Shrimp Scampi In Lemon Butter

Saw this recipe for shrimp baked with lemon and butter on, none else than, Pinterest . Looked quick and easy and I decided to try it and turn it into a shrimp scampi and turn serve it over linguine. 

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 package of medium 40/51 count, uncooked peel and eat shrimp
• 1 stick of butter melted but cooled down
• 3 table spoons minced garlic
• 1 lemon sliced 
• 2 table spoons of italian seasoning 
• 2 table spoons parm cheese 
• box of linguine pasta

Preheat oven to 350, and in a baking dish arrange lemon slices on the bottom, topped with shrimp, garlic, butter, italian seasoning and parm cheese. Bake for about 15 minutes until shrimp are cooked, pink and translucent. Cook pasta according to directions.

Toss pasta with a little of the butter sauce, top with shrimp and parm cheese- add access sauce to preference. 

                                       

This is my first time ever doing  this dish, and it came out great, the kids even ate it! I made them their own little dish of it since me and my husband don't eat until he gets home from work. 

Since the shrimp is baked it's not that much work at all and you can pretty much prepare and cook the whole meal in 20 minutes, because the shrimp and the pasta take about the same amount of time to cook. 




Credits:
Baked Shrimp

Red Velvet Cupcakes with Buttercream Frosting

Last week I was perusing Pinterest and found a really awesome pin for "A cupcake for every day of the month". I used to make cupcakes all the time during my pregnancies (when I had a wicked sweet tooth), but haven't made any in a really long time. Tomorrow is Oliver's 1st birthday so I figured I'd make a batch today so he can eat one tomorrow on his big day. I was originally going to do a jam filled lemon cupcake, but changed my mind at the last minute. This recipe was super easy to execute. 

INGREDIENTS:


Cupcakes

• 1 1/4 cups flour
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon cocoa powder
• 3/4 cup vegetable oil
• 1/2 cup buttermilk
• 1 egg
• 1 teaspoon red food coloring
• 1/2 teaspoon white vinegar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Buttercream Frosting

• 1 stick room temp butter
• 2 1/2 cups confect. sugar
• 1/4 cup of milk
• 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla extract
• 1/4 teaspoon almond extract

In one bowl you want to combine all of your dry ingredients: Flour, sugar, baking soda, salt, cocoa powder. 

In a separate bowl whisk together wet ingredients: Vegetable oil, buttermilk, egg, food color, vinegar, vanilla.

While mixing at a medium speed, gradually add the dry mixture to the wet mixture until combined. 

Fill cupcake liners, bake at 350 for 20 minutes ( an inserted toothpick should come out clean).

To make the frosting; beat the butter until smooth and creamy- add the sugar, milk, vanilla and almond, mix until a spreadable consistency.

This recipe was right on! It literally made exactly a dozen cupcakes, with a little left over frosting.



Credits:http://slowrobot.com/i/39918

Baked Pork Chops with Home Made Apple Sauce, Mashed Sweet Potatoes, and Corn

So here we are, the day before food shopping day- and I'm in my freezer wondering what I have to make for dinner. My philosophy is, if you have a meat- a veggie and a starch thats enough for a complete dinner. So I had a few bone in pork chops in my freezer, 2 sweet potatoes, a can of corn and of course stuff for a salad.  I also had a few apples kicking around, and you know nothing goes better with pork than apple sauce. So I decide to make some home made apple sauce to go with some pork chops and mashed sweet potatoes tonight.

                                                      HOME MADE APPLE SAUCE:

• 3 Apples ( I had a few different kinds, it really doesn't matter what you use it'll all taste awesome)
• 2 Cinnamon sticks ( you can use ground cinnamon too)
• 1/4 cup of juice (you can use any kind I used orange pineapple today)
• Ground Nutmeg
• Ground Ginger

Cut your apples into small cubes, add to a small sauce pan, add juice, and spices. Cook on medium heat for about 15 minutes or until apples can mash up easily. 

MASHED SWEET POTATOES:

• 2 large sweet potatoes peeled and diced
• 1/4 cup of milk
• 3 table spoons butter

Throw diced, peeled sweet potatoes in a sauce pan and cover with water, boil for about 20 minutes until it is fork tender. Drain and add butter and milk, mash with a masher or break up until smooth with a fork.

BAKED PORK CHOPS:

• Pork Chops
• Seasoning you want to use

Bake Pork At 350 for about 12-20 minutes until white on the inside

We also had a side salad and a little corn with this dish. The combination was great. Just enough of everything and the mixture of textures was awesome! I really love that pork rub we used, lemon and rosemary. It compliments the pork so well. If you prefeer a traditional baked pork chop, salt and pepper will do.

