Greek Lamb Tacos

This was a fun take on tacos we made one night, fusion style! We used some ground lamb we had in our fridge and made a tzatziki sauce with cucumbers for the added crunch factor. Definitely a winner for a quick easy way to mix up #tacotuesday!

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Chicken Stock Recipe

I try to not waste any part of the chicken when I have a rotisserie or whole chicken on hand, so I always keep whatever leftover meat and bones on hand to make chicken stock! This recipe is perfect to freeze, as a base for soups, stews, and you can season this to your liking.

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Stained Glass Shortbread Cookies

This recipe for Stained Glass Shortbread Cookies started out of the cookbook my mom first got for me, which I added pink candies to for the Valentines Day holiday! I would definitely experiment with different candies in this recipe, as I used peach gummy candies in mine the first time, and the shortbread was so soft that it crumbles as you bite into it and you’re left with this chewy candy afterward. Make sure you make these bite-sized to accommodate for that!

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Shark Bait Shrimp Pasta

This one is for all the Shark Week lovers out there! I was inspired to make this Shark Bait Shrimp Pasta with a lobster-based sauce as I had some leftover lobster bisque from Cousins Maine Lobster in my fridge. Check out the second link for the story of how I first found out about the awesome food truck along with more on my inspiration for this recipe. Perfect for date nights in too!

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Rachel Ray Inspired Sausage Baked Ziti

We were inspired by the original Rachel Ray recipe (linked below) to create this dairy-free version of her Sausage Baked Ziti! This was a really cool thing to make as a family-friendly meal prep dish, as it makes a lot of leftovers (our favorite). We also found that after making the dish, it ended up tasting better if you mixed the bechamel, cheeses, and tomato sauce together and then baked it, as everything combined better, but itā€™s simply a taste preference for us there. Try it either way and let us know which way you prefer in the comments below!

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Purim Hamantaschen

This was an awesome experience for me. I got to spend the weekend with my Jewish friends who introduced me to Purim, the holiday that celebrates Estherā€™s courage and smarts saving the Israelites from being wrongly murdered at the hands of the Kingā€™s jealous right-hand man, Haman, who had a god complex. Super interesting story, but back to the cookies!

I had never made Hamantaschen before, so I offered to make a homemade apple raspberry compote as a filling (see rectangular Tupperware above), and man, was that a hit! I had to stop people from double-dipping into it before we got through making the cookies. It would be delicious on bagels, muffins, over ice cream, on waffles, you name it! We’ll put that into recipe form in the future so stay tuned for that.

The cookies, which translate to ā€œears of Hamanā€, are supposed to represent either Hamanā€™s ears or the three-cornered hat he used to wear. They make the cookies in this shape to make fun of him, to a point (haha see what I did there šŸ˜‚). Starting from the top down (second picture, second row above), the flavors we made were:

  • Black Current (my British Grandma wouldā€™ve been proud)
  • Apricot (very traditional Hamantaschen flavor, I was told)
  • Homemade Raspberry Apple jam (the next two rows down)
  • Black Raspberry
  • & Strawberry

The cookie dough batter, a recipe from a blog by Tori Avey, reminded me of almost a shortbread cookie dough and had a hint of orange zest in them, which paired really well with the super sweet jams and jellies in the middle. The link to her recipe is here.

Check out this blog to see slideshows of more pictures, along with talking about making this and another type of cookie for Two Cookie Thursday here.

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