Recipes Tried In November -Round 2

 

November Recipes.

This round of recipes that I tried for my November Challenge were more along the easy-peasy lines. If you miss round 1 of recipes, you can find that here.

In Friday’s post, I talked about how insane my week decided to be. Yet somehow, I did manage to try out a new recipe each day.

Don’t forget… Each recipe title has a clickable link to the Pinterest pin of the recipe I used.

Ready to see if anything strikes your fancy?!

November 6th.

Mediterranean Chickpea Salad with Herb-Citrus Dressing.

I was trying to get this one prepped and ready to go before I needed to take Miss Sunshine to soccer practice. I wanted it to have some time to sit and marinate in the dressing. If I’d had time to change anything, it would have been to cut the cucumber smaller.

If you have trouble finding chickpeas, you should also note that sometimes they are packaged by their other name: garbanzo beans.

My zester and I are not amicable friends. It likes to keep the zest all to itself and insists that I take a toothpick to scrape off the zest.  I may have been a little short on the amount of zest called for. I also added 1 1/2 tsp of red wine vinegar and 3 dashes of salt instead of one. This was a personal preference decision. I also used kalamata olives in a brine over green olives. I am not an olive fan, but I do like kalamata olives in moderation. Plus, they are the hubby’s faves. He eats them as a snack.

I probably would have paired this with a soup, but it was a crazy day.

Assessment: Good enough to have again. I would prefer it as a smaller side to a meal.

November 7th.

5 Ingredient Chocolate Peanut Butter Chia Bars.

But, wait! That looks like a photo of a quiche.

Yes, yes it does. Because it is. That’s what we had for dinner, but it was not a new recipe.

The bars were not photogenic. She does warn in the recipe about stirring peanut butter with oil separation. I do use natural peanut butter, but it doesn’t require stirring. My “bars” looked like a smooshed tootsie roll with a puddle of oil in the dips. I did use walnuts in place of peanuts since I didn’t want more peanuts in the recipe. However, I don’t think this was the downfall of my recipe debacle.

Still, I dabbed the oil off and ate them anyway.

They were good. My “bar” had no real rigidity to it either. I would make this again but would roll it into balls and eat them like energy balls.

Bacon and Cheese quiche recipe:

Ingredients:

• Frozen deep dish pie shell
• 5-6 slices of bacon
• 6 eggs
• 3/4 cup heavy cream
• 1/4 cup milk (I use 1%)
• 1 1/2 cup grated or shredded cheddar cheese
• Salt and Pepper (to your taste)

Use a fork to prick the bottom of the frozen pie shell. Bake in the oven at 375° F for 10 minutes. Cook the slices of bacon and allow it to cool. In a bowl, add the eggs, cream, milk, and salt and pepper. Whisk the ingredients together. Crumble the bacon into the bottom of the pie crust. Sprinkle the cheese on top of the bacon. Pour in the egg mixture. Do not overfill. Some pie crusts may be a little smaller than other. Bake in the oven at 375° F for about 40 minutes. I use a toothpick check in the center and consider it done when it comes out clean.

Assessment: Ugly…but tasty. The bars, not the quiche. The quiche was pretty AND tasty.

November 8th.

Pineapple Avocado Green Smoothie.

I wanted to try a green smoothie and opted for this because I had some pineapple that needed to be eaten. However, I substituted 1 cup of fresh pineapple along with 3/4 cup of pineapple juice and 1/4 cup of water in place of the frozen pineapple and water. Also, I added about 1/2 cup of ice because I prefer my smoothies to be slushy. I found it to be very tasty and reminiscent of a smoothie you would find at some smoothie chains. If you don’t like sweet, you may have wanted to cut back on the amount of pineapple juice and had more water.

Assessment: Yum. Green Smoothie addition. Check!

November 8th.

Thai Curry Vegetable Soup.

I substituted powdered ginger for fresh. Mostly because I forgot it and wasn’t going back to the grocery store. I also did not add fish sauce and due to that choice, omitted the brown sugar as well.

I found this to be tasty, but lacking something. Maybe it was because I opted against the fish sauce. I don’t like fishy things so that component isn’t going to change.

When I lived in Florida, I had a friend from Thailand and she said that she could eat both spicy and stinky (fishy) because one parent was from the north and one from the south.

