For Future Reference

gluten-free chocolate-chip bars made without xanthan gum will be crumbly. Delicious, but crumbly. Still good in a bowl with vanilla ice cream.

Snow Day!!

I love waking up to snow! In celebration of the snow, we started the day with chocolate chip pancakes.

Some of us had peanut butter chocolate chip pancakes:

Yum!

After a long, busy day of chores, we had a quick and delicious supper of "Wisconsin Mac & Cheese" from the Bon Appetit recipe-a-day calendar. Trader Joe's frozen green beans on the side. Delicious! And probably dangerous to have a 10-minute stovetop mac & cheese recipe in the arsenal.

Made with Sam Mills corn pasta (elbow macaroni), gluten free all-purpose flour (no xanthan gum), and 2% milk.

Tomato Soup and Grilled Turkey & Cheese Sandwiches

This is a great dinner that we make quite often, especially in the winter. It's warm, comforting, and we can each make our sandwich to our own tastes. And it helps that the husband doesn't have to eat gluten free bread.

V-8 Herbed Tomato Soup. Purchased with a coupon, this tasted a bit like minestrone. You could definitely taste all the other vegetables in it. Decent, but not something I would probably buy again.

Sandwiches of deli turkey and swiss cheese with onion, mayo, and mustard.

Eaten while watching District 9.

Monday night: California Tortilla - yum!

Tuesday night: pan fried potatoes with onion, garlic, and collard greens.

Wednesday night: sauteed garlic, carrot sticks, onions, mushrooms over brown rice, with a fried egg. Topped with your choice of sesame oil, gomasio, tamari, sriracha, chili paste.

Thursday night: avocado-chickpea tacos with homemade tortillas. Topped with cheese, sour cream, salsa, and a squeeze of lime.

Quick, easy, and so much tastier than anything you can buy in the store, homemade tortillas form the basis of many quick-and-easy meals around here. That tortilla press, added to the wedding registry on a whim? Best.Decision.Ever. Seriously.

Avocado and chickpea tacos made based on this recipe from Vegetarian Times.

Fresh From the Freezer

After a late night return from the mountains on Saturday and a day playing tour guide on Sunday an easy dinner pulled out of the freezer - butternut squash and swiss chard lasagna with steamed broccoli.

Butternut Squash and Swiss Chard Lasagna. This was much better after a couple months in the freezer, allowing the flavors to mingle and deepen. However, I would have undercooked the gluten free noodles even more than I had. They were a little mushy, not too mushy, but mushier than I would have liked. I wonder if I can leave the noodles uncooked? Would they cook enough in the water given off by the squash or would they end up crunchy surrounded by dry filling?

Chili Night at the G's B&B

Carried out in an effort to fill the G’s freezer.

Beef chili made with one box of Carrol Shelby Chili Mix. Served with Fritos, shredded cheddar, diced green onions, cilantro, avocado, and sour cream.

We even documented the different ways we all composed our chili bowls.

We also made Giada’s White Bean and Chicken Chili. Made with only one pound of chicken, instead of two; without a few spices (fennel seed, cumin); and with the addition of two bay leaves. Served with avocado, parmesan, cilantro.

No pictures of the white bean and chicken chili, but it was delicious.

We also made simple roast chicken and potatoes one night and chicken enchiladas another.

The final freezer tally for the week included:

1 pan chicken enchiladas,

3 2-cup bowls of beef chili,

3 2-cup bowls of chicken and white bean chili,

3 cups shredded chicken (for making Southwest King Ranch casserole),

as well as 2 containers mashed potatoes, 2 containers chicken Marbella, and one container green beans left in the fridge. Phew. At least she'll be eating well for the next month or so!

Chicken Marbella

We’ve eaten this dish before, but hadn’t cooked it until recently. We made it for company while visiting family. I knew it was easy, but was impressed at just how easy it was (and it still turned out great, even cooking at almost 10,000 feet!)

Marinade made the night before (measurements loosely followed, until it looked “right”). Chicken baked at 380 for about 50 minutes. Served with simple mashed potatoes (butter, milk) and green beans sautéed with garlic, onion, and topped with a squeeze of lemon.

Sausage and Potatoes with Spinach (Or, Cleaning Out the Fridge Before a Trip)

An improvised dinner, the likes of which we’ve been making for awhile. I don’t remember where we first saw this idea, but it’s a good one, with lots of variations.

2 medium potatoes

2 spicy Italian Chicken sausages (from freezer), sliced in rings

last of a bit of onion in the fridge

last 3 mushrooms from the fridge

Brown potatoes with a bit of olive oil. Remove to a bowl, brown sausage. Remove to a bowl, sauté onion and mushrooms until soft. Add back to pan potatoes and sausage, and stir in the spinach. Cook until wilted, and season as needed with salt and pepper.

Somehow, I forgot the garlic. We didn’t this time, but it’s also delicious with an over-easy or runny fried egg on top and/or topped with sriracha (or other hot sauce).

Mexican Eggs

A quick and easy dinner, made of things we usually have on hand.

Serious Eats recipe for Mexican Eggs

We served it with a can of Whole Foods refried pinto beans with chili and lime, roasted potatoes with a dash of cayenne, and lots of cheese, cilantro, tomatoes, and sour cream. I have to try and remember that those refried beans are not spicy, even though the label says they are.

No photo, because we had company over.

Guess who has the coolest insulated lunch bag in town?

This post is a little late, as this was a Christmas present from the husband.

Tuna & White Bean and Herbed Egg Salads

In an effort to be better about taking my lunch to work, I made up a little tuna and white bean salad. I didn’t follow a recipe, but just tasted as I went.

1 stalk celery, diced

about ¼ med. red onion, diced small

1 can white cannellini beans, rinsed and drained

1 can tuna, drained

fresh dill, chopped

squeeze of ½ lemon

small spoonful of yogurt and mayo

salt and pepper, to taste

Herbed egg salad was a recipe from the NYTimes “Recipe for Health” section. It wasn’t far off from how I normally make egg salad, but had more dill and parsley added, as well as plain yogurt. No picture of this either, although, curiously, my version had many more visible herbs in it than the picture from the paper. Delicious for breakfast on a toasted English muffin.

Herbed Egg Salad Recipe

No photos taken (which is okay, it wasn’t much to look at).

It's Good to be Back in the Kitchen

Improvised Black Bean Vegetarian Chili

I had a container full of sauteed vegetables (onion, zucchini, portabella mushroom, butternut squash and black beans) in the fridge from making veg and goat cheese enchiladas a couple months ago. I let it defrost in the fridge for a couple days and then improvised chili tonight.

Here's what I did:

Saute about 1/4 cup diced red onion and 2 cloves garlic in about 1 Tbsp olive oil.

Add 2-3 cups of leftover chopped veggies out of the freezer, thawed in fridge and drained of any excess liquid.

Add about 2Tbsp tomato paste, squeezed from tube. Cook a few minutes over med-high heat to heat the veg and cook off any extra water out of the previously-frozen vegetables.

Toss in about 1tsp ground cumin and 3-5 shakes of cayenne pepper. Salt and pepper.

Stir in slices of an ancho chili pepper straight out of the freezer, along with a can of black beans (rinsed and drained) and one large can fire roasted tomatoes, undrained. I added them whole and tried to break them up with the spoon later. Next time I would chop the tomatoes before I add them to the chili.

Stir and let simmer. Taste and adjust seasoning as needed.

Serve with toasted tortillas, cilantro, lime wedges, cheese, sour cream, guacamole, and pickled jalapeno.