recipes Archives - Page 6 of 17

Big Mac salad – Special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, sesame seeds!

cheese, other sites, recipes, salad, sandwiches | January 9, 2012 | By Jessi

Okay, so it’s not the absolute most appetizing-looking dish on its own, but it *does* look like someone tore up a few McDonald’s big macs and threw them in a bowl, right? Which, for all intents and purposes, is pretty ideal for something called a Big Mac Salad.

I’m sharing the recipe directly here because I hate when things like this go missing. I highly recommend clicking through the recipe link and scanning the comments and pictures, though. There’s some great info about serving this hot versus cold, how even though it’s a “salad,” it’s not exactly healthy, etc.

8 slices white bread

1 -1 1/2 lb extra lean ground beef

1/2 cup finely chopped onion

1 head iceberg lettuce, shredded

1 1/2 cups shredded cheddar cheese

3/4 cup mayonnaise

1/4 cup ketchup

2 tablespoons sweet pickle relish

1/4-1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon pepper

1 tablespoon sesame seed

Directions:

Toast all eight pieces of bread until just lightly golden-brown. Let cool and cut into cubes; set aside.

Brown and drain the extra lean ground beef. Let cool.

In a large bowl, combine the cooked and cooled ground beef, toasted bread cubes,finely chopped onions, shredded lettuce and cheese; toss well. Place in a large salad/serving bowl.

In a separate small bowl, stir together the mayonnaise, ketchup, relish, salt and pepper.

Drizzle the dressing over the salad. You can either leave it drizzled or toss everything to evenly coat salad.

Sprinkle with sesame seeds.

Doesn’t that ingredient list just scream “I’m a Big Mac”? I thought so.

Asian Chicken Noodle Soup – For when you want something a little different than “homestyle”

asian, cabbage, carrots, chicken, cooking challenge, dinner, pasta, recipes, rice noodles, soup, winter, winter food | January 7, 2012 | By Jessi

14 comments

Last month I signed up for the Crazy Cooking Challenge and immediately kept an eye out for chicken noodle soup recipes. I knew I wanted something “different,” just for the sheer sake of this being your not-so-average cooking site, but really, there’s only so much you can twist and tweak a classic dish like chicken noodle soup. The requirements said it had to be soup…had to have noodles…and had to have chicken. No exceptions, so there would be no converting it into a hot pocket or casserole or anything “different.”

Or so I thought anyway.

That’s when I ran across Lynn’s Kitchen Adventures Asian version. It fits all the requirements, but isn’t exactly the standard soup you think of either. I probably wouldn’t have given it a try had it not seemed so perfect for this challenge either, so I’m glad it worked out this way. Turns out, it was delicious!

I must say, I really had my doubts about it, mostly because the ingredients are so simple and it doesn’t sit on the stove, simmering for a long period of time, which is a key step for soups in my mind. But anyway, let’s get to the food, huh?

Normally I would have homemade chicken stock in the freezer, but I’ve been looking for an excuse to use up the last of these little Knorr stock packs I received at BlogHer this year. They’re actually a lot better than I thought they would be and don’t carry the overly salted taste that most premade broths do.

And would you look at that?? I thought it’d be liquidy or maybe a dry block like bouillon cubes, but instead, they’re gel packs of sorts. Almost like strange jello shots….of chicken stock. Weird, but easily dissolved and mixed.

I think I may’ve mentioned that my can opener broke? Well I haven’t replaced it yet. Shhh. :P

For the slaw, I just finely sliced part of a cabbage and carrot that was already in the fridge and on their last legs. The cabbage in the final product wasn’t really even noticeable…it blended in entirely. It’s great for the bumping up the nutrition, but if you don’t have any on hand, it’s not going to make or break this recipe. The carrot added some nice color and texture, though.

My “red sauce” of choice was chili garlic sauce that I’m savoring the bottom of the jar of. I love this stuff so much. I added some both directly to the soup and more to mine after serving to give it some extra kick.

If you’ve never cooked with rice noodles before, they’re quite amazing. They’re really rough and crumbly out of the package…pieces will fly everywhere, even if you’re careful. Add them to water for a few minutes, though, and they become really soft and bouncy. Yes, bouncy, as in, if you drain off the water and toss them on the table, you’ll see them bounce. Go ahead, do it!

But that’s not relevant to the recipe, so moving on….

Put it all together and you get something like this:

Asian chicken noodle soup with rice vermicelli noodles, carrots, cabbage, cole slaw, green onions, soy sauce, and chicken

Alright, so really, it doesn’t *look* like the most appetizing dish. It’s this sickly gray color that even with some photo editing, doesn’t really look much better.

But it tastes good and that’s what really matters. Be happy I spared you the grosser series of prep pictures that were more like this picture. The shadows actually make it look better.

Ew! But it smelled delicious and I was starving so at that point, I obviously carried on. Tossing on more color really helped, so I’m happy I had green onions.

Asian chicken noodle soup with rice vermicelli noodles, carrots, cabbage, cole slaw, green onions, soy sauce, and chicken and coconut milk

Overall impression? It was better than I expected. It was really easy and fast to make, which made it even better. A little lemon or lime juice could really go a long way in kicking it up a notch in the flavor department, too.