She used to make this amazing salad that had Thai peppers, which she grew outside the kitchen window. She would set aside mine with one Thai pepper, while she and her other local girlfriends who were also originally from Thailand would eat it with 4-5 peppers. All the while, I’m drinking glass after glass of water to take down the fire in my mouth. Sometimes she would add fish sauce to her plate of food. They used to joke that one of the women couldn’t eat really spicy or stinky (I can’t recall which) because she was from the city.

It was interesting to hear about how different areas ate their food in different ways.

But back to the soup…

Mr. D thinks all soups and salads should have some form of meat so we decided to see if adding some small shrimp would add to the overall taste. I do think that it made a difference and could see adding chicken as well. Otherwise, I felt it needed some more flavoring. The hubby, Mr. D, and I all tried this recipe and were in consensus on our thoughts.

Assessment: Tweak the recipe to find a way to impart more flavor. Thai food is very flavorful so I’m not sure as of yet what the missing component is.

November 9th.

Apple Pie Smoothie.

I had already decided to make this smoothie when I saw that somebody had commented that it was so gross.

I didn’t have time to look for a new recipe so I decided that it wouldn’t be the first time that I’ve had something gross and I’d give it a go. The only thing that I changed was that I added 1/2 cup of ice for the slushy consistency. Also, I always use unsweetened vanilla almond milk. I didn’t think it tasted gross at all. I’m not sure it tasted like apple pie either. I had Miss Sunshine try it. She didn’t think it was horrid, but she didn’t think it tasted like apple pie.

Assessment: Not bad. I’m not sure it’ll be in my rotation. I typically use smoothies to pack in a bunch of vitamins and minerals in a tasty drink. Most of these ingredients, I’d rather just eat on their own.

November 10th.

Mint Chocolate Chip Smoothie.

The recipe was my inspiration for this smoothie, but I did not follow the recipe. Miss Sunshine and I were trying to finish up the packing to head down to Greensboro for her soccer tournament. I had mint leaves left over from the chickpea salad, so I created a concoction with ingredients I had in the house.

My version:

• 1/2 cup ice
• 1 cup of almond milk
• Large handful of spinach (I have a big hand. It was over 1/2 cup, but probably less than 1 cup)
• 1 Tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1 Tbsp mini chocolate chips
• Slightly less than 1/2 cup mint leaves
• 1 banana

It looked like wheatgrass so I added a few frozen raspberries and mint leaves to the top for appeal. I don’t usually care for chocolate drinks. I do, however, love mint. The drink tasted good enough to finish. Miss Sunshine thought it was okay. We both agreed that the chocolate overpowered the mint. Not that the chocolate tasted bad, we just would have preferred the mint notes to come through more. The chocolate chips settled into the chopped pile toward the bottom. As a side note: the raspberries enhanced the flavor.

Assessment: Less chocolate. More mint. Try again.

November 11th.

Banana Bread Overnight Oats.

No photo. No love. It’s me. Not them.

I needed a recipe that could be made at the hotel. Overnight oats seemed to be the easiest option. There may be versions that I would find that I love, but that day it wasn’t this one. I like oatmeal, but I eat my oatmeal with a slight amount of orange blossom honey. On the occasion that I’ve eaten it at a hotel breakfast buffet, I add a tiny amount of brown sugar and slivered almonds. This was too sweet for me on that specific morning.

Assessment: While I haven’t ruled out overnight oats, I think I might like berries over bananas.

November 12th.

Cream Cheese Stuffed Dates.

I expected to be home from Miss Sunshine’s soccer tournament earlier than how life turned out. I did not plan ahead for a recipe. But, I am not one to proclaim defeat so I worked with something quick and easy that I had in the house. I had some Medjool dates and I put a dollop of cream cheese inside, drizzled a little orange blossom honey across the top and crumbled a pecan. It was the perfect mix of sweet and not. You’ll find this isn’t exactly like the recipe. I’m sure that version is just as tasty. Also, I find that all honey tastes differently. I’m obsessed with orange blossom honey. This is because I grew up near orange groves in South Florida. This honey has a very distinctive taste. I can find it at my local grocery store or I pick some up when I return home to Florida.

Assessment: Great appetizer or snack. Definitely going into the rotation.

Did you see any recipes that you might give a try?

I’m hoping that this week is a little less chaotic and I can try more main dish recipes.

Stay tuned.

Oh…and Miss Sunshine and her teammates were U15 Champions!

Check out week 3 and week 4 and the final set in lessons learned.

 

 

Let your light shine!

Amy