Vietnamese Cold Rolls

This was my first time making Vietnamese Cold Rolls and I was extremely impressed with how easy they were and how delicious they turned out!!  I've had rice paper in my pantry for over 3 years and threw it out the last time I moved without it ever being touched.  I bought some again about a month ago, determined that this time I would actually use it.  (I checked the best before date on it just in case they did end up sitting around for a while and they're good until 2013 -- phew!)  I got thinking today when discussing these with a colleague, that it would be really easy to "North Americanize" these rolls as well.  You could fill it with whatever suited your fancy at the time -- Honey Garlic Chicken? Sure why not!  Lemon Pepper Shrimp?  Yes, please!   Montreal Spiced Steak? ooh Mike would like that one.  Anyways, enough with my rambles, here is my recipe (which I didn't actually use a recipe, but I did follow the directions on the back of my rice paper on how to 'cook' it!

Vietnamese Cold Rolls
*1/2 pack vermicelli rice noodles
8 rice paper circles
1 raw carrot, peeled and grated
1/2 cucumber, grated
1/2lb ground pork
S&P to taste
1/2 large onion, diced
1/2 tsp garlic powder - or the real deal if you have some handy

(You can easily adjust these spices to suit your tastes! Like it spicy?  Add some cayenne or some hot sauce)

Scramble fry the ground pork with onion and spices until cooked through and no pink remains.  Set aside.  Boil a pot of water, remove from heat and add the vermicelli.  Let sit for 5 minutes until soft, then drain.  Fill a pan (large enough for your rice paper to dip in) with warm water.  Immerse one sheet of rice paper in warm water for 5 seconds.  Remove and lay flat.  Starting at the bottom of the circle of rice paper, fill with two TBSP each of pork, carrots, and cucumber.  Add generous amount of vermicelli noodles.  Fold the left and right sides over the filling and then starting at the bottom, roll it up until it is completed sealed.  Repeat filling and rolling until all the mixture is done!  Serve with peanut sauce for dipping or any other kind of sauce that you would like!

*The vermicelli rice noodles that I bought (Double Happiness Brand) actually were separated into bricks inside, which made it super convenient to only cook half.  I've purchased other brands that the whole package was one brick and impossible to divide it up.

Slow Cooker Pulled Chicken Taco's

Ok, I only have two seconds but I wanted to share my new concoction with the world!  And it's possible that this already exists, but I've never heard of it before so I'm claiming this as an original recipe.  I was thinking of Auntie Mar's chicken and loving it but thinking about all of the fat and calories that comes with using French dressing.  So at the grocery store this week, I was looking for something similar but a whole lot less calories, and I came up with a brilliant idea!  I have a taco salad recipe that calls for Catalina dressing to be poured over top, which gave me the idea of combining these ingredients....

Slow Cooker Pulled Chicken Taco's
1 lb boneless skinless chicken thighs
1/2 bottle Kraft Calorie Wise Catalina Salad dressing
1/2 package taco seasoning (I used Epicure's taco seasoning pkg)
1/2 cup water
1 cup prepared rice

Mix dressing with taco seasoning and water in slow cooker.  Add the chicken, turning to coat.  Cook on low for 8 hours.  Once cooked, using two forks, pull apart the chicken thighs.  (This should be very easy and the chicken will just fall apart.)  Add the rice to the chicken mixture, stir, and serve in a soft tortilla shell with grated cheese, lettuce, and diced tomato.

**black beans would also go good with this!

I hope you enjoy this recipe -- we sure did.  (Even Gray loved it!!)

Auntie Mar's Chicken

Hello, friends!
I've missed you too - thanks for stopping in! :) I had a little accident tonight while cutting up a honeydew so my thumb is wrapped in a band-aid and it's making it difficult to type!  You know, I didn't think it would really get in the way either, but instead of hitting 'space,' my thumb is too big and I hit the 'b'!  But I've been wanting to blog for a while - I have so many great recipes to share!  My new favorite recipe is one that I got my from Auntie Mar and it just delicious!  And it honestly only takes FOUR ingredients!  (You can even get away with only using 3 of them, too!)  This turns out to be kind of like a sweet and sour chicken, but the sauce could also be used as a gravy.  I'm always searching for new ways to serve quinoa, and this chicken and sauce was perfect!!  It also goes very nicely with mashed potatoes or rice.

