Thai Basil Chicken, done my way

Ingredients

1 lb chicken tenders

snow peas (couple handfuls)

1 large sweet onion, sliced thin

thai chili peppers (to taste, i use big handful)

sri racha (red chili sauce)

2 tbsp chopped thai basil leaves

soy sauce and/or teriyaki (the sweet soy sauce kind, not the thick stuff)

1-2 tpsb oil (peanut or vegetable)

1-2 tbsp brown sugar

1 tbsp fish sauce

chopped garlic cloves (to taste)

bean sprouts for topping

limes, quartered

Mmmm this is my favorite thing to eat. I had tried a thousand ways to make this but none came close to tasting authentic until central market started selling jars of thai basil leaves (check out the asian isle) and thai chili peppers in produce. I'd made it with regular fresh sweet basil, Jalapeno and lots of sri racha, and it was good, but it wasn't thai. Now it is. You can totally substitute peppers (or omit them altogether) and use normal basil, but its worth the extra effort to get the real stuff if you consider yourself a connoisseur of thai food. Like I do.

Everything else in this dish is pretty much "to taste". Changing the amount of garlic or peppers is not going to mess with the cooking process.

My method for getting this so good is to marinade it for hours and cook it all in one of those "oven bags". It's just a plastic bag you bake in, Reynold's makes it but HEB's generic is cheaper. These things are so worth it-- the meat is super tender and you don't have to clean out the baking dish. After its baked, the chicken easily cuts into pieces and then I stirfry it all together.

Here's the steps, enjoy:

1. throw into an oven bag the chicken tenders, snow peas, and thai peppers with the stems pulled off. Unless you love pain a LOT, you're going to want to leave these whole as to easily avoid them when you're eating. They hurt. They are very, very hot. They're just there for flavor so be careful!

2. add chopped garlic, fish sauce, sri racha and then pour a few cups of soy sauce on top until all the chicken and veggies are submerged in liquid. let this sit for a few hours.

3. while cooking rice (I do brown rice in the oven) chop the sweet onions and sautee them with a splash of peanut oil and the brown sugar. I cook them til they're browned but still snappy.

4. place the oven bag in a baking dish at bake at 375f for 30-35 minutes.

5 cut a hole in the corner of the oven bag and let the liquid drain out

6. put the chicken on a cutting board and cut it into pieces. snow peas too if you want them in smaller chunks.

7. throw chicken and veggies in with the onions with the flame on high. sautee for a few minutes and serve over rice, with lime juice and bean sprouts :-)

The best. pasta. dish. ever.

Yeah, its creamy and green. Yeah it looks a bit funky. But this is THE tastiest pasta dish I have ever tried. And I made it myself! With just a handful of simple ingredients and a food processor. The entire recipe takes about 20 minutes to whip up. There is no cream in this pasta at all. What makes it so creamy and good then? AVOCADO (omg yummy).

This is definitely the good twin to alfredo's evil twin. When made with whole wheat pasta this is so healthy. Avocado is loaded with monounsaturated fatty acids (that's the "good" kind of fat) and has more potassium than bananas! (Also note: avocado is a berry. Who knew?)


Ingredients
1 medium avocado, peeled & pitted
1/2 lemon
Fresh Basil
2 big garlic cloves
Lemon Zest
Salt & Pepper
6 oz. whole wheat pasta







Throw the avocado in the food processor with fresh basil and garlic. Squeeze juice from lemon half into the mixture. Blend until creamy and add salt and pepper to taste. Lemon zest is optional, but it adds a really nice texture. Boil the pasta and strain it. Immediately throw the avocado sauce in and mix well. Serve immediately!

Mm Chicken Fried Rice

Okay- this is one of my favorite things to make but I don't use a recipe! It's super delicious and healthy.
This is very similar to fried rice one would get a Chinese restaurant, however I make a few key substitutions. First, I use brown rice instead of white. Aside from being healthier, I like the texture much better. Brown rice is especially nice when tossed in a frying pan, so it is ideal for this dish. I also substitute edamame (soy beans) for the typical peas. I love peas, but edamame are bigger, tastier, and much more nutritious! One thing I add not ordinarily used at restaurants is red pepper. It adds crunch, color, and a tiny hint of flavor. Nom nom!





So here's an ingredient list, the amounts are not exact!


brown rice (1 cup dry)
shelled edamame (about a cup)
1 small baked chicken breast
2 eggs, scrambled
green onion (one bunch?)
baby carrots (small handful)
bean sprouts (big handful)
soy sauce
splash vegetable oil
SRI RACHA!!!



1. I make the rice in a rice cooker. (Its foolproof...) However, there is ALSO a "foolproof" recipe for brown rice from Cooks Illustrated. This is the one my mom makes all the time, it works perfectly and is MUCH easier than stovetop rice! The recipe can be found here.

