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Foodie Friday

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Today’s Foodie Friday post is a delicious pasta dish that you could make this Labor Day weekend to impress your guests! It’s super easy.. I based this recipe off one of my favorite pasta dishes at the restaurant Brio. I invented this dish because unfortuneately the pasta pesto dish I loved so much at Brio was discontinued! How rude. But anyway, here is the recipe!

Ingredients Needed: Sun Dried Tomatoes – Pesto Sauce – Pine Nuts – Baby Spinach – Penne Pasta (or whatever is your favorite pasta!) – Parmesan Cheese/Feta Cheese (optional)

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This is literally one of the easiest pasta dishes. First, cook your pasta (follow directions on the box). Once the pasta is cooked, drain it, and return it to your sauce pan. Turn the heat on low. Next, add in the pesto sauce, sun dried tomatoes and baby spinach. (I don’t give amounts because it really is up to you and what you like most). Why you need to turn the heat on low is to slowly wilt the spinach slightly. Add in the pine nuts, and feta cheese/parmesan cheese(if you want). Some people might toast the pine nuts, but that seems like a lot of unneeded effort. Normal pine nuts taste GREAT! So that’s all there is to this dish! I mean seriously, how easy is that?!  Another addition to this dish – you could add in cut up chicken tenderloins chunks to give it more of a hearty taste (obviously cook the chicken before you add it).

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Doesn’t that look SO delish!? Let me know what you think!

xoxo

Cinco De Mayo Fiesta! Part 4

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Okay, last mexican fiesta post! A fiesta is not a fiesta without FAJITAS!!!! Some people are scared of making fajitas, but they really are quite simple. You can do it! I promise!

Ingredients:

1 white onion – 1 fajita skillet sauce – olive oil – steak – red and yellow peppers

First, cut the onion. You want pieces that are long and will get slightly smaller when you cook them. The easiest is to cut the onion in slices, then cut those in half.

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Next, cut the peppers in the same long, thin slice fashion.

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Lightly pour some olive oil in a sauté pan. Then add the peppers and onions. Cook these on medium heat. I usually cook them for as long as the meat is cooking. It ends up being roughly about 25 minutes.

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While the peppers and onions are cooking, you need to cook your meat. I chose steak for these fajitas, but you could use chicken as well. At our local grocery store, they sell steak already cut up in thin slices for stir fry,  but it also doubles as fajita meat! If your store does not have meat already cut up, you can just buy your favorite cut of meat and thinly slice it. You can cook the meat in a sauté pan, or a bigger pot like I did. (I only did this because my other pans were dirty, and I didn’t feel like doing more dishes haha) Cook the meat over medium heat.

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Once the meat is fully cooked (it usually takes about 15-20 minutes), then it is time to add the secret ingredient…….. FAJITA SAUCE!! I LOVE LOVE this sauce. It’s by Rick Bayless, and since I am a cooking show geek, I get excited every time I eat a well-known chefs food. 🙂 So you add the sauce to your meat and let it simmer for about 5 minutes. Then your fajitas are ready to be prepared!

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Here is the finished product, it was SOO GOOD! My Cinco De Mayo fiesta was a success!! Maybe I filled my tortilla with too much ingredients so that I couldn’t roll it into a burrito….but oh well! It was delicious! *Shown with a Strawberry-Limearita. yum yum 🙂

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So that was my Cinco De Mayo…what do you think?! Will you try to make some of these recipes for your hubbs?

xoxo

 

 

Cinco De Mayo Fiesta!! Part 3

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So after I made the two salsas, I figured I should make some guacamole. Because really…what mexican fiesta is complete without guac.

Ingredients:

2 1/2 avacados – pico de gallo – salt and pepper – tortilla chips

Since I had just made the pico de gallo, the guacamole was super simple to put together. All you have to do is mash up the avocados, add some pico de gallo and salt and pepper, and mix. And there you have it.

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Talk about simple, this was for sure the quickest part of the meal I made.

