Coconut Curry Noodle Soup

Ingredients

  • 1 Tbsp. vegetable oil
  • 1 (2-inch) piece ginger, peeled and grated (we got about 1 ½ tablespoons of grated ginger from our piece)
  • 1 large shallot, peeled and grated
  • 4 cloves garlic, grated
  • 1 Tbsp. red curry paste
  • ½ tsp. turmeric
  • 1 Tbsp. all-purpose flour
  • 2 cups unsalted chicken broth (we used reduced-sodium chicken broth)
  • 1 can (14.5 oz.) light coconut milk (we used a 13.66 oz. can)
  • 1 lb. boneless, skinless chicken thighs, sliced in half
  • 1 Tbsp. fish sauce
  • 1 Tbsp. packed brown sugar (we used light brown sugar)
  • 1 Tbsp. lime juice
  • 12 oz. fresh (we used dried) linguine or fettuccine, cooked and drained (we used whole wheat linguine)
  • Bean sprouts, cilantro, sliced shallots, crispy chow mein noodles, lime wedges and chili oil (optional) (we used bean sprouts, cilantro, sliced shallots and lime wedges)

Directions

  1. Take a medium-sized pot and pour the oil in, setting the heat to medium-high. Add the ginger, garlic and shallot to the pot, stirring constantly for 1 to 2 minutes*. Add in the curry paste, turmeric and flour, continuing to stir for another minute. Stir in the broth and coconut milk, scraping up any browned bits from the bottom of the pot. Once boiling, add the chicken in and turn the heat down so it’s at a low simmer now. Put a lid on the pot and let it simmer for 20 minutes or until the chicken is fully cooked.
  2. Take the chicken out of the pot and shred into large pieces. Add into the pot the fish sauce, brown sugar, and lime juice, stirring to combine. Add the chicken back into the pot afterwards.
  3. Divide the linguine between 4 bowls before ladling the soup over it, adding any topping you want on afterwards.

*The ginger, garlic, shallot mixture started to get burned quickly so we turned the temperature down a little bit and moved onto adding in the curry paste, turmeric and flour possibly before the first minute was even up.

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The soup’s good on its own but the toppings help add some texture and additional flavor.

We found this recipe in a Family Circle magazine.

We weren’t paid in any form to promote Family Circle.

Take care everybody !

Southwestern Nachos Potato Skins

We came across a 2010 issue of Food Network magazine where they made a themed potato skin for every team in the NFL and their toppings for the Arizona Cardinals themed potato skins was just too scrumptious to pass up without trying !

Ingredients

  • 4 large russet potatoes (we used 5*)
  • Melted butter
  • Salt and pepper, for seasoning (we used kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper)
  • Salsa (mommy used Pace Picante medium chunky salsa, I used La Victoria Thick’N Chunky Salsa Verde Medium that was pureed**)
  • Pickled jalapeño slices
  • Chopped scallions
  • Cilantro
  • Sour cream
  • 1 cup grated cheddar cheese (optional) (we used Kraft Mexican Four Cheese)

Directions

  1. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Take your potatoes and pierce them with a fork. Stick the potatoes in the oven, directly onto the oven rack and let them cook for one hour or until the potatoes are tender. Pull them out and let them cool (we let them cool for 15 minutes and found they were still hot so we cut them in half lengthwise and found that after an additional 15 minutes, they cooled down enough). Set the oven temperature to 450 degrees. Once the potatoes are cool, cut each potato into 4 pieces lengthwise and scoop out enough flesh until it’s only a ¼-inch thick shell. Take melted butter and brush both sides*** of the potato skin with it, seasoning the skins afterwards with salt and pepper. Stick the potato skins back in the oven, skin-side up, until the skin feels crisp, around 15 minutes or so should do the trick. If you want cheesy skins, flip the potato skins over, sprinkle the cheese over them and stick them back in the oven**** for an additional 5 minutes. Add the remaining ingredients into the potato skins and enjoy !

*Some of our potato skins fell apart so it really is a good idea to bake an extra potato just in case something goes wrong with one of the other potatoes.

**The picante salsa is red so it really pops better against the other toppings. Mommy like the flavor of the picante salsa with the other toppings and I enjoyed the salsa verde more even though it didn’t stand out color wise since it’s green.

***We brushed both sides of the potato with the butter when we stuck it in the oven and it dripped down to the bottom of the oven and created so much smoke ! We had to turn on the fan over the oven and lower the window so the smoke could go somewhere. It really freaked our cat Ghost out (he even hissed at the stove at one point) so we turned the heat off after 5 minutes and just left them in there for the remaining 10 minutes.

