Showing posts with label rachael ray. Show all posts
Showing posts with label rachael ray. Show all posts

Thursday, July 9, 2009

Fancy Pork Chops

I guess this is my week to make fancy looking food. For example, the salmon I made yesterday was just fried with a lot of things added to the top. Today, I fried some pork chops and did the same thing. Here is the Rachael Ray recipe:
Pork Chops with Balsamic Strawberry Salad and Pine Nut Orzo
I didn't think my husband would like the orzo because of the spices used, but he loved this meal. He just wants me to get meatier pork chops next time, the ones I used were sliced pretty thin.
I served some creamed corn and bread to make up for the lack of meat lol. Hope you enjoy the recipe!

Wednesday, July 8, 2009

Dressy Salmon and Potato Cakes

Last night was the first time I have made anything notable in a while, but here it is!
Well-Dressed Salmon
Crispy Mashed Potato Cakes
This is the best salmon recipe I have maybe ever made! The relish and the dressing really add a ton of flavor to the fish.
The potato cakes I found a little mushy, and I added salt to mine. But my husband loved them.
I would have made a picture, but the batteries in my camera are dead :(
So take it from word of mouth, this is worth trying!

Thursday, April 9, 2009

4/2 Citrus-Soy Chicken Stir Fry

On the Rachael Ray website you can find this under Citrus-Soy Chicken, Pork or Shrimp Stir Fry.
I used the packaged pre-cooked chicken strips you get in a bag at the grocery. This cut down on the cooking time, and made this recipe super-fast. I had to buy frozen edamame because I could not find fresh, but I just thawed them a little before using.
This is the best stir-fry I have made in years. We both loved it, and I will be making it again!

4/1 Beef n Bean Burrito Burgers

This is from the Rachael Ray magazine:
1 lb. ground beef sirloin
1 15 oz can black beans, rinsed
1/2 c. white or brown rice, cold
1 T. grill seasoning
1 T. ancho chili powder
1-1/2 t. ground cumin
1-1/2 t. ground coriander
1 T. veg oil
1 avocado
1/2 small red onion, finely chopped
1 jalapeno chile or serrano chilies, seeded and finely chopped
1 clove garlic, grated or finely chopped
grated peel and juice of 1 lime
1/2 c. sour cream
4 crusty rolls, split
4 leaves red leaf lettuce
1 tomato, sliced
In largebowl combine thebeef, beans, rice, grill seasoning and spices. Form into 4 patties. In large skillet, heat oil over med-high heat. Add patties and cook, turning once and lowereing the heat slightly for the last few minutes until browned, 12 minutes.
While the burgers cook, in a med bowl mash together avocado, onion , jalapeno, garlic, lime peel and juice. Stir in sour cream.
Layer each roll bottom with lettuce, tomato, beef patty, guac, and roll top.

The first time I made bean burgers was when I was teaching myself to cook. They were HORRIBLE, even my mom's dog would not eat them. So this recipe made me a tad nervous, but it turned out great! Because I seeded the jalapeno, there was no heat to the guac, and it was a nice touch on the burger. Try this!

3/31 Rachael Ray Chili

I decided to try this Rachael Ray magazine recipe:
Texas Turkey Chili
1/4 c. olive oil
1 bell pepper, finely chopped
1 onion, finely chopped
1/4 c. tomato paste
1 T. chili powder
3/4 lb ground turkey
salt and pepper
1 14.5 oz can fire roasted crushed tomatoes
1 12 oz bottle beer
1 15.5 oz can kidney beans, rinsed
Heat oil over med-high heat. Set aside 2 T. chopped bell pepper and add the remaining bell pepper and onion to dutch oven, cook until soft about 5 minutes. Stir in tomato paste and chili powder. Add turkey, season with salt and cook, breaking up and stirring to combine, 3-4 minutes.
Pour in crushed tomatoes and beer, bring to a boil, then lower the heat and simmer, stirring occasionally for 10 minutes. Add the kidney beans and cook until heated through, about 5 minutes more. Season with salt and pepper. Serve in bowls with cornbread, top with reserved bell pepper.

OK I know you guys are used to me changing every recipe, but I follwed this one to the letter...and it was very bad. The first thing my husband said was, "this is a woman's chili" then he said, "Rachael does not know her chili." We did not like the raw bell pepper on top at all. So we are not recommending this one.

Monday, March 30, 2009

3/27 An unhealthy? splurge!

