A Day of Good Eats Part III - Main Course

We decided that instead of going out to eat we wanted to make a really fancy nice dinner, so we decided as a main course to make Beef Wellington, Baked Chard in a Bechamel sauce, and carrots. It was amazing. I've never had Beef Wellington and it was so delicious I would probably eat it every day if someone let me. Not only that, it was really fun to make all these dishes and really nice to sit down to a meal like this.

Beef Wellington

Ingredients:

• 2 pieces of beef tenderloin
• 1/2 cup mushrooms
• 1 medium onion
• 1 can beef broth
• Puff Pastry dough
• Wine
• 2tbsp butter softened
• 2tbsp butter
• 2 tbsp butter softened
• egg yolk
• 2 tbsp wine
• 2 slices of prosciutto

First you put your meat in a oven safe dish and cover with 2tbsp of butter softened. Bake at 425 for 10 minutes then set aside and let cool completely.






































While that's cooling get your onions and mushrooms all chopped up.










































Cook those in some butter until nice and brown then set those aside as well and let cool.



















Make sure you took out your puff pastry to thaw. Now roll it out til it's big enough to wrap up your meat in.



















Rub 2 tbsp butter on tenderloin and then wrap in a slice of proscuitto



















I took pictures of the next steps but they disappeared off my phone :(
Set on pastry dough and top with mushrooms and onions.

Fold up the dough and pinch it nice and tight. Brush with your egg yolk.

Put them back in the oven and cook at 450 for 10 minutes and then at 425 for 10 minutes. While thats cooking you have to make your sauce.


In a sauce pan take your beef broth and wine and reduce and simmer.



















We served the sauce on the side so we could dip it.





















Baked Chard with Bechamel Sauce

Ingredients:

• 1lbs Chard
• 1 cup whole milk
• 1tbsp butter
• 1 tbsp flour
• Salt
• Pepper
• Pinch of nutmeg
• 1/4 tsp chili powder
• 1/4 cup bread crumbs

Put your chard in an oven safe dish.

In a sauce sauce pan melt your butter



















Add your flour and salt and mix well



















Slowly a little bit at time add your milk.



















Whisk constantly while doing this (not able to take pictures of this). Eventually you'll have a thin sauce. Turn up the heat a little and continue to whisk until it thickens up. About 3 minutes. Add in your pepper, chili powder, and nutmeg
Pour over your chard (we added mushrooms we had left over) then top with bread crumbs and bake at 375 for 10-12 minutes




















This was all so tasty!












































































Enjoy!

:)


P.S

Dessert was Rootbeer Floats



















:)

A Day of Good Eats Part II - Appetizer

I've never had jicama before and I wasn't sure what to expect. It kind of tastes like an apple, potato, and onion...in a good way :) The orange in the salad though really makes all the flavors come out nicely. This was a tasty and refreshing appetizer. I think it will be a really good thing to make in the summer when it's too hot to do much. The only thing I would do differently is marinade the jicama longer.

Jicama and Orange Salad Ingredients

• 1 Jicama - roughly 1lb
• 3 Oranges
• 1 tbsp lime juice
• 2 tbsp cilantro
• Salt

Cut up the jicama in the small pieces.



















Cut an orange in half and squeeze the juice of the orange over the jicama making sure you coat everything well.



















Add a little salt and the lime juice and then marinade for as long as you'd like.



















Right before you're going to eat it, cut up the other 2 oranges and add them to the bowl



















Also add in your cilantro.



















Mix together and enjoy!






































:)

A Day of Good Eats Part I - Breakfast

Well today is an exciting day. Since Tuesdays are kinda lame and Steve and I don't see each other at all cause of our schedules we decided to celebrate my birthday/anniversary today. This means basically a day of laying around in my pajamas and making delicious food. I'm really excited for the menu we've planned and I'm gonna blog it all. Our first course is a breakfast/brunch thing that Steve made . He made baked eggs in tomatoes wrapped in Prosciutto. I came across this on the blog Almost Bourdain and decided I needed to eat these.

They are pretty easy to make, the biggest problem we encountered was that the blog we got the recipe from had their oven temp in Celsius and Steve didn't realize at first...thus we were wondering why nothing was happening with our oven set to 180 degrees. oops :) The only thing I would change was that there was no specifications on how much olive oil to use so I think we could have cut back on that a bit. Over all those these were amazing and we will be making these again.

Baked Eggs in Tomatoes

Ingredients:

• 4 tomatoes
• 4 eggs
• Basil
• Olive Oil
• Prosciutto
• Salt & Pepper

First you have to cut the tops off the tomatoes and scrape out the insides. Turn them upside down and let drain for 15 minutes.






































While those are draining prepare your basil mixture. In a bowl (or preferably with a mortar and pestal) smush up the basil with salt and pepper. Add a little olive oil and smush some more.



















Once tomatoes are drained rub your basil mixture on the inside of them.






































Next take your slices of prosciutto and wrap around the outside of the tomato. Secure with toothpicks. Throw these into the oven at 350 for about 15 minutes until prosciutto starts to crisp up and the tomatoes are soft.



















Remove from oven and crack your eggs into the tomato. Bake for another 5 or so minutes or until the egg is set.



















Enjoy!!!!!



















:)

Breakfast Risotto

I found this recipe on the Worlds Healthiest Food website. I've decided this will be a great winter dish for cold mornings. It's tasty and filling while also being healthy. The recipe doesn't call for any spices and I definitely think they are needed. So far I've tried cinnamon and nutmeg but I'm still working on that aspect. This risotto is easy to make too because you are able to just pour the liquid all in instead of a ladle full at a time.