Oh, and I had never used coconut milk before because well, I really dislike coconut, remember? When the can was opened and the smell hit me, I started having even more doubts, but it added a creaminess that straight broth couldn’t…and it didn’t actually *taste* like coconut, so once the smell died down, I was happy with the results, hehe. I added more liquid to my bowl than what’s showing in the pictures and oh my god, I was so stuffed by the end. I had no idea it would be so filling.

For the original recipe, check out Lynn’s Kitchen Adventures. She has a version that doesn’t use the coconut milk, too, which looks more like this:

Asian chicken noodle soup with rice vermicelli noodles, carrots, cabbage, cole slaw, green onions, soy sauce, and chicken

My version of the recipe ended up being for a smaller batch. Take note I didn’t just cut the original in half, and actually used almost the full amount of some of the ingredients anyway.

Asian Chicken Noodle Soup

1 sheet of rice vermicelli noodles
3 cups chicken broth
2/3 can coconut milk
A large splash of soy sauce
One inch piece of fresh ginger, peeled
1 cup cooked chicken
1 cup finely sliced cabbage/carrot slaw mix
1/2 teaspoon chili garlic sauce, tweaked to taste
Handful of diced green onions

Soak noodles in warm water until you’re ready for them. 3 minutes is usually plenty, but it won’t hurt to let them sit longer.

Heat chicken broth, coconut milk, soy sauce, and ginger to a boil. Let simmer for 5ish minutes. I let it cook a little longer to try to get more flavor out of the ginger…which still couldn’t really be tasted much in the final dish, so I would probably go even longer.

Add chicken and let cook until everything is heated through.

Drain noodles and cut into thirds using scissors or butcher knife. It’s a lot easier to eat this way. Add them to the soup, plus the cabbage mix. Let heat just for another minute or two, pull out the ginger pieces, and you’re ready to go.

Add green onions, hot sauce, and some salt or extra soy sauce to taste.

Remember to check out others at the Crazy Cooking Challenge.

Seven layer pea salad recipe – Or how to make new best friends

holidays, recipes, salad, Thanksgiving, vegetables, veggies | December 19, 2011 | By Jessi

One comment

I have no idea when we discovered (rediscovered?) this salad, but it’s worked its way into being a traditional meal expected at many family gatherings, including Thanksgiving and summer barbecues.

Don’t you just love a dish that isn’t bound by seasons? Or is that only me?

Seven layer salad with peas, bacon, cheese, green onions, mayonnaise and sugar dressing

Again with the “recipes that aren’t really recipes,” I’m really not sure of the amounts that go in, but here’s a good guesstimate for you:

1 package bacon, cooked and chopped (minus the strips used for “taste testing” and “ugly ones that have to be eaten”)

1 head of lettuce (minus all the bits that fly to the floor, depending on who is chopping it)

1 cup frozen peas, thawed in boiling water for about a minute (minus 1/2 if I’m doing it because I really don’t like the peas)

8-12 ounces shredded Cheddar cheese (minus….oh who am I kidding? I have no idea how much actually makes it in the salad)

One bunch of green onions (or red or white or whatever that furry thing in the fridge is that kinda smells like an onion)

1 1/4 cups mayonnaise

2 tablespoons white sugar

Prep and layer all but the last two ingredients. We make multiple layers of each, but you could simply put all of each ingredient as its own layer.

Mix the mayo and sugar together and spread it directly on top of the salad. Create a “seal” with the dressing, if you will, and then cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate. This is important! This is the type of dish that gets better as it sets, so make it a couple hours in advance. Mix together just before serving.

So is that 7 layers? Nope. There are lots of salads that float around as “7 layer salads",” with all sorts of varied ingredients like cauliflower, broccoli, green peppers, and boiled eggs.

But really, all that stuff takes away from the cheese, bacon, and dressing, don’t you think? The ~~green stuff~~ lettuce and peas are just there as a filler so it can still be called a salad. :P

Also, if you skipped over the recipe, ~~shame on you~~ I was serious about the seal being important. Looks like this:

And while I’m at it, here’s some more pictures from that Thanksgiving, uh, 3 years ago?

From pea salad up top, clockwise, we had green bean casserole , corn on the cob, turkey, mashed cauliflower and gravy, stuffing, and my first attempt at making my own cranberry sauce (hence the tiny portion…I’ve never had good experiences with cranberry sauce, but this was pretty good).

The obligatory green bean casserole….extra fried onion crispies to counteract the green beans.

Yes, I took a picture of the gravy. It turned out the perfect color and consistency. I was thrilled. Shush it.

The pies, pumpkin, pecan, and apple crisp:

And I’m posting these mostly because I was trying to find a good picture of the pea salad on the table.

But what I found was that in every single picture, one of the kids in staring at the food on the table instead of the camera, lol. Love it. I’m sure they couldn’t wait for me to finally put the camera down so we could dig in…I know I couldn’t, hehe. B’s even licking her lips in the first one.