Hook Line & Savor: Black Bean Crusted Cod and Avocado Salad with Chimichurri Dressing

A big thanks to Hook Line and Savor for sponsoring this post and for creating great-tasting, allergy-friendly, clean ingredient products.  All thoughts and opinions are my own.

When the word “hangry” became a thing I felt so very validated.  After years of me proclaiming that “bad things happen when I don’t eat” (sort of like a werewolf faced with a full moon or like the Hulk when he rips off his t-shirt right before he smashes things) the world had finally slapped a label on the condition.  Hungry + angry = HANGRY.  A complex concoction of physical and emotional unfulfillment.  A critical mass of dissatisfaction.  A state that once entered into left me incapable of making conversation, let alone decisions.  In fact, once hangry, just the thought of deciding what to make for dinner often left me curled up on the couch with that soft checkered blanket I’ve had since I was thirteen, sucking my thumb, and wishing my mom was my roommate so she could make me some dang meatloaf.  Hangry.  When that word became a thing, I realized (at least in this one respect) I wasn’t a weirdo.  

(This is an actual photo of me trying to decide what to make for dinner.)

Through years of dealing with my condition, I’ve developed several coping mechanisms, namely grilled cheese and peanut butter toast.  Two quick and carb-filled comforting cure-alls.  But you know the problem with grilled cheese for dinner?  It always leaves you wanting another grilled cheese.  Alas, I’d considered stocking the freezer chock full of microwave meals for times when life got crazy, but the problem is the ingredients lists on these sorts of pre-packaged foods are typically so out of control that I’d regret fueling my body with this sort of junk.  Oh and also, I don’t own a microwave.  

Continue Reading

Crazy Easy Crustless Quiche with Arugula Salad {as seen on WBTV}

Now that fall is finally here, it’s time to bust out some comforting cool-weather breakfast recipes.  I’m a self-declared morning person, but when I wake up with a grumbling tummy, the less hands-on time required of a breakfast recipe, the better.  That’s why I love baking eggs in the oven.  Call it a casserole or a crustless quiche (or a frittata if you start the cooking process on the stove top).  The method is simple:  eggs are whisked with a little milk (or half-and-half or cream, whatever you have on hand) and then combined with one to two cups of the fillings of your choice—sausage, leftover veggies, cheese, whatever sounds good–and baked for 30 minutes.  Breakfast done.

Turkey Sausage Crustless Quiche 4To take the dish up a notch, top it with a simple arugula salad tossed with an olive oil and lemon dressing.  Not only does the arugula salad add extra veggies, but the tartness offers a nice contrast the richness of the eggs.  Plus, look how fancy!

Continue Reading

Asian Pork Tenderloin Skewers {recipe}

About that recipe I promised you…

asian pork tenderloin skewers

How good do these pork skewers look?

I tend to shy away from Asian cooking.  Usually, it’s because the recipe calls for lots of ingredients I don’t have on hand (rice vinegar, sesame oil, fish sauce?  oyster sauce??).  The long recipes and foreign (no pun intended) techniques are intimidating!  Last year, in a short-lived wave of cooking confidence, I bought a wok at Ikea, and I’ve used it a whopping two times.

Continue Reading

An easy dinner: Sweet Chili Pork Tenderloin & Roasted Parmesan Brussels Sprouts

The beginning of the year is a stressful time for us accountants.  There’s year-end close and year-end audits plus T-A-X season.  Spelling it out makes it sound a little less dreary, right?  With all the extra hours clocked at the office, the only recipes I’ll consider right now are ones that take the littlest, teensiest amount of hands-on time possible.

pork and brussels sprouts

 

Two of my favorite simple recipes are Sweet Chili Pork Tenderloin and Roasted Parmesan Brussels Sprouts.  The oven does all the work for both recipes, and the hands-on time is pretty minimal.  Ever since we made these wickedly addicting sprouts a few months back, they’ve become a Sunday night ritual.  A pound of them split two ways is barely enough.  There’s talk of making a pound a piece from here on out.

parmesan roasted brussels sprouts

As for the pork, the sweet chili flavor combo comes via a simple brown sugar and chili powder spice rub, and the high temperature and relatively quick cooking time keeps the meat moist.

sweet chili pork tenderloin

If you’re lucky enough to have any pork leftover, it makes for one mean sandwich!

 

Sweet Chili Pork Tenderloin

Serves 4

  • 1 pork tenderloin (approx 1.25lbs)
  • 1 tsp onion powder
  • 1 tsp garlic powder
  • 1.5 tbsp chili powder
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1.5 tbsp brown sugar
  • extra virgin olive oil

STEP ONE:  Preheat oven to 500 degrees.  Cover a cookie sheet with foil, and coat with cooking spray.  Remove excess fat, if any, from the tenderloin.  Combine all remaining ingredients (except olive oil) in a large Ziploc bag or large container with lid.  Add the tenderloin to the container, seal, and shake to evenly distribute the spice rub.  Lay the tenderloin onto the cookie sheet, lightly drizzle with olive oil.

STEP TWO:  Cook the tenderloin for 15-20 minutes, flipping the meat half way through, or until a meat thermometer reads 165 degrees.  Set the meat aside to rest before cutting.

Note:  if you are serving this pork with the sprouts, tent the meat with foil at this point and proceed to the Roasted Parmesan Brussels Sprouts recipe.  Serve with carb of choice.

Continue Reading

Easy Black Bean Burritos {recipe}

A funny thing happened the other day.

I went to a sausage making class and emerged three hours later a fleeting vegetarian.

Bring on the beans and cheese.

Easy Black Bean Burritos

Of course, I expected a slightly different outcome when I signed up for the class.  Visions of grinding my own meat and hand-stuffing thick chicken, turkey, and pork sausages filled my thoughts while mounds of frozen links filled my fantasized freezer.  I was one excited sausageer – that is until I spent 3 hours huddled around fifty pounds of raw pork.  There was just so much meat and so many people and so much talk about the step-by-step process involved in getting the poor free range piggies from the farm to that fork you’re holding in your hand there.  And the smell…. oh dear god the smell.

I didn’t know it was possible to get the meat sweats without actually consuming meat.

Continue Reading