****After the butter fiasco, we decided to take a baking sheet out and line it with aluminum foil. We put the potato skins on the lined baking sheet, skin-side up, and spread the cheese over them afterwards. We put the baking sheet in the oven for the 5 minutes (oven still turned off but had plenty of residual heat) and it came out with the cheese melted and no mess to clean up like we would have, had we put the skins directly on the oven rack.

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This is such a great game day snack even with the problems we ran into ! The skins might have been crispier had we left the oven on but otherwise it was still delicious. You can pick it up with your hands to eat and the skin’s firm enough that the toppings don’t go spilling everywhere. You get some heat and acidity from the salsa and pickled jalapeño slices, a freshness to the dish from the scallions and cilantro, the sour cream adds a tanginess as well as tempers the heat from the salsa and jalapeño slices, and it’s nice having that cheese flavor come through as well in the dish.  You can really change up the flavor of this simply by changing the salsa ! If we make this again in the future, we’ll probably skip spreading the melted butter over the flesh side of the potato skin.

We weren’t paid in any way to mention Food Network, La Victoria, Pace salsa or Kraft.

Take care everybody !

Seared Baby Bok Choy with Tofu and Shiitakes

Ingredients

  • ½ lb. extra-firm tofu (we used 14 oz.)
  • ½ cup low-sodium chicken broth
  • 1 ½ Tbsp. minced jarred pickled jalapeño slices
  • 2 tsp. Asian sesame oil (we used toasted sesame oil)
  • 1 tsp. granulated sugar
  • 3 Tbsp. canola oil, divided
  • ½ lb. baby bok choy (about 2), split in half lengthwise (make sure you clean the bok choy ‘cause dirt can build up between the folds of the bok choy)
  • 1 tsp. kosher salt, divided
  • 1 ½-inch piece fresh ginger, peeled and thinly sliced (about 2 Tbsp.) (because ginger can vary in size, it’s best to go by the 2 tablespoons rather than the length of the ginger)
  • 2 cloves garlic, thinly sliced (about 1 Tbsp.) (cloves vary in size so we sliced up enough garlic to equal a tablespoon)
  • 3 ½ ounces fresh shiitakes, stemmed

Directions

  1. Drain the tofu (we also pressed ours so that we could get as much water out as possible) and afterwards cut the tofu into ¾-inch-thick slices. Now cut those slices crosswise into ½-inch-wide sticks (you should end up with fat, rectangular sticks). Rest the tofu on paper towels and leave them off to the side for now. Take a small bowl out and add the broth, jalapeño, sesame oil, and sugar to it, stirring to combine.
  2. Take a 12-inch skillet out and pour 1 ½ tablespoons of the canola oil in, setting the heat to medium-high. Once the oil’s hot, place the bok choy in the skillet, cut side down. Take half of the salt and sprinkle it over the bok choy and oil. Let the bok choy cook without moving it until it’s browned, which takes 2 minutes. Flip the bok choy over and continue to cook it for another 2 minutes or until the stems start to soften and wilt, tossing the bok choy every now and then. Put the bok choy on a plate for the time being.
  3. Pour what’s left of the canola oil into the skillet and toss the ginger in, stirring continuously until it looks golden, which could take around a minute (maybe less). Toss the garlic in and let it sizzle for 10 seconds* (the original recipe doesn’t say to do this but trust us, you need to take the garlic and ginger out before moving on to the next part**) Toss the tofu and shiitake into the skillet, followed by the remaining salt and cook, stirring now and then until the mushrooms are browned and softened, about 3 minutes.
  4. Add the bok choy, garlic, ginger, and the broth mixture to the skillet, tossing to coat everything in the broth mixture and continue to cook until the bok choy is tender (takes about 2 minutes). Eat right away.

Serves 2

*You have to keep such a close eye on the garlic, it may be burnt by the 10 second mark so just pull the skillet off the heat as soon as the garlic looks golden.

**We tried to make this dish following the original instructions and the garlic and ginger were both burnt (the garlic more so). Scooping the ginger and garlic out after the garlic looks golden allows it to simply get warmed up and maybe get cooked just a tiny bit more before it’s ready to be served. The only tiny downside to this is that the ginger can be a little bit chewy but we’d rather have chewy ginger compared to burnt ginger.

