Deck Party Couscous Salad

This is a quick, cheap and fresh salad to whip up in the last minute before a cookout or to bring for a picnic. It is the perfect side dish to go with grilled meat, fish or other barbeque items, and very colorful too.

Ingredients:

• Pint of cherry or grape tomatoes,
• 1 cup of raisins,
• 2 cups of couscous,
• 1 cup of carrots
• 1/2 cup of sliced almonds
• 2 TBS of chopped fresh parsley
• 1 cup of diced apple
• Olive oil, vinegar, salt, pepper

Other ingredients you could add/ substitute into if you don't have the ones above handy:
Chickpeas, pine nuts or walnuts (instead of almonds), pear (instead of apple), onion, cramberries
(instead of raisins), black olives, basil (instead of parsley), peas, corn.

The amounts are completely eye-balled, you can add more or less of each of the above. This is the type of recipe you really can't screw up, so play it by ear and experiment as you go along to get a nice mixture of colors, tastes and textures.

1. Dice the carrots into small pieces and boil them until they are a bit soft but not so much that they fall apart.
2. While the carrots are cooking, make the couscous. This usually only takes five minutes.
3. Add some oil to a pan and toast the sliced almonds slightly with a bit of salt.
4. Make a dressing with the olive oil, vinegar, salt and parsley to taste.
5. Once the couscous and the carrots have cooled, toss all the ingredients together, mix them around and drizzle the dressing in. 
6. Taste, and add some more salt if needed.
7. Ideally, chill in the refrigerator for an hour or so, but if you're in a rush, it's perfectly delicious at room temperature.
8. This dish will keep nicely for a few days, so double or triple the batch.

Valentines Day 2012- Debriefed

"Pretzel Buttons" for the Teachers

This delicious idea for a Valentines treat came from Pinterest, it's from a great blog called G*Rated which includes the instructions on how to make them and very nice pictures, check it out!

I am no baker, I rarely stray from the box, so I liked the simplicity of this idea, but also the fact that it was a perfect activity for the kids. They had to line up all the pretzel squares on the oven tray, unwrap each Hershey kiss and place one on top of each pretzel (as you can see from the pictures, some did not make it...). I did the M n M part myself, didn't trust them with that... We then put a handful of the Valentines treats in celophane bags for each of their teachers and adorned them a bit. 

 

"Heart Surprise" Valentines Cards

The concept behind these cards might have been a little over the head of the 4 and 2 year olds receiving them, but they were definitely fun to make (for me). Don't know why I had this idea in my head of making something with those paper spring things we used to make when we were young, but this is what came out of it...The kids helped me stick the Valetines monster greeting on the cards and stamp the envelopes.

 

Classmates Goody-bags

This is the first year my kids are in preschool, so I didn't know about classmate goody bags until they came back with a bunch of little bags with treats on Halloween and then again at Christmas. In the spirit of keeping up with the rest of the Martha Stewarts in the class, I made sure to send them with something for their classmates on Valentines Day. I figured they would get a lot of chocolate, candy hearts and pencils, so we made glitter playdough in pink and purple and also put in some bubbles that I had found at Michaels. If you've never made playdough before, the texture is great and it keeps forever. It is much cheaper than the one you buy and you can customize it with scents and colors. The recipe I used can be found below these pictures.

DYI Playdough Recipe:

• 4 cups flour
• 1 cup salt
• 2 TBS cream of tartar
• 1 TBS oil
• 4 cups water

Mix the flour, salt and cream of tartar in a deep pan. Add the water and the oil, along with any food coloring and scent. Mix.

Cook over medium heat, stirring until the mixture starts to pull away from the pan and forms a ball. Remove from the heat and let cool.

Glitter, more food coloring, etc can be added at this stage too. Knead till its soft and store in an airtight container or ziplock bag.

 

It was a fun day at school, everyone was happy with their "stash"

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bacon and Mushroom Penne

I'm always surprised at how good simple pasta dishes can be. This one's a lighter version of the creamy bacon pasta I usually make. It's easy, you can make it in under 15 minutes and it's a guaranteed crowd-pleaser (unless there is someone in the crowd who is not a mushroom lover- in that case you can substitute the mushrooms for artichoke, broccoli or chicken for example, or just bacon).

BACON & MUSHROOM PENNE
Ingredients:

• 1 package of sliced baby bella mushrooms
• 1 lb of penne pasta
• 4-6 strips of bacon
• 1/2 cup of shredded Parmesan cheese
• 2 Tbs of reduced sodium chicken broth
• 1 Tbs of minced garlic
• 1/4 cup of half and half
• salt and pepper to taste
• Extra virgin olive oil

How to:

