For my brother’s birthday (turtle), I made him homemade tacos.I love a good taco bar.
Sometimes I add rice, sometimes beans.
This was turtle’s taco.
Its fun to make you’re own.
I sometimes cut the tortillas and make mini tacos.
It was a really good taco. I think everyone enjoyed it.
I love a good rice dish. . .
It can be in a pudding or in a bake.
You can make rice in an oven, stove, or microwave. There is long grain, short grain, and even in a bag, instant rice.
It is versatile: there are so many different things you can do with rice.
You can make in minutes and just add herbs and butter.
I love sushi: fish and sticky rice. . . yum.
You can add gravy or sauce to it.
Yesterday when I slow cooked the BBQ ribs that fell off the bone. I took the render fat and extra BBQ sauce and use it as part of the liquid to make the rice so it had the BBQ rib flavor. (It was so good.)
Turtle even add a ginger hot sauce to it.
You can even add rice into stews and soups.
You can add fruit and nuts with it.
The suggestions are limitless: go bold, or comfortable.
Note: I was use a fork to light stir the rice as I feel it makes it fluffier.
Turtle, Zeroman and I take advantage when we can get access to the kitchen. We had access yesterday and we made a feast.
Zeroman made . . .
I made . . .
Turtle helped with both.
We also baked. . . chocolate pudding cake and very chewy brownies.
The lasagna and the lasagna cheesy rolls.
Here is the plain and candied bacon BBQ meatloaf.
Roasted and glazed carrots
The soured beans had bacon and were sour and yet tangy. It was grandma’s recipe and my mom had asked for them, so we made them just for her.
The brownies were chewy.
The cake was soft with the creamy pudding on top. . . yum.
It was a nice way for us to celebrate Mother’s day as Turtle, Zeroman, and I got to cook for our mothers.
We had three days worth of food as we also have leftover for tomorrow as well.
I love to cook! I like being in a kitchen, turning on the radio and just making something yummy and awesome.
I enjoy making food. I really like it when I have people enjoying the food that I made. I appreciate feedback.
However, I have some pet peeves . . . (I talked this over with Turtle and Zeroman, and they agree.)
Cooking is an exploring science. (Yes, most who know the kitchen, may not measure, but I always suggest taste as you cook, especially herbs, seasons, and sauces. Even the most studied chef will experiment with seasons, meats, veggies, and flavors.)
Baking to me is precise science. (You really need a recipe and to measure to get the brownies, cookies, cakes, or pastry exactly the way you need them. Measuring cups and spoons are baker best friends.)
If you don’t like to cook, then find friends who do.
If you are picky on your food, find people who are just ask picky.
I knew if I just posted “Salads” that someone would say there are so many out there. . . (from leafy to protein like chicken or tuna to potato and pasta etc.) I love many different salads.
However over the weekend we made an awesome leafy salad. . .
I had few salad mixes. . . it ice-burg lettuce, Kale, greens, spinach, shredded carrots, and red cabbage. We added tomatoes, mushrooms, green pepper, and shredded pork and shredded cheese.
We have a south-western ranch or Italian dressing.
When I go to a restaurant, I don’t mind a simple salad before my main meal. However when I am at home everything is in my leafy salads. . .
I love fresh spinach, tomatoes, cucumbers, sprouts, snap peas, black olives (sliced), shredded cheese (prefer white cheeses), sunflowers, flavored croutons, and whatever else will work. Plus I will cut up lunch meat or cube or shred chicken. My salads usually become a huge part of the meal. I even love having bacon in my salads.
Whenever I make a salad and my family is home, I usually end up making them salads too. I like to think of myself as a creative salad. . . I’m not sure if I am to master level yet. LOL
Growing up, whenever I would visit my grandparents for dinner, they could always have some kind of salad with dinner. My grandma got me into sprouts, poppyseed dressing, and adding chopped nuts in salad. I love the crunch and freshness.
I try to eat salad at least once a week.
Happy Easter! Or Happy Ham Day!