Aunty Mar's Chicken
1 lb boneless, skinless chicken thighs
1/2 can jellied cranberries*
1/2 pkg onion soup mix
1/3 container Kraft French dressing

Mix last three ingredients together in a roaster.  Add chicken and stir to coat evenly.  Bake at 300 degrees F for an hour and a half.  Serve

*You can freeze the other half of the cranberries and it's ready for the next time you make it!
**I've also made this without the cranberries when I didn't have it on hand and it is just as delicious, just a little bit less sweet is all.  I use more French dressing (about 1/2 container) if I'm not using the cranberries.

I'm sure you will enjoy this as much as we have!

Chili Salad? YES!

Is that Chili Salad you ask?  Why yes it is - I'm glad you asked!!  I made this a while back and it really was a fantastic combination!  Take one bed of spring greens, top with one tried and true recipe for Chili, add some crumbled tortilla chips and finish off with some grated cheese.  Seriously, can't get any better!  (and it's a great way of making Mike eat salad -haha).

My Tried and True Chili Recipe

1 lb lean ground beef

1 large onion, diced

1/2 tsp minced garlic

1 can of corn, drained and rinsed

1 can of black beans, drained and rinsed

1 can of kidney beans, drained and rinsed

1 can of diced tomatoes, with liquid

1 cup of salsa (or if not on hand, I actually use tomato soup)

2-4 TBSP chili powder (my stock is old so I use lots!)

S&P to taste

Scramble fry the ground beef and onion over medium heat until beef is no longer pink.  Drain and rinse in the sink to get rid of the extra fat.  Add all other ingredients into the pan and let simmer for about half an hour (l.onger if you have the time!!).  

Turkey & Broccoli Divan - Turkey leftovers!

Turkey & Broccoli Divan - Served on a Bed of Quinoa.

I like posting recipes that involve using up leftovers.  Although I wasn't the one cooking the meal, we still ended up with a lot of turkey!  I decided to substitute leftover turkey in one of my favorite recipes  - Chicken & Broccoli Divan (a Campbell's Soup Recipe).  I actually had some leftover spinach dip and some sour cream that I had in the freezer that I threw in too!  The turkey really added a nice change to this recipe and I will definitely use up turkey leftovers the same way in the future.  

The only changes I made to the recipe (other than the additions above) was substituting two cooks up chopped up turkey for the chicken.  I, as always, add a lot more bread crumbs than recommended, as I love a nice crisp crust on top.  I used panko crumbs, which I like because they seem to make a crunchier top than regular bread crumbs. 

The link above is to my post about Chicken and Broccoli Divan, but if you want to go straight to the Campbell's recipe, the link is here.

Sous Vide Pork Loin

And We Meet Again!   Hello there you faithful reader(s)!  I do realize that I am two weeks tardy on this post, however, with a sick boy and the holidays, there has been little time for myself.  And when I've had time, I sunk into bed with my book (The Psychopath Test by Jon Ronson - interesting non-fiction read).  Alas, that has finished and I have a couple moments, so here I am.

Thanks to Mike's boss, we have been introduced to the lovely world of Sous Vide.  It's essentially a super slow cooker that you use to make lean cuts of meat super tender.  You seal the meat in a ziploc bag (or sealed bag now that we have a foodsaver system- yay Christmas!) , throw it in your cooking vessel, plug it in, set the temperature around 140 (different for different cuts of meat), and let it cook for a day or two (or three!).

So we bought a cheap pork loin from Costco, cut it into roast size pieces, found a delicious spice rub, and went to work.  (And by 'we' I really mean 'Mike' as this is his baby but is just so good I feel I have to share!)   The rub he found was the Meatheads Memphis Dust Rub Recipe, which you can find here from www.AmazingRibs.com.

We did two pork loins as we were having a Christmas potluck and had a lot of hungry mouths to feed!  

We cooked it for 2 days at 140 Degrees F and the result was pure heaven. Mike did a quick sear on the meat just to get some appetizing color to the meat.  To be honest, I didn't realize that pork wasn't supposed to be dry.  The tenderness and the moisture was incomparable to any other pork dish that I've ever had!  Thank you, Mike, for a wonderful meal.  Yummmmmmm.

Quick Ground Beef Curry

Ever since my cooking classes earlier this year, I have been a lot more experimental with different flavors and spices.  Curry was my biggest enemy and now we are becoming at very least, acquaintances.  I ventured out to try this ground beef curry recipe after a quick google search brought up this CBC program "Best Recipes Ever" recipe located here.

To be honest, it wasn't that quick and I used the wrong type of curry.  I used a yellow curry powder, as it was all I had, and it was much too mild.  I think if I would have used the Madras Curry (which is a lot spicier apparently), this would have been much more flavorful and I would have enjoyed it more.  With that being said, Grayson liked it anyways!  I served it on basmati rice with a side of garlic naan bread.