I’m back with new stuff

Hi 🙂  It’s been a while since I posted.  I was on vacation for the last two weeks.  One day we decided to buy a new kitten.  So we spent almost 6 hours trying to find a cat we would like.  And we finally chose this little kitten that is so adorable.  We name him Garfield because of his color and also cause my son likes to watch this movie.

Then we went to visit my parents in Lac-Megantic (small town in Quebec).

The lake is beautiful :

If you want to see more photos click here.

We also visited Omega park in Montebello, near Gatineau.  It’s amazing there.  The animals are great.  We saw wolves, my boyfriend was so happy as it’s his favorite animal besides cats.  I still haven’t have the time to upload the photo.   After we visited the Montebello Castle.  Wow!  So impressive!

To see more photo click here.

And we also made a few trips to Ikea.  We changed our bed, duvet cover and my got also a duvet cover (he wanted this one so much that the next day we went back without him to buy him).

I haven’t cook a lot during my vacation.  And when I did, I didn’t always took photo.

I made this bacon recipe, so wonderful.  But again I didn’t take a photo.  You really have to try this.

We also made these Garlic Lemon Potatoes on the bbq.  My boyfriend really loved them.

I made these Vegetable Quesadillas.  So yummy and easy to do.

My son is now at a new daycare.  A big one.  They are 10 in his group.  He was used to go at a familial daycare with only 5 kids but the last months they were only 3.  He really likes this new daycare.

Have a nice weekend 🙂  I’m going to cook wonderful recipes this weekend.  I have full of tomatoes and cucumbers to use from my garden.  Do you have great recipes to use tomatoes / cucumbers?  I have to find different recipes.  🙂

A few recipes I made lately that are great

On April 1st, my post was about jalapeno poppers.  I made a recipe on Monday.  It was yummy even though there is just 3 ingredients.

Jalapeno Poppers
From RecipeZaar

20 jalapeno halves

• 10 fresh jalapeno peppers
• 8 ounces cream cheese
• 1 lb bacon
• 20 toothpicks

1. Halve and seed the jalapenos.
2. Roast on a hot grill just until skins start to turn dark.
3. Slice the bacon strips in half.
4. Fill the jalapeno halves with cream cheese.
5. Wrap halves with bacon and secure with a toothpick.
6. Bake in a 350 degree oven about 30 minutes or until bacon is done to your liking.
7. Serve warm.

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This chicken was so easy to do and great flavor.  But there is just too much liquid.

Simple Italian Baked Chicken
From RecipeZaar

2 servings

• 2 boneless skinless chicken breast halves
• 1 tablespoon butter
• 2 tablespoons v 8 vegetable juice or tomato juice (I used V8)
• 1/8 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/2 teaspoon dried basil
• 1/4 teaspoon dried oregano
• salt and pepper
• 1/2-3/4 cup mozzarella cheese, grated (optional)

1. Preheat oven to 350°F.
2. Liberally salt and pepper BOTH sides of the chicken breast halves.
3. Arrange chicken pieces in a glass baking dish just big enough to hold them without the pieces touching each other or the sides of the dish.
4. In a microwave-safe measuring cup or bowl, heat butter and V-8 just enough for the butter to melt. (About 20 seconds on high).
5. Stir in garlic powder, basil and oregano, crushing the dried herbs with your fingers as you add them to release more flavor.
6. Pour butter-juice-herb mixture over the chicken, turning the chicken as necessary for complete coverage.
7. Bake, uncovered, for 25 minutes.
8. If using the mozzarella, sprinkle it evenly over the chicken AFTER removing from the oven.
9. Tent loosely with foil to melt the cheese and keep warm until serving.

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This recipe is so easy to do.  And the taste so good.  It’s just a little bit sweet.  I made it with trout.  What you see on the photo, the 2 trout fillets, I paid $ 2.50 and it was fresh.  I jumped on it when I saw the price.  And I’ll go back to that place (Bonanza for the ones in Montreal).

