You've Got To Taste This

The first time I had tilapia was at a holiday party at a local restaurant a little over a year ago.  When eating out, I try to choose something that I don't normally eat at home, both to step out of my comfort zone a little bit and to get the opportunity to try something new.  I ordered their tilapia with a white wine lemon butter sauce and I swear I did everything but lick the plate clean at the end of the meal. It was that good.

So good that later that night, when we were back home, I headed to the computer to find some tilapia recipes to try out.  I found just what I was looking for from Cooking Light ... it's crazy simple to make and just short of OMG good.  Truly restaurant worthy, it's perfect for a quick weeknight meal or fancy enough for entertaining with friends.  The only change I made to the recipe was to swap out the peppercorns for capers.  I love the salty bits of juicy goodness that the capers deliver with the rest of the dish, and wouldn't make it any other way.  Whether this is your first introduction to tilapia, or your 50th, you can't go wrong.

See the recipe for Sauteed Tilapia right here.

Last year about this time I told you about the Freezer Fair that my church women's group did to raise money for missions. We've done it again this year and, as I write this, I am weary from making 56 pans of Chicken and Rice Bake and helping roll 1,900 sausage balls.  We had 18 women and several children and youth helping this year, and by noon on Saturday, we had prepared over 200 casseroles. In addition to the Chicken and Rice Bake, we made Chicken Tetrazzini, Corn Souffle, Broccoli Casserole, Frozen Cherry Salad, and Sausage Balls. 

Because this is our third time to do this fund-raiser, we've pretty much got it down to a science, with stations for each recipe set up ahead of time, complete with a laminated recipe, large mixing bowls, measuring cups, and big stirring spoons.  All of the casseroles are put in aluminum dishes, covered with foil, and labled.  The label includes the name of the dish, the date, and reheating instructions.

This continues to be a popular fund-raiser for our group.  People love stocking their freezers with these bake-and-serve casseroles, and we make thousands of dollars that are donated to local women's and children's missions.  All of these are great reasons to do the Freezer Fair, but what keeps us doing it year after year is the fun we all have coming down to the church and spending the morning together cooking for a great cause. As if we needed another reason to love casseroles!

If your group is interested in doing an event such as this, check out our casserole recipes and let us know how it goes. I imagine that you'll use a few cans of cream soup, so don't forget to recycle the cans.

Just wanted to post a very cool link: This is an article by current International Space Station Flight Engineer Sandra Magnus about the trials and tribulations of cooking in space. Turns out gravity is necessary for just about everything we do in the kitchen.

Food and Cooking in Space, part 2

Popping up in stores nationwide is a healthier snack alternative to the traditional potato chip-popchips. These crispy chips are air-popped so they have less than half t he fat of fried chips and are seasoned with natural ingredients giving them more flavor than baked chips. My personal favorite is salt & pepper (they are DIVINE) although their other flavors like sea salt & vinegar, barbecue, original, and parmesan garlic are tops too. Our staff couldn't decide which flavor we liked best and before we could come up with a general consensus, they were gone.

Praise for popchips is sprouting up all over. From The O List's "A Few Things We Think Are Just Great" to Health Magazine's America's Healthiest Buy 2008 to Real Simple naming them Best Chips, popchip love is definitely contagious.

At the beginning of this year (January '09), popchips made their way from the west coast expanding into the eastern US. They are currently being sold at retailers like Whole Foods, Safeway, Costco, and Target. If you can't find them there, check out popchips' website to find a retailer near or order on amazon.com. (Birmingham, AL folks--I looked the other day and they are sold at the Target on 280!!)

Let me know if you have been able to find them in your city and what your favorite flavors are. These crunchy, bold-flavored chips are an exciting revolution for those of us (like me especially) who love to snack but are always looking for healthier, lower fat/calorie options. (And Weight Watcher folks, they are only 2 to 3 points per serving!)

This is going to sound extremely food-snobby of me, but preshredded "Mexican" cheese has no place in Mexican food. There are a wide variety of real Mexican cheeses that are useful in all kinds of ways, and they're worth trying out. Here are a few of my favorites; you can find these at many supermarkets and nearly all hispanic/Mexican grocery stores.

