awesome pita chips, autumn salad, roast chicken

Have you checked out Food52? I'm addicted to the videos, the Piglet and their weekly recipe contests. This week, Amanda and Merrill are asking home cooks to submit recipes for their best autumn salads and best sweet potatoes. I thought about the salad, and what flavours/foods I'd like to include, then I built a Sunday night dinner around it.

Fall Sunday Night Dinner

Rosemary thyme pita chips (awesome recipe from Food52)
Roasted garlic & sage cannellini bean dip
Autumn salad (I'll post on Food 52 later this week)
Roasted chicken with lemon and rosemary potatoes

Let me know what you think about Food52. Could it become one of your go-to recipe sources?

roasted chicken breasts with lemony bombay potatoes

How much do you love roast chicken? Interested in trying something Indian-inspired? Trust me, it's not too "weird" and it's weeknight simple.

Jamie Oliver's roasted chicken breast with lemony bombay potatoes only calls for ingredients that can be purchased at your local, small-town supermarket. I often quadruple the recipe and add extra veggies like sweet potatoes, brussel sprouts and/or cherry tomatoes.

Buy everything you need this weekend and plan to make this next week. Let me know what you think. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do!

P.S. We were lucky tonight to have some leftover Tomato, Coriander & Ginger soup from Terry the Firefighter's visit. It was the perfect appetizer. Thanks T!

P.P.S. This chicken recipe is from Jamie Oliver's Cook With Jamie. I blogged about it on WindsorEats.com last year. :)

metabolic cleanse menu #4: grilled chicken with brown rice pasta

Earlier today, I was trying to follow a Bob Lutz Twitter chat at work. Shortly after it finished, this tweet from Canadian culinary personality Lucy Waverman caught my eye:

Butter 2 slices challah on both sides. Add 1/2 cup taleggio, 6 thin slices crisp apple,1T chutney.Fry slowly on each side pressing down.#yum

I almost stopped my cleanse on the spot. Luckily Maria from Fresh Eats was nearby. She talked me out of aborting the cleanse during a moment of severe weakness. A few hours later, I was still planning my "quit" but my Pilates instructor half-told me to keep on truckin'. {wow! just realized how chi chi this all sounds}

So, here we are. I've now completed four days of detox. I feel great on the inside but I've become completely ambivalent about food. I don't really care what I eat, nor do I really enjoy it. And, that's bothering me a lot! The only thing I'm craving is to start caring again.

Metabolic cleanse dinner menu #4

Red leaf lettuce and grape tomato salad with balsamic vinaigrette

Grilled chicken on top of brown rice spaghetti and store-bought tomato sauce

Big unknown: Will I make it through detox day #5?

metabolic cleanse menu #2: salmon with green beans and pesto

It's Monday at 7:50 p.m. and I think I survived "day two" of the cleanse.

Metabolic cleanse dinner menu #2:

Salad

Roasted salmon with green beans and pesto

No wine

The salmon recipe is from Jamie's Food Revolution and it took all of five minutes to prep before popping it in the oven. Unfortunately, the store-bought pesto contained a little sugar (it was one of the last ingredients listed, I swear)!

Before

After

You can find the recipe here. And, if you're not on a cleanse, take Jamie's advice and serve with some roasted fingerling potatoes. I'm imagining it right now...and it tastes good!

grilled shrimp on salad

Grilled shrimp on Greek-like salad

What to do?

• Grill shrimp on the barbecue until opaque
• Toss together salad veggies of your choice
• If you want, throw on some cheese...I chose feta
• Chop some fresh herbs from your garden, in this case, parsley and dill. If fresh isn't an option, sprinkle dried herbs of your choice; I do it all the time.
• Add kosher salt and freshly ground pepper
• Drizzle white vinegar (yes, white vinegar) and extra virgin olive oil
• Toss salad
• Top with shrimp
• Eat...
• Drink a glass of wine (optional but highly recommended)

Do you have a simple, protein-packed salad that you'd like to share?

sunday dinner with the in-laws

We invited my in-laws over for dinner but I wasn't feeling at all creative. I just wanted to make something that wouldn't involve any new recipes or measuring. Something pedestrian. You know that kind of meal that you can pull together with your eyes closed...

Pita and dip pretty much make a daily appearance in our home. Tonight I wanted it to look pretty, so I arranged the appetizer on a large plate. I made hummus with canned chickpeas, tahini, chili flakes, cumin, garlic, lemon juice, olive oil, kosher salt and freshly ground pepper. To jazz it up, I topped the hummus with my best extra virgin olive oil and chopped parsley.