I am winding down my Rachael Ray recipes I promise. This time I have chosen something I normally would not cook. I felt like we needed to eat something a little on the wild side, then my husband hurt his leg, and I wanted to make him happy. SO here is:
Cheese-stuffed Hot Dogs with Spicy Onions
4 franks
2 T. grill seasoning (Rachael uses this a lot)
2 thin slices sharp cheaddr cheese, cut into 1/2 in strips
2 T. olive oil
2 small onions, sliced 1/4 inch thick
2 T. brown sugar
1 t. finely chopped chipotle chile in adobo sauce plus 1 t. adobo sauce
salt
2 T. butter, melted
4 hot dog buns
Preheat broiler. Make slit down each frank, being careful not to cut all the way through. Place grill seasoning and franks in plastic bag, shake to coat. Place franks on baking sheet and stuff each with 2-3 strips of cheese.
In large skillet, heat the olive oil over med-low heat. Add the onions and cook, until soft and golden 12-15 minutes. Add brown sugar, chipotle, adobo sauce, and 1/2 t. salt and cook, stirring until sugar dissolves. 2 minutes.
Butter insides of buns and place face up on baking sheet with dranks. Broil until cheese melts and buns are toasted, 3-5 minutes. Serve with caramleized onions on top of hot dog.
Only advice I have here is to broil the buns and hot dogs seperately. My oven burned the first batch of buns cause I either had it too high, or you just can't leave them in as long as the franks.
I added mustard to our dogs, but they can be served without cause they are so good. We also had oven fries.

3/26 Mexican Lasagna

Rachael Ray magazine has turned chiliquiles into something she calls Enchilada Suiza Mexican Lasagna...
2 T. olive oil
2 lb ground chicken or turkey
1 T. ground cumin
1 T. ground coriander
salt and pepper
1 15 oz can hominy, rinsed
1 rec onion, chopped
2 jalapenos, chopped
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
12 large or 14 small tomatillos, peeled and coarsely chopped
1/3 c. cilantro or flat leaf parsely leaves
2 avocados
grated peel and juice of 2 limes
1 T. honey
1 11 oz package flour tortillas
1/2 lb monterey jack cheese, shredded
1/2 lb Siwss cheese, shredded
1 c. sour cream or creme fraiche
Preheat broiler or oven to 400. In large skillet, heat 1 T. olive oilo over med-high. Add meat, crumbling with cumin and coriander. Season with salt and pepper.Cook 3 minutes, stir in hominy and cook for 3 minutes more.
In large saucepan, heat another T olive oil; add onion, chilies, and garlic, season with salt and pepper. Cook until soft, 5 minutes.
Using food processor, process tomatillos and cilantro until almost smooth then stir into onion mix and simmer for 5 minutes. Rinse out food processor bowl, add avocados lime peel and lime juice; puree and season with salt. Stir the avocado mix into the tomatillo sauce. Stir in the honey.
In dry skillet, cook tortillas until charred. In bowl, combine cheeses. In 9x13 baking dish add sauce, tortillas, meat, cheese, tortillas and so on. End with layer of cheese. Broil about 5 minutes and serve with sour cream or fraiche.
OK this week I left my grocery list at home :( So I ended up getting most of this recipe bought, but not all of it. So here are the changes I had to make:
lemon juice instead of lime and peel
corn tortillas instead of flour, I did not char them and I only used about 6 or 9
10 tomatillos
1 avocado
cheddar cheese instead of monterey jack
Believe it or not, this still turned out fabulous, which just proves you don't always have to have everything to make a recipe work! Try it using the recipe or my changes, either way it is great.
And my toddler liked it too.

Thursday, March 26, 2009

3/25 Total rework of Rachael Ray Recipe- Try mine!

I found a recipe for spaghetti and meatballs in the Rachael Ray March magazine, but then when I read it it called for it to be slow cooked for SIX HOURS! I dread bringing out the slow cooker for anything besides chili and pot roast, and there was no way I was going to use it for cooking some simple meatballs. I am not going to post the original recipe to avoid confusion, but they were using ground turkey and loads of paprika with some veggies, fire-roasted tomatoes, and a jar of roasted red peppers.
I was out of red peppers, and it is hard to find jarred ones at the stores I go to. I also used ground beef because we are cooking a lot of ground turkey later this week. So here is the revised recipe:
Meatballs in Paprika Tomato Sauce Jennifer Style
Oilve oil
2 onions, finely chopped
2 ribs celery, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, finelyh chopped
1 14.5 oz can diced tomatoes
1-/2-1 c. spaghetti sauce of your choice
1 T. or more paprika (taste test)
salt and pepper
1/2 c. unseasoned breadcrumbs
1 egg, beaten
1-1/2 lb ground beef

1. In large skillet, heat the olive oil over medium heat. Add onions, celery and garlic and cook, stirring often until soft, 7 minutes. Transfer 1-1/2 c. of the onion mix to a large bowl, let cool. Reserve skillet.
2. Add tomatoes and spaghetti sauce to skillet. Stir in paprika and season with salt and pepper.
3. Meanwhile mix breadcrumbs, egg, 1/2 t. salt, 1/4 t. pepper into remaining onion mix. Mix in meat. Form 1-1/2 inch meatballs. Add meatballs to skillet and cover.
4. Sauce will cook down, add more spaghetti sauce and paprika if needed. Flip Meatballs once and cook until done. Serve over spaghetti noodles.

We loved this!

Monday, March 2, 2009

3/2/09 Cobb Salad Triple-Decker Sandwich


Sorry it has been a few days since I have really "cooked" anything. I had some things going on, so we have been warming up things and eating them.

