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!
...Yummy kale pesto without pine nuts made in my favorite food processor (the parts go in the dishwasher!) is the best meal prep ingredient ever! It doesn't require fresh herbs so can be made year-round and keep beautifully in the freezer.
Here's the thing:
I don't actually hate cooking entire meals on the weeknights. I find it relaxing to put our kids to bed, chat with Jay, and make an entire meal start to finish.
Buthoweveralso, when I do that it means that we eat dinner at 9pm and then don't go to bed until 11, and that's not OK. SO, I mostly prep some things and then cook one or two items when we're ready to eat.
...Just in time for summer! Which starts in June I know but the pools open this weekend and I'm a pool rat and pools mean summer and the pools open this weekend so this weekend is summer.
You get it.
This summer! We are going to keep cooking, but we are cooking light in two senses of the word: lighter food calorically, sure. It doesn't feel as great to inhale three plates of pasta when it's 95 degrees outside. But also, light on the actual cooking.
...Ok so here is a five minute doohickey that you can make today and eat all week. PROMISE.
We're starting our week with a sauce! An epic sauce. A wonderful sauce. A spicy peanut sauce that we make in the blender in five minutes and slather all over our lives, not sorry at all about that.
I think most people have categories of food that they eat almost weekly, and sometimes find it a struggle to eat foods that they know/like/can cook but with different flavors. We might always do a veg/chicken/rice meal, a pasta meal, a main dish salad, etc. But those meals can be totally different each week, which I like because I have a list of about ten thousand favorite foods, and I want to eat them all all the time.
...Continuing our leftover plan for the week! I feel like sometimes there are LOTS of leftovers of certain casseroles, especially heavier things. Maybe it's just our family, but if you make an 8-person casserole or side dish BUT there are 97 side dishes and people only eat a few spoonfuls of each thing....leftovers. 
Like mashed potatoes! That we are going to fry into patties and top with stewed apples, latke-style. If these are inauthentic enough, feel free to re-purpose the idea for Hanukkah. Here's the recipe that I used for this batch of potato cakes. 
Since Beck has gotten big enough to care we usually do a breakfast all together one or two days per week - usually on weekends when Jay is with us, but also sometimes Mondays call for pancakes made with all white flour and extra butter, and I'm not above that at all. I'm REALLY hoping to score some leftover mashed potatoes this week to make these on Saturday. They're super easy to make and you could definitely form them the night before and fry them right before breakfast, maybe throw some bacon in a skillet just for good measure.
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Raise your hand if you recently had surgery and ate all of the things while not moving for nearly a month!!!
Jay is raising his hand right now. We've had the weirdest few months - we were all three sick in increments so basically someone in the house was sick for over a month, then Jay traveled for work, then had surgery, and in that time frame we decided that CARBS AND DAIRY GOOD and KALE BAD. Which honestly emotionally was exactly what we needed, but still. Can't do that forever, sad aging bodies don't work well that way. Now, let me be super clear that I think Jay looks no different and he's maintained a super duper great outlook on health and food in 2018 so far, BUT, I definitely get that sometimes after a slump it feels great to eat especially lighter or healthier meals. For us, that means less/no red meat, fewer carbs, and smaller portions. We aren't cutting out anything exactly, but more fish + veggies + vegetarian options feels great to us right now. With cheese on top.
So to continue our Whole30-is-over-but-white-carbs-aren't-great way of eating, spaghetti squash is back in the house with a fun vengeance, because we both love it. The idea for this fresh sauce came from Pinch of Yum, which I read all the time and adore, and serving it over spaghetti squash seemed like a no-brainer. The way to make this delicious is a teeny bit of butter in the sauce, parm on top, and LIBERAL use of salt and pepper. Unsalted anything isn't great, but an unsalted healthy-on-purpose meal is just the most sad. Salt for president!
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Homemade ranch dip in just 5 minutes! This version has lots of yummy dill flavor and uses dried spices - no chopping or messing up a ton of dishes! This ranch dip recipe is particularly delicious with homemade pan fried potato chips or baked chicken tenders.
