Salad for Supper

Marinated Steak Salad

In order to convince Nathan to eat a salad as his dinner, I had to make sure that it was going to be big, filling, and most importantly, good. If you are trying to eat more vegetables, a salad is the perfect solution. A half cup equals a serving, and an entree salad can easily have four to five servings of vegetables. In order to make it filling though, it is going to need some sort of protein, whether that be meat, beans, or something else...tofu maybe? (blech). Anyways, I took some inventory of what we had around the house and whipped up a dinner salad that ended up being one of our favorite go-to dinner options. It's inexpensive, quick, healthy, and really yummy!

Ingredients:

Half of a bottle of Lawry's 30 Minute Marinade (flavor of your choice - we used a peppercorn blend)
Grocery store package of flank steak
Head of romaine lettuce
1/2 cup of dried cranberries
1/3 cup of crumbled feta cheese
1/3 cup of pecans
Salad Dressing of your choice - we used Marzetti's Light - Ancho Chipotle Ranch (only 70 calories for 2 tablespoons!)

Directions:

Put flank steak into a resealable plastic bag with half of a bottle of 30-minute marinade. Marinade the steak for at least 30 minutes in the refrigerator.
Cook the steak either on a grill or in a pan on the stove with some non-stick cooking spray. The steak will cook through quickly, usually about 2-3 minutes on medium-high heat on the stove on each side does the trick.
While the steak is cooking, chop up the romaine and put it on two dinner plates.
When the steak is finished, layer pieces of steak on top of the salad, and divide the craisins, feta, and pecans on top of each salad.
Serve with dressing and any other toppings that you like!

Our Favorite Summer Dinner

Toppings for the Tacos!

One of our favorite places to travel that is somewhat closeby is Washington D.C. After seeing all of the historic sites, we now just like to go there for the shopping and dining - some of the best of which is found in Georgetown. The first time we tried fish tacos was at J. Paul's in Georgetown, and we were eager to make our own version when we got home. The tacos are light, fresh, summery, and easy to make. One of the most fun parts about making them is getting to choose whatever toppings you like. I like to chop up lots of fresh fruits and vegetables for ours. Our usual toppings include: chopped romaine, salsa, lime juice, chopped tomatos, red onions, jalapenos, avacado, and mango. To add an interesting flavor, we use crumbled feta cheese rather than more traditional shredded cheeses, and to save some calories, use plain yogurt rather than sour cream. We have used these same toppings and cooking methods for different types of fish, but our favorites have been tilapia and shrimp. For the tilapia, we season it with salt, pepper, and some of Emeril's Essence and then saute the fish in olive oil until it is cooked through and the inside flakes. For the shrimp, we peel and devein it, and then saute it in olive oil with some smashed garlic gloves and grated ginger. I prefer corn tortillas, and Nathan prefers flour tortillas, but we cook those for a few seconds on each side in some olive oil to make them a little crispy. It might sound weird, but give these tacos a try, they are healthy and delicious! We like to serve them with a side of black beans and corn.

Tilapia Tacos

(Serves 2)

One pound of fresh tilapia (use fresh - much tastier than frozen)

4-6 Corn or flour tortillas

3 Tbsp. Olive Oil

Seasoning: Sprinkle on salt, pepper, Emeril's Essence (combination of garlic, paprika, salt, garlic powder, black pepper, onion powder, cayenne pepper, oregano, thyme)

Toppings (choose what you like): Lettuce, Tomato, Red Onion, Feta, Plain Yogurt, Mango, Jalapeno, Salsa, Lime, Avacado, Black Beans, Corn, Cilantro

Directions:

Heat two tablespoons of olive oil in a skillet on medium-high heat until it is hot (you can test this by dropping a drop of water in it and seeing if it sizzles). While it is heating, season each filet of fish with the salt, pepper, and essence. When the oil is ready, drop the fish into the pan and cook for about 4-5 minutes on each side, or until the outside of the fish is crispy, and the inside flakes - you can test it with a fork - it's ok to cut into it, you will be shredding it up anyways.

While the fish is cooking you can work on chopping up the toppings.

Heat a tablespoon of olive oil in a separate skillet on high heat. Once the oil is hot, drop the tortillas in individually for about 15 seconds on each side, or until they have a slight crispiness to them.

Remove the fish from the skillet and shred into small pieces. Place into tortillas, and then serve with the toppings.