1. Boil your penne pasta.
2. While the pasta is boiling, drizzle a pan with olive oil and toss the minced garlic in, sautee it at medium heat.
3. Once the garlic is golden/ light brown, add the sliced mushrooms. If you want them to cook faster, cover the pan with a lid, but make sure to stir ocassionally.
4. While the mushrooms are cooking, cook some bacon in the microwave (4-6 slices). I use this awesome Makin Bacon rack, you can buy it at Walmart for under $8. Microwaving bacon is the best way to make it less greasy, otherwise this dish comes out too oily.
5. Go back to the mushrooms and add the 2 Tbs of chicken broth to the pan, mix it around with the mushrooms. This makes a bit of sauce.
6. Add the pasta to the mushroom pan, mix around. Then add half and half a bit at a time. Depending on how creamy you want the pasta, you might want to add less or more than the 1/4 cup. You can see from the picture I only added a bit, I wanted them lighter.
7. Cut up the crunchy bacon with kitchen sears so you get biggish pieces, and toss them in the pasta. Let it simmer for a few minutes while stirring so the cream thickens a bit.
8. Remove from the stove, add the shredded parmesan, salt and pepper to taste and serve!

Bean and Chorizo Soup

"Fabada" or "Judias pintas" is one of my favorite Spanish dishes. I have been trying to recreate this hearty stew since coming to live in the US without much luck. They key to the tasty thick soup are a variety of pig products that I can't find here (chorizo, morcilla, tocino). I have tried adding things that look similar here (like Anduille sausage or Portuguese chorizo) but nothing quite measures up.

Today's attempt, though it didn't have exactly the same taste or texture as the original (the Mexican chorizo is nothing like the Spanish one, and yes, I'm biassed), was delicious and easy to make, here it goes in case you want to try it...

BEAN AND CHORIZO SOUP
Ingredients:

• 1 small onion
• 1/2 green bell pepper
• minced garlic from a jar or fresh
• 4 small cans (16oz) of beans, any variety (I used 2 cans of red kidney beans + 2 cans of small navy beans)
• 2 Mexican chorizo sausages
• Paprika
• Salt + pepper
• 1 small can of fire roasted diced tomatoes

How to:

1. Drizzle some olive oil on a pan and sautee the garlic, onions and green pepper together.
2. When the onion starts to look golden, add a bit of water, to soften the onion and make the mixture more "soupy".
3. Once the onion and the pepper look light brown and thoroughly cooked, add the can of fire roasted tomatoes.
4. Let simmer for 10 minutes or so, then puree it with a hand blender or similar.
5. Put the pureed onions, pepper and garlic back into the pan and add the beans (don't rinse them, add the contents of the can, including the liquid) and simmer.
6. In a separate pan, fry the chorizo sausage meat with a bit of olive oil (you need to take the filling out of the casing first, don't fry them in the casing!). It will kind of look like dark brown/red ground beef when fried.
7. Add the fried chorizo meat to the stew and simmer for a bit. The longer the better, but a few minutes is enough to flavor the whole stew.
8. Add salt, pepper and paprika to taste.

This soup also freezes great, so make an extra batch for another day.

NB. The chorizo is pretty spicy. If you have kids (mine are 4 and 2 and they loved this dish), add the chorizo to whoever wants it after serving the stew.

Express Mushroom Risotto

I am not a crock pot, slow cooker type of person, I don't have the time nor the patience for dishes that take a long time to cook. That's why I love my Fagor pressure cooker. We got it as a wedding gift from my husband's grandmother and have been so pleased with everything I have made with it. As an added plus, it's Made in Spain, so I like that I'm contributing to my native country's current dismal economy.
Here's my favorite dish so far:

EXPRESS MUSHROOM RISOTTO 

(Delicious, mushroom and parmesan risotto ready in 10 minutes!)

Ingredients:

• 2 cups of Arborio rice
• 4 1/2 cups of reduced-sodium chicken broth
• 16 oz baby bella mushrooms
• Some extra virgin olive oil
• 2 TBS of Chopped garlic
• 1/2 cup of grated Parmesan cheese
• salt and pepper

How to:

1. In a pan, drizzle some olive oil and sautee 1 TBS of chopped garlic until golden.Then add the mushrooms and let them cook at medium heat.
2. While the mushrooms are cooking, drizzle some more olive oil into the pressure cooker and add the other 1 TBS of chopped garlic. (Optional: You can also add some chopped onion here, I'm not a huge onion fan...)
3. Once the garlic is golden, add the rice and toss around a bit until translucent brown. Then pour the chicken broth into the cooker, stir well, close the lid and turn up the heat.
4. Once the pressure builds up, turn down the heat and set the timer for 7 minutes.
5. When the mushrooms are cooked (it should only take a few minutes) remove this pan from the heat.
6. When the 7 minutes are up on the timer, release the pressure of the cooker, open the lid and add the mushrooms, parmesan and salt and pepper to taste. Stir, serve and decorate with parmesan shavings and toasted tortillas.

Optional: Add a TBS of butter with the mushrooms to the risotto at the end to make it creamier. Some white wine can also be added along with the chicken broth, to bring out the flavors of the mushrooms and parmesan. Mushrooms can be swaped for peas, aspargus, artichoke or anything else you like. If the vegetables are frozen (or take longer to cook like the aspargus), you can add them to the rice at the beginning, before closing the pressure cooker. You can probably do the same with the mushrooms, I've never tried it this way, I feel like they would get too mushy, I don't know.