Unlike some people who love eating a wide variety of foods, I adore ranch. BUT, it has to be good. Hidden Valley is not good. Homemade bar ranch from a packet is good. Those packets are also Hidden Valley, so riddle me that. I think it's something about the combo of less preservatives, less or no mayo, that makes "homemade" ranch so wonderful.
I've seen a ton of no-packet homemade ranch ideas on the internet, and a lot of them call with powdered milk or something similar to achieve a more classic flavor. I don't love having ingredients around that only can be used for one or two things, though, so I don't use anything but spices and sour cream in my ranch.
...I don't know what to call this but you need it. 
Ok so. This is incredibly simple but very life-changing, probably. I'm a really huge fan of sauces and condiments in general. Having them around makes it really simple to amp up any regular dinner. Grilled chicken and roasted veggies becomes special with a balsamic drizzle and some fresh herbs. Seared salmon and rice is amplified with pesto, that kind of thing. So this! This is a very garlicky, vegan green sauce with lime, lemongrass, and basil at the base. I hesitate to call it Thai, necessarily, but it goes GREAT with all types of far-east flavors, so there's that.
Hence, a basil green sauce instead of a Thai green sauce. Whatever it is, though, you definitely need to make a batch and drizzle it all over your LIFE for the next week or so.
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I've written about this before, but one of my favorite things to have on hand in my fridge is marinara sauce. We're lucky to have a few great fresh pasta makers in our little city, so we almost always have frozen pasta in fun flavors that boil in 3 minutes. If I already have marinara in the fridge or freezer dinner becomes even easier, but still feels like I've made it myself because...I kind of did. 
No knock at all on jarred pasta sauces, but it's so simple to make your own (and cheaper! and less chemicals!) that I prefer to make big batches of it, keep some in the fridge and some in the freezer, and call it a day. I did this when I was pregnant and it was so nice to have on hand for quick pasta. I toss it with shredded chicken or cooked ground beef to serve over pasta, bake it with some cooked pasta and dollops of ricotta and shredded mozzarella for a quick ziti, or throw it into lasagna for a weekend meal.
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Easy green tomato jam recipe that comes together quickly with the help of a food processor! This is a great way to use up green tomatoes at the end of summer. Onions in this recipe add great umami, and I love this with crackers or bread and sharp cheese.
I feel like this is a new trendy thing in the world, do you? Jams or jellies that are sweet but savory and go with savory stuff. I'm talking tomato jam on burgers, bacon jam (?) over pimento cheese, that kind of thing. Is it a southern thing? a soon-to-be-passe thing? I don't know. What I do know, however, is that it is all of a sudden feeling like summer is ending very quickly. Jay and I were walking to lunch yesterday (there's a taco place that's mayyyyybe 10 minutes on foot from our house and it's become our new Sunday outing) and talking about how the weather feels all of a sudden very different. I say that it feels like summer has broken, kind of like a fever. The humidity goes away, the temperature has dropped 5-10 degrees, and the sun is warm but not so piercing.
It's also the time of year where produce that was amazing 3 weeks ago is somewhat lackluster, like the sad dry tomato plants in our yard that are trying so hard to still produce fruit but it's just not great anymore. The red tomatoes we get are still delicious, but they seem to not ripen as quickly, or if they do they'll rot faster when we bring them inside.
...July! I can't believe it. The days are shortening. What. It'll be super hot here for another few months, but July 4th is definitely the beginning of the end as it relates to summer, you know? I love changing seasons and fall as much as the next basic white girl, but summer is still probably my favorite season, leftover nostalgia from growing up and being out of school and swim team and all that. 
In case you missed it yesterday, here are some of our tried-and-true summer favorites that we eat all the time in our real lives. If you need any ideas for tomorrow, here they are! This dip is on the new-favorites list, and I can honestly say I haven't eaten that much of it because when I've made it other people have consumed it SO quickly that I don't get much, which is a problem for me but not for my pants fitting so pros and cons there. Green Goddess dip is traditionally made with an anchovy base like Caesar Salad, but I skipped that here to make the dip truly vegetarian. There's also Greek yogurt in it for extra tang, and so many fresh herbs to contribute to the gorgeous green color.
