Maple Almond Bacon

I recently went to brunch and they have Maple Pecan bacon. It was so yummy. My oldest can not eat pecans so I thought I would recreate that bacon at home for her with a nut she can have. This is very simple to make. The salty sweet crunchy flavors and texture combined is satisfying, the almonds and bacon both get a little caramelized from the maple syrup.  This bacon is great for breakfast, brunch, on top of a salad, on top of a creamy soup, or served as hors d'oeuvres. 

Chicken Chicharrón

I'm not sure Crispy Chicken Chips, Chicken Chicharrón is a thing, but this is good and it now is a thing right here, right now. Like bacon good to me. Maybe better because it's so crispy. They are like Chicharron/Chicharrón but different animal. It's wrong, you say? Then I don't want to be right.

Spicy Candied Bacon

Bacon. Candied. Spicy. Crunchy from caramelized sugar. Spicy from the chili powder. Salty. Sweet. Droool. You must make these. They are similar to Bacon CRACK-ers. Which are also amazing. So good. I could eat a whole batch, all by myself. Just. As. Is.

Sopapillas

Sopapillas

Sopapillas are a New Mexican food that is much like Fry Bread. They are hollow because they puff up when fried. Almost like a roll in other parts of the country, they are served as such. They are served with meals, sometimes they are stuffed with taco meat, beans, etc. For a sweet treat they can be drizzled with honey. You can fill them with ice cream and top with chocolate sauce.
I spell sopapilla with out the "i" after the first a, that's just how I grew up seeing it spelled. Though I have seen it spelled sopaipillas. They are not strictly New Mexican, you find them in both Mexican and Spanish cuisines. But I grew up eating them in New Mexico.

How To Cut A Pomegranate

 How to cut a pomegranate in three easy steps and avoid wasting any of the precious seeds. So simple, and easy.

Halloween Party (2015)

Sooo, Finally getting around to posting our Halloween Party pictures from last year! It was so fun to put together. I really enjoy doing things like this. It's so fun. Anyway, we had one of the soccer teams over along with their families.  The kids got to run around and after they went trick or treating together.

Lao Style Egg Rolls

Egg Rolls are a childhood favorite of mine.
My children enjoy them also.
We eat them "plain" or in lettuce wraps.

I originally posted this Egg Roll "method" here. It's not really a recipe because I tend to make my Egg Rolls with whatever is on hand. This time around I threw in 1/3 cup of black fungus, that was soaked in water and rinsed well. I do prefer pork in my egg rolls, but I don't mind doing half pork and turkey or chicken. I feel beef is a little over powering.

Golden brown goodness: Egg Rolls

Bacon Wrapped Jalapeno Poppers and 101 ways to stuff a pepper.

It's the holiday season, bring on the food, bring on the appetizers, bring on the bacon! I was thinking about these poppers. I think you could freeze them. I mean why not? Everything is cooked. Cook, cool, then freeze. When company stops in, pop them in the oven!
The original post for these is from 2008. But here it is in all it's Give Peas A Chance glory.

Here's one for Pepperoni Poppers, we love poppers around here!

Crab Stuffed? Fancy schmancy? Not really.

 The Original 2007 post.

How about on the grill?

Forget the jalapenos how about Grilled Rellenos? 

Your choice! Enjoy!

Simply Stinking Good Hummus

Sometimes things can be simplified and it's just better. This hummus is one of those dishes- for me. It used to be that when I wanted to make hummus I had two problems

1. I had to go out and buy tahini because I didn't have any.

2. I had tahini but it was expired. 

After I made hummus, I had tahini sitting in the fridge and there's TWO things I use tahini for. Hummus and Sukiyaki Sauce- which is awesome, but that's another post. I just don't use tahini enough. So I decided to make hummus without it. I add a little something to give it that tahini flavor, it's an ingredient I always have  on hand, AND it has a longer shelf life. Perfection. Simple. Easy. Still stinking good.
If you'd like some Pita bread with your hummus, I've got you covered HERE.

