What's Cooking?

Happy Monday All. Here is a recap of what I have been cooking lately...

Lazy Stuffed Peppers via Cheryl Style 

I tried the Lazy Stuffed Peppers recipe again and this time it wasn't a flop! The biggest change was to cook the rice separately and mix it in at the end. 

To be honest, I thought the flavor of this dish was a little bland. Maybe because I used the cheese as a sparse topping instead of a big element. I think if I made it again, I would use sausage (or at least half sausage) instead of ground beef. Jack will try peppers now, but still isn't really a fan of peppers or tomatoes.

Parent Score 3/5 | Toddler Score 3/5

End-of-Summer Juicy Tomato Sandwich

Sometimes you just crave things like tomato sandwiches. They remind me of summers as a kid. The warm toast, the juicy tomato, the cold Miracle Whip. I will always love this sandwich. 

Fruit Smoothie

Jack and I make a smoothie almost every day. One cup of frozen fruit, one cup of juice, blend. Sometimes I add in some yogurt, but it is always a sweet afternoon snack. We have to have it outside on the porch because Jack says it is too cold for drinking inside.

Parent Score 5/5 | Toddler Score 5/5

Pineapple Grilled Salmon via Make the Best of Everything

I was so excited about the idea of this dish. Unfortunately it didn't meet my expectations. Don't get me wrong, it was good, but the flavors of the pineapple didn't translate to the salmon. 

The grilled pineapple, on the other hand, was loved by our entire household. In the future I would just grill the fresh pineapple and skip on the pineapple plank – it made the salmon take forever to cook.

Parent Score 4/5 | Toddler Score 4/5

Fruit Trifle via Taste of Home
I made this dessert for our small group on Sunday night (I forgot to take a finished photo though). I was running short on time, so I substituted cold pudding cups (8) instead of making the pudding. I think the sour cream in this really gave it a nice kick. The kids loved it, but it tasted more like an adult dish and not just pudding with fruit and angel food cake.

Parent Score 5/5 | Toddler Score 5/5

Skinny Shrimp Alfredo Pasta Bake via Damn Delicious 
Every once in awhile I will get it in my head that I will make something with an alfredo sauce, and every time I do this I end up not making alfredo. Daniel and I don't really care for the creamy white sauce (too rich) and I just cant bring myself to put cream cheese in a pasta dish (even though I know it will be delicious)! 

For this dish, I used half a pound of shrimp and half a pound of sauteed chicken. And instead of making a white sauce, I just stirred in mozzarella with a bit of cream until it melted. Not exactly alfredo, but still good. 

Parent Score 4/5 | Toddler Score 4/5 

Crockpot Enchilada Soup via Your Cup of Cake 

I don't make many crockpot dishes, but this one is a win. The only thing I changed was using a chopped up fresh red pepper instead of roasted red peppers and corn from a can instead of frozen. This dish was a big hit. The flavors were perfect and it didn't feel as heavy as eating enchiladas. Jack cleaned his bowl.

Parent Score 5/5 | Toddler Score 5/5

BBQ Chicken with Corn on the Cob and Zucchini on the grill

We have really enjoyed our grill this summer and this was a simple dish to throw on the grill. Everything cooks quickly (about 5 minutes per side).

Parent Score 5/5 | Toddler Score 5/5 

What's Cooking?

I have decided to switch gears a little since my last "Cooking with Pinterest" post. I am still going to review recipes I find on Pinterest, but also share stuff I am cooking that might not have recipes. Each thing I try will include what I changed (if anything) as well as whether or not it was toddler approved. Also, I will include the flops – for some reason these always tend to involve rice when it comes to my cooking...

Grilled Chicken Kabobs, of the Hawaiian kind

Mushrooms, Peppers and Pineapple combined with chicken on the grill is a win in this household. I made this variation with a Hoisin, soy sauce blend. Jack loves mushrooms and pineapple, but still isn't a fan of bell peppers.

Parent Score 5/5 | Toddler Score 4/5

Tacos with a side salad

We like to enjoy a good taco night every once in a while. Especially when we are short on time. If we have tacos, we prefer the Stand and Stuff kind since you can fit more in them and they don't fall over. Jack likes his toppings wrapped in a soft shell. I tried to sneak some fresh baby spinach into Jack's and he called me out and said it was yucky. Minus the spinach for Jack, tacos are always a hit at our table.
Parent Score 5/5 | Toddler Score 4/5

Grilled Chicken with an Alabama White Barbeque Sauce via Buns in My Oven 
with a side of Grilled Mushrooms and Zucchini

Oh my, this was a great recipe! From the homemade rub to the homemade white barbeque sauce, this was delicious. I loved the flavors and it really wasn't that hard to make. 

