Strawberry Bread Puding

I cleaned out my fridge last week, and found that I'd been hoarding bread. I had 3 of these bowls. That's a LOT of bread pudding. I made bread pudding over the holiday season, partially out of curiosity. That one was a different recipe (there are a bazillion) but the basic one is super simple.

Cream Cheese Stuffed Meatballs

Hi friends! Sorry it's been such a long time since I've posted. :( I was talking to the Chopping Block a lot lately about hamburgers. She has an obsession with them, but who can blame her; May is national hamburger month after all. My current obsession (for the last couple of days) has been cream cheese. So with that, I've created the most delicious meatball ever. Seriously. No lie.

Lunch Date Recipes

So I don't really go out to eat much any more. So making food-related dates special means putting a little effort into lunch. Mostly, this meal is comprised of assorted leftovers and arranged to look pretty.

So the recipes of each of the dishes are, starting with the meat:

Terriyaki chicken

1 frozen chicken breast
honey
soy sauce
sake

Nuke the chicken until it starts to cook.
In a skillet, place enough sake and soy sauce to just barely coat the pan. Add a touch of honey, (maybe 1/2 a tablespoon?)
Chop up the chicken into tiny bits, and add to sauce after honey has melted.
Stir chicken until it is evenly cooked and browned.
Then you're done!

Stir Fried Rice Noodles

This dish came about because I had a massive honking bag of rice noodles I picked up because they "looked yummy" but had No Idea what to do with them. Letran told me: "stir fry 'em!" I said "With what seasoning?" "Vegetable oil, soy sauce and sesame oil." Me: "Oh, I got those things!"

So...boil rice noodles, fry them in:
Canola Oil
Soy Sauce
Sesame oil

Vegetables in the rice noodles:
Green onion
Cabbage
Carrot
Mushroom

--add these vegies in while the rice is browning. My bag was super big, and so I had to use my wok for this dish. It made a lot of leftovers, some of which were in this lunch.

The broccoli ringing the noodles was frozen, I warmed it in the microwave and ringed the noodles with them.

Garam Masala Oatmeal Cookies

I was researching spices and ran into a recipe for Garam Masala Oatmeal Raisin Cookies on NPR. What do you know? I have just bought some garam masala so I decided to make it. Did you know that garam means heat and masala means spice mix? Well, now you know!

Fried Oyster Mushroom with Seaweed

Friend are such great inspirations. Nur mentioned to me that she got an oyster mushroom growing kit and it immediately reminded me of this dish. I learned about this from one of my parents' vegetarian friends. Actually, I didn't learn it the proper way. I came over for dinner, they were making this and somehow I helped them made it. Basically, I stole the recipe. Now you can be a part of my band of recipe thieves and make this, too!

Tomato Egg Cups

Nur sent me this recipe from La Casita Inspirada out of the blue. It's super easy and pretty so I made it.


Two beautiful and ripe tomatoes? Check.


Hollow out tomatoes' innards? Check.


Fill each tomato with an egg, some ground pepper, and salt? Check, check, and check!



Pop in preheated 425 degrees F oven for 20 minutes, then top with crispy bacon bits? Check! The recipe actually says to top it off with cheese but I think bacon is greater than cheese, so I went with bacon.

That's it. I actually switched to the broiler option for an additional 5 minutes because I do not like my eggs so runny. So easy and pretty even a LeTran can do it!

Chicken Pasta Salad

This was one of those "I'm hungry and don't wanna walk to the store," sorta meals. Very easy.

What I had:

Greek yogurt
green onions
1/4 bag of wheat pasta
lettuce
frozen chicken
sandwich pickles

So chicken salad it is!

1st I cooked the chicken in the microwave and boiled the water for the pasta.

I sliced the green onion, 2 sandwich pickles, and the lettuce.

I placed the pickles and green onions in a mixing bowl. Added pasta to boiling water. Chopped the chicken into bite-sized bits, then added to the mixing bowl.

When the pasta was cooked, it went in to. I added a dash of garlic salt for taste, and tossed the mixing bowl contents with 1/4 cup Greek yogurt (-ish, sorry, I cook by instinct, not measurement), point is to coat, but not soak. Just a bit, not too much.

The lettuce I placed in the bottom of the bowl (sorry, can't see it in the picture) and scooped some of the chicken salad mix on top.

Very simple,. very yummy!

Waffle Ice Cream Sandwich

In the previous post, I talked about candied bacon ice cream. Then that spawned this conversation:

Brendan: make the ice cream
and add chunks of egg in it
LeTran: cooked eggs? (commentary: I'm not stupid, ice cream has uncooked eggs in it)
Brendan: yup
and a bit of waffle
oh oh, nix the egg
and just put pieces of syrupy waffles with the bacon
orrr a bacon ice cream sandwich
LeTran: omg waffle ice cream sandwich
waffle bacon ice cream sandwich
Brendan: ohhhhh omg
that is a real good idea
no joking

...and so it began...

Spicy Candied Bacon

Studying gave me serious cases of the munchies. No lie. Checked the fridge for tasty drinks. None. Checked everywhere in kitchen for random snacks. Nada. Well, except for those stale/raw almonds. Then I remembered that I had some bacon left from previous bacon adventures. My fatty mind was craving something sweet. The light bulb went on! I also remembered seeing a recipe for Spicy Candied Bacon from Serious Eats.

What do you think my bright idea was?

Misadventure: Strawberry Stuffed Ice Cream

Remember Brendan? I was having a little chat with Brendan about food...because there are only three things that I talk about 1. food, 2. cats, 3. dogs. I'm not well-rounded. I cannot hold an intelligent conversation about politics, history, geography, philosophy, literature, string theory, game theory, human behavior, etc. But I digress.

Brendan and I were talking about ice cream sandwiches. Who doesn't like ice cream sandwiches? Then Brendan had the brilliant idea of making ice cream sandwiches not with cookies, but with fruits instead. Talking with Brendan tickled my brain, so I started to think about stuffing fruits with ice cream. Basically, the conversation went something like this...okay, maybe not a bit, but exactly like this:

Brendan: i wonder if ice cream sandwiches would be good with fruit as the bread like mango ice cream inside slices of mango
me: too slippery
Brendan: or ice cream between wedges of banana
me: OR ice cream in hollowed out strawberries
Brendan: ooo, i like that one, and then it can be dipped in chocolate
me: yes!
Brendan: for extreme tastiness
me: and rolled in a bit a sea salt!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! akdjfaoier
Brendan: haha
me: just a tiny bit
Brendan: you're one of those salty choco people/

...and so that conversation gave fruit to this misadventure!