squash.

Baste the birds and cook for another 10 minutes.  Baste again.  Check for thorough cooking of the birds by piercing a thigh.  If the juices run clear, the birds are cooked.

If, at this point, the skins are not brown enough for your liking, put the birds under the broiler UNDER CLOSE SUPERVISION until desired brown-ness has been reached.

Remove the pan from the oven and cover.  Let the birds rest for 5 minutes.

Serve and enjoy.

Beautiful skin.  Hey, we’re talking about decadence here, so you know I’m eating the skin on this baby!  And you know what?  It was everything I could have hoped for!  Delicious!

This was actually a lovely dish to start the DoD.  I’ve always wanted to make brandied birds, and they didn’t disappoint.  If you’re new at poultry, please pay attention.  My little birds cooked in the 50 minutes that I listed in the recipe, but maybe my oven runs low, or maybe this or that or a million other reasons.  It’s a touch and feel sort of thing.  I’ve roasted many a bird in my time so I’ve got a pretty good birdie sense going on.  If you’re new, take it slow.

And the veggies, JOY!  Wars have been fought, I’m sure, for the potatoes that have the brown crunchy bottoms.  And although butternut squash is a giant pain in the butt to peel and cut up, I just adore it.  It’s so sweet and wonderful when it’s roasted.

I hope everyone’s holiday season is going wonderfully.  Holiday season or not, this is a delicious dish.  I love making Cornish game hens.  They seems fancy to me because I get my own little bird to demolish.  And they’re so dainty and easy to cook.  I do hope you try this.

Enjoy!

I lived for that dish.

I’m unsure that what I was served could actually be widely considered Goulash by many.  Really it was a runny spaghetti sauce poured over macaroni noodles.

Now ask me if that offended me then or now.

Of course not.  It was delicious!

I hadn’t had this dish since I was a small child, and I got to thinking about it.  I couldn’t get it out of my mind. I HAD to make it.

I decided to change it up a little bit so that the sauce wasn’t exactly like my spaghetti sauce.

What I came up with was pure sin in a bowl.  It HAD to be a sin, it was so good.

Goulash My Way

My Recipe

2 medium carrots

2 stalks of celery

1 large onion

3 cloves of garlic

1 lb. ground meat (I used lean beef)

1 15-oz. can tomato sauce

1 cup water

1/2 Tblsp. Italian Seasoning

1 tsp. salt

1/2 tsp. pepper

1 box of pasta (macaroni is traditional, I used ditalini)

Grated cheese for topping. I used Colby Jack

In a food processor, add your carrots, celery, onion, and garlic.  Make into a paste.

Heat a small amount of oil in a dutch oven.  Brown the meat and remove to a plate.  Set aside.

Add the carrot and celery paste to the dutch oven and cook over medium heat for 2 minutes.

Return the meat to the dutch oven.

Add the tomato sauce and water.  Add the Italian Seasoning, salt and pepper.

Bring to a boil, cover, and reduce the heat to low and cook for 45 minutes stirring occasionally.

In a pot of salted water, cook the pasta.  When al dente, drain and immediately add to the tomato sauce.

Serve in bowls and top with grated cheese.

This is a good cold weather dish (like so many of my other recipes).  It’s filling and it’s warming to both the body and soul.

It’s meaty and also somehow light.  Of course, this being a pasta dish, my children loved it.  And I wasn’t drowning in mommy-guilt over them not eating enough vegetables.

I do hope you give it a try.

Enjoy!

There but for great dental work and a lovely soft accent goes me.  Okay, perhaps I think too highly of myself.  However, this woman embodies almost everything that I would like to be in my kitchen.  She’s confident, she’s low fuss, and she’s serving food that is fit to split your pants because you won’t be able to stop eating it.

Let me just say, that my Christmas wish list is going to contain all of her cookbooks this year.

I watch the shows that the Cooking Channel airs, and simply from that I get a ton of ideas for new dishes.

