This is a simple and delicious meal I often make on weeknights. It is healthy and hearty and my whole family loves it. It isn’t completely homemade, but I never feel a meal has to be to be good. This saves a lot of time and makes a satisfying meal your family will be sure to love. I hope you enjoy it as much as we do! You can also easily make this meal vegetarian by simply not adding the chicken and only using vegetables, or adding some tofu.

You will need:
1 jar of Trader Joe’s brand Red Curry Sauce
1 small head of cauliflower
1 Red pepper
1 onion
1 – 1 1/2 cups of broccoli
1 large carrot, or 2 medium carrots
2 large chicken breasts (you can use more if desired)
1 can of light coconut milk (optional)
1 cup of Basmati Rice, uncooked
2 cups of water
1 package of storebought naan bread (package usually comes with two pieces of naan)
olive oil
2 cloves of garlic
Red pepper flakes
chopped cilantro

step 1: Rinse the rice under cold water in a fine sieve to remove residue on the rice. Place rice into a medium saucepan and add two cups of water. Cover with a lid and cook on high until bubbling, then reduce head to medium-low and cook until rice is tender. DO NOT STIR THE RICE!.

step 2: Meanwhile, chop all the vegetables into bite size chunks, except for the carrot. Then add to a large skillet. For the carrot, use a vegetable peeler and peel off the rough outer skin. Then continue to use the peeler to shave long thin strands of carrot and add it to the other vegetables in the skillet. Add about 2 Tbsp. of water to the vegetables and cover the skillet with a lid. Steam the vegetables on a medium heat until just tender. Remove the vegetables from heat and set aside in a bowl.

step 3: Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Rinse the chicken and pat dry with a paper towel. Remove fat and discard. Cut chicken in bite size chunks and add to the skillet with a drizzle of olive oil. Saute over medium heat until no longer pink. Add salt and pepper to taste.

NOTE: once your rice is done cooking just remove the pan from the heat and leave the lid on until ready to serve to keep rice warm.

Step 4: Add vegetables back into the skillet with the cooked chicken. Add in the entire jar of Trader Joe’s Red Curry Sauce. Simmer on low and stir occasionally until everything is coated and heated through. If you desire, add int he coconut milk and stir until well blended into the curry sauce. Cook until heated through.

Step 5: Meanwhile, while the curry is simmering, Place the naan bread slices onto a baking sheet and brush with olive oil. Then crush one clove of garlic per piece of naan bread and spread evenly over the surface. Place tray of naan bread into the oven and cook for about 8 minutes until crisp and heated through. Remove tray and cut naan bread into slices.

Step 6: Serve curry over a bed of the rice garnished with red pepper flakes, cilantro, and 2 wedges of naan bread. Enjoy!

This meal, yet simple, is quick and easy and tasty.  It’s a traditional Polish dish that I’m sure many of you have heard of before.  I’m not Polish, but I LOVE perogies enough to be.  I’ve promised myself that one day I am going to make perogies from scratch for my blog, I have the recipe sitting in my binder, but have yet to get around to doing it.  Anyway, that was a little off topic, but since we’re talking about Polish food I thought everyone might like to know that someday there WILL be a perogie recipe on here.

Kluski noodles are something I remember my mom making every once in awhile for dinner or buying at sport’s games in high school from the concession stand.  It was literally like 5 ingredients, but so addicting.  I will warn you, this is one of those dishes that requires a lot of salt for seasoning or you can experiment with other seasonings to your liking, but this dish can lean towards the bland side, so don’t be afraid of the salt shaker… otherwise you may write this dish off as not so tasty when in fact if you add the salt it will end up being very addicting, like french fries.. well maybe not QUITE THAT addicting, but close.

P.S. for those of you who don’t know what “Kluski” noodles are, it is basically just a homemade Polish egg noodle.  The noodles are thicker than the curly egg noodles in the store and when cooked they are soft and thick, kind of more like a dumpling, but cut in strips. Most grocery stores carry them, but sometimes they are hard to find.  I substituted Kluski noodles with a similar noodle i bought from Wal-Mart called “country noodle”, but it was the same texture, so it worked exactly the same.

INGREDIENTS:

makes about 8 -10 servings

8 oz. Kluski noodles
1 head of cabbage noodles
1 lb. ground beef (Optional)
1 small onion, chopped
1/2 stick butter
1 large clove garlic
olive oil
salt and pepper
Paprika

Boil water for your noodles. Meanwhile, Saute the ground beef, crushed garlic, and chopped onion over medium heat until browned and onion is soft.

Add noodles to boiling water and cook according to package directions. Transfer cooked ground beef to a bowl and drizzle the same pot with 2 Tbsp. olive oil. Turn the heat down to medium-low.

Next, rinse the cabbage head and chop into big chunks of cabbage (see below). S

1. place cabbage head onto a large cutting board.

