Chimichurri

Every which way but loose.

So, I started out with equal parts cilantro and parsley.

Chopped it up and set some aside for the potatoes.

The I added, 

2T red wine vinegar

3 cloves garlic,

1/2t red pepper flakes,

1/2t oregano,

salt and pepper

and spun it with 1/4 cup olive oil.

Put that on top of pork tenderloin medallions.

(or a shoe)

Next, add some cut up avocado and put that

on some thick tomato slices and 

WALA!

Chimichurri 

every which way but loose.

It's not often I name a meal.

PS, the one item not 

chimichurri-ized was that

delicata squash.

Not sure it could have saved it. 

Not a fan.

Cheesy Garlic Bread

I found this on that website that shall 

remain nameless. 

Well, alright, 

Pintrest.

Basically you take an Italian loaf

cut it diagonally in both directions

so as to make diamonds across it. 

I think an extra pair of hands could be helpful

as the bread gets pretty wobbly

when you are making the second 

side of cuts.

Then you mix up 

6 T. of melted butter,

2T. olive oil, 

fresh minced garlic, 

dried minced onions, 

dijon mustard and

parsley 

and put it over top, getting down into

all those nooks and crannies you've created.

Then take a mix of shredded cheese and shove it all 

on, in, and over.

Wrap it all up in foil and bake for about 20 min. 

What's not to love?

Well, maybe not the dried minced onions and 

dijon mustard the recipe calls for

but that is easily remedied.

Next time.

Because there will be a next time. 

You hear me Christmas Eve?

Follow Up

Whereas these are really cute and a good idea,

everyone can double dip to their hearts content, 

the dipping is difficult. 

Next time I will serve them with little spoons

or spreaders of some sort. 

Just a little heads-up. 

You're welcome.

Individual 7 Layer Dips

Another Pintrest find.

How cute are these!?

They are small cups filled with, 

you got it, 

7 layers of taco dip.

Little individual servings of everything

are all over the place. 

I've been doing the whole dessert thing.

It started with cupcakes in a jar.

And then moved on to the dessert "shots".

And now, snacks!

Here's the formula:

refried beans

salsa

guacamole

sour cream

shredded cheese

chopped black olives

green onions

tomatoes.

That's 8, but who's counting. 

What are they going to come up with next?

Vegetable Platter

You know how a vegetable platter is 

usually all nice and neat and all 

the different vegetables

are lined up in a row?

Well, Christmas Eve I decided to change things up a bit. 

Shake it up, as it were.

This is a riot of vegetables, 

a cornucopia,

a melee,

a mosh pit, 

a celebration of all things

vegetable. 

It was met with mixed reviews. 

I kinda like it. 

Sloppy Mini Muffins

These were part of our Christmas Eve Appetizer Lollapalooza.

They were a new addition and it would appear they will be a keeper.

I couldn't even get a picture of the plate full of them.

Well, truth be told they were diving for the olive bread

but you get the picture.....

These are a twist on something I saw 

Sandra Lee make. 

It's just a Jiffy corn muffin mix that I baked in a mini 

muffin pan.

 You scoop out the center of the cooled muffin.

I used a serrated grapefruit spoon. 

(good thinking, huh?)

and then Sandra made a chili to spoon into the divot.

My mom had made sloppy joes the day before

and mom being mom, there was plenty leftover

to stuff my mini muffins.

(good thinking, huh?)

I topped them with some cheddar that I used

a microplane to shred so it was really fine and popped 

them in the oven to warm up and melt the cheese. 

 and 

WALA!

(that's for Shanna)

Sweet Basil Cheesecake

I could have eaten the whole thing.

But I didn't.

Only because we had a couple other things with it.

This is one of my favorite kinds of dinner. 

I hate to tell you who this came from.

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/giada-de-laurentiis/sweet-basil-cheesecake-recipe/index.html

It's really good and not difficult to put together at all. 

Just a couple of points;

the cheese and eggs need to be at room temp before you mix it up

and about the 4 1/2 inch spring form pans,

I could only find a set of 4 inch pans at Walmart.

I was actually (actually) able to make 2 cheesecakes

from the one recipe.

So I shared one with my friend Nancy.

And some socks.

Prayers for Nancy please as she begins her battle.

Leftover Puff Pastry

I had a sheet of puff pastry in my freezer left over from making these:

These would be "bite size" cream horns.

Yum. 

But, there was puff pastry calling me from

the frozen tundra and a package of 

mini heirloom tomatoes sitting on my counter. 

I had goat cheese in the fridge from my latest appetizer craze:

That's a dried apricot with a smudge of goat cheese, 

an almond and a drizzle of honey on top. 

