Mexican Breakfast

On the weekends I usually have some creative breakfast ideas brewing, and today was no exception. This creation turned out to be really delicious and I'm extra proud because it is made from all "whole food" ingredients, nothing processed and everything home made (except for the cholula hot sauce). Another great thing about today's breakfast was that I was able to use some things I already had in the fridge. 

And I present to you:

Griddled Brown Rice Patty with Mixed Beans and Fried Egg

I used cooked brown rice from the fridge to make the patties. I put two handfulls of cold rice into my Blendtec blender on the "grind grains" setting until it was fluffy and uniform. I seasoned the rice meal with salt and pepper.

Then I formed the mixture into flat patties and put them on the griddle with a little butter.

Using the brown rice was more nutritious than an average slice of bread, and beans on bread is just too fluffy/starchy for me. The rice patties came out crisp and sturdy, a nice contrast to the soft beans.

I fried some farm fresh eggs hatched only days ago that I picked up with my first CSA share from my local organic farm.

Finally assembly:
I topped the brown rice patty with a spoonful of mixed beans (previously cooked with chicken stock), a generous dousing of Cholula hot sauce and a beautifully orange yolked egg.


Yum. And it was a hit with my testy tester as well.

         

Kids Today

I have always been envious of the young people growing up in the Woodstock generation. Young people who left home for San Francisco with a flower in their hair, feeling free to get weird and be whoever they thought they were. To me, these young people represent the birth of individualism. They were first generation to disregard the mold created by their parents' generation. (I understand that this may not be an accurate discription of youth in the 1960's and 1970's, it's only my (an 80's kid's) impression of it).

Now, as it turns out, its all happening again.

Thanks to Glee, Youtube, American Idol, Etsy, and other resources available today, what used to be labeled nerdy and shun-worthy is no more. Chorus is now cool? You are actually uploading that video of your mediocre singing and strumming of a guitar? Middle School and High Schoolers can now come out as gay? A small business start-up is your after school activity? All of these things were unheard of when I was in school.  

While I am happy for the young people growing up now, I am also desperately sad that I was too shy to pursue my own interests. Now, decades later, I am finally working up the courage.

The Salad Bar - A Wealth of Money Saving Opportunity

Until recently, when I thought of the salad bar, I thought of the chance to exercise my "eyes bigger than my stomach" muscle, and to pay way more for my meal than I had anticipated. While that aspect of the salad bar remains true, I have rediscovered the salad bar as a wealth of ingredient opportunity for relatively little cost.

 

Sundried Tomatoes: In an attempt to copy the paralyzingly delicious namesake sandwich from the Red Onion in Burlington, Vermont, I was preparing "Red Onion" sandwiches for some lunch guests. The sandwich requires sundried tomato mayonaise. I have never been a big fan of sundried tomatoes and I knew that if i bought a container of them, they would go to waste, along with the money I used to buy them. Then I had a lightbulb moment: I could just grab a few off the salad bar! So for a few cents, I purchased all the sundried tomatoes I needed.

 

Pepperoni:  Next was just last week when I needed pepperoni to make pizza paninis for a quick dinner. I knew I didn't want to purchase an entire package of pepperoni, so I headed to the salad bar and plucked out ten sices. Then I spyed grilled sliced chicken in one of the cubbies, and after confirming that it didn't taste gross, I added that to my container. I rounded out the shopping trip with ten small fresh mozzerella balls. I checked out with one container costing around $4. Along with pizza sauce, mushrooms and spices, the paninis were great. And I wasn't stuck with a whole package of pepperoni.

Shredded Carrots: I grabbed these to save time and effort, when I made my Improv Vegan Chili. 

Check it out:

(http://whatiseeanddo.blogspot.com/2013/09/improv-vegan-chili.html)

 

So, next time you need a small amount of an ingredient that you probably will not use again, go grab it from the salad bar. You'll save money and valueable space in your fridge.

Quick Cheap Holiday Decor

Here is another quick cheap way to spruce up your space for the holidays. Use festive wrapping paper to cover art already hanging on the wall. Add one additional touch like a graphic card or large bow as I've done here. You can see a candy cane wreath on the peppermint background in a previous post.

Homemade Holidays

This year I've been dedicated to making the holiday decor for our home. Rather than buying new things, I have taken a more homemade approach.


 I found two holiday cards that I had kept from last year. I loved them so much I wanted to make them more permanent and useable from year to year.


I used a hole punch around the edge of each card, and crocheted a frame and hanging chain. I love the final product.

Pattern for the larger frame: in the first hole 1sc, 1hdc, 2dc, 1hdc, 1sc, ch1. Repeat in each hole. For corners, 1sc, 1hdc, 1dc, ch1, 1dc, 1hdc, 1sc, ch1. 