Turkey and Swiss Panini with Jalapeños, Onion, Tomato and Sriracha Cream Sauce

I know that not everyone has a panini press, so all of my sandwiches will work and be just as good made as grilled cheeses or a toasted sandwich in a pan or in the oven. 

INGREDIENTS:

• Bread ( I did this on a mini sub roll, but whatever you want to have your sandwich on works)
• Deli Turkey
• Swiss Cheese
• Diced Jalapeños
• Sliced Tomate
• Sliced Red Onion
• Sriracha Cream Sauce ( See Teriyaki Salmon for recipe)

Easy directions, build your sandwich and press or toast it! Enjoy!!

This was a great little sandwich to have for lunch, no effort at all using items I had in my fridge!

Fun with Egg rolls

I Just posted a pizza I made using some left overs in the fridge. This is another fun way to use up some left overs, or things you normally have around the kitchen. This stemmed from a recipe I saw using egg roll wrappers and string cheese to make mozzarella sticks. I thought that sounded really cool, so those were the first ones we made tonight. Once we got going on stuffing the egg rolls it really became fun, so my husband and I ended up using the entire package of egg roll wrappers and made some really interesting combinations. 

INGREDIENTS:

• Package of egg roll wrappers
• What ever you want to fill them with
• Vegetable oil to fry egg rolls in

The mozzarella stick egg rolls, just a piece of string cheese and roll that baby up. These were served with left over sauce I had in the fridge. (left)

South western egg roll, was a piece of string cheese, and a mixture of corn, black beans, diced tomatoes and cilantro that I had in the fridge from a few other things I made during the week. (right)   

Bean sprouts, scallions and shredded

carrot egg roll. Just items that I had in 

my fridge. (left)

Banana, peanut butter and chocolate

egg rolls. These were my husbands idea

and they came out amazing (right)

Just add some vegetable oil to a deep frying pan on the stove, wait until it gets hot enough a drop of water sizzles, put egg roll gently in oil, seam side   down and fry a few minutes on each side until golden brown. Don't over crowd the pan it'll take about 2-3 minutes each side of the egg roll.

This was so easy and it took under an hour to stuff, and fry these egg rolls in batches. We made about 20 all together.
The only things that I specifically bought for this meal was the egg roll wrappers and the bag of string cheese, so all together it was under $7 to make about 20 egg rolls.

Beef, Broccoli & Mushroom Pizza with Feta and Pesto

A fun saturday night meal, using left overs to make a pizza. Last night I made a fake out take out beef and broccoli dish in the crock pot- so we made a pizza tonight using some of the left overs. As long as you have a pizza dough hanging out in the fridge, you can pretty much make a home made pizza out of anything.

INGREDIENTS:

• Broccoli
• Mushrooms
• Shredded beef
• Red onion
• Pesto
• Olive oil
• Feta cheese
• Pizza cheese

Preheat the oven to 400, press the dough out on the pizza pan or cookie sheet you're using. Layer ingredients, and drizzle olive oil on top. Bake for about 15-20 minutes until the crust is brown.

Super easy meal to make, and an awesome way to use up some of the left overs hanging out in the fridge. I spent $2.19 for the ball of pizza dough, and everything else I used was stuff I already had in the kitchen.

My Famous Asparagus

While other people may have been snacking on junk food on a friday night, we were snacking on grilled asparagus. This is my go to recipe for making asparagus. I usually stick it under the broiler to achieve the charred grilled like texture, but this time I used my on the counter grill. This is simply one of the best appliances that I have in my kitchen. It's a 3 in one, grill- griddle- panini press. I seriously use it almost every day, so for $100 it was a smart, time saving investment. Especially in the summer when you don't want to turn on the oven or don't have a stand up grill outside.

INGREDIENTS:

• Asparagus
• Olive oil
• Parm cheese
• Minced Garlic

Combine about 3 table spoons of each along with the asparagus in a large ziplock bag. Shake it up to coat the asparagus with all of the goodness. Stick it on a hot grill or under the broiler in the oven- Keep an eye on it and rotate it a few times to get a nice char all around. If you're doing it under a broiler keep a good eye on it as to not to let it burn.



This is a really flavorful easy way to cook asparagus. We literally just ate it as a snack. The combination of the parm cheese, and garlic on the grill is a no fail way to cook this sometime bland vegetable.