Recipes

Chai Tea

It's that time of year! The leaves are changing, there's a crisp breeze in the air, you're putting on the coat and scarf, and craving something with cinnamon. If you're a fan of Chai tea click here and check out a tasty recipe I came across!

Pitas and Falafels

If you enjoy Greek food I would recommend trying these pitas and falafels. Click here to get the recipe. Enjoy!

Green Smoothies

If you want a tasty but healthy smoothie recipe check out a blog post I recently did by clicking here. It has the recipe and step-by-step instructions on how to make it.

Pasta Party

I hosted a Pinterest party this past weekend and I tried out some new yummy recipes (to see a post about the crafts we did click here). We made Italian food and some brownie dessert (which the dessert was a yummy disaster! Check out the post for the details on that one :). 

I absolutely love lasagna but I didn't want to make it the traditional way, so we made lasagna rolls instead with some broiled tomatoes and butter/garlic/herb french bread. Oh man, the whole meal was fabulous! I started off taking some good pictures to put on the blog, but I'm not going to lie. Half way in I got a wee bit distracted by the aroma filling the house and once I took the first bite it was over! I remembered half way through the meal to snap a picture of the bread but that was after it was half way eaten! Oh well...I will just explain in detail what a lack of pictures can not.

Here are most of the ingredients I used for the lasagna rolls:

Lasagna noodles

Tomato sauce

spinach (better to use fresh, but I didn't have time to prepare that!)

Ricotta cheese

Mozzarella cheese

Different spices and such (garlic powder, Italian seasoning, etc.)

While the water is boiling and the noodles are finishing I like to prepare the filling. After squeezing all the water out of the spinach, mix it into the ricotta cheese. Add the garlic powder, Italian seasoning, etc. Mix well until even dispersed. 

Drain the noodles. I like to run cold water over the noodles so my hands don't get scalded. Lay the noodles flat, take a butter knife and spread a thin layer of the mix across the whole noodle and then roll the noodle up. I put a thin layer of tomato sauce on the bottom of the tray before placing the rolls. 

After finishing the rolls, pour a decent amount of sauce to cover the whole tray so that the noodles don't dry out when baking. Top with some graded mozzarella cheese. I usually set the oven for about 350 or 375 degrees and put tin foil over the tray. Bake with the tin foil on for the first 25 minutes. Take the tin foil off and continue to bake an additional 10 or 15 minutes. 

Now for the broiled herb/mozzarella topped tomatoes. Super easy and wonderfully delicious! Items needed include: Tomato(s), olive oil, mozzarella cheese, fresh herbs of your choosing. I would suggest parsley or basil. I didn't have basil so I had to go with parsley and it came out perfect. Slice up a tomato and place on a tray. Drizzle some olive oil across the slices, top with the cheese and fresh herbs, then place in the oven on broil until the cheese is golden brown on top. I think it took about 5 minutes, but just keep an eye on it :)

The French Bread. Man, this bread was AMAZING! If you love garlic, butter, bread, and artichokes, this is the recipe for you! For this recipe you will need: 

• Artichoke hearts (my Wal-Mart doesn't sell fresh artichokes so I have to go with the canned kind...) 
• 5 or 6 cloves of fresh garlic
• 1 stick of butter
• Some fresh parsley or basil (like I mentioned before, parsley was the only option but I bet basil would be killer!)
• Loaf of french bread 

Take the garlic cloves, a nice handful of herbs, and about 3/4 of the can of artichoke hearts and put in a food processor so that it is finally ground up. Dump all of those ingredients into a bowl and mix in the soften stick of butter.

For the bread, cut about 1" slices. The trick is to only slice 3/4 of the way through the loaf. Take a butter knife and spread the mix between the slices. Wrap in tin foil and place in the oven at 350 for about 10 minutes. What I liked to do to get the bread toasty is to take the top of the tin foil off and switch to broil until the bread is browning nicely on top. This took about 3 minutes so keep an eye on it when you switch to broil. Here is a half finished product. I was lucky I remembered to take the picture when I did! So yummy!

Fruit Pizza Bites

This past weekend I had a surprise 30th birthday party for James. One of the first foods that popped into my head to make for the special event was FRUIT PIZZA Bites! This recipe is an easy one and definitely a top favorite dessert of mine. Because I was making enough for about 30 people I made a double order. But here are the list of the ingredients for 48 pizza bites:

1 container of cool whip

1 package of cream cheese

1 package of sugar cookie dough (Pillsbury ready-to-bake dough is what I used)

Favorite fruit toppings

A mini cupcake tin

Electric hand mixer

**Pre-heat oven at 350 degrees**

I would definitely recommend making your own sugar cookie dough, but a quick way to make it is by using the ready-to-bake, refrigerated Pillsbury brand sugar cookie dough (you can find this at your local Wal-Mart refrigerated section). The thing I like the best about this brand is that the dough comes in already squared off pieces of dough that you can easily cut to the right size of dough. You will cut each square of dough in half and roll into a small ball as pictured below.

Once you have cut and rolled up the dough, place into the mini cupcake tin. Then place into the oven for approximately 10-12 minutes. 

Since every oven is different, it's probably a smart idea to closely watch the dough. The dough will start to rise but at just about the time you take it out, it actually starts to sink in and ends up being the perfect little shell for you frosting and fruit toppings! Once the dough sinks in I usually let it bake about 1 minute or so more until the very edges are browning. When they come out they should like just like this:

I usually let them cool for about a minute (but not too long or they will stick to the pan!). To get them out I run a butter knife around the side of the cookie and it pops out super easy.

Now for the super easy topping. It's just a thing of cool whip and a package of cream cheese. I usually set the cream cheese out for a few hours to soften it up. When it's time to make the topping, put the cream cheese and the cool whip into a bowl and mix it with a hand mixer til it's smooth. I usually start the topping right after I put the first batch of cookies in. I usually mix it, cut up the fruit for the topping, and then mix it again to get it as smooth as possible. It takes a little bit for the cream cheese to evenly distribute into the cool whip.

After that, it's easy-peasy. I let the cookies cool than butter those bad boys up with the whipped cream topping. Cut up some fruit and decorate away! I usually try to put strawberries, kiwi, grapes, and blueberries on them but since some of that fruit is out of season, and my Wal-Mart sucks at stocking, my options were limited to strawberries and kiwi. But here is what the finished product looks like!