Let us go forth and maketh hummus.
Greek Chicken Kabobs
Perfect Pita Bread

Simply Stinking Good Hummus

Simple Roasted Garlic Hummus

Give Peas A Chance Simply Stinking Good Hummus

1- 1/2 cups cooked chickpeas, drained, or one can of chickpeas rinsed and drained

1-2 cloves of garlic, grated (or mashed into a paste with a little salt)

2-3 tablespoons olive oil

1-2 teaspoons sesame seed oil

1 Lemon, reserve zest

Water

Kosher salt

Cayenne pepper (to taste, optional)

Top with-

Olive oil

Paprika

Flat leaf parsley, chopped

1. Place chickpeas in the food processor or blender.
2. Add 2 tablespoons of olive oil, garlic, and 1 teaspoon sesame oil to the food processor, processes until smooth. 
3. Add lemon zest (optional) and juice from half the lemon and process.
4. Add remaining oil to the chickpeas, if needed to get the consistency smooth. 
5. If the hummus is not as smooth a consistency you like, add a tablespoon of water at a time and process.
6. TASTE.
7. Add salt, lemon juice, and sesame oil to adjust seasonings as needed.
8. Transfer hummus to a bowl, drizzle with olive oil and top with paprika and or flat leaf parsley.

-Roasted Garlic can be used

-I usually double this recipe.

-It's not traditional but curry powder, or cumin are good in hummus also.

Bacon Wrapped Shrimp With Garlic Oil

Shrimp. Yum. Bacon. Yum. Garlic. Yum.
I so had to share this eMeals recipe with you, looks good doesn't it? So easy, and it doesn't have a ton of steps or ingredients. You could finish these on the grill too.
You should check out eMeals  for easy meal planning. They will send you recipes, menus, a shopping list. You can pick from Paleo, Clean eating, Clean eating slow cooker, simple gourmet, low carb, and more eating plans. Highly worth it.  So many great recipes, I'll try to share more of them!
Paleo Made Possible with eMeals Meal Planning

Bacon Wrapped Shrimp With Garlic Oil    

18 slices of bacon, halved

36 large shrimp, peeled and deveined

1 tablespoon honey

1 teaspoon water

½ teaspoon ground black pepper

3 tablespoons olive oil

2 tablespoons sliced garlic

1. Cook bacon in a pan until it is cooked but still soft and pliable.
2. Combine honey and water in a large bowl. Add shrimp, and toss to coat. Sprinkle with pepper.
3. Wrap one piece of bacon around each shrimp. Divide shrimp evenly among 6 skewers.
4. Preheat broiler. Place skewers on a baking sheet; broil 3 minutes per side or until done.
5. Combine oil and garlic in a small saucepan over medium heat. Cook 4 minutes, or until garlic begins to brown. Drizzle over cooked shrimp, and serve additional oil alongside shrimp for dipping.

*This is an eMeals recipe and picture. I have full permission to use it. I am an emeals affliate. However all opinions about eMeals expressed are my own, I was not paid to write this post. I just wanted to share a recipe :)

Manic Monday- Rice Paper for Spring Rolls

My mom got me these cool things for my spring roll wrappers. They are like plates but they all have grids/holes on them. Like a screen or a drying rack. It's nice because the rice paper doesn't get overly soggy. Once I dip the sheets of rice paper I can put them on these racks/plates to soften. They stay flat and ready for wrapping. She got these from the Asian Market.
Since this is a Wordless Wednesday/ Repeat Wednesday, here are some Spring Roll recipes for you-

Spinach Cheese Pinwheels, and more!

I found this recipe on the back of my Pepperidge Farm Puff Pastry box. The original recipe calls for Muenster cheese, I use whatever is on hand. In this case a Mexican four cheese blend. For the frozen spinach, I let it thaw, then wrap it in a clean kitchen towel or paper towel and SQUEEZE the water out. You want it to be DRY. If you don't like Parmesan cheese, sometimes I think it's too strong, leave it out and use 3/4 cups of shredded cheese.

Mix up fillings as you like, use pesto, different cheese, jalapeno/cheese/cream cheese, pepperoni and cheese, shredded chicken/bell peppers/cheese, dried fruit and nuts chopped up, so many options!

Do you use a lot of puff pastry? What's your favorite thing to make with it?