My Favorite Cookie Recipe

Ok this is my favorite chocolate chip cookie recipe ever - and I have had lots of chocolate chip cookies in my 23 years of life, so that's really saying something. One morning when I was watching the Today show, they featured these cookies. They are the creation of pastry chef Richard Ruskell, and he won the Food Network Challenge "best cookie" episode with this recipe - deservingly so.

From my limited baking experience, I have picked up several cookie-making tips that are essential for making great cookies.

• Use real vanilla - not the imitation vanilla extract
• Use real butter - not margarine, not "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter" (what is it actually?), not anything else...just deal with the extra calories, they are well worth it
• Let the ingredients (especially the eggs and butter) sit out at room temperature for several hours before baking, otherwise it affects the consistency and texture of the cookies
• Depending on how you like the cookies (I like mine slightly doughy in the middle) bake them for a minute less than the instructed baking time
• Put wax paper on the cookie sheet to keep the bottoms from burning
• When making chocolate chip cookies, splurge on the good chocolate - I like the Ghiradelli chips personally

Ok, so those are my tips for making good cookies - and now I am pleased to say (maybe I should be ashamed actually) that I can give the recipe for these cookies from memory. Thank you Richard Ruskell for this recipe! Just to make sure he gets proper credit I will cite the recipe - but I promise, I am quoting from memory here.

Richard Ruskell's Chocolate Chip Cookies

Ingredients:

 

1 cup butter (2 sticks)
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
3 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 cups the best chocolate chips you can find

*It's really important for this recipe that all of your ingredients are at room temperature

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350.
In a large bowl (or even better, in a Kitchenaid stand mixer) cream together the two sticks of butter (room temp) and both sugars
After this has reached a smooth consistency, add in the 2 (room temp) eggs and the 2 tsp (real) vanilla extract until combined.
In a separate bowl, mix together the flour, baking soda, and salt. Once mixed thoroughly, add this into the liquid mixture...slowly so you don't end up with a huge mess.
After this has been combined, add your 2 cups of chocolate chips.
Drop on the cookie sheet in rounded scoops and you are ready to bake! The recipe says to bake at 350 for 10 minutes, but I always bake them for 9...just a personal preference.
Enjoy with a glass of milk.

What's for Dinner - 6/20/2011

Puerto Rican Pork with Cannellini Beans and Squash (try and ignore the chip on the plate)

Sort of a boring title - but I figure this can sort of be a reoccuring theme...you know, since dinner is a reoccuring thing. Anyways, last night I tried out a new recipe, and it was a success! I made Puerto Rican shredded pork (adapted from Gina's WW Recipes) and served it with cannellini beans sauteed in olive oil with some crushed garlic cloves and some squash from the garden (I love saying that) roasted in olive oil and topped with some parmesan cheese. That might seem like a weird pairing, but I wasn't sure what else to pair with Puerto Rican pork - I would be welcome to suggestions though. Until I get a nice camera, my pictures might not look great, in fact some of them might look kind of gross (i.e. this picture) - but I promise it was so flavorful and good. A plus side too is that the entire meal was only 402 calories - not bad for a filling dinner! The pork is made in the crock pot, which I love. I got the marinade ready the night before and stuck everything in the crock pot and refrigerated it, then in the morning, all I had to do was stick it on the crockpot on low for 8 hours. When I got home from work it was ready to go! I will post the recipe for the pork below. For a while, I was just making meat and vegetables for dinner, but Nathan and I realized that we still feel hungry if there isn't some type of carbohydrate, so I have been trying to be creative with the carbohydrates that I choose, and keep them somewhat healthy. Beans are a great carbohydrate side, they are full of fiber, protein, and can be cooked in a variety of ways. For the cannellini beans, I just heated about a tablespoon of good quality olive oil (I use the spanish olive oil from Trader Joes) and then threw in about four crushed cloves of garlic. Then I threw in the drained and rinsed cannellinni beans and let it cook up for about six or seven minutes. In the words of Barefoot Contessa, "How easy is that?!" The squash was easy too - I sliced up two squash, and threw them in a mixing bowl with about two tablespoons of olive oil and a dash of salt and pepper. After they were coated, I put them on a baking sheet and sprinkled them with some parmesan cheese. They baked on 350 for about 20 minutes - until the parmesan had formed a crust on top. The pork made for nice leftovers, and we will use it tonight for some sandwiches!