2. Prepare! Put the rice on to cook and the chicken breast in the oven. Then, chop the carrots and green onion. Prepare the edamame by the instructions on the bag. Also, scramble your egg slightly undercooked and set it to the side.

3. Sautee them veggies! Get the oil in the pan hot first. I start with the carrots because they need the longest amount of time to soften, and then everything else is up to your preference. I add the bean sprouts last, as I like them to be freshest. Sautee the veggies with a bit of soy sauce and sriracha (if you like your food HOT! Be careful, this stuff is powerful.) Chop the chicken add the egg very last.

4. Add the egg and finally, the rice. Lower heat and stir fry all ingredients together for a few minutes, with soy sauce to taste.

5. Nom, nom, nom nom nom.

Beef Stew

Ingredients
1 (14oz) Can Diced tomatoes
1 (10oz) Can Cream of Mushroom Soup
1 Cup Water
1/4 Cup dry White Wine (save the rest for happy hour)
1 Teaspoon Salt
1/4 Teaspoon Garlic Powder
1/4 Pepper
1 Bay Leaf
1 1/2 Lbs Beef Stew Meat
6 Carrots
4 ribs Celery
1 Large Potato (I use 2-3 red)
1 Onion Chopped


Mix all ingredients together, cover and bake at 350 for 3 hours.
**or** in a slow cooker on high (5 hours) or low (8 hours)

Lentil Bean Stew

Yum! Delicous! Double this recipe and freeze some, because you will want lots and lots of this yummy, thick, vegetarian soup.




Ingredients
1 bag lentil beans
8 cups water
handful of chopped carrots
1/2 large yellow onion, chopped
splash olive oil
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 block (280 grams) frozen chopped spinach


1. First, rinse the lentis good to remove all dirt, make sure there are no rocks in them!
2. Put lentils in water and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and continue to cook for about 30 minutes, meanwhile preparing vegetables.
3. Chop onion and carrots, saute in oil for about 5 minutes. Add garlic and remove from heat.
4. After the lentils and water have cooked for about 20-30 minutes, add the veggies
5. Add block of frozen spinach and continue to cook for another 20-30 minutes, stirring occasionally.
6. Salt and pepper to taste. Yum! Healthy! Soup! Serve with cornbread :-D

Chunky Tomato Basil Soup

My mom read this blog yesterday for the first time; she made the interesting note that so far I have been remaking all of my childhood favorites. Well, this is certainly no exception. Campbell's tomato soup and grilled cheese was definitely my comfort food. This tomato soup though is way, way better. Its chunky and delicious and perfect for dunking grilled cheese in!

ingredients
3 pounds ripe, hothouse tomatos
2 small yellow onions
2 cloves garlic
Olive oil
Salt / pepper
Basil leaves, chopped
1/2 cup half and half
1 Cup Milk (or stock for a less creamy soup)




1. The first step is to peel the tomatos. You can roast and then peel, but then you loose too much tomato. The best thing to do is blanch the fruits in boiling water for a few minutes, then transfer them immediately to cold water. The skins should just slide off. (Is anyone else a bit grossed out by the fleshiness of raw tomatoes?)

2. Half the peeled tomatoes and throw into a deep roasting pan, with a hearty swig of olive oil and the chopped onion and minced garlic. Add a pinch of salt and pepper now if you want. Roast at 400 for 25-30 minutes.

3. After roasting, put the tomato mixture into a food processor and puree it.

4. Add the pureed mixture to a soup pot, adding the half and half and the stock/milk as you desire. Then, season and spice! Cook for about 10-15 minutes until hot and well seasoned. Enjoy!

Minestrone Soup

Once, I looked up what "minestrone" soup meant, since the recipes are so many and varied. It boils down to this: Menstra is Italian for soup and -one is a suffix meaning "the big one". So Minestrone is "the big soup", literally, but colloquially means a (usually) vegetable soup made up of whatever leftover vegetables are in season, plus some sort of pasta or rice. Thus, everyone's is different and so are the recipes. Its great though, because you can tweak it to be precisely to your taste.



My mom got this excellent recipe from Cooks illustrated; when I recreated it, this is how mine ended up:


3 carrots, peeled and chopped
1 sweet onion, peeled and diced
4 small ribs celery, chopped
1 baking potato, chopped
4 cups spinach leaves, sliced into strips
8 cups water
1 cup finely grated parmesean cheese
salt, pepper
28 oz can whole tomatoes, sliced
1 can cannelloni beans (white kidney beans)
whole wheat bowtie pasta


1. Finely chop all the vegetables (except the beans) and add to the soup pot with about 8 cups of water.

2. Cook on medium heat uncovered, stirring occasionally for about 1 hour

3. Add bow tie pasta, cook until al dente (8 minutes)

4. Add beans, heat and stir until temperature is even

5. Serve and enjoy