Queso fresco: This is a crumbly, unaged cheese, very similar in texture to feta, but with a much milder flavor. It's great crumbled over tacos or scrambled eggs, but it doesn't melt well, so it's a bad choice for quesadillas or enchiladas. Queso fresco's creaminess counters spicy flavors well; one of my favorite snacks lately is a toasted tortilla with queso fresco and hot pepper jelly (call it Southern meets South of the Border). Larger Mexican markets often make their own. If you're lucky enough to live near one of them, fresh queso fresco is fantastic. Aged queso fresco is called queso añejo and has the same crumbly texture but stronger flavor.

Queso oaxaca: Oaxaca cheese is almost identical to mozzarella. It's made by stretching and kneading the curds, and is usually shaped into balls or knots. Grate or shred and use in quesadillas, on enchiladas, or over beans. Oaxaca cheese can also substitute for mozzarella in lasagna or anywhere else--the flavor is extremely close, with a bit more tanginess.

Queso chihuahua: A firmer cheese than either of the above, chihuahua is made to melt smoothly and evenly. Pale yellow in color, its flavor can range from very mild, in between mozzarella and jack, to stronger, like a medium cheddar, depending on how long it's been aged. Use chihuahua in chiles rellenos or queso fundido, a zesty cheese dip. It also makes for super-flavorful quesadillas if you're a cheese lover.

Queso para freir: Literally meaning "cheese for frying," this is a dry, harder cheese that doesn't melt well. It's cut into slabs, breaded, and fried, similar to Greek saganaki, for a great snack or hors d'oeuvre.

This weekend, my fabulous sister gathered my favorite girlfriends from three different states to the lovely city of Birmingham for an out-and-out girls weekend packed with a shower, plenty of red wine, and, you guessed it, delicious food.  Whether we were brunching at Jackson's or dining on tapas at Sol Y Luna, the 11 of us spent the weekend feasting on the best food this city has to offer.

While we did go out for two meals, we tried not to be a one-group stimulus team and opted to eat in for a few of our gatherings, starting with the welcome pizza dinner on Friday night and ending with the breakfast-casserole departure brunch on Sunday morning.  But my favorite do-it-yourself dish was this amazing black bean dip one of the girls made for the shower. 

I've scoured the internet for the origins of this dip, but I'm pretty sure it's simply an appetizer of legend and lore, handed, emailed, and texted from friend to friend for various parties and gatherings.  One thing's for sure, it's darn good.  Slightly sweet, this dip is a flavorful departure from the typically salty black-bean-and-corn-salsa offering.  I can't wait to make it for my fiance; I know he'll go crazy for it!  And, besides, he should be privy to at least one thing from the whole "girls only" event.

If you're planning a bachelorette party or a shower, check out our Girls' Night In guide to the perfect girls-only night.  It's easy on the budget and big on the fun. Plus the "Party Plan" section takes all the guesswork out of the prep, getting you out of the kitchen and back into the festivities. 

Sweet Bean Feta Dip
1 can black beans (rinsed and drained)
1 can white corn (drained)
8 oz feta cheese (I use 2 packages Athenos reduced fat feta crumbles)
Handful green onions, chopped
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup distilled white vinegar
1/2 cup white sugar

Mix all ingredients together and serve with chips.  If you can, make it the night before and let it hang out in the fridge so the flavors can mingle overnight.

Even though Spring isn't here quite yet, it's nearly time to start making lighter fare and celebrating salad ... all the better to eat juicy, red summer ripe tomatoes with, right?  When it comes to salad, it's very rare that we can all agree on loving the same one.  My husband likes iceberg, shredded cheese, tomatoes, croutons and oil and vinegar.  That's it.  While he will eat other salads, not quite so ravenously.  My son is fast following in his footsteps, and likes his salad the same way, though he will also eat ranch dressing.  Me, on the other hand, well I'll pretty much eat any salad, any way.

So with such divergent salad preferences, I'm always a little hesitant to try out a new one.  Salad doesn't keep well, if at all, so if it's not a hit, there are leftovers that will likely be wasted, and I hate that.  Although I knew this recipe for Blue Cheese and Walnut Salad with Maple Dressing would be a tough sell since it doesn't have the core components the boys like, I didn't care. When the recipe surfaced on the Cooking Light bulletin boards a few years ago, Bobmark affectionately nicknamed it "heaven on a plate," and salad preferences be darned, I was making it!