Thanks to Sandy at Reluctant Entertainer.

http://reluctantentertainer.com/2011/06/day-13-keeping-fruits-nuts-and-cheeses-on-hand-for-apricot-and-goat-cheese-bites-recipe/

And inspiration struck!

Ina Garten has a recipe for 

Tomato and Goat Cheese Tarts

in her Back to Basics book. 

I had a lot of the ingredients on hand, some "almost" ingredients

and a couple, not so much.

But the one thing I have learned over these years

is that recipes are mostly suggestions.

These were lovely.

Dinner!

Oh, and those are the leftover purple asparagus from the other night.

Only the steak is new. 

Not bad for a "clean out your fridge" dinner,

huh?

Love it when that happens :O)

Michael Had An Idea

And it was good.

It wasn't exactly an original idea. 

He adapted it from some crazy food website.

I can't even begin to describe the premiss of this site.

Or the reason for it's existence.

It appears to be a bunch of guys doing crazy things with food. 

One of their extravaganzas involved

 90 McDonalds breakfast sandwiches. 

It defies description. 

They did create something where they lined

a muffin tin with bacon and filled them 

with I can't remember what. 

I thought there was actually potential there

and did a bit of brainstorming with Michael. 

This is what we came up with

 These are mini muffins lined with one slice of bacon

cut in half and crisscrossed to line the cups. 

Then mini red potatoes that I par-boiled and thinly sliced, 

a bit of shredded cheese and topped with one more

slice of potato. And then all tucked in.

I baked them 450 degrees for 25 minutes. 

They were pretty good.
But then, what isn't good all wrapped up in bacon?

ABS Tea Cakes

Apple, Brie, Salmon

that is.

I love these things!

They were the result of brainstorming with multiple friends.

I wanted to make tea sandwiches but didn't want to use the usual 

"white bread cut with a cookie cutter" vehicles.

This started with my thought to put something on a 

sweet bread, I was thinking zucchini bread.

Lynne suggested brie and smoked salmon.

Reminiscent of an appetizer of

a slice of apple with brie and salmon.

It seemed to me that you could change up the zucchini to apple

and come even closer to the original. 

I just took my standard zucchini bread recipe and swapped out 

grated apple, with the peel on that I squeezed most of the

moisture out of, for the zucchini and swapped

apple sauce for the oil.

It worked out great. 

Then I just sliced the bread and used

a round cutter about the same size as the 

Brie that you can get in a log!

Stack em up with a little salmon and a 

parsley leaf on top and

 WALA!

That sweet bread takes you by surprise but once you

get over the surprise the yum factor kicks in. 

PS, the "WALA"

is just to make Shanna twitch :o) 

No Guts No Glory

I spent Saturday held captive by Easter baskets.

And in an effort to make the most of my time waiting for

 moms to come by and pick up their baskets,

 I did a little experimenting in the kitchen.

Michael and Michelle were coming for dinner. 

I was making bratwurst stew and I thought 

Pioneer Woman's Cheese Muffins

would be a good accompaniment.

 But how fun would it be to add beer instead of milk?

I even had a few to choose from.

I consulted with my chef in my pocket 

(like how I have taken possession of Chef Brian?) 

and my FB friend and overachieving home cook, Maggie.

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Maggies-Scratch-Bakery-Cafe-at-Home/127269640678700?ref=ts

If you want to be impressed, go "like" her page. 

We all decided cutting back on the baking powder a bit and 

leaving some of the milk in for the fat would be a good start.

Yeah, well, it was a start.

Maybe they could have used all the baking powder?

I would pursue this but honestly, the beer didn't impart that much

flavor. The cheese is the Diva in this recipe and there ain't

no getting around a Diva. 

http://static.thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/files/2008/08/figs-cheese-muffins.pdf

There's the original recipe for you.

But here's the glory:

My egg, avocado, wasabi salad in endive leaves.

Duh, Winning!

Sorry, had to. 

These little beauties will be making it to the baby shower next month.

And the good news is, the expectant mother can eat these!

Unlike the apple, brie, smoked salmon tea sandwiches.

....who knew????

Sherried Sardine Toast

I feel compelled to share.

This was my darlings lunch today.

I love him very much. 

That is the only reason I would EVER touch 

these things. 

*****shiver*****

And, I might add, this was the second

time I have prepared this plate of,

um, words fail me.

This was actually featured on one of Alton's shows.

(I'm on a first name basis with him)

He went into all the reasons why it matters what kind of sardine

to use. I know, right?, there is more than one kind?

Well, there is and the kind you should get is "brisling."

But I don't remember why.

Just trust me for it.

I cut the recipe in half because I only serve one.

I also used a baguette so that each little fishy had it's

own little nest of avocado. 

They do look kind of good in a strange way. 

There you have it. 

Do with it what you will.

My work here is done.

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-brown/sherried-sardine-toast-recipe/index.html

Tomato & Goat Cheese Tarts

I love Ina Garten. 

