Panko Crusted Tilapia- Fish Sticks

If you need an easy lunch, this is it. Im not at all a seafood fan, but when I saw the recipe for this I was excited because I love fish sticks! All you do for the coating is add 2 cups of Panko bread crumbs, 2 tbsp evoo, and 1 tbsp Bay seafood seasoning.  Whisk one egg together with salt and pepper, and dip each piece of tilapia in the egg mixture. This helps the bread crumbs to stick and makes the crunchy breading to the fish.  Lay onto a baking pan and  bake at 425 for 12-15 minutes. Enjoy with tartar sauce and serve with lemon wedges.

Grandma Dianne's Chocolate Chocolate Banana Bread

This recipe is my grandma's and has been in the family for as long as I could remember. I was looking for something chocolate and could never come up with anything that we liked and then I remembered that my mom had a recipe from grandma for the perfect banana bread :) My father in law Mike requested this specially for his birthday on wednesday instead of cake! Happy Birthday!

Tex-Mex Turkey and Bean Chili

Most Chili's consist of beans, tomatoes, and meat. This one is unique because of the ground turkey, bacon, and cocoa in it. Who would have ever thought to add chocolate to a chili!?! It works so well, and it doesn't over power any of it. I was looking for something that was not like any other chili and this is it. It's a keeper!

Serves 8, Total Time 1 hour 30 minutes

Here are the directions:

1.) Heat a dutch oven or heavy stock pot over medium. Chop 4 slices of bacon into 1/2 inch chunks and add to pot until crisp about 8 minutes. Turn heat to high and add 3 lbs of ground turkey cooking until no longer pink.

2.) Add 4 onions coursely chopped, 4 garlic cloves, minced, and 2 jalepeno chiles, minced. Cook until soft about 5 minutes. Then 3 tbsp chili powder, 3 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder, and 4tsp ground cumin. Add to meat and stir in for about 1 minute.

3.) For the tomatoes, it called for 2 28oz cans of whole peeled tomatoes but I would suggest using just regular diced tomatoes-then you dont have to cut them up. So you add in two cans of whichever tomatoes you prefer along with the juices. Add in 2 tbsp molasses, and 1 cup of water. Season with salt for taste. Bring to a boil, and cover for 30 minutes.

4.) Add beans, continue cooking until turkey is tender, and liquid has thickened about 30 minutes more.

5.) Serve hot with sour cream, cheese, and jalepeno slices. Buon Appetite!

Stuffed Poblanos

   We got together with Mary, Amy's old roomate, for this delicious dinner and just to hang out since we haven't seen her since our wedding in March. This recipe we have made before but it was before we started our blog so we wanted to include it now! Along with the stuffed peppers, we made corn bread with green chiles.

Ingredients :

Serves 4. Total time: 1 hour 30 minutes

1 can peeled tomatoes in juice

1 jalepeno chile

2 small onions coursely chopped

3 garlic cloves, 2 crushed 1 minced

salt and pepper

1 can black beans, drained and rinsed

1/2 cup cornmeal

1 cup shredded pepper jack cheese
1 teaspoon ground cumin

3/4 cup water

4 large poblano chiles, halved lengthwise,ribs and seeds removed

Puree tomotoes, jalepeno, half of the onions, and crushed garlic. Season with

salt and pepper and then pour sauce into a 9x13 inch baking dish.

In a bowl, combine beans, cormeal, 1/2 cup cheese, remaining onion, minced garlic, cumin, water.

Slice peppers in half, removing seeds, but leaving the stems intact.

Divide bean mixture evenly and stuff peppers. Place on top of sauce in baking dish.

Sprinkle with remaining cheese. Cover dish tightly with aluminum foil.

Bake at 425 until poblanos are tender about 45 minutes. Remove aluminum foil and continue to cook until sauce thickens slightly and cheese is browned. 10-15 minutes more. Let cool 10 minutes before serving.

Also, for our homemade cornbread...

3 tablesoopns unsalted butter, melted

3/4 cup yellow cornmeal

3/4 flour

2 tablespoons sugar

1 teaspoon baking soda

2 teaspoons salt

1 large egg

1 1/4 cup buttermilk

mix in a small can of diced green chiles for color and flavor

Comine ingredients and spread batter in prepared pan. Bake until golden, 15-20 minutes. Serves 6

Playing with Friends & Food :)

Today we had our friends Tony and Kellie over for the labor day weekend. We spent the morning shopping at the Sunflower Market (which I had never been too), and then headed back to our apartment to begin with our creations. Our menu consited of the following:

Lunch-

"Wierd Pizza Thing"-aka a tortilla and 3 ingredients

1. sour cream

2. brown sugar

3. grapes

Crisp tortillas in oven: 3 minutes per side, then spread sour cream over the top, mixing in brown sugar and then top with grapes. Wha-la!