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It almost feels canibalistic, you know? Like how people don't like to eat eggs with chicken, except for not at all.
Because carrot top pesto. We're using the whole plant!
I've seen sauces and drizzles using carrot leaves in several recipes, but they have been more thin and acidic, like a chimichurri. The benefit of a pesto is that you use a LOT of the tops, which is important to me because there is essentially more top than bottom to a carrot when you think of using the carrot itself as the food and the greens as a topping. I've also seen carrot greens wilted down like spinach, but I wanted to keep them raw for their lovely barely-there-carrot flavor.
So. Pesto! The first time I made this I used pecans because I already had them, and I wanted the flavor of this pesto to be different than a regular basil pesto. I did use parsley, lemon, garlic, and parm - all the usual suspects. We've used this over fish, with pasta, and on toast as crostini, but my favorite way to use this is to have it almost as a dip for roasted carrots. These came straight out of our yard, but any carrot bunch with the leaves still attached will do!
...OMG kill me now this is all I want to eat for the rest of my life. With wine duh. Maybe add some olives to the plate for vegetables.
I made this dip for an Oscars party, and it was devoured in addition to 3 other cheese-based dips. Why not, you know? We weren't fitting into dresses. We were wearing PJs. The dish is inspired by a crazy-good appetizer we had last year at Biltmore House, of all places, at their on-site pub that is surprisingly really yummy. We didn't order it again the last time we were there, but we saw a few people order it and kiiiiind of regretted our decision to try something new, even though the something new was delicious too.
So I made it at home the next day. It's a pretty traditional garlic + wine + Swiss fondue, but we dot it with prosciutto that gets crispy in the oven and is just ridiculous over bread. RIDICULOUS.
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A yummy orange mustard vinaigrette made in the blender using seedless clementines! This is a thick and flavorful dressing made almost creamy without any dairy. It's also delicious as a chicken or shrimp marinade for grilling.
We are having a very serious citrus moment in our house. But everyone is, right? It's citrus SEASON, after all! It's kind of hard to remember to eat seasonally with everything being available all the time, but I find that when we do eat seasonally the produce tastes SO much better, and is usually cheaper. So. Everyone wins!
We cut up some clementine wedges into little bits for Beck a few weeks ago, and holy hell, you'd have thought I offered her a glimpse of Joseph Smith's golden tablets. There was yelling, and clapping, and inhaling....it went really well. Now every time we walk by the bowl of clementines in our house there is much cooing and pointing and squealing, which probably makes the citrus feel really good about itself, you know?
I used 2 clementines to whiz up a salad dressing in our blender, and it turned out gloriously. Not too citrusy like if you were to use concentrated juice, not too sweet at all, just wonderfully orange-ish and slightly bitter and spicy from the mustard.
...Don't be alarmed. This looks like the salad dressing I showed recently but it has no similarity, OTHER than that we make it in 5 seconds in the blender and then basically dinner is done. So, the similarity is a good one, you know?
Since I've been making Beck's food (when am I supposed to buck up and let her eat real food, btw? the choking is just so constant), I've been using the blender a bit more for our food, just because it's out on the counter and I can kind of puree a bunch of stuff for Beck, rinse the thing between batches, then wash it once at the end of the day like the sanitary human that I am. Wash once, cook 9 times, that's my motto.
So this came from that. Blender was out, we can't kill our arugula no matter how hard we try (SINCE MAY), and a quick simmered sauce to go over ravioli just made sense, you know? There are a few fresh pasta places at our farmer's market that sell lovely flavors of frozen ravioli, and this time I used crab ravioli, which was perfect with the sauce. But any old ravioli you like will be great, I promise.
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FINALLY YOU GUYS YES.
I've replicated something from a chain restaurant that tons of other people have also replicated on the internet!
It's inspired, is my point.
Ok so what's your stance on chain restaurants? We are kind of...in the middle. Some fast food is fine (Subway + Chick fil A), some medium fast (Panera duh), and then we kind of have a gap where we are really snobby (no Applebees ever no no no no) and then there are some ...higher end? chains that we like. That I like. Like Chuy's! The Mexican joint that is really consistent and delicious and everything always tastes the same as last time but it's FRESH and reliable if you need to eat in one while travelling for work. Family rules for chain restaurant eating, right there.
