Healthy Rainbow Snack for St. Patrick’s Day

edible art, holidays, other sites, peppers | February 24, 2014 | By

Spinach Artichoke Hummus in a green, yellow, orange, red pepper rainbow arch with cauliflower clouds for St. Patrick's day.

As I have mentioned time and time again, it’s really easy to turn desserts into fun edible art. After all, you can sculpt fondant into just about anything, so toss it on a cake and suddenly, you’ve become super artsy. It takes talent to create those masterpieces, no doubt, the you really don’t have to think too far outside the box to morph fondant into a known creature or object.

To turn otherwise existing foods into something cohesive and still entirely edible takes a different kind of thought process entirely. Throw in some picky eaters and well…good luck. Ha!

The mom who created the above rainbow snack somehow managed to come up with a creation that her son both helped make and loved (mostly!)….and it was healthy, at that! I know a lot of adults who wouldn’t touch something called “spinach artichoke hummus,” so hats off to this mom….even if her son still didn’t like eating the rainbow arch peppers.

If you happen to be hosting a St. Patrick’s Day gathering of any sort, I think these would be a hit compared to a lame veggie tray, too.

Pepperoni pockets – Which shape is best?

 photo Canada2011-2012576.jpg

 

I clearly love cooking. I love being in the kitchen. I love trying out new recipes. I love creating new dishes or weird food art.

What I don’t love is doing it every single day.

I burn out really fast if I have to  cook every day. Even if I’m just doing simple dinners every day or fixing my own lunch, I get lazy crazy fast if I do it too many days in a row. Then I don’t want to cook at all and I especially have no interest in playing with my food either because I want to get right back out of the kitchen as soon as possible.

So instead, I end up cooking a whole bunch at once and tossing half of it in the freezer or repurposing the ingredients for several dishes at one time. I used to do more of what the internet blogging world calls “once a month cooking” but I find it more realistic to simply do it when I have the chance…whether that’s once a month or every couple weeks or even just doubling up recipes when I’m cooking on one of those mundane “pasta for dinner…again” nights.

Below is an example of buying pepperoni and turning it into several different pizza pockets. My lighting was really bad in that kitchen, so I know some of it doesn’t look very appetizing, but every variation was delicious.

Most of the ingredients were the same… pepperoni, peppers, cheese, sauce, homemade dough…. but they were in different combinations and presentations. The braided wraps were great for dinner and midnight snacks because I could cut off whatever size I felt like. And the little “pork bun” style pockets were more perfect for tossing in a lunch bag for an easy packed lunch. The ones near the end where the pepperoni isn’t cut were a bit more similar to “pigs in a blanket” with a very strong pepperoni flavor compared to the rest.

Most of these variations also would’ve been great examples of when I fry my pepperoni first. Any of them that are chopped and mixed with other ingredients would’ve been de-grease-ified a little bit first because otherwise, the filling ends up with pockets of nasty orange-ness that I’m just not too thrilled with eating.

Homemade pizza dough for pizza pocketsPunching down the homemade pizza dough for calzones Fry pepperoni first to remove some of the grease Filling recipe for pizza calzones Chopped pepperoni, cheese, peppers, etc, for pizza pockets How to make pepperoni, pepper, and cheese pizza pockets Fill pizza dough braids with pepperoni and pizza fillings How to braid pizza dough How to braid dough for pizza wraps Flattened homemade pizza dough circles to make pork bun style pockets Lots of different ways to use the same pizza toppings in pockets instead Personalized pizzas with pepperoni and cheese Why are my pork bun pizzas exploding out the side??
(Oops!) Big bubble in pizza dough
Pepperoni and cheese pigs in a blanket  Pizza braids, calzones, pockets, personalized pizza pans 

Rainbow of peppers (Wordless Wednesday)

Several kinds of different colored peppers (red, green, yellow, purple, orange, black), hanging in rows

(I suppose there’s not that much “quirky” about this image, but it was creative to arrange them like this and I thought it was a really artsy/pretty shot. <3)