Chili Roasted Salmon
From RecipeZaar

4 servings

• 4 (4 ounce) salmon fillets  (I used trout fillets)
• salt (I omitted it)
• 1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
• 1 tablespoon honey
• 1 teaspoon chili powder

1. Place salmon on lightly greased baking sheet or broiler pan and season with salt.
2. In small bowl, combine vinegar, honey and chili powder and mix well.
3. Spread mixture evenly over fish.
4. Roast at 400°F for 10 to 15 minutes or until fish flakes when tested with fork.

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I don’t always succeed when I try to cook rice.  I made this basmati rice and it was perfect.  Not crunchy, not mushy…  And the taste was great.  My boyfriend didn’t need soy sauce.

Creole Boiled Rice
From RecipeZaar

4 servings

• 1 quart water
• 1 cup basmati rice or jasmine rice
• 2 fresh bay leaves or dried bay leaves
• 1 tablespoon kosher salt (I omitted salt)
• 1 tablespoon unsalted butter

1. Bring the water to a boil with the bay leaves. Add the salt.
2. Add the rice, stir to make sure the rice doesn’t stick. Do not stir again. If the rice is agitated too much, it gets sticky. Give it a good stir when it comes back to a boil, and partially cover.
3. Cook for about 11 minutes, test it. It should have a bite, but crunch is bad. When it’s tender, drain it, remove the bay leaves, and if desired, place it into a 400 degree oven with the butter patted on top for about 15 minutes; this helps dry the rice out.

Tomato Crostini

On Monday I made this recipe at the last minute.  Cause I had a leftover of baguette, 1 roma tomato and of course all the other ingredients.  It was very easy to do.  And so tasty.  Usually I’m not the one to try recipes with mayonnaise when it involves some cooking after.  So I was quite amazed at how delicious this recipe turned out.  Even my son ate 2 slices of it.  He loved it also.

Tomato Crostini
From RecipeZaar
18-24 crostinis

• 1 cup light mozzarella cheese, shredded
• 1/2 cup half fat mayonnaise (I use Hellmann’s)
• 2 roma tomatoes, seeded and diced small
• 1 teaspoon dried oregano, crumbled
• 1/2 teaspoon dried basil, crumbled
• 1/2 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper
• 1-2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
• 1 whole grain baguette, cut into 18 – 24 1/4-inch slices

1. Combine all ingredients except for the baguette slices, until well blended. Spread cheese mixture evenly on one side of each baguette slice.
2. Place slices, cheese side up, on a grill topper (a nonstick flat grate that has many holes). Grill, with lid down, over low heat on barbeque for 3 to 5 minutes, or until bread is is lightly toasted and cheese is melted.
3. These can also be baked in the oven at 350F or broiled, until lightly browned.

I’m trying lots of new recipes these days (in fact I’m always trying new recipes cause I don’t do a recipe more than once.  It can happen but not very often)  I’m playing Pick A Chef on RecipeZaar.  We adopt “babies” (chefs).  We commit to do 3 recipes of each one.  It’s a lot of fun.  So far, I adopted 9 babies.  I have until end of April to complete the recipes I choose to make.

RecipeZaar is now free.  It’s easy to create an account.  Come take a look at Pick A Chef.   Then after Pick A Chef, it’s going to be Zaar World Tour.  My favorite event.  We do recipes from different region of the world and at the end, we can win prizes.  So fun!  I was captain last year.

I wish you all Happy Easter!

Baked Jalapeno Poppers

I love jalapeno poppers.  It’s been a while since I made that.   I think soon I’m going to do some jalapeno poppers.

Here is one I made and that was really good and spicy.

Baked Jalapeno Poppers
From RecipeZaar
5 servings

• 9 fresh jalapenos
• 1 ounce low-fat cream cheese
• 1/4 cup ranch dressing, already made up
• 1/2 cup cheddar cheese
• 6 slices bacon, cut into thirds

1. Wear plastic gloves, wash off outside of jalapenos, cut off tops, slice in half lengthwise, deseed, and cut out the white membrane the best you can.
2. Mix together the cream cheese, ranch salad dressing, and cheese.
3. Fill peppers with salad mixture.
4. Wrap each pepper in bacon.
5. Set on rack so that later the popper is out of the dripping bacon grease, put rack on plate, and refrigerate for 3 hours or freeze for 15 minutes.
6. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
7. Set rack inside a cookie sheet that has edges to catch the drippings.
8. Bake about 35 minutes, or until bacon is done.

