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Chex mix has never really been at the top of my list, but then I made this spicy version with Asian flair and was hooked. I made a crazy huge amount and left it out in my apartment all week. Everyone was addicted after a few days! This would be the perfect thing to put out if you have people staying over for the holidays. Check out my sriracha chex mix recipe on Tablespoon.
You guys have no idea how good it felt to have a bit of a vacation for the holiday last week. Not only did I take a few days off the blog, but I took the whole week off "real work"! It was super relaxing and I did a ton of fun stuff, little of which involved cooking. I really needed the break cause I was feeling a little burnt out in the kitchen, messing up easy recipes and taking some photos that I wouldn't really consider up to my standards. These macaroons were pretty much the last straw. Something that should have been easy turned into mashing 2 different recipes and the wrong ingredients into a cookie that tasted like eating gravel. Click through to see the photos of this mess.
It's a tradition in my family to make tortellini the day after thanksgiving. We make them and freeze them to eat on Christmas Eve. For a better writeup on this tradition, or making tortellini in general, check out the first post I wrote about it. For now though, I am going to talk about the soup I made to feed the workers this year. No one is going to come over and work for 4 hours and not be compensated! It's my job to pull a soup together to feed everyone about half way through the operation.
I ate an amazing cookie at a farmers market that inspired the recipe for this pie. The best part is that you guys can all try the cookie too because they ship to anywhere in the country! Check out the CC L'Orange cookie here, and check out my recipe for Cran-Orange-White Chocolate-Coconut Pie on Tablespoon.
It's always a tough thing to have some friends over the week of Thanksgiving. People want Thanksgiving, but they don't want THANKSGIVING. I always try and work in some of the flavors, but give them a creative twist that wont ruin the upcoming big meal. We called this one an Asian Thanksgiving, because it had some of the ingredients of the big meal (turkey, mashed potatoes, cooked greens), but added a lot of Asian flair (ginger, soy sauce, wasabi, bok choy). It turned out to be a great meal with some old friends that wasn't too hard to put together but tasted fantastic.
The infamous banana-habanero-pork flavor combination rears it's head again! This time in a crazy chili recipe where the banana flavor really surprised people. In a good way! Check out my recipe for Habanero Banana Chili on Tablespoon today.
Thanksgiving meal in sausage form. I stuffed cranberries, stuffing, and ground turkey into a sausage casing last week to hold me over when I was craving Thanksgiving dinner early. Check out the recipe for Thanksgiving Sausage on tablespoon.
It's a long standing tradition here on TFimB (season 4, season 5, season 6, season 7) to endorse a Top Cheftestant before the show even starts based on facial hair alone! Last year I didn't get to do it because season 8 was all-stars, so I am happy to be back for season 9. If you watched the two pre-episodes (is that what we are calling those?), you know there is one crazy front-runner in the battle of the beards.
Andrew has a pretty standard beard situation, it's a little low on the face though.
Edward is rocking the standard sushi-chef look. Long handlebars with a mini chin thing. He is flirting with goatee though.
Richie knows how to rock some serious handlebars. I was a fan of him in the pre-episodes and I think he is gonna do well.
Tylor knows a thing or two about the ironic moustache. I wonder if he also likes skinny jeans and PBR?
KEITH!!!!! Thank you Keith. You have my vote, now and forever. Also those glasses? Killing it. Do us bearded folk proud!
Have you guys caught the pre-episodes? Who do you like so far?
Bro week was more of a success than I had imagined! Don't worry though, I'm not gonna do anything drastic like stop making crazy complex meals with strange flavor combinations and impossible to find ingredients. But before we close the book on bro week, I wanted to give you guys a nice convenient page to bookmark with links to all the bro recipes and a bunch of other recipes of mine that are on the easy side. And don't worry, I heard the requests for Ladies Week... I might tackle that late January...
Baked Chicken with Tomatoes and Spinach
Fra Diavolo with Linguine and Mussels
Coconut Crusted Pork with Grilled Pineapple
Flank Steak Sandwiches
One of my faves
Buffalo Shrimp Tacos
Honey Mustard Risotto
Bacon Wrapped Meatloaf
Beef Kabobs with Cous Cous
Andouillee and Chicken over Sweet Potato Grits
Rice and Bean Tart
My dad made this off my directions so it can't be that hard!
Baked Beans
1 pound bacon + 1 pound beans = awesomeness
Steak and Gorgonzola fettuccini
Sausage and Bean Ditalini
Penne with Shrimp and Arugula
Korean Spicy Marinaded Pork
Thai Chile Basil Beef
Quinoa Stuffed Peppers
Fish in a bag
The original easy meal on my site. This is a wicked old post and you can tell, but fish in a bag is a classic recipe that I have made countless times. Also people get real angry in the comments, then there is a lot of spam I should probably clean up...
