2 English muffins 

4 strips of bacon

4 eggs

9 oz of fresh spinach

1.5 Tbls of minced garlic

4 slices of Swiss cheese

• Cook the bacon in a medium saute pan. Once the bacon is fully cooked, remove from the pan, and drain off about half of the rendered fat. Save the fat in a bowl for later. 

• Use the remaining bacon fat in the saute pan to cook the eggs, two at a time. Cook the eggs to desired doneness, and remove from the pan. 

• Add the remaining bacon fat bacon into pan, and bring to a medium heat. Add the garlic and cook until fragrant. Add the spinach and cook until it wilts down. 

• Slice the english muffins and toast. 

• Once toasted, layer one egg, some of the spinach, one piece of bacon (cut in half) and top with a slice of Swiss cheese. 

• Repeat this step with remaining muffins, and the broil till cheese melts.    

Eggs Benedict

Hooray! Stuffed Waffles!

What's cool about this, is you can substitute your favorite fruit/nuts for zillions of flavor combinations (and I do mean, zillions.) I've done this with fresh bing cherries/hazelnuts, and I've also tried granny smith apples/cinnamon/almonds too. If you don't have a waffle iron, you could do stuffed pancakes or french toast, too.  Makes two servings.

Ingredients:

waffle/pancake mix (enough for two servings)

4 oz. cream cheese

1/2 tsp. lemon zest

dash of vanilla extract

1 cup finely chopped strawberries

1/2 cup finely chopped walnuts

maple syrup

1 cute boyfriend to serve it to

Instructions:

• Make the waffle mix according to package instructions.

• While waffles are cooking, thoroughly mix cream cheese, lemon zest, vanilla extract, 1/2 cup strawberries, and 1/4 cup walnuts.

• Once waffles are done, spread 1/2 inch of cream cheese yummy-ness on half of the waffle, then fold the rest of waffle over to cover it.

• Top with remaining strawberries and walnuts.

• Garnish with powdered sugar, and serve with maple syrup.

Skillet-Roasted Strip Steak with Pebre & Avocado Sauce

A few notes about how I cook: I always have a jar of minced garlic in the fridge to use.  It just saves time that way and chopping garlic, although not by any means difficult, is a pain the ass.  Also, I never measure things so these are just estimates.  If you have extra bit of onion you need to use up, throw it in.  Extra cilantro?  Throw it in. I hate waste and don't like saving small, unusable portions of things, so seriously just use up the contents of your fridge. Also, not having a dish washer makes me lazy and not want to wash measuring devices.  So there.

I made this last night for dinner and was pleasantly surprised that despite the addition of the jalapeno, I didn't find this dish to be too spicy for me - in fact I would have added more!  Because of that, this isn't exactly what I made last night, but it contains the modifications that I would make in the future to make it even better.  Feel free to use any type of beef steaks, as NY Strip is a "special occasion" beef and totally expensive.  Served with fresh corn on the cob / possibly a potato and you've got a meal.

Makes 2 servings.

Pebre Salsa

1/2 cup chopped red onion

1 medium tomato, diced

1/3 cup chopped fresh cilantro

1 minced jalapeno

2 tbsp. red wine or cider vinegar 

2 tbsp. minced garlic

1/4 tsp. garlic salt

Steak

1/2 tsp. smoked paprika

1/2 tsp. ground cumin

1/2 tsp. dried oregano

1/2 tsp. garlic salt

1/4 tsp. pepper

2 5 oz. New York (top loin) steaks, trimmed of fat

1 tsp. olive oil

2 avocados, pitted and peeled

• Combine the ingredients in the Pebre Sauce in a bowl. Keep at room temperature until steak is done.

• Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

• Mix the steak spices in a bowl and rub on both sides of the steaks as evenly as possible.

• Heat oil in skillet over medium-high heat and grill steaks about two minutes on each side.  Transfer to oven for 7-10 minutes (for medium rare) depending on thickness of the steak.  Take out of oven and let rest for 5 minutes.

• Mash avocados in a bowl and mix with a dash of garlic salt.

• Carve steak into this slices and serve with avocado and pebre sauce.

Quinoa Apple Dill Salad

Quinoa Dill Apple Salad/Side Dish
This is a great grain/starch side dish when it is served warm, or a yummy salad when cold. You could do this in the fall when everything is in season, except for the dill, and it would be excellent; however all of the ingredients are fairly non-seasonal since they are easy to come by in most markets. Best of all, this is super freakin easy to make.

Ingredients

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-1 cup Quinoa uncooked
-1 tsp broth base
-1.5 cups water


-1 bunch fresh dill
-1 red apple, chopped into small peices
-1 cup walnuts, toasted and chopped
-1 tsp(ish) balsamic vinegar, to flavor
-dash of salt
-dash of pepper

Preparation

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Boil 1.5 cups water, bring to rolling boil and stir in broth base and quinoa. Let cook for 15-20 minutes until all moisture is absorbed. Remove from heat.

Toss remaining ingredients with quinoa and serve either hot or chilled.

Pics to be added later (I know I'm breaking my own rules)

Help me make this the recipe dynamo

So my hope is that this will be a public repository for some totally sweet, new recipes. I know that I like to make up my own recipes, and so lets upload them here, along with a photo and then once we have something sufficient for a little recipe book we can turn the blog into a book.

Format for entries:

-Description of the recipe, seasonality of the ingredients, suggested pairings etc.
-Tag your post with relevant recipe info, and things that pertain to the above mentioned seasonality, specific ingredients, pairings.
-Measurements in standardized units, preferably cups, tablespoons etc., if you must go ahead and use weights.
-Photo include a photo if you can of the dish, cause well it is just better that way.

So that is pretty much that, e-mail me with questions. I just thought it would be fun to start collecting some recipes that we enjoy.