Fall Wreath (She's Craaaaaftay!)

Making a wreath is very easy and inexpensive. I spent $25 at Michaels to make this wreath. I still have left over materials. I bought a wreath there and all the trimmings. All you need is a glue gun, a bit of paint if you use a letter, and a bow maker if you want a fancy bow. The two owls were originally supposed to be ornaments that hang. Have fun!!!

Below is the before. Trimmings only at this point.

The bow below.

 A lil instagram final photo shoot ; )

Refrigerator Pickles

4 medium cucumbers ( or 6-8 Persian cucumbers) sliced very thin

2 teaspoons of salt

    Combine sliced cucumbers and salt and let set at room temp for 1 hour.

    Drain

1/2 C rice vinegar

1/4 C sugar

1/4 teaspoon white pepper (or black)

2 tablespoons finely chopped fresh dill

1 teaspoon salt or less if desire

Refrigerate 3 hours before serving

Makes an excellent fresh cucumber salad

Will keep well in refrigerator and served as pickles

I add chopped red onions sometimes. It gives a nice additional flavor. 

Purple Pickled Eggs

Hard Boiled Eggs:

6-8 eggs (large)

Medium pot

Vinegar (2 tablespoons)

Gently place eggs in pot

Fill with water until just covering the eggs.

Turn the burner onto high.

Drop in 2 tablespoons of white vinegar

Let the eggs boil until it's at a rolling boil for one 30 seconds to 1 minute.

Once at a boil TURN OFF HEAT, but leave pot on burner....COVER the pot with lid and leave it alone for 20 min.

Once 20 min is up drain pot, run over with cool water.

Get a large bowl (big enough for 8 eggs and some ice cubes and water.

Throw those eggs into the ice bath in the bowl. Place in fridge for at least 20-30 min. 

DRAIN....PEEL, set aside

NEXT: 

3 cans of PICKLED BEETS, I like the sliced kind best.

DRAIN the liquid into a jar or tupperware you don't mind getting potentially stained. (I used an old pickle jar...seemed fitting. 

To the jar filled with pickled beet juice add:

 2 table spoons vinegar

1 tsp sugar

1tsp salt

A couple dashes of pickling spice

DROP your hard boiled eggs into that purple bath.

Like so........

Next you should let them soak for at least 4 hours min. They are best after 24 hours +. You can leave these for about a week and a half in a cold fridge.

They will look like this above, a nice deep purple is what you want. You can eat these babies just as they are with some salt.....

SOOOOOO GOOOOOOOD...... OR

Make deviled eggs with them! Recipe to follow soon!

Cauliflower Buffalo Wings (boneless)

These are SIMPLE!
DELICIOUS!
aaaaand if you didn't guess it already, completely 100% boneless ; )

Supplies:

1 bunch cauliflower (chop in florets (mini trees)
1 oven, preheated to 350
1 jar Frank's Red Hot WING SAUCE
garlic/herb seasoning
extra virgin olive oil
S&P (salt and pepper, not the female rap group...not this time)


1) Take cauliflower florets, place on baking sheet. Drizzle with EVOO, and S&P. Toss to coat. Bake for about 10 min or until soft & a bit roasted.

Take out of oven and toss with Frank's Red Hot Wing Sauce (half the jar). (let sit in sauce on pan for about 5 min, to really get all the sauce soaked up. It's like a hot sauce hot tub!

Then sprinkle with roasted garlic and herb seasoning
TOSS
BAKE (5-8 more) min. Toss once mid way through.

Take out of oven and enjoy with some bleu cheese dip or ranch!

Gnarly Guinness Shepherd's Pie

This one I started out with 2 steaks slow cooking in brown gravy for 8 hours....I know that's a lot of fore thought and work (Not necessary, but worth it)

I browned 1 POUND GROUND BEEF (set aside and let cool)
1 back frozen peas and carrots (thawed)
1 packet brown gravy
5 russet potatoes peeled and chopped (to make mashed potatoes)
1 bag shredded cheddar cheese
1 large onion
1 big boy beer EXTRA STOUT Guinness (you'll need a little more than half for the dish, and the rest for the cook)
LARGE DEEP baking dish.

Brown your ground beef, add chopped onion and cook till tender. (set this aside and let it cool)
Make your gravy-follow package instructions, once prepared add to ground beef/onion mixture in pan.
ADD: Salt & Pepper and anything else for spice that you like. I added garlic & red pepper. Next add Guinness to this and let simmer until thick. Add the Guinness in slowly to make sure you don't make it too liquidy (yes it's a new word)

Next start your mashed potatoes.
Peel, chop, plop (into boiling water till soft)
Drain
MASH  do the moooonsta mash... ok no just mash the taters.(add in about a 1/2 cup milk and a few tablespoons of butter to help it get creamy)

Get you baking dish....LARGE/DEEP...Rachael Rays casserole dish is PERFECT for this dish.

Add in the meat, gravy, Guinness mixture of heavenly yumminess!
Add the bag o' frozen (now thawed) veggies.
Now top with mashed potatoes

Bake at 375 for 20-25 min

Take out and add cheddar cheese mixture to the top

bake an addition 10-15...until cheese is bubbly, gnarly, and oozing love.

