Tuesday, April 30, 2013

Magic Bullet...magic

I love my Magic Bullet! I make smoothies every morning with it but kinda have an issue with the size of the mug, well until now. My poor bullet blender bases were leaking! Oh no! So I took a look on Amazon to find replacement parts, which I found but I also found this!! These mugs are much bigger than the standard mug, as you can see:


This is this morning's smoothie: spinach, 1/2 banana, watermelon, 2 T protein powder (I use Designer Whey), 1 T chia seeds, 1 t macha powder, 1 c almond milk, 10 drops liquid stevia. In the smaller cup I have to use 2 installments to make my smoothie. With the larger cup, I can put it all in the cup and there's room for everything to blend smoothly. I can even use the full scoop of protein powder, I am one happy girl!!

Sunday Breakfast

I've always thought the idea of "eggs in purgatory" was a good one, but have never tried it...until now. Weekdays I make my green smoothies for breakfast. On weekends I usually have eggs. Love, love, love eggs. Particularly now since I have real organic eggs from a coworker's chickens. The yolks! I have never seen such yellow yolks! Ok, enough poetry on Ruby's eggs...on to cooking them in tomato sauce! A quick search of the internet (I'm very surprised that I don't already have a recipe on hand!) gives this recipe from Skinnytaste. On a side note, do you know about Skinnytaste? You do now!! Amazing website/blog with great, flavorful recipes that are lower calorie!!!

I just happened to have leftover tomato sauce from my adventures in cauliflower pizza so that went into a skillet. I don't have harrisa, as is mentioned in the Skinnytaste recipe so I doctored the sauce with my stand by of Italian seasoning. Then, when the sauce is all nice and bubbly, add eggs and cover for 4-5 min or until egg is set to your liking. I added cheese on top at the end for some extra yum.



Nom nom nom. Fast, easy, no fuss breakfast. Also, I saved the tomato sauce for another cauliflower pizza the next night - easy tomato sauce - can of tomatoes, put in Magic Bullet, blend, done!

Saturday, April 27, 2013

A New Hobby...Quilting

I think I've demonstrated thus far that I can cook (perhaps?). I also have other interests but most of them have been out on the back burner since I was in school then residency. Earlier this year, I decided that if I was going to be in Pennsylvania, I should learn to quilt (I guess after that, next would be canning). I have some very basic sewing skills but didn't have a machine or used one in many years. This was going to be an interesting pursuit.

I decided that I needed to start with a class. If anyone is interested, there is a shop in downtown Danville called Rose of Sharin that offers classes and the ladies that own the shop are just wonderful! Through the class I made this (in 2 classes no less)...

my first pieced block

the finalized topper
back from the shop, all quilted

a closer look at the quilting
I decided to let the shop do the heavy lifting and paid for them to do the quilting. They have what is called a "long arm quilter" with a computer that does fancy quilting. I still have to do the binding but then it is finished! Yay!

I have learned that to quilt is actually the hardest and most time consuming part (and one that I don't really want to do myself). The topper is pieced together then you add the batting then the back and quilt it together.  I took up stained glass last fall and of the two, I like quilting more. Fabric is way more forgiving than glass. I also have signed up for another class, so more pictures to come!

Sunday, April 21, 2013

Skittles Vodka and Drunken Gummy Bears, oh my!!

Ah, Pinterest! What would we do without it? All I can say is that I'm glad it came post-college or I would never have gotten any work done!! 

A friend of mine from work just moved into a new house (her first house! awww). She was having a housewarming party this weekend and I decided to use recreate some of my favorite Pinterest finds - Drunken Gummy Bears and Skittles Vodka

BEFORE

AFTER

Look, how cute he is!! This one's fairly simple - put gummies in bowl, cover with vodka, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate. How long seems to be the question. On some sites, it said to wait only 8 or so hours, others said 1 week. I decided to go for 24 hours. The outside was squishy but the middle still had some tooth to it. 

The vodka I used was what I would call a mid-grade vodka. Not Grey Goose, not Popov's. It was on sale and was something I would just drink regularly. In the gummies, it packed some serious punch, in the Skittles, you couldn't even taste it. So you can choose your libation at your leisure.


24 hours later

See that more opaque stuff at the top? That needs to be filtered out.


ewwww
Skittles Vodka
2- 1lb bags skittles
vodka
empty bottles

Separate skittles into flavors. Place flavors into bottles. Add 1.5 cups vodka to each bottle. Let sit 24 hours. Filter vodka using coffee filters. Freeze. 

Simple enough. It was a lot of work. If I were to do this again, I might prefilter with cheese cloth then use the coffee filter. It took a REALLY long time for the liquor to filter. Really was just a pain. BUT all good things to those who wait...


It was pretty tasty. I was worried with that many candies dissolved in vodka it would be too sweet so I mixed it with tonic. I thought it was a good combo. My next drink was with club soda - liquid skittles. Not really my favorite so I'll stick with the tonic. 