Over the weekend, we have been cooking ham and other goodies to celebrate the holiday as we have done in past traditions.
Sandwiches. . . growing up we joked because we would make our sandwiches “Bleed” as we had an egg Easter bread, beet horseradish sauce, ham and cheese.
Cvikla s Chrenom – Beet and Horseradish Relish (http://slovakamericankitchen.blogspot.com/2014/04/cvikla-s-chrenom-beet-and-horseradish.html )
Easter bread: Paska (https://dcslovaks.org/slovak-easter-traditions-paska-bread/)
Easter Cheese: Veľká noc Cirák (https://slaviccooking.com/slovak-easter-cheese-cirak/)
We kept it simple (we didn’t make Cvikla s Chrenom, Paska, or Veľká noc Cirák but do remember them as a kid.)
We made three hams (actually my friend and my brother made the hams.)
I focused on the sweet potatoes with marshmallows.
What is awesome is that with ham. . . there are so many things you can do with the leftover. . .
Note: Ham has a lot of salt, so make sure you drink a lot of water to get a lot of the salt out of your system.
This ham is addicting that I’m dealing with a stomachache from eating too much. So I am taking a nap now.
Theme: Bacon
Zero, Turtle and I got another change to work in the huge kitchen again. Saturday we made so much. It was a really nice night, and we accomplished so much.
Zero made Mayo and BBQ chicken with homemade mashed potatoes.
The mayo chicken was creamy and really good with some black pepper over those mashed potatoes.
Then we got out the bacon. . .
Zero made two meatloaves . . . Plain BBQ glaze and cheesy stuffed bacon wrapped one.
I personally loved the bacon wrapped meatloaf just a bit more. (It was even better the next day.)
Turtle made a roasted chicken with bacon and green pepper stuffing.
It was really good and very juicy. I also didn’t realized that green pepper was that good in stuffing. I learned a few things this weekend.
We also got a bag gruyere cheese from a friend as they have extra. We took the cheese sauce with thinly sliced potatoes and of course bacon and made our own homemade au gratin potatoes.
We also made bacon saute yellow squash and french fries.
We had so much food left over. I didn’t have to cook on Sunday. We had left over for dinner and still some left. Yay.
It was nice that we put down the Internet and the phone and just focused on the food. Sometime we need to forget everything around us and focus on what in front.
By the way, I love bacon!
Today, I took lemons and lemon pepper seasoning and put them in the boil water to cook the chicken thighs.
I pulled the thigh out when I felt they were cooked but not over cooked.
Then I took 1/2 cup of veggie oil, butter and infused lemons in it.
I fried the outside of the chicken thighs with the lemon oil. I fried the lemon halves.
I made the skin crispy.
It turned out really good. It was tart and with the grill marks had like a BBQ feel to it.
I made Tilapia fish with a butter Moro blood orange sauce.
It was a very simple meal cook the fish in butter squeezing the blood oranges over the fish.
Once the fish is out if the pan squeeze more oranges and put the pulp in the pan with the butter and fish juice.
Note: Do not put a juicy orange on your computer. (orange in color or blood . . . its’ a moro as there are several types of blood oranges) I just did this to show the color.
We had it over stuffing with side of Asia cabbage salad mix.
I love to cook, and I usually cook at least one meal 5-6 days out of the week on average.
However I also love to bake. Usually those around me have to exercise or they end up gaining weight.
I used to make a joke if I can’t lose weight, I will just make everyone else around me weight more.
Seriously I enjoy baking cookies. My favorite cookie to make and eat are my chocolate chip oatmeal cookies. (I’ll give you a secret, I use the “The Joy of Cooking” Oatmeal cookie recipe. I just add a lot of chocolate chips. ) They are soft, chewy, and or course have chocolate.
I also love to bake cakes. I prefer chocolate, but I have made layered cakes and even pineapple upside down cake.
I will be honest though I’m not that great at decorating cakes, but family are just happy that is edible, not burnt, and tastes good.
Cooking Improv 