Potato Rosemary Sausage Soup
Lasagna Soup
Asparagus Soup
Buffalo Chicken Soup
Sweet Potato Fish Chowder
Broccoli Soup
Carrot and Leek Soup
You read my website, so I don't need to convince you of how awesome short ribs are, especially around this time of the year. Paired with a sauce of balsamic, tomato and parm, they become even better! check out my recipe for Braised short ribs with a tomato balsamic parm sauce on tablespoon
Pulled pork and tacos are definitely two bro meals. I've made bbq tacos in the past, but I wanted to make a simplified recipe that any bro could master! When I made this meal, all of my roommates asked me one by one how to make the pulled pork and were shocked by how easy it was. The best thing about this recipe is it makes a large amount and it's perfect for your next bro-down watching the game this Sunday.
BRO. A girl is coming over for dinner and you need to make something delicious. But there's not much time! Don't worry, stop at the fish market on your way home from work GTL and you can pull together a super simple yet elegant and impressive meal in less than half an hour! Fra diavolo is usually made with lots of tomatoes and crushed pepper flakes, but this version uses sriracha and banana peppers to bring the spice and stays light on the tomato to not drown out the delicious mussel "juice". And I think you know a thing or two about muscle juice.
French onion soup is any self respecting bro's app of choice at their local chain steakhouse. I wanted to make a soup for bro week because one of the reasons I decided to do this week in the first place was my friend asking for an easy soup recipe to cook for his sick girlfriend. But french onion soup isn't really a meal now is it? I added some beans and beef to make it a bit more substantial.
Bro week continues today with a super easy mac and cheese dish. The main barrier to entry when it comes to making and mastering mac and cheese is the bechamel sauce. Making a nice thick cheese sauce requires a bit of effort that most bros are not willing to put in, so the blue box reigns. THIS mac and cheese however requires no such thing! The secret is the mixing of soft and semi-soft cheeses to form a perfect gooey creamy and tangy cheese sauce without all the effort!
It's bro week! When I say "bro week" I don't mean bro food like chicken wings and pizza, what I mean is recipes that bros can make. Probably 4 or 5 times in the past month, good friends of mine have asked me for recipes and when I try and direct them to my website I realize that many of my recipes are too hard to make! The food I post on TFimB is stuff that I love to make and eat, but not stuff that your average inexperienced cook can make. I decided to dedicate a week of recipes to my friends who don't know what they are doing in the kitchen. Super easy meals that they could make, enjoy, and maybe even impress some people with.
Bro week starts off today with a simple weeknight dinner. It was inspired by my roommate Joe. He came home after work one night and slapped 2 chicken breasts in a baking dish with no seasoning of any kind. He popped it in the oven, and 20 minutes later he ate the dried out bland chicken with a generous helping of BBQ sauce. As far as I could see, this whole ordeal took about 3 minutes of active prep, 20 minutes of baking time, and 2 ingredients. I set out to try and make a weeknight meal that had a similar time commitment with only a few more ingredients and a way better payoff.
Hey guys! Normally I wouldn't post 3 links to my tablespoon recipes in a week, but there are a few reasons for this. 1, My schedule is all over the place right now. 2, I am doing extra recipes for Tablespoon in Oct and Nov. And 3, next week is a THEME WEEK so I wont be linking any Tablespoon recipes. Wohoo theme weeks! I love theme weeks! The theme of next week is "bro week" so that's obviously gonna be awesome. But for now, check out the Coconut Pumpkin Soup recipe on tablespoon. It's a new take on pumpkin soup, loosely based on the classic Thai soup, tom yum. And yum it was! Make sure you read the sincere letter to curried pumpkin soup in that post. And if you need more pumpkin recipes, Macheesemo recently posted an awesome pumpkin pie/coffee cake hybrid that will kill at your next brunch!
Busy, busy, busy, cold, running around, doing errands, rain, SNOW, chill in the air, power outages, trees down, shoveling, cold showers, cooking with a sterno, midterms, raincoats, 5 hours of sleep, wet shoes, crowded train, cold car in the morning. STOP. Make this. Feel better.The Fall Shepherd's Pie recipe on tablespoon is comfort food defined.
There were some leftover meatballs from my peanut noodle dish, so I made this awesome sandwich with them a few days later. Based on a banh mi, this guy was packed with flavor. Sweet, salty, sour, and spicy with a strong essence of ginger and Thai basil. So good that it didn't feel like leftovers.
© 2009 The Food In My Beard