Oh and a warning - the green skittles is now green apple not lime...my world has been shaken!!

Saturday, April 20, 2013

Cauliflower Pizza

I'm not really into fads - what IS with that mustache thing anyway? But when I saw the newest coolest thing floating around Pinterest was a pizza crust made out of cauliflower...I just couldn't resist. Particularly since it looked so easy!


So first you start with cauliflower. Break it down into manageable pieces. Then grate. I found that it is easier to grate the florets part first. Then you end up with a pile of small bits. Put all of that in a microwave safe bowl and microwave uncovered (don't add any water or anything) for 8 minutes.

I grated the whole head - that's enough to make 2 pizzas. So take out 1.5 cups and set aside. To make the crust, add 1 egg, 1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese, 1T italian seasoning, 1 tsp garlic powder, salt/pepper. Mix together. Dump the mixture out onto a lined baking pan - I used parchment for the first pizza and foil for the second one. I found that the pizza on the parchment was evenly browned but not very crisp, the pizza on the foil was crisper around the edges but not browned in the middle - take your pick. Once the crumb mixture is on the pan, pat it into a flat round that looks like a pizza. Bake at 450 degrees for 15 minutes.


Once your crust is cooked, top it like any pizza. I decided to add tomato sauce and just cheese. I wanted to see how the crust actually tasted. So turn the oven to broil and cook your toppings until the cheese has melted - about 3-4 minutes. Cut and serve.

Sorry for the poor "after" picture, I was too excited to taste it and ate some before I remembered I needed to take a picture!! All in all, I would say it was very tasty and that I would make it again. Great substitute for pizza and pretty quick to make too. Enjoy!

Wednesday, April 17, 2013

German Potato Salad

Ok, it's been a while since I have posted anything, and I'm sorry for that. Life gets in the way (and when you don't have a weekly thing that needs to be posted, you just push it off). That doesn't mean I haven't been taking pictures of my food, it just has been tough to get them on the blog. Alright, enough blubbering!!

I made this side dish a few weeks ago for a pot luck for a coworker who is moving departments. It was already stated that sandwiches will be served so I was trying to think of what I wanted to bring...potato salad it was! Now, I'm not talking about that nasty, mayonnaise-y, gloppy potato salad you buy at the store (which I have to say, every now and then is good). I'm talking about a warm, potato with a kiss of vinegar.

It seems no one around here has heard of this stuff, and I find that very interesting since there is a very high population of Amish around here and THEY are German. On a side note, for those of you from the West, do not eat anything labeled "Amish Macaroni Salad"!! Bleh! I made that mistake once I got here, thinking it would be like regular macaroni salad you are used to from anywhere else...spoiler alert - it has TONS of sugar in it!! Yuck!! On to something more appetizing...

BACON!!
Thaaat's better. So I have seen a lot of recipes running around the internet for bacon cooked in the oven and I've been meaning to try it. Using it in my potato salad recipe seemed like a good idea. It was really easy to do.

Oven Cooked Bacon

  • 1 package bacon
  • aluminum foil
  • rimmed baking sheet
  1. Line baking sheet with foil. Lay out bacon in a single layer (you may need multiple sheets for an entire package of bacon, I don't have multiple sheets right now so I tried to crowd them all in there by overlapping them and the parts that overlapped did not get crispy, just an FYI).
  2. Place baking sheet in a cold oven and set temp to 375. Then set timer for 20 min.
  3. Since I made the mistake of overlapping my bacon, I had to separate them at 20 min then I put them back in for about 5 more min.
The reason I chose to use this recipe for cooking my bacon was that I was trying to make the potato salad vegetarian friendly. What is vegetarian friendly about bacon you ask? Well I was using this recipe as my inspiration for the dish. It calls for cooking the bacon first, then using the bacon drippings as the base for the dressing. Delicious, yes. Vegetarian, no. So I decided that I would omit the use of bacon fat and replace it with olive oil. I think it turned out pretty well.


German Potato Salad
  • 2 pounds yukon gold potatoes
  • 1/2 lb thick-cut bacon, cooked and crumbled (optional)
  • 2T olive oil
  • 3/4 c finely chopped onion
  • 1/3 c white vinegar
  • 1/4 c sugar
  • 1 T dijon mustard
  • salt/pepper
  1. Cut potatoes into similar sizes (about bite size). Place in a stock pot and cover with cold water. Add few big pinches of salt and bring to boil. Cook until tender when stuck with a fork, about 15-20 min. Drain.
  2. In same pot, add oil and cook onion until translucent and beginning to brown. Whisk in vinegar, sugar, mustard, salt and pepper. Adjust seasoning to taste.
  3. So this is where I had some road blocks - without the tastiness of the bacon, the salad lacked A LOT. I ended up adding much more mustard and vinegar (switching to apple cider vinegar), more salt, etc. 
  4. Top with bacon, if using. Serve warm.

I, of course, had to try some for dinner that night and added bacon to mine. It made a big difference in the flavor, just so you know!