I happen to love this one and make it often.  Usually it means just picking up the greens at the store, since I'll always have the dressing ingredients and the blue cheese on hand.  I love a dish that you can whip together straight from your pantry shelves.  Since this isn't my husband's favorite type of salad, he's only good for one plate, BUT my six-and-a-half year old son happens to love this one, and is good for two helpings at least.  And that, my friends, is enough for me.

See recipe for Blue Cheese and Walnut Salad with Maple Dressing here.

In my four years at college in New Orleans, I fell in love with shrimp--they were fresh from the Gulf, abundant, and cheap (even for a poverty-stricken student)--so I cooked them twice a week or more. I still love shrimp today, but prices are a bit higher now that I'm farther from the coast, so I save by buying shell-on or even whole shrimp. Peeling the shrimp takes a little time, but it's worth the better price.

Problem is, I'm always left with piles of shells and tails, and it seems like a shame to just throw them out. That's how I discovered the wonders of shrimp stock.

All the food magazines and cookbooks rave about how wonderful homemade stock is, and how important it is for proper sauces (and, sure, they're right), but veal stock takes half a day to make, and chicken stock not much less time. The beauty of shrimp stock is it takes half an hour.

Next time you buy shrimp, get shell-on, and try this: roughly chop an onion (you don't even have to peel it), and throw in a pot with the shrimp shells and tails and a little olive oil. Saute until the shells just begin to brown, then add enough water to cover (3-4 cups is enough for the shells and tails from a pound of shrimp) and a few whole peppercorns. Bring to a boil and simmer 30 minutes, then strain. That's all there is to it. If you want to get fancier, you can add parsley or other herbs, carrot and celery, half a lemon, whatever you like. I like to pour the stock into ice cube trays to freeze so I can thaw out just what I need when I need it.

Now that you've got shrimp stock in the freezer, you can make all kinds of great dishes really easily: shrimp bisque, seafood stew, this great Chile-roasted Shrimp recipe (photo above) where the stock makes a sauce, but my favorite use for shrimp stock, and my secret dish to impress anybody, is seafood risotto. Replace the chicken or fish stock in your favorite recipe with homemade shrimp stock for a big boost in flavor, combined with risotto's natural creamy richness and plenty of seafood. I love shrimp, scallops, and mussels in my risotto, but clams, firm-fleshed fish, lobster--anything works. The best part is, risotto only takes about 25-30 minutes to cook, which makes an indulgent, restaurant-like dish like this one feasible even on a weeknight.

With a new baby in the house, it seems I'm becoming the office expert on tasty, pre-packaged foods.  (We do cook occasionally, I promise!  And at least it's better than some of the things I ate during early morning feeds when she was a newborn - can we say Little Debbie Nutty Buddy bars with a tall glass of OJ?) 

In any case, I've been trying to add more protein to my diet, and picked up a box of ZonePerfect All-Natural Protein Bars.  With a ton of ingredients I can't pronounce, I'm not sure where the "All-Natural" figures in, but these are by far the best-tasting protein bars I've ever had!  They're still nothing like a good old fashioned Snickers (or Nutty Buddy, for that matter), but these bars are far more appealing than any others I've tried. 

Most grocery stores around here carry 3 varieties: Fudge Graham, Chocolate Mint, and Chocolate Caramel Cluster.  Fudge Graham is my favorite, with Chocolate Mint a close second.  These bars are worth a taste, but don't take my word for it - take theirs.  ZonePerfect makes it easy to get your money back if you're not completely satisfied.

I'm no sushimi master and I still haven’t tried making the real deal, but rolling candy sushi is a great start! These bit-sized enjoyments are fun for kids like myself to make and gobble down by the handful. Beware of the high volume sugar rush. A box of roll-ups, gummy worms or Swedish Fish, Rice Krispies, marshmallows, and butter is all you need to make 32 rolls.

While I was rolling a batch for a work related project last night I couldn’t help but imagining ways to incorporate these sweet sushi bites into party ideas. This partially originated from an invitation I received last week to attend a ladybug themed birthday party for a precious 2-year old, Megan. So it made me think, wouldn’t these sweet sushi bites be fantastic incorporated into a Japanese themed Birthday party? Cute kimonos, beautiful paper lanterns, and creative origami art. I've decided that candy sushi can be fun for everyone and the possibilities are endless in how you can incorporate these colorful treats. Enjoy!

What are some fun foods you’ve made or seen?