Summer Slacking

Lately its as though I've been slacking at everything in life.  Blogging, cooking, keeping my room clean.  Obviously this means the beginning of the school year and the end to another summer.  It's funny because the lack of productivity really starts in the summer when you should be cutting down your to-do lists with all your free time.  But somewhere between the pool, rehab for my knee and wedding festivities, the list has been built up and put off for quite some time now.  Since school has started again, the to-do list has been amplified and categorized as: "Home to-do lists," "Work to-do lists," "Suburb to-do lists," and "Weekend to-do lists."  It's all just very stressful.  So yes Mich, I too have an obsession with Post-its.  (I'm also convinced I'd get more done if I stopped making lists and just completed tasks as they came on.) 

Once school starts back up, you start to wonder what you did with your whole summer.  One thing that I really didn't do this summer was cook.  I'm going to chalk that one up to the never-ending heat.  Who wants to turn on a stove or oven on a 100 degree day?  As for grilling, I have two outdoor grills.  An electric grill that is slow as molasses to heat up and to cook and a good ole Weber charcoal grill.  I actually used each of these grill exactly one time this summer and decided they were just too much work.   I resorted back to my stove top grill pan which smokes up the house quite lovely.  As a result, I didn't cook very much this summer.

As school started back up, my friend Leanne started bringing in these awesome left overs for lunch which inspired me to want to look into some new recipes. Well I didn't have to look far because apparently I have a million recipes in a folder in Gmail, and another handful on pinterest and in my recipe box.  So while I was awake at 3:30am on Sunday morning, I decided it was the right time to sift through them (probably because I was trying to fight off my hunger until a reasonable breakfast time.)  I came across so many great recipes that I had once found or been sent and never made. 

That led to me being impractical about cooking dinner dinner every night.  Even though this would be wonderful in theory, I'm too lazy to make massive dinners for 1 and I'm not even home for dinner 5 days a week.  So.. if you're interested in coming over for dinner... call for your reservation =)

For now.. I've cooked one dinner since Sunday titled "Easy Garlic Chicken" that I found on Pinterest. 


Picture & Recipe taken via Pinterest from food.com
http://www.food.com/recipe/easy-garlic-chicken-5478
 

I'd like to call this recipe a little something different:

Brown Sugar & Garlic Chicken
2 pieces of boneless skiness chicken breast
1 1/2 tsp olive oil
2 tbsp brown sugar
a lot a lot of garlic (more than the recipe calls for), minced

1. Preheat oven to 500 degrees.
2. Saute the garlic in the oil for a few minutes.
3. Remove from heat when its translucent.
4. Mix with the brown sugar.
5. Spray down the pan you're using. Place chicken in the pan. Pour the mixture over the chicken. (I like to put slices in the chicken so some of the juices soak in and the thick meat cooks all the way through.)
6. Bake for 30 minutes.

Enjoy =)

Avocado-- The Game Changer

Let's start off with a round-of-applause for Jessica.  Though dinner was later than I'd hoped for (which is usually 4:30pm for the old folks special), it was well worth the wait.  Plus, she fed me cherry tomatoes, walnuts, and SANGRIA in the meantime. (What's to complain about?) We both agreed that though the zucchini's were packed with protein, it was still missing a main food dish because the meal was very light.  We also agreed to some of the suggestions for improvement in the comments section: Use chickpeas instead of Cannellini Beans, Only 2 tbsp of oil needed.  We topped them with extra parm cheese instead of oil.  I think we won.  Sorry, no picture... Too much sangria.

But let's not dwell on that.  Yesterday was another fantastic dinner.  This week, I was a little over ambitious at my trip to Trader Joe's. I picked up 4 ripe avocados-- my first mistake.  I'm not really sure why I thought I'd be home to cook 5 fantastic dinners this week (all requiring avocados).  Clearly, I was delusional. (Is that an oxymoron?) But I did. I also decided this week that I needed to up my iron & protein game.  Since I'm not going to stuff my face with red meat, I chose avocados as my building block. 

Did you know that you could put avocado on everything?  I find the best way to do that is to mash it up with a little freshly squeezed lime juice (or lemon, your preference), lots of salt, and a dash (or several dashes) of cayenne pepper.  Waahlaah.  An avocado spread, if you will.

So I first spread this business on some fresh broccoli florets for breakfast one morning (I eat weird breakfasts).  I sliced some avocado to add to my Mexican fiesta salad for lunch, too. And finally, the dinner I had been waiting for: 

Grilled Portobello Onion Pepper Panini Guac Awesomeness.. unofficially named.

Here's what you see:

• White Onions
• Red Pepper
• Portobella Mushrooms
• Tomato Slices
• Udi's Gluten Free Bread
• Avocado Spread (4 avocados, 1 lime squeezed, salt & cayenne pepper)

In my lovely grilling pan (which causes an indoor forest fire every time I use it) grilled the peppers, then onions, then mushrooms.  I brushed each with a tad bit of olive oil before grilling and salted each one (of course).  Then I sprayed the pan with my olive oil cooking spray and grilled both sides of my bread.  I spread the "guac" onto one side of my bread and stacked all the ingredients up for my final masterpiece. 

(If you were wondering, my 4th avocado was Taryn's dinner Saturday night.. she prefers the lemon spread option.)

Bottom line: Avocados make the world go round.  Don't tell me you haven't looked at a restaurant menu and changed your mind to something with avocado in the ingredients list.

Keen-Wah

Have you heard of this magical nutritious food? Well, I have just recently discovered it.  Okay, so  I tried it once and hated it.  I tried this recipe from my good friend Chelsey, and tried to substitute Nutritional Yeast with Baking Soda & Vinegar.  (Gross, I know.  But Google made me do it.) So my first experience literally left a bad taste in my mouth.  I've had two boxes of Quinoa (pronounced Keen-wah) sitting in my cabinet collecting dust until this week when I established a new found love for this delicious food. Yesterday, my coworker (and life partner), Marianne, offered up this delicious Quinoa-balsamic salad that her sister had made, (Laura Z.-- if this is you, I'm waiting for the recipe...) and I fell in love.

Why is quinoa so amazeballs?  It's often mistaken for a grain because it's cooked like pasta, it's texture is pasta-like, but its not pasta. Quinoa is a seed (which is great because I'm not a big fan of pasta.)  It's gluten free and packed with protein and other vital nutrients like magnesium and fiber!

Tonight I will continue my Quinoa kick with this Quinoa Stuffed Zucchini that my roomate is making me.  Hopefully this recipe goes better than my attempt. Doesn't food always taste better when someone else is cooking for you AND cleaning up the dishes??  Life is good.

I'll let you know how Jessica's dinner turned out! For now, enjoy a side of sunshine with your Quinoa (or whatever's on your dinner table!)