Tip:

I had half an avocado that I had saved from the other night with this funny goop I found at Sur La Table. It’s just the rubbery-flubber like thing that you put over your avocados and it keeps them fresh for a few days! It’s GENIUS!! I suggest everyone go get one, if you eat avocados as much as I do. I think it was about $5, a steal!

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Cindo De Mayo Fiesta!! Part Two

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After I made fresh pico de gallo, I thought “Why stop there?!?!”. So I decided to make some fresh corn salsa! I have never made this before, but after my Food Network watching, I just knew I could do it.

Ingredients:

Half of a red onion – 2 jalapeños – handful of fresh cilantro – 2 bags of frozen sweet corn (I used the steamer version, you just microwave each bag for 4 mins 30 secs, super simple!) – chips(duh)

First, dice the red onion. Add to bowl.

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Next, dice the 2 jalapeños. I left almost all the seeds in this one, because I knew the sweet corn would counteract it so it still wouldn’t be too spicy.

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Next, add the sweet corn. Finely chop/tear the fresh cilantro and add to bowl. Add a pinch of salt and pepper. Mix. And BOOM. Corn Salsa complete!!

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It’s beyond tasty, and trust me, your boyfriend will love you for it. Unless it’s my boyfriend, who doesn’t like corn. I found this out yesterday, after I slaved in the kitchen for a hour making all these salsas. But he LOVED the pico de gallo, so I decided it was okay. haha

Let me know what you think! What do you like better….corn salsa or pico de gallo??

xoxo

Cinco De Mayo Fiesta!

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Hi Everyone! I’m back!! I was in a festive mood yesterday, and went crazy cooking a big mexican fiesta! Usually when mexican food is involved, my boyfriend is the one who does the cooking. He has learned how to cook authentic mexican from some of his friends parents, and he does it VERY well. But as luck would have it, my boyfran was snowboarding at A-Basin yesterday, so it was up to me. Luckily for me, the Food Network was running a lot of Cinco De Mayo episodes, so I got seriously inspired while doing laundry/watching tv. And keep in mind, if I can do it.. YOU can do it!!

First up – fresh pico de gallo!

Ingredients:

4 tomatos – 1 sweet onion – 1 jalepeno – a handful of fresh cilantro – salt – pepper (and chips, obvi!)

 

Really all you have to do is dice all your veggies. This seems easy, but does take some time. So first, dice your tomatoes. I actually cut them open, then scrape out all the seeds and extra juices before I put them in my mixing bowl. I personally don’t like tomatoes that much, so I try to avoid any unneeded slimy parts. It’s your call 🙂

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Next, dice your onions. I did pretty big chunks of all my veggies, because I didn’t want to chop my fingers off trying to get the smallest dices possible. Add them to your bowl of tomatoes. If you like a little heat, add a diced jalepeno. I take out the seeds, so it’s not too spicy. Just perfect. Roughly chop/tear the cilantro and add to the bowl. Add a little bit of salt and pepper (up to you how much you want). And voila! You’ve made pico de gallo!

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I mean how pretty does the final product look?! And it’s SO GOOD!! I love how fresh it tastes.

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So what do you think?! Is this not the easiest, most stastifying thing ever?!

Mid-day Snack?

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I have found the BEST midday snack! It’s called Snapea Crisps, and they are fabulous!! Here’s a picture(look for these in your local grocery store!):

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I found these at the grocery store the other day and thought I would give them a try. I picked the “Lightly Salted” flavor, but there were a few choices if salty isn’t your style. And obviously if you don’t like sugar snap peas, you might not like these…What I liked is that the whole bag is about 300 calories. THE WHOLE BAG! If you have binge eating problems like me, this is a good find. For someone who could go through a bag of chips in 5 seconds, this is a much better go-to when a craving hits. Hopefully you don’t eat the whole bag in one sitting, but if you did..it wouldn’t be the worst! Each serving is 13% of your daily fiber for the day, not too shabby!