Zucchini Noodles with Shrimp and Goat Cheese

I knew when I first saw this recipe that it would be a big hit. I've made dishes in the past with similar ingredients usually with pasta. My husband and I both loved this dish. It came from Cara over at carascravings.
Simple and easy to make. I love simple yet wonderful recipes.

Recipe found here:

I made my greek pasta and shrimp dish recently, so I had about 1/2 lb of shrimp in the freezor. I also bought some goat cheese when I went grocery shopping yesterday...thinking I'd think of something to make that includes goat cheese, such as omelets or this wonderful little chicken or pork dish that I make that uses it. I love goat cheese. I ran out today and got some zucchinni and had my husband pick up some fresh basil. In this dish, I put the cheese in the pan at the end and let it melt and blend with all the ingredients. yummmmm

I can't post a picture of the final product because the pictures came out to blurry. The cheap money I paid for a digital camara lately is probably why.

This will definetely be made again.

I wasn't sure if diced tomatoes meant from a can or diced real tomatoes. I ended up dicing about a cup of roma tomatoes and than filled the cup with some tomato juice from a can of whole tomatoes. I also got a little tired of using my little lemon zester to get the zucchini into strips so after I was half way done, I just used my big cheese grator. It's definitely worth using the zestor for at least half of it. I did use about an oz of goat cheese, although I didn't measure and I think it was a little bit more than an oz. I used 1 small to medium size zucchini. My only regret is the shrimp. I had less than 1/2lb and it would of been even more delightful to have more shrimp in the dish.

My final thought on this is the zucchini. I had prepared the zucchini ahead of time so I wouldn't have to grate or zest the zucchini into strips when it was time to cook. Especially with my 2 yr old and 3 yr old to take care of. After sitting for awhile, the bottom of the bowl had water in it from the zucchini. I didn't end up using all the zucchini as I didn't want it to take over the dish too much and didn't use the water on the bottom of the bowl. I wonder if I should have used my potatoe ricer to drain the water out of the zucchini. Well never the less, this was soooo good and creamy and tasty and oh I could go on.

Thank you sooo much Cara.

It didn't end up being a complete carbless meal though LOL. I made a batch of my pizza/calzone/rolls dough and made some rolls to go with it. Pizza dough recipe.
I posted and raved about this dough recipe in an earlier post on my site.

Homemade Tortilla chips

I can't believe how easy it is to make home made tortilla chips. Cut corn tortilla's into fourths and fry in oil for approximately 4 minutes. Turn them about 1/2 way. I found 3 to 3 1/2 minutes worked better for me. Take them out, put them on paper towels and throw into a bowl. Sprinkle with salt.

They are great and work the best when making a nacho supreme snack. They are strong and hold everything really well - aka they don't break.


















I got this idea from Nick at his macheesmo site. Thanks Nick. I didn't quite follow how he made the nacho supreme. I just followed his advise on making homemade Tortilla chips. I just put the following in order on mine. Guacamole, ground turkey, cheese, salsa, and sour cream. I found the ground turkey stuck really well on top of the Guacamole and heard salsa can make chips less soggy if not put as one of the last ingredients. I did cook the ground turkey with a little taco seasoning on the stove first. It would be best if the guacamole, salsa and sourcream were warmed up a little before making, but I didn't do that. It was put into the oven at 350 for about 7 minutes. The cheese melts fast, so keep checking.

Homemade tortilla chips can be found here:

Slow Cooker Cranberry Roast

Wow I'm slacking this week with pictures. So busy at supper time especially with the kids. I have been making this meal for many years now. My husband loves it. It's so easy. I found the 7 bone chuck roast comes out the best!!!. All you need is the 7 bone chuck steak, can of jellied or whole cranberries and a package of lipton onion soup mix. My friend Sue tried this tonight for the first time and her and her family loved it.

I got this recipe years ago off allrecipes.com. Sometimes I make the gravy by thickening the juices as explained - but usually we just use the juices right from the crockpot. I have many tnt recipes from allrecipes.com. I love that site especially with all the reviews you can read.

Recipe link: Slow Cooker Cranberry Roast.

ground turkey tacos

This is one of our favorite taco meals. Simple, but good.
I've made it many times. Serve it with sour cream, salsa and shredded cheese.

3/4 to 1 pound ground turkey
3 green onions including the tops sliced
1 package (1 ounce size) dry taco spices and seasonings
a little water
A whole bunch spinach
2 carrots peeled and shredded


Cook and serve on tortilla's or pita rounds. I usually start cooking the turkey, than I move it to the sides of the pan and start cooking the carrots and onions. I let that cook and than I throw in the spinach and cook that for a few minutes. I mix it all together and than I add the taco seasoning and some water.

It wasn't quite done yet, but here it is in the pan almost ready to be made into yummy tacos. Sorry for the lack of pictures in the last couple blogs. Stay tuned for our very favorite Slow Cooker Cranberry 7 bone chuck roast meal. I will be making it tomorrow.

Simplest Roast Chicken

I did already post a Roast Chicken recipe on my blog, but thought I'd give this a try. I got it from Thibeault's Table blog. She got it from Barbara Kafka's "Roasting, A simple Art" Cookbook. I read rave reviews about it on her site as well as other sites.

It's basically high heat method of roasting. 500 degree oven, 1 hour and done.

See here for more details. My husband and I loved it. My husband said it was one of his favorite chicken meals. Served it with mashed potatoes, peas and gravy. I do sometimes brine my bird before cooking, I bet it would come out even better if I did. Sorry no pictures for this one. I did not have time.