Another reason I'm super into Chuy's is that there is a local delivery service that will bring it to. your. door, and we used it a ton when Beck was super teeny, so I have these kind of happy far-away memories of Chuy's and my tiny baby.
The best part about Chuy's, as many of you know, is their mother effing Jalapeno Ranch. Or Jalapeno Dip. Or Creamy Jalapeno Dip? It's listed different places as different things. This is a salad dressing that you can order with your chips + salsa or over a burrito or as an addition to any other part of your meal. We always get it with our chips and then usually eat salads for our meal with this dressing on top.
THEN it turns out that the best thing to come out of our garden this year (after basil, which is like a tree) was jalapenos. We have a gazillion, and I think they're going to keep on keepin' on for a little while longer if the caterpillars will leave them alone. We've been putting jalapenos in everything, multiple times per day, and finally I was all CHUY'S WHY HAVEN'T WE MADE THE DIP YET. So I did. And we ate it. And it was SO good.
...So, when we were in NYC last time, before our trip was wrecked by a sick dog and an early departure, we ate Italian food at Margheritas in Hoboken with our friends from Greenville. It was one of the best meals we've had in NYC in recent years, and I couldn't get the arrabiata that I had out of my head. 
It was a really fresh tasting tomato sauce, spicy but just really tomato-y, not bogged down with lots of other flavors at all. What I loved about it most, though, was that there were hot and mild peppers in it, and some of them were pickled.
Pickled anything is just the best ever, you know?
This is my version! Spicy, sweet, tangy, and SIMPLE. It's definitely a new favorite around here, and I'm already planning how I can recreate a summer version with just fresh tomatoes when ours get ripe. How great would that be?
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Meaning, stuffs mixed into butter. Natch. 
This is the recipe I wrote to go with Matt's epic bread yesterday, but really the bread is so good that plain butter is perfect. but I had some fresh sage and frozen cherries and omgkerrygold, so why not? It takes five extra minutes of your life and compound butter is SO legit.
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We have been eating a lot of salads recently. I think it's all important to get the 5 servings of fruits and veggies we're supposed to get each day, and sometimes that's hard, man. BUT, even a little side salad has 2 or so servings (1 serving being a cup of veg, give or take), and if you add nuts and cheese and dressing it's like all the food groups coming together so....we all win.
Jay's a big salad fan too, and I noticed awhile ago that after I'd painstakingly make him a really pretty salad he'd take two knives and just beat the salad to hell so that everything could get mixed together. Then he'd add a lot of pepper and eat said salad in about 89 seconds, but that's a different behavioral issue. The point is, the guy likes chopped salads all mixed together with tons of ingredients and sexy dressing, and this is one of our absolute new favorites. The feta in the dressing was Jay's idea too, and I find that it's PERFECT for a neutral-but-tangy dressing that is really great on any kind of salad.
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So this is weird. This is what I made this year for Thanksgiving!
No but really. Sort of. We celebrated Thanksgiving last week with my family on Friday, so on Thursday we decorated the house for Christmas (got our first real tree!) and putzed around in the baby's room and since it was Jay's birthday I asked him what he'd like to eat and he said "fish balls." I think originally he had something Asian in mind but then started talking about lemon and parmesan and I was all THIS IS WHAT NEEDS TO HAPPEN.
Also, I did originally plan to make these round, not flat, but I have a hard time keeping balls round - I find they always kind of end up with a flat edge anyway, so I figured why not just beat the flattening to the punch? 
So what we have here is this: little mini fish cakes with CHUNKS of cod, not ground up to smithereens, and a leeetle bit of filler for flavor and to hold everything together. Then it's coated in parm and panko and fried so gently AND THEN we have a tangy but creamy dipper with dill and other yummy flavors. I photographed this as an appetizer first, then tossed some of the sauce with lettuce and made a cod cake salad, and no one in this house was mad. You will adore these.
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