 

When you have gone all the way around, slip stitch to join at the end.



Slip stitch into back of top corners and chain however many until you reach desired length. Sl st to fasten off.

 

 

Pattern for the smaller frame: in each hole, 1sc, 1dc, 1sc, ch 4, repeat in each hole.


For corners, 1sc, 1dc, 1sc, ch 1, 1sc, 1dc, 1sc, ch 1.


For chain: Slip stitch back into desired location and chain however many stitches until you reach the desired length.

Happy Holidays and Happy Crafting!

Ham Bone Soup

This Hanukkah, to my great delight, I received the gift of a Honey Baked Ham. Yum. (Pork is no stranger to my kitchen.) As a bonus, this also marked my first opportunity to cook with a ham bone. With no dinner planned, I stopped at the market on the way home from work and picked up some beans for what would be my ham and bean soup.

Since I'm terrible at making decisions, I chose the very non-committal 15 bean variety blend. I had finely chopped onion in my refrigerator, and I didn't feel like buying more veggies. Therefore I was keeping it simple. Into the pot went 3/4 cup finely chopped onion, about 3 cups of water, 1.5 cups of mixed dried beans, and liberal unmeasured amounts of dried garlic, black pepper, thyme, onion powder, about 1tbsp Cholula hot sauce, the ham bone, some additional ham. This cooked on medium.

After twentyish minutes I took a taste, and there was nothing good about it. To add to its "appeal," it was looking pretty grey. I added more ham, carrots and a frozen brick of chopped spinach.

Another twentyish minutes of simmering and I took another taste. This time it was yum, and it looked much better too. The carrots were very soft so I turned the burner off and let the pot sit on the hot spot for a little further melding of the flavors.


Everyone liked it and the house smelled great. Here's lunch and dinner for the next few days. Enjoy!

Healthy No Bake Breakfast Bites

After days of prepping and cooking for Thanksgiving and a few more hours of preparing extra healthy lunches for the week, what's the first thing I wanted to do when it was time to relax on Sunday night? Get involved in another recipe of course! These no-bake breakfast bites were on the top of my list. (http://fooddoodles.com/2011/06/28/one-bowl-all-natural-no-bake-energy-bites/ picture from this website)

I used the following ingredients: 1/2c peanut butter, 1/3c honey, 3/4c unsweetened shredded coconut, 1/4c ground flax, 1/4c chia seeds, 1/4c raisins, 1c uncooked oatmeal, 4tbsp hemp protein powder, pinch salt, 1tsp vanilla extract.

Typically I would steer clear of a recipe that calls for 1/2 cup nut butter and 1/3 cup honey because I hate to use so much of those precious ingredients all at once, but I caved in and went for it anyway. After all, if i'm ever going to get to work on time, I need to figure out a quick-grab breakfast option that's not full of processed junk, sugar, and empty calories.

This recipe was incredibly easy to put together - in a bowl mix the wet ingredients, add in the dry ingredients, and refrigerate for 30 minutes. The hard part was turning the bowl of ingredients into neat tightly packed balls. This took me quite a while.

The other bummer was, the recipe, as written on the above website, does not have all that much protein, so I added 4 tbsp of hemp protein powder. Thankfully, the powder did not overpower the other yummy flavors, in fact, I could not even taste it (and when you can taste the hemp powder, it ususally tastes pretty bad).

I laboriously formed 21 balls (mine shown on red). The recipe was supposed to yield 24, but my sizes got a little irregular. Because the plan is to eat these on the way to work, I had to dust them with something dry so that I wouldn't ruin my clothes or steering wheel with oily fingers. I chose to grind some almonds in my Blendtec blender (the wonder machine), and give the balls a roll in that. Then I packed single servings (see nutrition information below) in wax paper bags, sealed the whole stash in a big ziploc bag, and put it in the freezer.

This morning I grabbed a small bag on my way out the door. I'd say it was out of the freezer about 10 minutes before I started eating it and it was delicious. I actually ended up eating only one instead of both. Maybe I will have the second for an after-lunch dessert.

NUTRITION INFORMATION  Serving Size: One Breakfast Bite
Calories: 104.2, Total Fat: 6.2g, Saturated: 2.1g, Polyunsaturated: 1.3g, Monounsaturated: 1.7g, Trans Fat: 0, Cholesterol: 0, Sodium: 2.1mg, Potassium 48.1mg, Total Carbs: 10.5g, Dietary Fiber: 2.5g, Sugars: 6.2g, Protein: 3.1g, Vitamin A: 0%, Vitamin C: .4%, Calcium 2.1%, Iron: 4.6%.