Showing posts with label food. Show all posts
Showing posts with label food. Show all posts

Sunday, May 27, 2012

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!!

Thursday, December 29, 2011

Favorites of 2011!

Here it is, the post you've all been waiting for... or not :-)   I've compiled a list of my favorite things of 2011. Keep in mind, these are my favorites, not necessarily the best, according to critics and the like. Some were brand new things that were introduced this year, while others I just happened to read, watch, buy or consume this year. Nothing is ranked in order, as that would take entirely too long for me. Enjoy, and share your own favorites for the year in the comments section!

Reading
Books
The Help
The Hunger Games trilogy
The Firm

Magazines
Entertainment Weekly
Good Housekeeping

Television
TV Shows 
The Middle
The Sing Off
Downsized
The Voice
The Closer
Parks and Recreation
Modern Family

New (2011) Shows
Revenge
The Glee Project
Up All Night
New Girl
Switched at Birth

Guilty Pleasures
Pretty Little Liars
Sister Wives
The TO Show
Dance Moms
Real Housewives of Atlanta & New York   

Music
CDs
Adele "21"
The Cocktails "Another Round"
Bruno Mars "Doowops and Hooligans"
Kelly Clarkson "Stronger"
Florence and the Machine "Ceremonials"
Maroon 5 "Hands All Over"

Songs
"Rolling in the Deep" Adele
"Moves Like Jagger" Maroon 5 & Christina Aguilera
"Perfect" Pink
"Not Over You" Gavin Degraw
"Til the World Ends" Britney Spears
"Skyscraper" Demi Lovato
"Poison and Wine" The Civil Wars
"Without You" David Guetta & Usher
"Mr. Know It All" Kelly Clarkson

Movies 
2011 Releases
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2
Super 8
The Muppets
Bridesmaids

Technology
Blogs

Apps
Hanging with Friends
IMDB Trivia
Spotify
Flixster
TripAdvisor

Shopping
New Beauty Products

New Food Finds 


Okay friends! Now it's your turn!