Chili lime salmon with honey is a DELICIOUS version of my best ever cast iron skillet salmon. Just 6 ingredients, 15 minutes, and gluten free, dairy free salmon dinner can be yours!
It's 6 ingredients of love, basically. How are we feeling about a 20 minute salmon dinner that feels slightly Mexican, slightly fine for any side dish you like, slightly practically perfect in every way?
We feel great about it, right?
...This old fashioned pimento cheese recipe is absolutely perfect! I love to have pimento cheese homemade with lots of storebought ingredients (crackers, cheese, pickles, etc) for an easy cheese board at a party or for a snack plate dinner! This is extra delicious paired with some homemade focaccia for dunking.
OK SO.
Let us discuss the glory that is pimento cheese, since it's Master's Weekend and we live in the South. Since I started this blog I've made a LOT of pimento cheese, and have tweaked the recipe over the years to a combination that I absolutely adore.
Other people adore it too, and that's not something I say about a lot of the food I make, because I'm insecure. Pimento cheese homemade, though, is something that people of all walks of life really enjoy when it is good. Back when we used to cater this was one of our most-ordered recipes, hands down.
...This raw bok choy salad with asparagus and peas is the most delicious easy salad! A no-dressing dressing with lemon juice and olive oil + some fresh parmesan rounds out this gluten free side or main dish. Round this spring salad out with some favorite grilled chicken and shortcut focaccia, or serve this as a cold vegetable side dish!
It's another non-dressing salad, aka my favorite way to throw together a super quick and fresh meal.
Farmer's markets are finally coming back, which means we are in Spring Greens heaven, and so many of these ingredients are able to be found locally right now.
The gist is this: raw greens, fresh herbs, and a few choice veggies blanched super quickly in salted water that get cooled and served on top. Salt, pepper, lemon juice, olive oil, and parmesan top the dish for flavor, so we don't need to mess with making a dressing.
I LOVE salads like this this time of year, because you can customize them based on what you like or have in your fridge that needs to be used up. Literally any veggie, herb, or cheese can be swapped out here, this is just a combination that I love.
...The best buddha bowls with cauliflower and tahini sauce! These are so delicious for a make ahead lunch, and the pickled onions and tahini sauce can be made in advance for a quick throw-together meal. These bowls are vegetarian, gluten free, and can be served hot, cold, or at room temperature.
When it comes to "healthy" food, I'm careful to not use words like "cheat, guilt, good, bad," and so on. I think that thought pattern surrounding food can be so damaging, but also I agree that in terms of physical health there are foods that are better for our bodies than others, if we're talking lentils vs cheetos.
I love lentils for the cheap + toothsome + nutrition-packed punch they pack in a bowl like this. They are SO flavorful (because salt) and honestly I could eat a bowl of them on their own.
We made this into a fun bowl with bright pink pickled onions, a shortcut gremolata, and toasty roasty cauliflower, one of my favorite substitutes for meat because when roasted it has just the best texture.
...Favorite pan fried potato chips are so easy to make yourself at home! These are a great lunch side dish or an offering for a summertime potluck. Just one russet potato makes enough to serve four people, and this recipe is done in an under an hour. I like Greek yogurt onion dip with these.
Let's make chips!
Because our lunches need a yummy side dish every day, right?
...My favorite baby potatoes recipe ever! Steamed baby potatoes are the easiest way to cook baby potatoes on the stovetop with just a few ingredients. I use baby yellow potatoes for this, but any small potato you enjoy works great! These are particularly delicious made into a meal with cast iron skillet salmon and a lemon kale salad.
Say hello to our new favorite GF side dish! Tiny baby potatoes, simmered and steamed and lightly crispy from butter + salt, tossed in any herbs you have, just super duper simple happiness all around.
These baby potatoes are simple and quick to make - I serve them all the time and just change the herbs I use so they go with whatever I'm serving them with!
...Super yummy easy chocolate mousse! This is my favorite chocolate mousse recipe in that it is totally foolproof, works BEST when made in advance, and is an easy gluten free dessert for dinner parties and guests. Chocolate mousse is definitely the at-home dessert we need more of!
For Valentine's Day! Or for your weekend, you do you.
A few nights ago Jay and I were ignoring each other on our devices before we fell asleep, as you do, and all of a sudden he was all "what should we do for Valentine's Day?" I probably replied "I want to keep reading stop talking to me," but honestly we don't always do anything for Valentine's Day. We definitely don't exchange gifts, but we've done flowers and fun dates and cooked fun food together over the years. Valentine's Day falls at a time of year where I'm travelling a lot on the weekends, and now that we have Beck we'd rather relax and enjoy family time with no work (the 7 days a week is getting awful), so I'm hopeful that's what we'll do this weekend leading up to the day.
...This gluten free chocolate cake is a BLENDER CAKE that has just a few ingredients and comes together in under an hour! It's totally foolproof and doesn't taste like it's trying to be healthy at all. Instead, think "is it a brownie, is it a cookie, do I care because it's covered in chocolate ganache frosting?"
It's here, it's here! ....Valentine's Day? To be clear, we celebrate very minimally on V-day, maybe make a big fancy meal, although we technically celebrate our dating anniversary on Valentine's Day - TEN YEARS, where did the time go.
Oh, I know, the time went into the pandemic vortex like the rest of my soul.