How about 

Palmiers

Spinach Feta puffs

Lemon Herb Chicken

Cherry Turnovers

Star Wars pastry Puffs

Beef Wellington

Spinach Artichoke Dip

MMMM.... spinach. Artichokes. Cheese.... YUM. This is easy/quick to make and it's serves I'd say 8-9 people as an appetizer. I make it, bake half of it and freeze the other half for another time. Awesome served with a crusty baguette, chips, veggies or crackers.
The girls loved/love it! I'm so glad because sometimes it's hit or miss, they love creamed spinach and spinach soup. But sometimes if things are made different then they decide they don't like it. Diva asked me to make it again soon.
I didn't want to bother with thawing the spinach and squeezing the water out, so I adapted several recipes to adjusted liquid to make my life easier.

Pepperoni Poppers (+3 other poppers)

Nothing new here... except I added pepperoni this time. So good, but really what's not to love? Jalapenos, cheese, pepperoni.

 That's all. Go forth. Make of them. Eat of them.
So now we've got, how many on this blog? 3-4? Can you tell we like them?

Pepperoni Cheese Dip

This isn't a pepperoni pizza dip. It's not fancy. At all. It's good though. This is just, well, an accident. I was making crab dip and had some cream cheese leftover. I thought the crab dip would be too spicy for Pixie so I threw this in the oven for her. It's so good it's silly. Sure you could do all sorts of things, add ingredients and make it awesome. Something fancy or froo froo. But, we both thought it was awesome as is, perfect for a quick snack or lunch. We had it for lunch. With blueberries and some carrot muffins I had in the freezer for fast lunches.
It's like this Pepperoni Pizza Cheese ball, but heated up to a ooey gooey melted goodness.

Cinnamon Spiced Almonds (Bread Machine)

I love candied nuts. So good, but so expensive to buy premade! I love making these in my bread maker/ bread machine, but you can do them on the stove top also. I like almonds when I use the bread maker because they don't break up as easily as pecans and walnuts. Because the paddle in the bread machine does break some of the nuts up. You do need to have a bread machine that has a jam cycle, and you will also need to keep an eye on the nuts so they don't burn. So do NOT just set this on the jam cycle and leave your house.

Seven layer dip

Seven layer dip, again. This one I added cream cheese to the sour cream NOM NOM.

I just mix the sour cream, cream cheese and Mexican seasoning together. Use any other layers you'd like. I have never tried shredded lettuce but I may try it next time.

7 layer dip

1 can refried beans, mixed with Mexican seasoning or I have a taco seasoning mix here.

1 -16 ounce container sour cream

1 -8 ounce block of cream cheese, softend

Guacamole

sliced olives

shredded cheese

diced tomatoes

green or white onion sliced/diced

chopped cilantro

Layer everything and serve chilled. (I'm actually OK with the beans not heated this way).

DO you like 7 layer dip? How do you make yours? Have you ever had it before? Leave me a comment below!

Pancake mini muffins for lunches

I made a bunch of these to freeze for lunches. I'm going to make some corn muffins with hotdogs in them also. The mini muffin tin size is perfect for lunches.

To make these use your favorite pancake batter. I used a whole grain and regular for this batch. Put some syrup into the batter- replace part of the sugar. Fill the muffin tins, press a cooked piece of sausage into the middle. Bake in a 375 degree oven for 13-17 minutes. Test with a tooth pick. When inserted in the middle of the batter, not the sausage, the toothpick should come out clean. Try bacon too!

Chicken Tenders

Frozen chicken tenders are wonderful to have on hand. I just put them under the broiler on high frozen. I tossed these ones in Italian dressing first, but you can season them just about any way. I don't thaw them first. I do put them on a rack so that any of the ice glaze will drip away from the chicken and it doesn't end up being like boiled chicken. Served with garlic chili sauce and these are an easy meal or appetizer. Healthy, quick, easy.

You can also make a quick chicken satay with frozen tenders also.

Chicharrón (In the oven)

I admit I was skeptical about making these in the oven but honestly, so easy! Here is how you make them on the stove LINK. Just like bacon in the oven, these are pretty fuss free, LINK. 

Some people will trim the meat from the pork belly and some of the fat, then boil in salted water for 30 minutes. I've never done that, but it's worth a shot to boil some of the fat off and salt in the process.
*you can save the fat renderings, strain them and keep them in the fridge- LARD!