With cheeeeese!

Remember my tortilla post? The one where I made a giant chip in the microwave? Well I added cheese to it today...

I shredded some Colby Jack cheese before tossing it in the microwave. Same time of 90 seconds. It came out good, but I wouldn't say that it's necessary. It tastes good with it, but it tastes good without it, too. So I'll do it sometimes, but won't go totally out of my way for it. The nice part though is it cooks on and is hard on the tortilla, not melty and messy. I would say that means it's good on the go... But this snack really isn't. It's so crumbly! But at least the cheese won't get on your hands, as the tortilla crumbles down your shirt ;)

Worth Our Weight

If you watch Food Network, you know who Guy Fieri is. And if you're from Sonoma County, you know who he is. Because he's local. He owns 2 fabulous restaurants (Johnny Garlic's and Tex Wasabi's). Well recently my mom and I were watching Guy Fieri on TV, and he mentioned a place called W.O.W. - Worth Our Weight. We learned that WOW is a culinary apprentice program and that they apprentice people ages 16-24 who have faced major challenges in their lives. The cooks, wait staff, etc are all apprentices and you pay what you think the meal was worth (no tips). They were located in Santa Rosa - one city away - so we decided to hit them up for brunch the next day.

We saw the huevos rancheros featured on the show, and Guy raved about them, so my mom and I both ordered that. It was delicious! Very flavorful. Very authentic tasting. I finished my entire plate. Seriously. The tortillas underneath were so fresh, the pork so flavorful, and the salsa mixture had just the right ratio of tomatoes and herbs.

What did we think the meal was worth? We paid $35 for 2 plates of huevos rancheros and 1 chocolate filled croissant (to take to my grandma). And we will most definitely be back to try other things!

This is what they brought when we sat down - various little bits of yumminess and some preserves. This was after everything (4 different items) were half eaten by either my mom or myself (we split them).

My plate all mixed up and already munched on - because I love to mix things.

My mom's plate - untouched.

Some rockin' pasta

I made a pretty delicious pasta tonight. Granted the sauce was jarred, but still. It was pretty friggin awesome. My brother even had 4 or 5 helpings!

I browned a pound of mild Italian sausage while boiling water for the penne pasta. While the pasta cooked, I continued browning the sausage, added some chopped red bell pepper and diced tomatoes. I also sprinkled on some dried parsley and onion powder. Once the pasta was done cooking, drained, and rinsed, I added the meat mixture and the sauce (Classico brand sun-dried tomato Alfredo) to it and then cooked it together with some more diced tomatoes for a few minutes. While that was cooking together a bit more I sauteed some baby bella mushrooms. I'm the only one in this house that likes mushrooms (and well, I love them) so I did it separate and just added them to my own.

The pasta turned out to be quite good. My brother loved it, my dad (who doesn't like bell peppers) liked it - and he added Parmesan cheese to his, and so did my daughter (she had seconds). I'm looking forward to the leftovers!

Fun twist on a staple item

My brother taught me this, and I love it. It's a fun way to eat a tortilla - essentially turning it into a big ol' chip! My 4 year old thinks it's pretty neat :)

Just take a medium tortilla and pop it in the microwave for a minute and a half - that's it! It comes out crunchy and full of air. It has the consistency of a really thin chip, and tastes just as good but with less salt. I'm going to try to sprinkle some cheese on it before doing it next time, and see how it comes out.

With normal flour tortillas

And with 100% whole wheat tortillas

I like both the whole wheat and flour, but as you can see, the whole wheat has less sodium and carbs while only 1 extra gram of fat, but with also extra protein. The whole wheat is of course the better choice.

Valentines

This isn't something I cooked... But lollipops are food... LOL

I just wanted to share the valentines that my daughter and I made this year. We made 80 of them to give out to her friends and classmates. I got the templates here, and bought some colored card stock at Office Depot. So we printed the flowers on a mix of the red and the pink paper, and the leaves on the green of course. Cut them out (took HOURS and left my hand cramped, and thumb tingly/numb), and then poked holes in the flowers. I tried to use a hole punch, but my punch doesn't go deep enough to fit the flower so I had to use scissors to do it. Then first we used tape to put the leaves on, though they didn't stay very well, so we went back and used glue after that.