Breakfast Risotto

Ingredients:

• 1 cup risotto rice - i always just use whatever rice we have which is usually a medium grain white rice and it's come out fine
• 2 cups water
• 1 can coconut milk - the recipe specifically said do not use low/reduced fat because you will lose to much flavor
• 8oz can of pineapple - you are going to use the juice and the fruit
• A couple bananas

In a medium sauce pan add the rice and water.



















Stirring frequently bring to a boil then reduce to a simmer. Continue stirring regularly until liquid is absorbed. You gotta make sure you keep stirring it so you get a nice creamy risotto.



















Once liquid is absorbed add your pineapple juice. Do the same thing as above, stir until absorbed.



















Add coconut milk and repeat above. Make sure your heat is not too high because if the liquid gets absorbed before the rice is cooked it will not be tender enough.



















When it's pretty much done throw in your pineapple and banana. Stir it in and let it cook for a minute or two. Add spices of your choice.



















Enjoy!
Nutrition Info - assumes 1 banana and 4 servings
Calories: 384
Fat: 17g
Carbs: 53g
Protein: 4g

Gingered Squash and Pear Soup

I found this recipe while browsing through a Woman's Day magazine and it sounded really yummy. I love butternut squash soups and even though you can make a really tasty soup with just the squash, I'm always up for fun variations on it. This was easy and pretty quick to make and tasted really good. The original recipe calls for topping it off with sour cream, but both Steve and I decided that it tasted much better without it.

Not only is it yummy, it's very healthy. We've been slacking off lately with our eating habits but we're getting back into things now so hopefully more of these posts will be not only delicious but good for you too!

Gingered Squash and Pear Soup

Ingredients:

• 1 Butternut Squash
• 2 Pears
• 3 tbsp oil
• 1 tbsp grated ginger
• 4 cups chicken broth
• 1 onion
• salt and pepper
• optional - sour cream

First assemble all of your ingredients

Peel, seed, and cut your squash



















Dice up your onion



















Grate your ginger



















Peel, core, and cube your pears



















In a pan heat up your oil. Add your onion and ginger and cook until soft



















Next add squash



















pears




















and broth, salt, and pepper.



















Bring to a boil, cover, and reduce to a simmer for about 15 minutes or until squash is tender.

Puree with a blender or stick blender.

Throw in some sour cream if you wish.



















Enjoy!! :)

Nutrition - Makes 8 servings- these numbers do not include sour cream
Calories:133.3
Carbs: 21.6g
Fat: 5.8g
Protein: 2.1g

Bread Cones & Curry Chicken Salad

Months ago I found this recipe for bread cones and I've been dying to make them ever since. The opportunity finally arrived and we made them for the start of the year BBQ. I stuffed them with a Curry Chicken Salad (recipe from a Woman's Day magazine, I think.)

Of course I forgot to take pictures of the final thing stuffed, but oh well. They turned out really well and they were very tasty.

First up is the Chicken Salad - I made a double batch

Ingredients:

• 3 cups cubed chicken breast
• 1 cup nonfat plain yogurt
• 1/2 cup mayonnaise
• 4 tsp curry powder
  
• 2 pinches salt, sugar and pepper
• 1/2 cup diced red apples

First cut up your chicken



















I wanted to cut it up nice and small since I was going to be stuffing it into the bread cones. Next put it in a pan, fill it up with water and bring to a simmer. Let cook for about 5 minutes or until chicken is done. I think mine was longer since I made so much.



















Meanwhile, cut up your apples.



















Here I have 4 apples, turns out half a cup of apples = 1/2 apple. Oh well more snacks for meeee!



















Next up in a bowl mix your yogurt and mayo together. You can always use a light/low fat mayo if you'd like. I am also thinking of trying this without the mayo altogether and just having the yogurt be the base.



















Into that mix your curry powder and your salt sugar and pepper. Look I actually have measuring spoons that are labled as a pinch.

























































Next stir in the apple and once the chicken is finished that as well.






































This is best to make the night before because the flavors come together and the yogurt marinates and chicken.

Now make your bread cones! - again, I made a double batch so feel free to cut these numbers in half.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup milk
• 1 cup water
• 6 tablespoons oil
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 2 beaten eggs
• 3 teaspoon salt
• 4 1/2 teaspoon instant yeast
• 7 cups bread flour (I used only 3 1/2)
  

First thing you have to do is pour your milk and water into a sauce pan and let it scald. Once that's done, poor it into a bowl and let it cool off for a few minutes. You want it to be lukewarm.



















Next beat up your eggs!






































Add your eggs to the milk and water mixture along with 4 cups of flour.



















Then add in your yeast.



















Let your dough sit for about 10 minutes, then slowly start to add the rest of the flour. Once it becomes to hard to stir, dump it out onto a floured surface and knead for about 8 minutes. (Action Shots!)






































Coat a bowl with oil and put your dough in there.



















Cover with a cloth and let rise for about an hour or until doubled in size. Well the dough is rising, make your molds. I found the covers of magazines to be suitable. Rip them off and roll them into little cones. Tape them then cover them completely with aluminum foil.



















Now punch that dough! knead it a couple times to get out the air bubbles. Now you have to break it up into smaller pieces, we did 32 of them.

At this point I had to go to bed and Steve took over. Roll the dough into a long thin strand and starting at the bottom of your mold, wrap it around like an ice cream cone. Works well if you grease your molds.






































Put them on a greased baking sheet and brush them with an egg wash that is 2 eggs and 2tbsp milk. Bake at 350 for about 20 minutes.




















Right before the event stuff them with your salad and some lettuce.
Enjoy! :)