...Just like the kind you find on hibachi plates, Japanese sweet carrots to level up your homemade Japanese fusion food! Make these sweet glazed carrots a meal with my favorite hibachi steak, hibachi shrimp, and hibachi vegetables!
More hibachi! This time my favorite little nibbly side dish, the sweet carrots that come on the side of hibachi meals, mainly of the takeout variety.
...Cabbage roll soup is a low carb soup version of traditional cabbage rolls; ground meat, cabbage, sweet, tangy tomato sauce. This recipe has just a few ingredients and comes together in half an hour or so. It's a great soup for freezing or meal prep - leftovers are delicious!
It's time for a super easy new cabbage and beef soup recipe.
One of those recipes that is comforting, cozy, filling (with bread dunked into it obviously), but requires no last minute rushing around to get food hot + crispy. It's 2021 on the last day of DJT's presidency in the middle of a pandemic and honestly we need food that just stays, you know? No emotional fortitude necessary, just an easy soup recipe.
...Featuring our favorite marinade for grilled chicken, this salad with goat cheese and walnuts is one that we make often for main dish salad dinners or for meal prep! The combo of tangy dressing, maple marinade, and creamy goat cheese is just the best ever. No boring main dish salads here!
Hello and hi! How are we managing in this pandemic coup? Are we being gentle with our New Year's Resolutions? Please say yes.
One thing that we have been trying to do for a few months is making one "lunchy" item during our meal prep. Not focusing only on dinners helps us stay away from takeout (which I'm such a sucker for especially on days where I don't have anywhere to go), and having super yummy foods in the fridge to grab just overall makes our workdays at home feel more enjoyable.
...My favorite slow cooked Sunday sauce recipe! This is a version of Sam the Cooking Guy's Bolognese recipe featuring tons of veggies, beef, and a few special ingredients. The recipe is super simple and simmers for a long time to develop a perfect Sunday gravy flavor and OMG the house smell. Best ever.
Hello and hi, let's finish this year with an uber bang. I've been talking with a lot of people recently about things that I make that never change, staples that I think are so handy for everyone to be able to make all the time. A good salad dressing, one kind of bread, that sort of thing.
This easy Bolognese sauce is a new-to-me recipe that I've been working on for a few months. I watched Sam the Cooking Guy make this Bolognese on YouTube, and I loved the method, ingredients, all of it. The key to the flavor in this Bolognese is that we use stock, wine, and milk to flavor and enrich the sauce so that it's super hearty without being creamy by the end.
...Super simple buttermilk cornish game hens roasted to perfection! This recipe has only 3 ingredients and is a fabulous Thanksgiving turkey alternative. The smaller size makes them much more manageable, and they roast in just an hour, leaving time for all of the other yummy side dishes you're making to heat up!
Two and a half weeks to Thanksgiving!
There's another countdown in my head to January 20, 2021, BUT I DIGRESS.
...What is Potatoes Romanoff? Only the best twice baked potato casserole recipe in the world! Envision: leftover baked potatoes, fused with cheese, butter, sour cream, and seasonings. I love this for a super easy Thanksgiving side dish that can be made ahead, but it's also delicious as a meal prep side dish served with my favorite marinated grilled chicken for dinner!
Great news!
We are staving off election and pandemic jitters with carbs and dairy.
What can I say except, you're welcome? (listening to a lot of Moana recently, Will's choice)
...Hey hey, fall sheet pan dinner recipe! This sheet pan sausage and root veggies comes with its very own warm spinach salad made right.on.the.freaking.pan. The ingredients are simple, the method is foolproof, and the salad dressing is seriously, drinkably delicious.
Omg how is it Halloween week. Like seriously.
...This creamy, cheesy baked broccoli has just FIVE INGREDIENTS and comes together in under an hour. It's my favorite new easy thanksgiving side dish for this year and is absolutely replacing traditional broccoli casserole (much as I love all casseroles!). This cheesy broccoli wins the side dish game again and again.
Well, HELLO. We're starting Thanksgiving side dish recipes!!
(no one asked, I realize this)
...This gluten free black beans and rice recipe has just 8 ingredients and is done in about half an hour! I love rice and beans for a quick vegetarian dinner, and make these black beans in advance often for an even faster meal-prepped dinner. If you have some extra black beans, black bean salsa is great to have around for snacks!
Weeknight vegan dinner idea, here we go! Weeknight vegan/dairy free/gluten free/BUT NOT SAD dinner, to be exact.
Free of some things people avoid, not free of joy, etc.
...This easy lemon vinaigrette recipe has just 5 ingredients and is done in under 10 minutes. I love to make a batch of this each week to have for easy salads. Bonus: use any kind of sweetener (honey, agave) or mustard you like to switch this dressing up each time!
Hey hey hey, lemon dressing!
...Super cinchy basic chicken marinade that we use for everything! This is my favorite kid-friendly chicken recipe, and it couldn't be easier: three ingredients, cook the chicken however you'd like, and enjoy! We use this easy chicken marinade often for grilling, but this is also a delicious way to make seared chicken breasts or broiled chicken thighs indoors. Mainly: yum.
Maple marinated chicken, HELLO.
...These easy baked meatballs are gluten free, made with ground turkey, and done in just about half an hour! They can be made in advance for a super easy meal prep, kept in the freezer, and don't have breadcrumbs or any extra binder. These are the yummiest healthy gf meatballs!
Gityer balls right here!
I'm sorry let's start over don't x out. I made you a yummy new meal prep entree and I hope you love it.
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