"Spring Salad with Strawberries and Creamy Orange Avacado Dressing"

1. baby spring mix

2. strawberries

3. orange juice

4. avacado

5. green onion

6. walnuts

For the salad dressing, blend OJ, avacado, and green onions together in food processor until smooth and creamy. Then prepare strawberries walnuts and baby spring mix and toss together with the dressing.

Dinner-
"30 Minute Gumbo"

(Which actually took an hour!)

 with Cornbread

Flank Steak Stir Fry

We tried making this stir fry for tuesday night's dinner. It turned out well, but it was a little bit difficult because you are supposed to cook everything on high heat so its very fast paced and everything that you throw into the stir fry needs to be prepared a head of time- which we didnt do. So we learned from that, and everything about it tasted good. The best part was it was done in less than 30 minutes! This meal is for those who don't have a lot of time to spend in the kitchen! Served with Basmati rice...

Snickerdoodles

We got a new cookbook! "1001 cupcakes, cookies and other tempting treats".  We needed new recipes to make this week and Snickerdoodles are one of Ryan's favorites cookies. So I gave Ryan the book and told him to choose something to make and those are what he chose! They called for a few ingredients that we didnt have so we made a special trip to our favoite spice store "Penzey's".

SNICKERDOODLE RECIPE:
1 cup butter, softened                                                     
3/4 cup superfine sugar (regular sugar works great too)   
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract                                                       
3 cups all-purpose flour                                                  
1 tsp baking soda                                                            

1/2 tsp freshly grated nutmeg
pinch of salt

CINNAMON COATING:

1 tbsp superfine sugar
2 tbsp ground cinnamon

Mix butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Beat in the vanilla and eggs. In a seperate bowl, mix together flour, baking soda, nutmeg and salt. Stir in until mixture becomes thoroughly combined. Shape the dough into a ball, cover and refridgerate for 30-60 minutes. Preheat oven to 375. Grease/spray cookie sheets. For the cinnamon coating, mix sugar and cinnamon in a small bowl. Roll dough into balls (about tablespoon size) and roll in the sugar mixture. Place on cookie sheets evenly spaced out. Bake for 10-12 minutes or until golden brown. Cool for 5-10 minutes and transfer to cooling rack. Enjoy with milk!

                                                 .                                                   

Famous Hamburgers-Minnesota's Famous: Lions Tap!

These Burgers are to die for! We have to go here everytime we visit Minnesota, or for at least one of our family birthdays. My favorite is the California Burger with bacon and cheese. You also gotta add on a side of fried onions (almost burnt), a basket of french fries, and a pitcher of root beer. This completes the entire Lion's Tap experience! Ryan likes to order the Mushroom Swiss Burger...wait, you better make that a double! We enjoyed going this time with Grandpa and Grandma Melling to celebrate Amy's 22nd birthday.

Summer Jam Making

We have made jam in my family for years. Grape, peach, strawberry, and now cherry! This was the first time though that I was able to learn the process from my mom. We visited my family up in Minnesota for 9 days and during the week, Micaela came over and we learned how to make cherry jam! There is the amazing invention-the cherry pitter. Without this thing, we would have to use a knife to pit every single cherry. Way too much work! So Ryan, Micaela and I spent the morning pitting cherries, and after lunch time, we started making the jam with Mom. You use the basic canning ingredients: Sugar, fruit, and Sure-jell (this is what makes it thick). We also added a bit of lemon zest for a kick of freshness. You also must boil the jars and lids for sterilization. It was so much fun, we intend on continuing this tradition at home here in Colorado :) Thanks mom!

Sherbet Watermelon

This is an easy summer time treat I used to make when I lived at home. It was for my birthday one year. So one of the weeks this summer that was in the 90's, we decided to make this watermelon!  All it is, is Sherbet-Rasberry and Lime. You have to let the lime sherbet melt just a bit so that you are able to mold it inside of a bowl. Leave an open center so that you can put the raspberry in the middle. And I would say mix in about a cup of chocolate chips to the raaspberry sherbet for the watermelon seeds! Let it freeze fully for a few hours, then flip the bowl upside down and let the watermelon fall out. Cut and enjoy!