The Co-Op: Month 3

Here's some more kitchen inspiration for you this month! Who would have ever thought I'd be writing posts like these?! Not me :-)


Recipe Inspiration: Onion Rings

Onion Rings
Ingredients we used: Vegetable oil, Great Value dry pancake mix, red onion

We followed the recipe exactly, except we used our mini deep fryer instead of a skillet. These are the BEST onion rings I've ever had. The batter stays on and the onion doesn't slide out. Oh my goodness, I want some more right now.



Recipe Inspiration: Blueberry Pie

Blueberry Pie

Ingredients we used: We used the same ingredients listed.

We had a ton of delicious sweet blueberries, so Jamie wanted to make a pie. This was the first blueberry pie I'd ever eaten, and I think it was quite good. We took it over to some friends' house and everyone there thought it was great, so the people have spoken! (And I have to give Jamie all credit for the lattice work :-D)



Recipe Inspiration: Light and Fresh Potato Salad

Light Potato Salad
Ingredients we used: balsamic vinegar, canola oil, salt, ground black pepper, 3 red potatoes, 2 small cucumbers, 3/4 cup grape tomatoes, 2/3 of green pepper, 1/4 cup yellow onion

I originally liked this recipe because it had no mayonnaise or mustard. I didn't have rice vinegar, hence the balsamic, which I think actually made it better. This was really good and I will definitely make it again... especially since they always give us LOTS of potatoes!



Recipe Inspiration: Baked Eggplant Chips

Eggplant Chips
Ingredients we used: No differences from the recipe

I followed the recipe, but as you can see from the picture, they turned out a bit chewy. If I make these again, I will use the recipe from the squash/zucchini chips and see if they are any better.



Recipe Inspiration: Fried Green Tomatoes

Fried Green Tomatoes
Ingredients we used: green tomato, salt, Mrs. Dash Table Blend, cornmeal, vegetable oil

These tasted really good actually, but next time we're going to cut them thinner so they cook a little faster, and also peel them so the cornmeal sticks better. Yum yum!



Recipe Inspiration: Roasted Radishes

Roasted Radishes
Ingredients we used: radishes, lemon, olive oil, thyme, salt & pepper

Sooo...these didn't turn out so great. I couldn't get them very evenly cooked; some parts were soft, but most not soft enough. I managed to get down what you see here, but I threw the other portion out. I hope they don't buy radishes again!!




Recipe Inspiration: Oven Roasted Eggplant

Roasted Eggplant
Ingredients we used: Same as listed... watch the oil and salt though, because it coats very easily

We made this twice, and the second time we peeled the eggplant, which was a great decision. It was much easier to eat without having to chew the skin forever. It made a little bit of a crisp on the outside anyway, so it was perfect. This is definitely my favorite eggplant recipe so far.




Recipe Inspiration: Baked Eggplant Sticks

Baked Eggplant Sticks
Ingredients we used: eggplant, olive oil, salt, pepper, cornmeal, milk, cooking spray

This was another recipe fail. They were way too cornmeal-y. Maybe it was because I changed too many of the ingredients. If you try this, let me know, so I can figure out what to do!

Memorial Day Munchies

This year, we used Memorial Day as an excuse to get a good start on using some of our produce, especially things we had an abundance of. Two of those were onions and corn on the cob, which led to this deliciousness:

You can't quite see it, but that is a grilled turkey burger patty underneath grilled peppers and onions. Then we made corn on the cob (see my previous co-op recipe blog to see how we make it) and sliced up some Roma tomatoes seasoned with salt and pepper.

And as if that's not enough, check out what we had for dessert:

That is homemade peach sorbet! We followed this recipe. We only had 2 cups of peaches though, so we used 1/2 a cup of sugar and 1/4 cup of (lite) corn syrup. We also kept it going in the ice cream maker for about 3 times as long as the recipe calls for. It was soooo good, and not too sweet at all!

We Joined a Co-Op

If you've looked at my Thrifty Thursday blogs in the past month, you may have noticed a sudden lack of produce. Well, that is thanks to the fact that Jamie and I have joined a co-op. We pay $20, once a month, for a ton of food! It has helped us with our goal of eating healthier, eating foods we probably wouldn't normally buy AND forcing us to learn how to cook some things.

We forgot to take a picture of the first batch of produce we got, so here's a list: red apples, oranges, strawberries, bananas, kiwi, beans, cabbage, carrots, corn, cucumbers, cilantro, greens, lettuce, yellow onions, spring onions, red potatoes, sweet potatoes, yellow squash, tomatoes, zucchini, and mushrooms.

Now, if you know me, you know how much I loathe cooking. I will 'Pin' food and recipes all day long, but when it comes to actually making it... that's a different story. So, I'm proud of us for buckling down and making stuff. Granted, it's all pretty easy, if I can do it :-)

Besides the requisite salads, here are some of the other things we made.

These are greens that Jamie cooked.
I'm not a big fan of them, but Jamie loves them.
You'll have to ask him for the recipe!

Here's the recipe for our homemade salsa: From our produce stock, we used fresh cilantro, yellow onion and spring onion. We didn't have enough fresh tomatoes, so we drained a can of Hunt's diced tomatoes and a can of Rotel tomatoes with chilies. We chopped up the onions and cilantro, then added them with the tomatoes into the blender and made it smoother. "(The picture is before it was blended) For a final touch of flavor, we seasoned with garlic salt and oregano. It was delicious!

These are baked zucchini chips. Although they look rather large, they're actually very tiny. I used this recipe, with a couple of alterations: Baked Zucchini Chips. I would recommend using a slicer b/c I had a mix of crispy and soft due to the fact that I sliced them by hand. I also ended up baking them for an hour and a half. As far as seasoning, I would use a grinder. That was the only thing I could figure out that would not put too much. Let me know if you figure something else out. In any case, these were really good. Hopefully next time I can more to be crispy!

I got the recipe for this roasted squash from my friend Mamie's blog. I used spring onion instead of red onion, and I didn't have any fresh spices, so I used dried basil and dried minced garlic. I actually made this twice, once using coconut oil and once with canola. The coconut was better because somehow it didn't seem as greasy, plus it just gave it a little bit of added flavor. Also, make sure to cut the squash into bigger pieces than normal, since they will get much smaller when cooked!

I'm one of those people that like to put all kinds of things in my salads: veggies, fruit and nuts. One of my favorites to make is a strawberry salad. In this particular one, I used lettuce, tomato, mushroom, mandarin oranges, strawberries, sliced almonds and pistachios. Top with a raspberry walnut vinaigrette or some type of asian dressing, like sesame ginger. Yum, yum!

In addition to this, we made Baked Sweet Potatoes, had sliced cucumbers with soy sauce, cooked Corn on the Cob, made a strawberry kiwi salad, taco salad and cooked carrots.

Here is our new batch of produce we got yesterday. Leave any recipe ideas for these new veggies in the comment section!!