Everyone loved these, including my daughter and I. Totally thankful to Skip to my Lou for such a fab idea. 

Sunday breakfast

Today we had a good ol' fashioned Sunday breakfast. Scrambled eggs (Barn Star cage free - not that the non-cage environments are good, because they usually are horrible), ham steak (Farmer John), bacon (Farmer John), and hashbrown patties (Harvest Day). Mmm.

Unfortunately for him, the only thing my brother could eat is the hashbrowns. He won't eat pork or eggs. 

2 servings per can?!

If you've ever looked at the nutrition label on a can of soup, you know that each can is two servings. Granted some cans are larger than others, but really? You're supposed to get two servings out of one can? One can fits in one bowl so to me, that means it should be one serving. But say you need to split a can of soup with someone (because you both want that LAST bowl of minestrone) else, and you know half that can will just not fill you up, then what? Add rice! You'll get a full bowl of food and you'll stretch that soup. You can even make it stretch with yourself - have half the can for lunch and the other half for dinner, or for lunch the next day.

I made some rice in the rice cooker, and put normal size scoops in my bowl. I used a white rice, but obviously you can use brown if you want to be healthier.

Then just tossed on half the can of my "traditional split pea soup" from Progresso

Mixed it together and voila - a full bowl of food for lunch, using only half the can of soup

This is also good for the budget conscious. Between the price of a big bag of rice, and half a can of soup you're talking as little as $0.75 for the meal, up to maybe $1.50 max.

Working on my pairing

On Sunday night my mom came over for dinner, and my dad made meatloaf. He made two kinds - one with ketchup on top, and one without. They were both 2 lbs so we've got leftovers! My dad uses Italian breadcrumbs in his meatloaf and that really adds something to it, versus when it's just rice or plain breadcrumbs. We love it. He thinks that using the Harris Ranch ground beef that comes in a tube results in a more moist meatloaf, but if I remember correctly, the last time he made meatloaf with that Harris Ranch beef that I purchased, it was an 80/20 fat content and what he made the other night was like a 93/7, and so I'm thinking it was the fat content that lead the other to be moist (not that these were dry, IMO).

I was in charge of sides so I chose potatoes au gratin (though I admit, I used boxed stuff due to lack of time). I also did corn and green beans. I like canned veggies flavor wise, but they just offer no nutrients and have a ton of sodium so I've been trying to get my family to convert to steamed. My mom and my daughter are on my side, and my brother could be more easily convinced than my dad.

My dad also wanted to do mashed potatoes, but those can get so boring (especially when my dad wants to have them almost daily), so I insisted on these. I thought they went well together, but maybe I'm wrong. I've been trying to work on being more creative with pairing entrees and side dishes, while making sure the dish still goes together.

Next I need to tackle the task of doing the potatoes from scratch! If I remember correctly, my late grandmother made really good scalloped potatoes... I wonder if anyone in the family has the recipe?

Easy breakfasts

If you're a "breakfast on the go" kinda family, this would be a good thing for you to try out. Simply make a huge batch of pancakes over the weekend. Like, a triple or quadruple batch. Then freeze them all, after they've cooled. In the morning before leaving, pop one in the microwave for like 30 seconds and you're good to go.

One is good for my kid, so I freeze them all individually, and just save the baggies to reuse. If your kid is a big morning eater, you could freeze 2 or 3 together. I wouldn't freeze a ton together, because they might actually freeze together, which can be difficult to get apart and keep intact.

Easy peasy but so yummy

This is a really easy dinner we like to do. We just brown some ground Italian sausage, cook up some rigatoni or penne noodles, then move the noodles into the pan we used for the sausage. We add in some sauce - this time we used Sockarooni by Newman's Own (because it was on sale). Then we put in some Italian shredded cheese and stir it together, so the cheese melts in. It's delicious! This was our first time with that particular sauce and it smelled spicy, so we were worried, but it wasn't. It was actually a perfect one to use with the sausage. Very nice combination.

We served it with French bread and green beans. 

I didn't take the picture until we'd all had at least 1 helping. Sorry.