French Omelette

I feel silly blogging about an omelette, I mean how hard can it be? I never thought my omelettes were anything special, good - but not great.

Until I came across Julia Childs video on making a French Omelette. I even went searching at Walmart for just the right pan that would do the job as she explains. I love my omelets now. LOL





This one has sharp cheddar cheese that I shredded, diced ham and a few cut up mushroom pieces. Onions and possibly a few other items should be cooked ahead of time, but most everything else will just cook from the heat of the omelette. The video stops after Julia shows a french omelette with no fillings, but these are just added right after you let it set a little and after the first initial shakes of the pan. The ovens have obviously changed since than as I could never use the highest setting on my stove or it will burn in seconds lol, but I did have it as high as I thought it should be knowing my stove.

Her video:
Maybe next omelette creation will be spanish, its made with potatoes, oil, onions, and eggs and is very!!! different and made differently from the French omelette.

fffff

Marys Greek Pasta and Shrimp dish

Here is the long overdue Greek Pasta and Shrimp dish that I created years ago. It's one of my husbands favorite meals and many family members and friends have had this. It serves two, but its easy to make more for more servings. Actually this always gives us a little left overs, but not much. I don't usually measure with this recipe, so it was hard trying to figure out exacts.

Ingredients:
2-3 large portabella mushrooms
3 tablespoons lemon juice
3 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/4 cup kalmata olives
3 tablespoons of kalmata olive juice
feta cheese
garlic
1/2 lb to 3/4 lb medium size shrimp.
salt,pepper, paprika
olive oil
1/2 lb spaghetti

Instructions:

*before following instructions below, start boiling water so you can throw the pasta in once the water is boiling.

1. heat butter in pan.
2. add olive oil - a few tablespoons
3. break mushrooms into bite size pieces and throw into pan.
4. add salt, pepper and paprika. if using garlic powder, add this too.
5. cook for a good 12 minutes
6. Add olives, the juice from the olives and lemon juice. Olives should be broken into pieces before measuring. You can add more too if you wish. Of course juice from real lemons would be great, but I didn't have real lemons in the house.
7. Let cook for a few minutes. If using real garlic, throw a little water in the pan and add the garlic. Actually if pan seems a little dry, add about 1/4 cup of water anyways.
8. add the shrimp. If precooked - only let cook 3 minutes. If the shrimp isn't cooked, cook for about 8 minutes. You can throw in about 1/2 tablespoon of lemon juice on the shrimp and toss some paprika over them too.
9. drain pasta. Throw pasta back into pan it was cooked in. Add an extra tablespoon or two of olive oil, extra virgin that is.
10. Add the shrimp/mushroom mixture.
11. Add lots of feta cheese - mix and enjoy

This is the basic recipe. I sometimes add spinache and have even added quartered cherry tomatoes. We love the basic recipe so I did that today.

Street Tacos

You would think that with all the recipes I've collected and tried over the years that I wouldn't always be on the lookout for new ones LOL.

I thought I'd try a different way to serve taco's. I think I still love the American ground beef, seasoned with one of those taco envelopes, sour cream, tomatoes, lettuce, cheese, taco sauce the best. : )

But, I tried these simple street tacos and served it with a refried bean dip and Corn Chips. The dip was refried beans, sourcream and salsa mixed together. I wanted to make an avocado dip, but the avocados were not ripe yet.




I got the idea for the tacos from Kate over at aspoonfulofthyme blog. They first had these taco's in Rosarito, Mexico and I have heard it's pretty common to buy street taco's all over Mexico.

It is just thinly sliced skirt steak, seasoned, cooked and served with fresh cilantro, onions, and salsa. All served on warm tortilla's. I've also read resources recommending marinading skirt steak before cooking.

Thank you Kate for the idea. See here for her nice description/experience with street tacos.

Yogurt Waffles and homemade Blueberry syrup

Last night I was looking online for a healthy version of homemade waffles. I came across this and gave it a try this morning. They were pretty good. Unfortanately, I only had white flour, but don't see any reason why whole wheat flour will make any differences in taste. I will definitely try it with the whole wheat flour the next time. I like the fact that it has yogurt and oatbran in it. I love oatbran and I use it a lot. The picture didn't come out that great - dang camara. ; )

Recipe found here:

I also made a quick version of homemade blueberry syrup using fresh blueberries. You can get all fancy with this using sterile jars, mesh strainers ect. I didn't get all fancy though - too time consuming with kiddos around.

Homemade Blueberry Syrup

* 1 cup sugar or try 1/2 cup of frozen concentrated fruit juice (grape, peach, apple or mixed)
* 1 cup water
* 12 oz. blueberries (either fresh or frozen)
* 2 tbsp honey
* The juice of 1/2 lemon

Combine sugar and water in a 3 quart saucepan over low heat, stirring occasionally until sugar is completely dissolved. Add blueberries and honey. Increase heat to medium and bring to a simmer for approximately 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Reduce heat to low, stir in lemon juice and allow to reduce for approximately 10 minutes. Remove from heat.

Syrup may be served warm or at room temperature. It will thicken noticeably the cooler it becomes.

If desired, strain out blueberries using a fine wire-mesh strainer before serving.

Note* you might have to simmer longer if you want it thicker. You can always try blending it all when done/cooled and than put back on stove, bring to boil and simmer to thicken.