Kale Salad

One of my favorite things about summertime is all the fresh fruits and veggies that are in season. This past spring we tried our hand at growing a few and the only thing that survived was our basil. (#maybenextyear) So until my thumb turns green, I love going to the farmer's market. We were thoroughly spoiled for weeks by friends with dinner practically every single night after Parker was born, so it was kind of a shock to be responsible for cooking and grocery shopping again :)

I love to make new meals, and guess whether or not they'll turn our like the recipes describe them. As just about everyone with access to the internet knows, kale is the new(ish) superfood. So when I saw it super cheap at the farmer's market I got some. I've tried kale chips before and they were pretty good, but I generally try to steer clear of the oven in the summer (except of course for the deliciousness that is zucchini bread. or cookies. or brownies. you know, the important things #priorities). We added some to our morning smoothies (we usually just use spinach) and it was a little too strong for my sweet tooth family's taste. So when I came across a recipe for melt in your mouth kale salad, I decided to give it a shot.

Surprisingly, it turned out delicious. This was seriously the perfect salad for summer. It was light and refreshing, and honestly I couldn't tell it was kale. A couple things to note though: I only used half a lemon, and it was still border line too lemony. I'd recommend adding the lemon last, and tasting as you go until you get it how you like it. Fresh parm is pricey. So i used the pre-grated. Definitely lost health points, but cest la vie. Lastly pine nuts are also pricey. However, they totally make the salad. Don't skip out on those, just try not to eat them all before you're done making the salad.

Bon Appetit!

Source

Melt in Your Mouth Kale Salad (adapted from Food Babe)

You'll Need:

• 1 bunch of kale rinsed and patted dry
• 1/3 C currants or chopped raisins (I used raisins)
• juice of one lemon (see note above)
• 1 T olive oil
• 1 t local honey
• 1/2 C pine nuts toasted
• salt and pepper to taste
• 4 T freshly grated parm cheese (see note above)

Directions:

1. In a food processor, chop up kale
2. Make Dressing: stir honey, olive oil, s & p, and lemon juice in a bowl
3. Add kale, currants/raisins, pine nuts, and parm to the bowl with dressing
4. Toss and Serve

The best chicken parm ever.

As you probably could have guessed, Valentine's Day was pretty low key at our house. We made a yummy dinner and just hung out with the girls, and may or may not have been "sharing" Gracen's candy from her Valentine's party at school. :) Dinner was low key, and turned out even better than I imagines. It's been so long since I've posted a recipe, and you won't want to miss this one I promise.

There are a million different versions of chicken parm out there on the interwebs, but I try to keep mine as simple and tasty as possible. When I found this recipe, it definitely piqued my interest in the simple factor. Seriously 3 ingredients, and about 2 minutes to prep and then put in the oven.

Ingredients (ok i lied, 4 ingredients including the chicken):

• chicken
• 1/4 C parm cheese
• 1/2 C sour cream
• italian bread crumbs

Directions:

Put the chicken in a baking dish. Mix the parm cheese and sour cream in a bowl, and then spread over the chicken. Sprinkle bread crumbs on top. Bake at 350 for 25 minutes and you're donezo! The Mr. said this was the best chicken he ever had, and was actually serious. Gracen ate ALL of it, and asked for more. Girlfriend has never, and I'm serious when I say never, eaten all of her chicken unless it was chicken nuggets, and even then she does it hesitantly. So you could say I was very pleasantly surprised with this dish. We made roasted asparagus to go with it, that Gracen picked out at the grocery store. Put it in the oven at the same time as the chicken, and we had an amazing dinner in 25 minutes. Everyone ate it, and liked if not loved it. I'm still sort of in disbelief.

Seriously make it this week. You won't regret it I promise.

Fajeetas

One simple fall meal that I love is fajitas (pronounced fa-jeet-as, naturally). For some reason I don't make them that often, but they're extremely versatile, and super easy. The first time I ever made them was when the Mr. and I were dating and I was just learning to cook. Turns out he didn't like to eat out every meal like I did, say what? You actually want me to grocery shop? and make a meal? in the kitchen? At this point, I had never even tried them before. (seriously picky eater people). I was incredibly intimidated by them mostly because I had to deal with raw chicken (goo). But they were in the "beginners" section of all my cook books and turns out, they're super easy! And actually this meal is perfect for picky eaters, because you can put whatever you like in them. And bonus, the Mr. (then boyfriend) said they were the greatest fajeetas he'd ever had in his life! (suckup ;)

When I made them the other day I actually ended up making my fajita seasoning from scratch. Although that wasn't intentional. Apparently I suck at grocery shopping (amongst other things) and couldn't find the pre-packaged fajita seasoning mixes. Seriously Hy-Vee you should hire me to help them organize their grocery store for dummies. Anyhoo, when I couldn't find it I just decided to make my own, which PS, when I made it, it probably cost me like 50 cents, and it made as much as 3 packages. So it ended up working in my penny-pinching favor.

All I did was marinate the sliced up chicken in the fajita seasoning with some water a and drizzle of oil. Then I cooked the chicken in a skillet. Took out the chicken and cooked some veggies (in this case some sliced up zucchini and green peppers) added in black beans and corn and added the chicken back in. That's it! Then of course I had to load mine up with cheese and sour cream. But hey there were a lot of vegetables in that bad boy.

We were in such a fajita mood last week, I decided to make a second version a couple days later. I know! Watch out now, I'm gettin crazy in my kitchen! (which is really hard to do because it's so small). This time after I cooked the chicken, all I added was a green pepper, and some ranch dressing. Boom Ranch Fajitas. Who doesn't love ranch? No one. (I then of course piled it high with cheese, black beans and sour cream).

All I need now is some homemade salsa and margaritas - yum!

Recipe for fajita mix:

• 3 Tbs cornstarch
• 2 Tbs chili powder
• 1 Tbs salt
• 1 Tbs paprika
• 1 Tbs sugar
• 2 1/2 tsp chicken powder (crushed up bouillon cubes)
• 1/2 tsp garlic powder
• 1/2 tsp cayenne
• 1/4 tsp red pepper flakes
• 1/2 tsp cumin

Mix it all together! Boom. Master chef worthy fajita mix.

Pork Chops and Pineapple Fried Rice

This past weekend was MAD crazy. It consisted of crafting all Friday night for the birdal shower my sister was throwing, decorating for the shower on Saturday, brunch on Sunday for Gracen's birthday at Blue Moose (oh so yummy) and her birthday party Sunday afternoon! Phew. I need a nap just thinking about it! (More posts on those events to come) Anyhoo. Sunday night after Gracen's birthday party, we had some family come over for dinner. I was really excited because I was going to make pork chops and pineapple fried rice! I know that might seem a little weird, but it was seriously so delicious. It was SO good I'm even brining the leftovers for lunch at work tomorrow, and I really don't do leftovers. The best part, it really didn't take that long to make, and even though it sounds quite complicated it was really pretty simple! And most of the things it takes you probably already have in your fridge or pantry. I got the recipe from P-Dub (Pioneer Woman, geesh!) so I'll show you her pics and her recipe becuase I didn't really have time to take pics, the recipe moves pretty quickly. A couple little tweaks I'll make for the next round though: I'm not a huge fan of onions, so I'd leave those out (unless of course you enjoy them, then by all means toss em back in!) also there were too many peas in my opinion in the rice. I'd cut it back to 1 cup instead of 1.5, and last but not least I'd add more pineapple, that was by far the best part!! Now go forth and make this, you won't regret it I promise!

http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2012/03/pork-chops-with-pineapple-fried-rice/