Puerto Rican Pork 

Adapted from Ginas Skinny Recipes

Original Recipe found here

• 3 lb pork roast
• 5-6 cloves garlic
• 1 tbsp salt
• 1/2 tsp oregano
• 1/2 tbsp cumin
• 1/4 tsp crushed black pepper
• 1/2 cup freshly squeezed orange juice (fresh really does make a difference)
• Juice of 2 limes

Directions:

Cut slits into the pork and stuff holes with small pieces of the crushed garlic. I cut each crushed piece in half and stuffed half in and kept the other half out to put into the marinade. Mix up the remaining ingredients and pour over pork. Place into the bowl of the crock pot, cover and refrigerate overnight.

The next day, remove the crock pot and cook on low, 8 hours.

Remove pork and it will shred easily. You can shred it using two forks. We ate it at this point, but Gina suggests to: "Remove liquid from crock pot and add pork back to crock. Add about 1 cup of the liquid back and adjust salt, pepper and cumin (you will probably need to add more). Let it cook another 15-30 minutes."

Coconut Tiki Cake

Nathan and I were asked to bring a dessert to a cookout tonight, so last night I was flipping through my Food Network magazines to look for a recipe that would be appropriate for the summery occassion. We came across a "Tiki Cocktail Cake" that looked perfect. Nathan went with me to the store to pick up the ingredients. We had no idea how long it was going to take us searching for cocktail umbrellas. Although his tone was indicative of "Is it that important?", Nathan was a trooper and approached various salespeople to inquire about where they could be - all of whom gave us a different answer: "party supplies", "paper products", "daquiri mixes". We didn't end up finding them - I was told to go to a liquor store, so I will have to get over there today - I mean what Tiki Cocktail Cake is complete without the cocktail umbrella? Right? After getting the supplies we got home and dove right in to making the cake. The recipe called for us to use a 6" cake pan and two 1-quart bowls. On hand we had a 8" cake pan and two 2.5-quart bowls, so we improvised. Since we knew that would make for shallower cakes, our cake would be much shorter and rounder than the one pictured in the magazine. I convinced myself that it would be fine because rather than a pineapple-shaped tiki cake, a coconut one (round shape) would be even more appropriate! Overall I was very pleased with how it turned out. It wasn't nearly as labor-intensive as I thought it would have been, the only part that took a while was toasting several batches of coconut, we assumed that what the recipe called for wouldn't provide enough...we were wrong...we now have an abundance of toasted coconut in ziploc bags in our baking cabinet. I hate to waste. Anyways, it's hard to try and sneak a taste of a cake in such a precise shape, so I can't comment on the taste, but overall the cake turned out looking good and once I stick that cocktail umbrella in it, I will be proud of our finalized creation!

Tiki Cocktail Cake

Recipe taken from Food Network Magazine

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/food-network-kitchens/tiki-cocktail-cake-recipe/index.html

Ingredients

• Cooking spray
• 1 18.25-ounce box chocolate cake mix
• 4 large eggs
• 1 cup buttermilk
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 1 16-ounce tub milk chocolate frosting
• 3/4 cup vanilla frosting
• 1 1/2 cups sweetened shredded coconut, toasted

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Spray one 6-inch cake pan (we used an 8-inch for the coconut shape) and two 1-quart ovenproof bowls (we used two 2.5-quart bowls to make a coconut shape) with cooking spray. Beat the cake mix, eggs, buttermilk and vegetable oil with a mixer.

Divide the batter evenly among the pan and bowls; bake until a toothpick comes out clean, about 25 minutes for the pan and 35 minutes for the bowls. Cool; unmold.

Trim all 3 cakes to make them level. Hollow out the smaller end of one of the bowl cakes, carving about 1 inch deep. (Leave a thick rim around the edge.)

Put the uncut bowl cake, wider side up, on a cake board or plate. Spread with a layer of chocolate frosting, then position the round cake on top.

Spread the round cake with frosting, then put the other bowl cake on top, carved part up. Freeze the cake about 1 hour (this will make it easier to frost).

Frost the outer rim and inside of the hole with vanilla frosting. Put the remaining vanilla frosting in a resealable plastic bag.

Spread the remaining chocolate frosting over the outside of the cake. Press handfuls of
toasted coconut into the frosting, covering the cake completely.

Microwave the bag of vanilla frosting for 5 seconds (the bag will not melt). Snip off a corner and squeeze the frosting into the top of the cake so it looks like liquid.
Add a cocktail umbrella and straw.