Roasted Red Pepper and Feta Spread

I’ve tried a few times feta and it’s a cheese I don’t like.  But in a spread like that, I like it.  This spread (dip for us) is so good.  Next time I have to do a spicy dip with feta.  If you have a wonderful recipe that is spicy with feta and hot peppers, can you share please?

Roasted Red Pepper and Feta Spread
From RecipeZaar

Serving : 1 cup

• 2 red peppers, roasted, peeled and seeded (I used the ones in jar)
• 1 garlic clove
• 1 pinch cayenne
• 250 g feta cheese (I used greek feta)
• 2 tablespoons olive oil

1. In a food processor, puree reasted peppers, garlic and cayenne.
2. Add feta and olive oil, pulse until just blended.
3. Serve with grilled pita bread, crackers, French bread chunks or baguette slices.

And I wanted to serve it with grilled pita bread, so I preheated the oven to 350 F.  I cut 2 pita bread in 6 wedges each.  Put on a baking sheet with parchment paper.  Let cook near 15 minutes, checking them each 5 minutes.  When I removed them, I brushed them with olive oil and sprinkled dried oregano.  Yummy.  This is how Peter told me to try it.

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Speaking of Peter, I made one of his recipes yesterday.  And this is so yummy.  We loved it.

This dish has mushroom, gruyere cheese, hot peppers… To see more, click on this link to see his recipe.  Thanks Peter 🙂  I’ll do it again.

Super Bowls from Paula

When I saw the recipe of Paula, I knew I had to try that.  Cause I already had wonton wrappers in the freezer since many months so it was about time for me to use them.

I’m going to put the changes I made:

1 lb ground turkey (I used 1/2 lb lean ground beef cause I made just a few bowls for me and my boyfriend)

2 stalks green onions – minced (more to garnish if you want to be fancy) (I almost used 2 stalks of green onions, it gave a good flavor)

2 cloves fresh garlic – minced (of course, I used 1)

2″ section of fresh ginger – minced (I omitted it)

6 tsp low sodium soy sauce (I used 3 tsp of low sodium soy sauce)

pepper (no pepper)

Wasabi Mayo:
Mayonaise
Wasabi Powder

but to have the full recipe just go there.

My boyfriend always refuse to have mayonnaise on his food.  I was surprised that he said yes when I offered him to put a dollop on each of his bowls.

We really enjoyed them.  Maybe I cooked them too much or they were too old (the wrappers) cause they were very crunchy.  The filling by itself is very good.  I gave the leftover to my son, without wasabi mayo of course and he said it was yummy.

Healthy Snack

I made these Cucumber Nachos 2 years ago.  This is something I plan to do again soon cause it’s healthy and so good.

Cucumber Nachos
From RecipeZaar

21-25 nachos

• 1 cup salsa
• 1 cucumber (I didn’t peel it)
• 1/2 cup fat-free cheddar cheese, shredded
• 1/2 cup fat free sour cream

1. Put the salsa in a strainer to remove some of the liquid.
2. Peel and slice the cucumber.
3. Put the slices of cucumber into the bottom of a 9×13 pan, without overlapping.
4. Discard the extra salsa liquid.
5. Put about 1 teaspoons of salsa on each cucumber slice.
6. Sprinkle the tops of the cucumbers with the cheese.
7. Put about 1 teaspoons of sour cream on top of each slice.
8. Serve cold.

Mushrooms + Lemon Roast Potatoes + Peas

I made these easy stuffed mushrooms last week.  I halved the recipe : wrong idea.  They are so good and so easy to eat 🙂

In the last 2 weeks, I made lemon roast potatoes and creamed peas with mushrooms and onions.  Both dishes are yummy!   The potatoes are like French Fries without all the oil with a lemony taste.  So good!