NomNomNomNomNomNomNomNomNomNomNomNomNomNomNomNomNomNomNomNom

Homemade Red Sauce

Start with about 5-8 ripe large tomatoes. (chop them up into large pieces or in fourths)
You will also need:

1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
1 Large yellow onion (chopped)
Fresh Basil (1 pkg or if you grow your about 8-10 leaves)
Salt & Pepper to taste
1 tablespoon minces garlic
1 small can tomato paste

Heat on low for about 10 hours in a slow cooker

(half way through I used a tomato smasher to mash it all together)

Once it looks pretty well cooked I let it cool.

Then you will need

2 zucchinis
4 carrots (large, peeled and chopped)

Heat some water to boiling and add in chopped zucchini and carrot.
Once tender (about 5-8 min) drain.
Add vegetables to tomato sauce


Next you will ladel in the tomato sauce into a blender.

Blend on high until smooth.

Taste! At this point you should taste your sauce. Depending on your preferences, tomatoes, etc you'll want to see if you want to add anything else to your sauce.

Let the mixture cool and then refrigerate

My batch made one and a half large jars, about 8 cups of sauce. I made mine each a  little different.
One with extra veggies added and the other a spicier red sauce with red pepper.

This sauce is fresh, delicious, and goes with ANYTHING....over pasta, on pizza, as a dip.....

Chicken Saltimbocca (Gnosh Version)

It's tasty aaaaand super fun to say. 

Here is what you need...

4 chicken breasts. (butterflied: cut almost in half but still attached)

1 package prosciutto (about 3 to 4 slices per breast)

Fresh basil 

Fresh mozzarella

1 red onion

First step is to pound the chicken flat.

HOW?!?! I am glad you asked, 

1)Place a cutting board onto a towel, this keeps it from slipping. Cover the cutting board with saran wrap. 

2) Place chicken down on the saran wrap, then place more saran wrap over the chicken. The chicken should be spread out. 

3) Using a meat pounder or heavy rolling pin, pound the chicken thin. Don't break it up or mash it, lightly pound until its become a good size to be stuffed. 

Here is the fun part. Season chicken with salt and pepper, both sides please. Then start by layering a slice of mozzarella, basil, and thin red onion slices in each chicken. 

Next you will have the breast stuffed and closed up. Now you can wrap them with the prosciutto slices....mmm yummy. 

You are now half way to gnoshing...

Heat a skillet to MED-HIGH. Have about 1 tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil in the pan. Once its hot place chicken in pan.  Sear those puppies until the prosciutto looks crispy. (About 2 minutes each side). 

Have your oven pre-heated to 350. Place Chicken on a rack over a cookie sheet lined in foil...for easy clean-up, we are hungry and not in the mood to clean!

Place in oven for 45min or until cooked through. IF you want this to be EXTRA Gnarly, top with HOLLANDAISE SAUCE, yep you read that right! IT'S so so soooooo good. OR you can always top with mozzarella or nothing at all. Simple. Delicious. 

I mean just LOOK at it!

LET'S GNOSH!

FauxZagna

What is FauxZagna? It's DELICIOUS!! I have recently started the media-fast diet. Knowing that a huge portion of my diet would be vegetables and lean meat I cried. OK I didn't cry, but I wanted to. I LOVE me some food and I love to cook. So here I am with a fridge full of vegetables and all I can do is conjure up ideas for how to make an old time favorite into a new lean, mean, delicious machine!! Here are the ingredients you'll need:

1lb Ground Turkey. (I used Jenny-o extra lean)
1 Eggplant
1 Zucchini
1 Onion
1 Jar Tomato Sauce (I used Ragu no sugar added tomato basil)
Spinach
Olive Oil
Salt & Pepper
Minced Garlic (about a spoonful) **It's up to you how much you want
Any seasoning you would like in there. I used an italian grinder of mixed flavors.

Now assemble into any oven safe dish that is deep enough. I used a round dish about 6in deep.

Brown the turkey meat on medium to medium high. I added spices and garlic during this process. Once brown set aside and let cool.

I used a mandolin to slice my vegetables, and when I am not careful my fingers. I ribboned the zucchini and sliced the eggplant to the same thickness.

I started my layer with EVOO (extra virgin olive oil) Then 2 layers of eggplant and then some onions. Feel free to switch this up. Maybe add a layer of tomato to the bottom, etc....

NEXT: Add the seasoned/browned turkey meat. Honestly you could add any meat to this dish. If I wasn't on a diet I would be adding in beef, pork, etc etc...

NEXT: A nice layer of zucchini blanket. This one came from my garden, yes I am bragging.

NEXT: a layer of raw spinach (it will cook in the oven) I added some S&P and EVOO to this section to help with the cooking and flavor. Getting hungry yet?!?

NEXT: Tomato sauce tiiiiime!!! YUM! About 1/2 the jar here
NEXT: REPEAT layers until you reach close to the top and then viola! FauxZagna!! I added some eh-hem HOME GROWN basil to the top as well as parmesan cheese. I am not supposed to have a lot of cheese yet in my diet but a girl has got to do what a girl has got to do! Feel free to add fresh yummy creamy mozzarella to this dish throughout. This just happens to be my low calorie, low carb, yumminess version. Once assembled I like to refrigerate it for 1 hour to an hour and a half. Then bake on 350 for about 30-45 min. It all depends on thickness of veggies. That's what I am Gnoshin'!

Fresh out of the oven, and on this step you EAT!!