It snowed quite a bit yesterday, and my son is in daycare today. So I wanted to fix something sort of easy that my husband would love. I really wanted to make a soup or vegetable stew, but then I remembered I had some avocados I bought the other day. Avocados are great eating, but have a extremely low life expectancy. Unless there is some way of keeping them around longer, if there is please share it with me!

I used this recipe on the Rachael Ray website (of course):


This sandwich layers things my husband loves such as avocados, tomato, and blue cheese. The recipe is so easy...the only thing I would change is instead of pouring the dressing on top, just put it on the sandwich. It makes it easier to eat, and the sandwich will look more appealing imo. My husband also said to use less blue cheese than called for.
I served with home fries in olive oil, herbs and salt.

So 2 thumbs up for this one.

Wednesday, February 25, 2009

2/25/09 Baked Fish and Chips


This recipe is the Fish N Chips in the February Rachael Ray magazine...NOT the one on her website....it is on page 72. For now, I am not going to type in the recipe, I am hoping they will add it to the website after this week so I can put the link here... if you are dying to try it leave a comment and I will get it to you somehow.

I couldn't get my sweet potatoes to look long and slender like in the magazine picture, but they still tasted good. I left out all parsely in this recipe, and it still tasted great!


This is a baked Fish n Chips instead of deep fried, and it cuts about 1000 calories or more out of it. How is that for healthy!

My husband hasn't come home yet, but I know he will like this. So this recipe gets 2 thumbs up!

Monday, February 23, 2009

2/22- $10 Rachael Ray- why it didn't work

I am not the type that usually likes recipes with fewer than 6 or 7 ingredients. But since I am on a budget and eating vegetarian lately, I thought I would try Rachael Ray's Baked Nestled Eggs recipe found on page 61 in the February Everyday with Rachael Ray magazine.
I am not going to post the recipe here, but it is basically red bell peppers stuffed with rice, onion, fennel, butternut squash, and cream with an egg on top. Baked.
Here are the reasons why we didn't like this recipe:
1) afterwards we were still hungry and went to Arby's- we don't know if we want to continue eating vegetarian or not since this always happens
2) the rice was not cooked evenly, or some of it was crispy for some reason
3) had to bake longer than recommended to get the egg to set
So this recipe got 2 thumbs down from 2 adults.

Thursday, February 19, 2009

2/18/09 Vegetarian Rachael Ray

I wasn't sure how much Rachael Ray knew abuot vegetarian since most days she is whipping up steak or some other meat. Plus, when I first started cooking I had a very bad result in a bean burger recipe, so this recipe for Sloppy Veg-Head Joe made me nervous. But you know me, I decided to try it. Here is the link:
http://www.rachaelray.com/recipe.php?recipe_id=2038
This recipe was SO easy to make, and it made a ton. It most definitely serves four. I used serrano peppers instead of jalapenos thinking it would be mild enough for me to eat, but they were still hot for me.
I did manage to find some fire-roasted tomatoes, but I couldn't tell if they really made a huge difference. Crushed prolly would have been cheaper.
This recipe got 2 huge thumbs from my husband and one from me, so I guess that is 3 thumbs from 2 people lol.

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

2/17/09 Low Cost egg/hash recipe

I chose this recipe because everyone says eggs are a cheap staple to make, and we are trying our best to save some money. Plus I always have some kielbasa or sausage lying around. This is another Rachael Ray recipe, so please don't hate on me for loving Rachael. Somtimes I get on a kick with a certain cookbook or website, and will cook from it for a month before I get tired of it. This seems to be the case with the Rachael Ray website and myself.
Here is the recipe for Campfire hash:
http://www.rachaelray.com/recipe.php?recipe_id=2484
This was really easy to make. The only problem I had was that even with occasional stirring, everything was sticking to the bottom of the pan. I was using a dutch oven instead of a skillet; that may have had something to do with it (I don't know). But since I couldn't let anything sit for too long without the sticky going on, I had to make the eggs scrambled inside the mix instead of cooking them over easy. Big Deal.
This got one thumbs up from me, my husband didn't like the sausage I used (Ukraine or German I forget, but it wasn't kielbasa). Otherwise I think he would have liked it.
VERY EASY, VERY CHEAP!

Friday, February 13, 2009

2/13/09 Lunch- a Rachael Ray patty melt recipe

Today for lunch I wanted to make something quick and simple. This is my day off, and I don't feel like standing on my feet cooking when my son isn't even here.
So, I tried making Sour Cream and Onion Turkey Patty Melts by Rachael Ray. The recipe can be found at:
http://www.rachaelray.com/recipe.php?recipe_id=2234
I accidentally used onion rolls instead of the rye bread I had bought (they were out of pumpernickel), but they actually tasted great with the scallions and turkey.
Serve with a pear/spinach salad with blue cheese and dried cranberries. My husband ate his with a root beer.
2 thumbs up out of 2 adults