Her breaded pork chops?  My children go out-of-their-heads crazy when I make these.  My husband inhales his share.

This recipe that I’m sharing today is highly HIGHLY inspired by something that I saw Nigella make on her show.  I must give credit where it’s due.

Roast Pan Stew

Nigella Lawson Inspired

8 chicken thighs, bone in and skin on

10 sweet Italian sausage links

3 carrots, chopped into big sections

1 large onion, roughly chopped into big pieces

4 medium potatoes, cut into 1-inch pieces

12 white mushrooms, cut into 1-inch pieces

1 Tblsp. salt

1/2 Tblsp. black pepper

Olive oil

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees F.

In a large roasting pan, add all of the ingredients except for the salt, pepper and olive oil.  Make sure the chicken is skin side DOWN.

Lightly drizzle the contents of the pan with olive oil.  Use no more than 1/4 cup.

Sprinkle with salt and pepper.

Do not cover the pan, just put it into your oven and cook for 1 hour.  After one hour, take the roasting pan out, stir the contents, and flip the chicken thighs so that they are skin side UP.  This will ensure crispy skins.  Bake for another 30 minutes.

Let the dish rest for at least 15 minutes before serving.

This is one of those awesome one-pan meals that I love to serve every now and then.  And this is a one-pan meal that will serve 8 people!  That’s a WIN in my book.

Just make sure your plate has a sampling of all that this dish has to offer.  All of the food is bathed in the lovely sausage oils and the rendered chicken juices.

It’s a rich and sticky dish, but wonderful and cozy-making all the same.  On a cold day when the skies are gray and the outside is basically terrible, make this.

Enjoy!

Me?  I’m kind of a purist.  I like ice cream.  The kind that is just cream, sugar, and flavorings.

I’ve posted a few other ice cream recipes on here before.  I REALLY like to make homemade ice cream.

I have even more ice cream recipes waiting for my attention.  But you know, so many of those recipes are a custard base, meaning that there are eggs in the recipe.

I don’t like pudding.  I don’t like custard.  I don’t want my ice cream quite that rich or egg-y tasting.

I had a particular problem when looking for just a plain ol’ vanilla ice cream recipe.

Finally, thank goodness, I came across an article or a tv show (I don’t remember!) detailing how to make ice cream with just cream and sugar.

YAY!

Vanilla Ice Cream (Or a good base ice cream for other flavors such as lavender!)

A Common Sense Recipe Gifted to You From Me!

2 pints heavy whipping cream

1 cup sugar

3 vanilla bean pods, split

Pour the ingredients into a heavy sauce pan and heat just until boiling, stirring constantly.  Strain and put in a bowl and cover with plastic wrap, making sure to put plastic wrap down onto the cream so as not to let a skin form.  When the mixture has reached room temperature, put it in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours.

When cool, add the mixture to your ice cream maker and let it go.  It will need to finish setting up in a freezer.

Look, you may have reservations about using heavy whipping cream for your ice cream.  Maybe you watch what you eat.  Maybe that just seems like it would be too rich.  Use half and half instead if it really bothers you, but you will sacrifice a bit of taste for it.  Ice cream is a treat, not an everyday thing.  Might as well make it as wonderful as you can!

I’ve noticed a lot of recipes and celebrity chefs will tell you to split a vanilla pod and take out the seeds with the back of your knife.  Those seeds are TINY and it is a giant pain in the butt to get them into your mixture, and then they clump together….blah.  Just split the pods and throw the whole thing in your saucepan.  Those tiny seeds make their escape on their own and flavor the ice cream wonderfully.  You strain the mixture anyway, the pods are easy to get out!

See?  Look at all those tiny black vanilla seeds.  EASY.

This ice cream is simple, pure, and yummy to the Nth degree!

I recommend serving it over the best brownies in the world topped with a dollop of hot fudge sauce.

Hey, I said it was a treat.  Treat yourself!

Enjoy!