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This was a fantastic vegan-like dish ! The chicken broth is the only thing keeping it from truly being a vegan dish. The bok choy may look soft but it has a pleasant crunch to it when you take a bite. All the main components really pick up the flavor of the broth mixture and the dish has a nice spiciness to it !

Recipe source unknown.

Take care everybody !

Lite (or maybe not so lite) Cheese Vegetable Chowder

Ingredients

  • 2 Tbsp. reduced calorie margarine or margarine (we went with regular margarine)
  • 2 cups chopped cabbage
  • 1 cup sliced onions (we used yellow onion)
  • 1 cup chopped celery (we sliced ours)
  • 1 cup thinly sliced carrots
  • 1 (15 oz.) can Cream Style Golden Sweet Corn
  • 1 (8.5 oz.) Green Giant Sweet Peas, drained (we could only find cans that were bigger than 8.5 oz. but we still used the whole can of peas)
  • 2 ½ cups skim milk (we used whole milk)
  • ¼ teaspoon pepper (we used freshly ground black pepper)
  • ½ teaspoon dried thyme leaves
  • 10 oz. (2 cups) cubed light pasteurized processed cheese (Velveeta light) (we used regular Velveeta)

Directions

  1. Take a Dutch oven or large saucepan out and add the margarine to it, setting the heat to medium-high. Once the margarine’s melted, add in the cabbage, onion, celery and carrots. Cook, stirring constantly for 8 to 10 minutes or until the vegetables feel crisp-tender. After those 8-10 minutes have passed, add in the corn, peas, milk, pepper, and thyme, stirring to combine. Turn the heat down to medium and cook for 15 to 20 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add in the cheese, stirring constantly until all of it has completely melted. Make sure the soup’s heat through, turning the heat down if necessary so that the soup gets heated through but DOES NOT BOIL in the process. Add salt to taste (we didn’t think that it needed any) and serve immediately.
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Recipe source unknown.

We weren’t paid in any form to promote Green Giant or Velveeta.

Take care everybody !

Beef Stew

Ingredients

  • 3 tablespoons olive oil
  • 1 tablespoon butter
  • 2 pounds beef stew meat
  • 1 medium onion, diced
  • 3 garlic cloves, minced
  • 1 can or bottle of beer (we used 1 bottle of Corona)
  • 4 cups beef broth (we used Swanson reduced-sodium beef broth)
  • 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
  • 2 tablespoons tomato paste
  • ½ teaspoon paprika (we used smoked paprika)
  • 1 ½ teaspoons sugar
  • ½ teaspoon Kosher salt
  • Freshly ground black pepper to taste
  • 4 new potatoes, quartered (we used 5 red potatoes)
  • 4 carrots, roughly sliced
  • 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

Directions

  1. Take a large pot or Dutch oven out and add the butter and olive oil to it, setting the heat to medium-high. Once the butter’s melted and the oil’s hot, add in the meat* to get a quick browning on all sides (original recipe says this should take roughly 5 minutes to achieve).
  2. Take the meat out and leave it on a plate off to the side for now.
  3. Toss the onion into the pot, turning the heat to low afterwards.
  4. Constantly stir the onion until it gets softened, approximately 3 minutes.
  5. Toss the garlic in, continuing to stir for another minute.
  6. Add in the following ingredients to the pot, stirring to combine: beer, broth, Worcestershire sauce, tomato paste, paprika, sugar, salt and pepper.
  7. Add the meat back into the pot, putting a lid on the pot afterwards. Let the stew simmer over low heat for 1 ½ to 2 hours or until the meat gets really tender. We didn’t need to but if you think the liquid’s getting too low in the pot, then add 1 to 2 cups of hot water in when you need to.
  8. Take the lid off and stir in the potatoes and carrots, putting the lid back on afterwards. Continue to let the stew simmer for another 30 minutes or until the vegetables are tender.
  9. If you think your stew liquid is too thin then take a cup of the liquid out and mix the flour into it.
  10. Pour the flour mixture into the pot and let the stew simmer for 10 minutes or until the stew gets thick (ours never got thick for some reason but it was still enjoyable).
  11. Serve the stew with some crusty bread to soak up the stew liquid with.

*We thought that there was too much meat to get properly seared in our size of pot all at one time so we split the meat into two batches for them to get seared.

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We got this recipe from a Ree Drummond cookbook.

We weren’t paid in any form to promote Corona, Swanson, or Ree Drummond.

Take care everybody !