Two Meal Tuesdays- Black Garlic Love
Inspired by a recent trip to Sprouts and discovering Black Garlic flavored hummus, I set off on an adventure to create two recipes showcasing the ingredient! Read on to see what makes this so special 🙂
Weekend Foodie Warriors- Take 6!
Hello hello, again, Foodie Friends 🙂 In this edition of Foodie Adventures, I’ll be talking about Fusion Food Truck Thursday and my new garden & farmers market finds!
Weekend Foodie Warriors- Take 5!
Hello hello, again, Foodie Friends 🙂 Let’s get right to it! In this edition of Foodie Adventures, I’ll be jam packing 5 new adventures in — Opening Day at the ballpark, Food with family, Shalom Fest, Automatic Taco Truck Thursday, and a sneak peak of my next blog coming out this week!
Mom's (in)Famous Cheesecake
One of my favorite things in the world is baking with my mom. When I was little, she would sit my sister and I down and tell us stories about her growing up in kitchens and learning from great people.
One of the things I love doing is taking recipes my mom has passed down and making them more my own in a small way, like the first time I recently made Peanut Butter Cheesecake. My boyfriend just celebrated a big milestone and this was his one dessert request!
However, we had never changed mom’s recipe before and it’s a family secret (not giving this one away, I would be disowned if I spilled the beans 🙊) , so I will link a recipe I used as a reference for how much peanut butter to use here (we actually cut it down to 3/4 cup):
https://www.aprettylifeinthesuburbs.com/peanut-butter-cheesecake/
Peanut Butter Cheesecake
Servings: 1 big cheesecake (using spring-form pan) or 20-24 cupcake sized versions
Prep Time: 10-30 mins.
Cooking Time: 15 mins- 1 hour, plus 30 mins to let cheesecake cool down after oven is turned off
How was your weekend Foodie Friends? Are there any secret family recipes that your family holds dear? Sound out in the comments below or let me know suggestions of where I should check out next. As always, feel free to like, comment, and share 🤗
Weekend Foodie Warriors- Take 4!
Hello Hello again Foodie Friends 🙂 Hope you had an awesome sunny weekend! In this edition of Foodie Adventures, I’ll be talking about the 5 year Anniversary for Swamp Rabbit Brewing Company and Mo & Joe’s BBQ.
🍪 Two Cookie Thursday 🍪
So to honor my love of everything cookie related, I’ve decided to touch on an old classic recipe in my family and a new favorite – Oatmeal chocolate chip cookies and Hamantaschen, a jam-filled Jewish cookie that is made during Purim celebrations.
Weekend Foodie Warriors- Take 3!
Hello, hello, foodie friends 😁 Hope you had an amazing weekend! This weekend in adventures – Birthday Dinners, Adam’s Bistro, and Bagels Galore!
Pictures above from the view around the hotel attached, patio, and vineyard adjacent. Someone could get used to waking up to a view like this ❤
The hotel and restaurant are nestled at the base of the Blue Ridge Mountains, surrounded by gorgeous views and a small vineyard across the road. Hotel Domestique, a quaint, Old World Style building next door, lends a great backdrop and atmosphere as you look out from the bar of Restaurant 17.
The three menus above change seasonally and also by the variety of amazing local ingredients contributed by the farmers and suppliers listed. Check marks on the menus (added post-dinner, of course) detail what we ordered for my friends birthday celebration!
Click on each picture for a description of the items!
This is one of our local favorites! Great homemade dishes, good atmosphere, and awesome service.
Going clockwise, starting at 12, we had…
- Chicken Sonoma- grilled chicken, topped w/sautéed asparagus, sun-dried tomatoes & a white wine cream sauce
- Pasta Mykaela- sautéed Portobello mushrooms w/ spinach, sundried tomatoes, artichokes, angel hair, lemon butter & Parmesan
- Chicken Cordon Blue- chicken breast stuffed w/ ham & swiss, crumbed & fried, topped w/ white cheese sauce
In business for 18 years, this little Jewish bakery is a gem and the best place around to get bagels, sandwiches, homemade cookies and baked goods, and some great lox too!
We got a black and white cookie, baked fresh on Sunday (which got inhaled so quickly I couldn’t even take a picture 😂), a Brown Sugar Blueberry bagel (pictured right with cream cheese), a cinnamon raisin, and honey wheat bagel, only three of their 20+ flavors on the menu. A must try for breakfast, lunch, and a Sunday morning with family!
How was your weekend? I’d love to hear your foodie adventures from this weekend too! As always, feel free to like, comment, and share, and look out for another post coming up later on this week 🤗
St. Patty's Day – Corned Beef & Cabbage
Happy (belated) St. Patrick’s day to all my foodie friends! 🍀
What better way to celebrate the day than drinking some green beer (if you’re over 21 😋) and finishing it off with homemade corn beef and cabbage? 🍻
One of the easiest holiday recipes to make, it’s super simple, and all you really need is time to finish this recipe. I’ll post the recipe and pictures on their respective tabs, so let’s talk about how to make it!
Corned Beef & Cabbage
All you really need is three main ingredients — 2-3 lbs. Corned beef (which usually comes with its own spice mix or packet in the store), One head of cabbage, and 6-8 potatoes. I always add carrots for extra veggies (6-8 as well), however, those first three ingredients are the Holy Trinity of Saint Patrick’s Day recipes!