Parent Score 5/5 | Toddler Score 5/5

Oven Roasted Sausage and Potatoes via Recipes from the Big Blue Binder

For a twist, and to make this dish a bit healthier, I used half sweet potatoes and half russet potatoes. Daniel didn't care for the sweet potatoes, but I actually liked them better. Especially with the sausage. I thought this dish was quite tasty, Daniel and Jack were less partial to it.

Parent Score 4/5 | Toddler Score 4/5

Double Chocolate Banana Bread via Smitten Kitchen

We had some bananas that were very ripe (mushy as Jack likes to point out) so we made a batch of Double Chocolate Banana Bread. I don't think you can go wrong when you add dark chocolate to things. In this case I added dark chocolate cocoa powder and dark chocolate chips. We all loved it. And Jack is a happy camper any time I let him lick the beaters.
Parent Score 5/5 | Toddler Score 5/5

Shrimp Boil Kabobs via Cook au Vin

This recipe was very similar to one I tried last month. This time I left out the chicken and marinated the kabobs as they cooked instead of just dumping the butter sauce on them afterward. Overall I love this dish. Daniel is a bit more ambivalent – mostly he just doesn't like that the sausage has such a high fat content. Jack and I enjoyed the sausage :)

Parent Score 4/5 | Toddler Score 5/5

Hoisin Chicken with Rice and Roasted Brussel Sprouts made up on the spot, by yours truly.

I literally just sautéed chicken in olive oil, added some Hoisin and soy sauce and a little brown sugar. Brussel sprouts went in oven at 425 for about 20 minutes. I covered them with olive oil, garlic powder and 3 garlic cloves that were in big chunks. Very yummy and quick! Jack and Daniel did not care for the brussel sprouts but enjoyed the chicken and rice.
Parent Score 4/5 | Toddler Score 4/5

Dark Chocolate, Zucchini, Oatmeal Cookies via Cooks.com

Jack requested cookies so I decided to make some that were semi healthy. To be fair, I did add dark chocolate chips to them. Daniel walked by and asked why there was green stuff in the cookies, but didn't complain once he actually ate them. Overall a win. We will be sharing these cookies with friends.

Parent Score 5/5 | Toddler Score 5/5

Lazy Stuffed Peppers via Cheryl Style
Flop. Flop. Flop. I think this would have been a really yummy dish but it was a flop because 1) I let the rice simmer at too high of a setting (my stove top is finicky and hard to get rice to absorb the water correctly) and 2) I used half white rice and half brown rice. The brown rice never got soft and the entire bottom of the pot burned. I don't toss out many dishes, this was a toss. I will have to try it again when I have enough white rice. Also, next time I will just cook the rice separately and mix it in at the end. The dish started out looking and smelling so good. I hate having to throw out food!

Not going to score this since we didn't eat it. Photo is pre-burning. 

Cooking with Pinterest.10

Recent recipes I have tried (not as many Pinterest finds this time around)... 

Toad-in-Hole with Sliced Tomato

Someone had recently given me some homemade sourdough bread so I used it to make Toad-in-Hole (one of my favorite things for lunch or breakfast). You just cut a hole out of your bread and then cook a fried egg, over-easy, in the center. The bread is great for soaking up the runny yolk. For my side, I sliced up a fresh tomato and added salt. Perfection.

Watermelon Mango-Banana Smoothie

Jack and I have been on a recent smoothie kick. Last week I cut up and froze some fresh watermelon and it has been a great base for smoothies. For this one I put 1 cup of frozen watermelon, 1 cup of frozen fruit (mango and bananas) and 1 cup of orange juice in a blender.
Parent Score 5/5 | Toddler Score 5/5

Watermelon Berry Smoothie

For this one I put 1 cup of frozen watermelon, 1 cup of frozen berries and 1 cup of orange juice in a blender. Yum! You can do all sorts of combinations for smoothies with whatever you have on hand. 
Parent Score 5/5 | Toddler Score 5/5

Quinoa Enchilada Casserole via Damn Delicious

Excellent dish. I added sauteed chicken to make it a little heartier (plus Daniel likes meat in his meal when possible). This dish came together really quickly and we had leftovers for lunches that week.