And I'm pretty fond of Val.

She gave me Ina's cookbook, "Back to Basics"

for my birthday. 

Actually, I love Val and am pretty fond of Ina.

Val is a quiet woman but is very passionate about things. 

It's kinda cool if you think about it.

 Someone who feels very strongly about many things and 

those around her know it, but somehow she 

is able to make us aware of those things without pounding us 

over the head with her views. You have to respect that. 

It cracks me up that my posts will start out being about one thing

 and then inevitably turn and wind up being about the 

people in my life. God has blessed me with

 amazing people in my path. 

But back to the food. 

How cool is this picture?

I really am not good at the photo side of this blog thing

but I think this one catches all the components of the tart.

Ina's recipe was for four 6 inch tarts with one

large slice of tomato in the middle.

I wanted to feed 6 people dinner and felt the tarts would

need accompaniments. So, I switched to mini tarts and

 bought a pint of small mixed heirloom tomatoes. 

Making 18 mini tarts was a bit labor intensive but was totally 

worth the effort. 

Then I got a vision of how I wanted the plate to look. 

I cooked mini farfalle, dressed it with some Rosso Pesto

(that I picked up at Aldi) some toasted pine nuts, fresh basil and a little

shaved parm on top. Then a little green salad with 

thinly sliced apples, craisins and walnuts tossed 

with a raspberry walnut vinaigrette. 

Once again my photographic abilities leave a bit to be desired

but you get the idea. 

And just to come full circle and end with a people thing, 

I love that Ina eats her cooking.

Just saying, you can't really trust a skinny chef.....

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/ina-garten/tomato-and-goat-cheese-tarts-recipe/index.html

Amazing Mini Corn Loaves

Corn Maze Cookout

Any party invite an adult gets that says

"bring a flashlight and your own bottle"

has got Winner Party written all over it!

I'm so excited to go (just wish I had thought of it!)

The hosts are providing the hot dogs and condiments.

Attendees have been instructed to bring aforementioned flashlight

and bottle, along with a lawn chair, muddy shoes,

and a dish to pass.

The fun starts at 7:30 which in this neck of the woods

is just about dusk.

Can you imagine a corn field full of *happy*

adults in the mud with flashlights?

I AM SO bringing my camera!

So, not to be cannibalistic or anything,

but I have decided to bring mini corn bread loaves.

Carol is bringing a corn salad.

Is there a theme running here?

How will all our *digestive tracks* be in the morning?

You know we can't be the only two with this bright idea.

I experimented and I want to share.

I started with two boxes of Jiffy corn muffin mix.

I added the 2 eggs, 1/3 cup milk and then 1/3 cup

sour cream instead of more milk. I chopped up one serrano pepper,

and note to all, they say to take a little taste of a pepper

before you put it in your recipe to check for the heat.

Good idea but, hey have a glass of milk close by, them buggers can get HOT!

I tossed in some roasted corn for, as Ina would say, "depth of flavor"

and a bit of grated chedder cheese.

I mixed some sugar and corn meal together and topped each loaf with the mix

before I cooked them.

YUM!

It worked!

Ok, I'll keep you posted on the outcome of the festivities!

YeeeeHaaaa!!!!

Avocado Chimichurri Bruschetta

Not too sure if this post is more about the food or photography.

This is one tasty dish I got from Vegetariantimes.com

I've served it a couple of times to rave reviews.

I always thought Chimichurri was something you fried.

Turns out that's a Cimichunga.

Chimichurri is a delicious sauce/condiment?

made primarily of cilantro and parsley.

And while this recipe has you mix it with avocado for an

amazing appetizer,I think it would be equally fantastic served over,

now don't tell Vegetarian Times,

a chicken breast or a piece of fish.

I think that's where some pretty safe creativity can come into play.

Go ahead and take a component of a recipe you enjoy and use it in a different application.

Now for the Photojournalist portion of my post:

The above photo I copied from Vegetarian Times web page.

(hopefully that suffices as full-disclosure/credit)

The one below I snapped at a party I had.

While I think I went one better by putting the Avocado Chimichurri

on bite sized toasts.

Photographing them from above and on a green place-mat...

Not so ingenious :o)

Caprese Skewers

I have made these little gems a few times now and each time they've been a big hit.

The best part about them is that they are

Stupid Easy to make.

Just grab a container of those marinated mini mozzarella balls

and a pint of grape tomatoes, or cherry, or those mini heirloom.

Cut everything in half and then skewer together (cut sides together).

The hardest part of this was finding the cool bamboo skewers.

I'll save you some time, Cost Plus.

You're welcome. It's just how I roll.

I show up with these and people think I'm amazing.

I choose to set them straight.

You don't have to.

You're amazing :o)