To start, take your corned beef out of the package and place in a big pot with the spice mix (I used a pot I usually make big soups or lobster in), filling the pot with water until about 2 inches of water covers the top of the meat. If your corned beef doesn’t come with a seasoning packet, all you need to add is a clove of garlic, a bay leaf, 1/2 tsp. whole peppercorns, 1 tsp. salt, and 1 tsp. of pepper (to taste).
Wash your potatoes, carrots, and cabbage well. Chop the stump off the bottom of the cabbage and remove the outer 3-4 leaves before cutting.
Chop the cabbage into small wedges, leaving the center intact to keep the cabbage in its shape.
Chop up about 6 to 8 small red potatoes and carrots into small chunks, increasing the amount of potatoes and carrots by how many pounds of meat you’re cooking. For reference, I cooked 2 to 3 pounds of meat, so increase your potatoes and carrots accordingly if cooking more meat (ex: the original recipe calls for 4-5 lbs. of beef = 16-18 carrots & potatoes, and a larger head of cabbage).
Bring the meat to a boil, then turn the heat down to low and simmer for 3 – 3.5 hours. This would be a great time to go out and drink beer with buddies and have some fun before finishing up the recipe!
Once the 3 hours is up, or your meat is fork tender and can pull apart really easily, put the wedged cabbage, potatoes, and carrots into the pot and bring the heat up to medium high. Once at a low, rolling boil, set the timer for another 30 minutes – 1 hour, whichever you need to cook the vegetables until fork tender. It may need more or less time depending on how small you cut your vegetables, and how much water is left after 3 hours. You may need to cook the vegetables on the longer end of time depending on how full the pan is.
After your veggies are cooked, pull or shred apart the beef, and put together Tupperware containers with a little bit of everything if doing meal prep, or just enjoy straight out of the pot!
What was your favorite part about St. Patrick’s Day Weekend? Shout out in the comments below! 🤗
Meal Prep Tuesday!
In the next few weeks, I’ll be updating my blog with meal prep ideas from HelloFresh, as my friend gifted us a discount and I’m taking you on my meal kit journey with me (#notsponsored #notanad)! I won’t be posting the recipes from these as they’re already written for us, so check out the pictures tab for the full recipe and more in-depth cooking shots.
Mediterranean Salmon
As (I think) I’ve mentioned before, I’m originally from New England, and I absolutely love seafood, so this salmon dish really caught my eye in the weekly meal lineup.
A long time ago, my parents introduced me to Middle Eastern food, and this Mediterranean salmon reminded me of the times we would go visit this little Lebanese restaurant in Pennsylvania on the way to see family. HelloFresh made it easier to recreate the flavors of some of my favorite food with this recipe!
With every HelloFresh meal kit, it gives you all the ingredients – Minus salt, pepper, and usually some sort of oil or butter. It also wants you to go fetch a few different pans or utensils that you may or may not have to complete the recipe.
For the first part of the recipe, it called for zesting and cutting a lemon into wedges, and taking the dill fronds off of the stems and finally chopping. In the meantime, I boiled about 1/2 cup of water and 1 tbls. of butter in a pan before I threw in the couscous and quickly took it off the stove. It absorbed the water in the next 10 minutes as it rested.
Next was getting that crispy salmon skin!
I salt and peppered the salmon on both sides and put it skin side down in a pan with vegetable oil. It took about 5 minutes on the skin side* and another 2 to 4 minutes to cook the salmon all the way through on the back.
While the salmon cooked, I made the creamy dill sauce, with a combination of the two sour cream packets, half the lemon zest, the juice of two lemon wedges, and a tablespoon of our chopped dill. I salt and peppered that to taste as well!
I also fluffed the couscous with a fork and added the remaining lemon zest, some salt, pepper, and half of the zaatar spice, and stirred until fully combined.
Next was cooking the green beans, which took about three minutes in a steaming bag in the microwave.
Once those came out of the microwave, they went in a bowl tossed with butter, salt, and pepper, to taste.
The only thing left was to Plate it Up! 🤗🍽
I was having lunch catered in the office yesterday, so luckily I only needed four lunches for this week, or else I would have needed to include more vegetables, couscous, and salmon to extend the recipe.** The directions suggested the couscous go down first, followed by the green beans, salmon, and top it with the creamy dill sauce, the remaining dill, and the rest of the zaatar spices.
- Notes:
- *One of the tips it suggested for getting really crispy skin was to press down with a spatula while it was skin side down to get the best surface contact while it was touching the pan.
- **The recipe only says it contains two servings, however, if you have a bigger appetite than I do at lunch or weren’t trying to meal prep, this definitely wouldn’t last you as long as it will for me.
HelloFresh Un-boxing! #notsponsored
I must admit, on this rainy day, getting this box made me feel like a little kid on Christmas morning. My friends and I got a gift card for a discount on boxes in the mail (#notsponsored #notanad) and decided to try it for a few weeks and make meals together!
The foil and bubble-wrapped liners contained all the meals we ordered in individually wrapped bags with everything but the proteins in the bundles.
Everything else was hiding under the gigantic ice bag, which was as long as my forearm – no joke!
All three of our meals with their proteins laid out, with recipe cards below!
I’m so excited to share these with you in the next couple weeks. I’ll be using this as meal prep and comparing how easy or hard the recipes are, based on what’s listed on the cards. If I add anything while cooking, I’ll note it here too!
Have you ever tried out HelloFresh or any other meal kit service? What did you think? Shout out in the comments down below, and stay tuned for more 🙂