2. Cut the cabbage head in half with a large sharp knife and lay flat side down on the cutting board.

3. Cut the cabbage half in strips lengthwise.

4. Rotate by placing your entire palm over top of the cabbage strips and rotate with your wrist 90 degrees so the strops are now horizontal. Cut strips lengthwise again to form chunks of cabbage. Repeat with second half of cabbage

Scrape all cabbage into the pot of oil and saute until tender. Remove noodles when done and drain in a colander.

The cabbage should look something like this when it is ready.

Once cabbage is soft, add in the cooked noodles and the ground beef. Stir together until well combined and heated through. You want the flavors to adhere to the noodles. Season generously with paprika, salt and black pepper. Feel free to try other spices as well (sometimes I like to use Cajun spice). I recommend letting it sit for awhile before serving.

A year or two ago I went to grab my guilty pleasure drink from Starbucks. My all time favorite drink, the caramel raspberry frappuccino. If you haven’t heard of this drink, it’s because it isn’t on the menu. My husband got me into this drink when we started dating and it still stands as one of my favorites when we make a Starbucks trip. Anyway… I’m not here to talk about frappuccinos, so that was a bonus. Oh,yes…I remember what I was saying now…so on that one day about a year or two ago when I was grabbing my frappuccino I saw they had some free Starbucks recipe cards for some of the items they feature in their refrigerated case. The recipe I picked up was for the banana walnut bread, which I happen to really enjoy on occasion. I was curious to see how close the recipe actually came to tasting like their banana bread. I figured if they were giving recipes out for free there was no way it was going to be THAT close to the real deal. Although I like walnuts, for some reason I really wanted chocolate in my banana bread when I decided to try out this recipe… and sister let me tell ya… there is NO turning back… the chocolate made the first cut. I LOVE this recipe! I add a bit more buttermilk and vanilla to the recipe than it calls for and it turns out just the way I like it. Turned out the free starbucks recipe ended up being a keeper! Now, I would like to share my favorite banana bread recipe with you all. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

Chocolate Chip Starbucks Banana Bread
2 c. flour
1 1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
1 egg
1 1/8 c. sugar
1/2 c. canola oil
1/2 c. buttermilk
1 tbsp. vanilla extract
3 ripe medium-large bananas (mashed)
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Smeeks… smeeeeeks! I love to say that word. Smeeks is an adorable little candy/gift shop off of Camelback Rd. in Phoenix, AZ between the 17 and 51, near 7th st. I saw the little candy shop featured in an issue of PHOENIX magazine several months ago and bookmarked it as one of the places I would like to visit someday if I ever had time. Well, I made time for it last week and was definitely NOT disappointed. It was a really friendly and colorful shop painted blue, red, and white. The shop housed tons of different kinds of candy from taffy to candy bars to gum, a lot of which were old fashioned brands you don’t find in the grocery store. They also sell refrigerated old fashioned soda pop and party favors. It is worth the trip, but definitely be prepared to spend at least $30 – $40 on candy! Here is some of the loot I picked up…

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This recipe has quickly become one of my family’s favorites for week nights. I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE using the crock pot during the week; especially on those really busy days… you can throw some ingredients in it and slow cook it all day and come out with a deliciously tender and flavorful meal at the end of a busy day. This recipe is not one of my own, but I tweaked it to my taste from an old issue of cooking light magazine. Also it is worthy to note for those of you who aren’t huge Indian food fans, the underlying ‘curry’ note of flavoring in this dish is very mild, so it is not an overwhelming or strong curry flavor. I like to serve this dish over Basmati rice, but white, jasmine, or brown rice will work just as well.

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I’ve been on an Asiago cheese kick lately… it’s such a refreshing alternative to Mozzarella, Provolone, or Parmesan. Those subtle hints of smoked flavor as well as a bit of sharpness and bite to the cheese makes it lovely to add as a garnish or to deepen or enhance flavors, which is how I used it in this particular recipe. It was love at first taste with me and Asiago… I’m sure you will have a similar encounter!

Meat Stuffed Shells
Makes approximately 18 stuffed shells

3/4 – 1 lb. lean ground beef
3 links of Italian sweet sausage, removed from the casing (may use hot sausage as well… i just accidentally pulled out the sweet from the freezer, but either works!)
2 large cloves of garlic
salt and black pepper
olive oil
Red pepper flakes
Fresh basil leaves (8- 10 leaves)
Dried oregano
1 small onion or shallot, chopped finely
1 c. Asiago cheese, grated
1/2 c. Romano cheese, grated
1 package of Jumbo shell noodles
1 jar of Dellalo brand Pink Vodka Sauce (feel free to use any regular spaghetti sauce for this, I just wanted to spice up the dish a bit, so I used something a little less traditional)

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I came across a delicious looking cobb salad on one of my favorite blogs recently. I did my own representation of the recipe a few weeks back and never posted the picture. The presentation of the salad was a little different as I wanted it to be easier for a group of people to scoop out a serving with all the goodies in it rather than trying to mix them in. I highly recommend this recipe, it was so satisfying and tasty. In fact I am already hungry for it again! Here is Smitten Kitchen’s Classic Cobb Salad recipe.

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