Parent Score 5/5 | Toddler Score 5/5

Peach Cobbler via Pink Parsley

This is one of my all-time favorite cobbler recipes. It is really simple to make and always turns out perfectly. Jack helped me make this for company last week. He likes to drop the peaches into the batter.

Parent Score 5/5 | Toddler Score 5/5

BBQ Turkey Breast and Shrimp

While my aunt and her family visited, I threw together this dish of rice with BBQ Turkey and Shrimp with a side of sauteed zucchini and corn. It was really simple to make and fed a big crowd. I just sauteed shrimp and turkey in BBQ sauce and made a pot of rice.

Cooking with Pinterest.9

Below are my thoughts on new recipes I tried over the last couple of weeks. I had one major meal flop, and a couple of excellent non-recipe meals. We have been enjoying our grill this summer.

Chicken, Rice and Vegetable Skillet via Diethood

This meal comes together quickly. Perfect for a weeknight meal. You can really add just about any combination of veggies you have on hand. Anything goes with chicken and rice.

 Parent Score 4/5 | Toddler Score 4/5

BBQ Spaghetti Casserole via Spicy Southern Kitchen
I don't know that I have ever tried BBQ spaghetti before, but this was an excellent meal. It made lots of leftovers which were perfect for Daniel to take to lunch. 

I used whole wheat spaghetti to make it a little healthier and chicken instead of pulled pork. The flavors were really great. I served this with a side of corn.

Parent Score 5/5 | Toddler Score 5/5

Grilled Salmon with Bacon Wrapped Mushrooms and Corn on the Cob 
This was an example of a meal that didn't turn out how I expected, though it looked yummy. To start, the salmon I picked up from our local grocery store ended up tasting a bit funny when it came of the grill.

Then the mushrooms were good, but the bacon didn't cook through enough – note to self, don't use thick cut bacon. The recipe for the mushrooms is from TastyKitchen, I may give it another try in the future.

Finally, the recipe floating around (via All Recipes) that calls for boiling corn in a combination of milk, cream, water, butter and sugar didn't turn out to be anything special, the corn was good, but not anything spectacular. It just tasted like sweet corn to me.

Parent Score 2/5 | Toddler Score 2/5

Surf-and-Turf Grill
This is an example of a lovely non-Pinterest meal we grilled. Sometimes it's nice to just throw a bunch of yummy food on the grill. I seasoned the steak and mushrooms with some steak sauce before skewering them and tossing on the grill. 

For the shrimp and sea scallops, we made a sauce of butter and garlic that did not disappoint. We had to time the food since the steak took about twice as long as the seafood. It all came out perfectly. 

We picked up the meat and seafood from our local our local seafood shop, Siren's Seafood and Meat Market, and I think it made a huge difference in the quality of our meal.

For sides we made pico de gallo (my brother threw this together) and baked sweet potato fries. The entire meal was a hit with everyone.

Parent Score 5/5 | Toddler Score 5/5

Sweet and Sour Chicken Kabobs
Originally I had planned to make Baked Sweet and Sour Chicken, but in the end the grill seemed like a better option.

I threaded chicken, pork, bell peppers, mushrooms and pineapple on skewers then coated everything with a combination of teriyaki, hoisin and soy sauce. I also made a little extra sauce for dipping. 

This was a really sweet and savory dish that we all liked. Jack is a big fan of skewers that include pineapple. This dish was plenty on it's own but a side of rice would be good with it as well.

Parent Score 5/5 | Toddler Score 5/5

Low Country Grill via Pink Parsley
If you live in the south you are familiar with the idea of a Low Country Boil – it usually has corn, potatoes, smoked sausage and shrimp or crawfish. When I came across the recipe for a Low Country Grill, I knew I had to try it. 

This recipe has all of the same components but you make it quickly on the grill instead of waiting for everything to boil. You do have to pre-boil the potatoes, but you finish them on the grill. I added chicken to my grill and the entire thing turned out to be incredibly delicious. I would definitely recommend this recipe.

Parent Score 5/5 | Toddler Score 5/5

Sausage Pinwheels
This is a family favorite that I grew up with. For holidays, we will make homemade biscuit dough, then roll sausage into it to form a log. Finally you freeze your roll and then slice and bake when you are ready to cook. I have recently started making this when we have company, but I have been cheating and using refrigerated croissant dough from the grocery store instead of homemade. It is a really fast dish to make and always a hit.

Parent Score 5/5 | Toddler Score 5/5