Our main course included grilled chicken breasts, roasted asparagus, mushroom medley quinoa and salad. The chicken breasts marinated for an hour in a mixture of pantry staples: grainy mustard, wildflower honey, olive oil, herbes de Provence, kosher salt and freshly ground pepper. Unfortunately, the chicken spent a little too much time on the barbecue so it was a bit dry. Our salad was comprised of romaine, arugula, chopped tomato, crumbled goat cheese, toasted pine nuts and a light lemon vinaigrette.

All in all, it was a nice evening that finished with a slice of rhubarb crisp.

early mother's day meal

Yesterday should have been a lazy Sunday. But it wasn’t. We generated loads of errands in the morning, I worked on a financial management take-home exam in the afternoon and my mother-in-law came over for an early Mother’s Day dinner. Thank g-d that she’s not difficult to please.

In an attempt to multi-task, I roasted a lone red pepper on the barbecue while working on the exam. Roasting is always a good idea when you have peppers on their last legs. Once it was charred, I let it cool, peeled it and threw it in the food processor with canned organic chickpeas, chopped garlic, cumin, lemon juice, kosher salt and pepper. Yummy roasted red pepper hummus!

Our dinner menu was a simple old-school steak dinner. It took less than an hour in total to prepare and was easy to enjoy.

Menu:

• Roasted red pepper hummus with homemade pita chips
• Caesar salad
• Grilled rib-eye steaks
• Roasted baby potatoes
• Steamed asparagus (from Washington…Farmer Hric will have local asparagus this weekend at the Ottawa St. Market in Windsor)
• Sautéed onions and baby Portobello mushrooms

Of course, our meal started with a bottle of something bubbly. In this case, it was Henry of Pelham’s Cuvee Catharine Brut. “Catharine,” as it’s affectionately known, is one of our favourite sparkling wines from the Niagara region. If you’re interested in trying it, you can often find it in Vintages at the LCBO or visit the winery.

All in all, it was a simple Sunday night celebration in honour of Cathy.

fajitas with emma & lia

Fajitas? No problem.

We grilled chicken breasts brushed with BBQ sauce.

We sauteed a sweet Vidalia onion and green and orange peppers.

We shredded cheddar cheese. We had salsa and sour cream.

ready to build fajitas

the final product

To keep this healthy, grill chicken breasts, use multigrain high-fiber tortillas, buy low-fat cheddar and low-fat sour cream.

birthday dinner, healthy style

For Jay's birthday, I couldn't make anything but a healthy meal. We had just spent the past two days eating and eating and eating and eating. To make up for the fact that we weren't going to have his requested meal of garlic bread with cheese and chicken wings, I tried to make dinner really tasty and with love.

• A bottle of Bellussi Belcanto Spumante Extra Dry (great prosecco for appetizers!)
• Hummus and Rosemary Pita Crisps
• Grilled Chicken Skewers
• Greek Salad

To make the hummus, just pulse the following in a food processor: 14 oz can of chickpeas, chopped clove of garlic, couple glugs of olive oil, spoonful of tahini, juice from half a lemon, pinch of Spanish smoked paprika, pinch of cumin, salt & pepper. To smooth it out, sometimes I had a splash of water. I put it in a bowl and drizzled with my best olive oil.

To make the pita chips: split a pocket-pita so that you have two thin pieces, cut into triangles, brush with olive oil, sprinkle with kosher salt and chopped fresh rosemary. Broil for 4 minutes at 400 degrees.

The chicken skewers were adapted from a recipe for Swordfish Soulvaki in Bonnie Stern's Friday Night Dinners book.

Basically, I marinated chunks of chicken for a few minutes in olive oil, lemon zest, chopped garlic, oregano and salt & pepper. Then I put them on metal skewers and BBQ'd carefully on low. I also made a "dressing" for the chicken that I poured on after the skewers were cooked. The dressing was 1/3 lemon juice, 2/3 olive oil, fresh thyme, salt & pepper. Very simple but extremely flavourful.

Greek salad is a staple in our home. Last night I made Aunt Shelley's version but with a twist. Combine chopped Romaine lettuce, green onion, Persian cucumbers and tomatoes. Top with fresh chopped thyme and parsley. Sprinkle with feta, garlic powder, kosher salt and ground pepper. Toss with olive oil and white vinegar.

Tonight it's a sushi party with Ted from Tiki Sushi. Check back tomorrow for photos. Check out Tiki Sushi by clicking here.