Great Guest Foodie and how I suck at blogging.

I readily admit that my blogging efforts have been an epic fail of late. The only excuse I can offer is that this term in school has been particularly composition heavy and when writing for school not much else gets written. I have struggled to write as much as a post it note recently! It does not help that, for a variety of reasons, I have felt kind of down in the dumps lately. You would think that cooking would make that all better but ironically the opposite happens. I do not cook when I am blue. Perhaps it is the utter lack of inspiration?

As my ten week term in school draws to a close I can see the light at the end of this term’s tunnel! I am taking next term off to (finally) take the vacation my father got for me on my nn^th  (I am actually 29, forever!) birthday. So a much needed adventure is coming my way and I will be blogging about it as I go. A month or so of touring Europe (mostly Italy, I think) with my best friend Amanda (yes we are both Amanda’s), hopefully a visit or two with some really great friends of mine, culinary explorations abound, and I should be feeling all kinds of perky when I return to the US of A. Words do not even express my excitement when I think of the potential here! I have only been to the United Kingdom in the past and I love, love, loved it! London has to be one of my favorite cities on earth! I cannot wait to see more of the continent and share it with all of you! There is the small matter of surviving without my precious Griffin, but as they say absence makes the heart grow fonder. Right?

So because of my serious lack of cooking lately I have been collecting recipes from friends and I literally have a file folder bursting at the seams of blogging ideas! The first “guest recipe” comes from my beautiful and great friend J~ and involves one of my favorite (easy) foods to impress with. Scallops! They are rich and buttery and should never, ever be rubbery! Go fresh with scallops avoid the bag of frozen scallops at the local Sam’s Club. Make sure that you rinse them and remove their “necks” (the little piece that makes them uneven circles, it comes off really easily) and always, ALWAYS pat them dry with paper towels before cooking.

The secret to a great seared scallop is to leave them alone! Do not whatsoever touch them until it is time to flip over the scallop. You will know their level of doneness by looking at the side of the scallop, when it is half way opaque then you may flip them. The bottom of the scallop when you flip it over should be this beautiful caramelized crust! It takes about two minutes on each size, but that is dependent on the size of your scallop! Watch them, but as I said avoid the urge to peek the searing process takes time. Also it is very important to make sure your pan is HOT. When I say hot I do not mean you pat your scallops dry and turn on the burner. No! Turn on the burner as you are rinsing the scallops and allow the oil to heat a bit, not smoking, but close. It is the heat that gives you the lovely sear. J~’s recipe is beautiful and would be lovely to really impress or just when you want something different than the usual mid-week ho hum chicken or tuna mac. Everyone does that, don’t feel ashamed. Without further ado J~’s recipe in her own words!

Saucy Seared Scallops:

Ingredients:

For the Tomato-Butter-Leek Sauce:

2 Tablespoons dry white wine

2 tablespoons white wine vinegar

2 tablespoons minced shallots (my grocery store was out so I used sweet onions)

1 bay leaf

Freshly ground pepper to taste

1/4 cup heavy cream

2 leeks, white part only, sliced

3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) cold, unsalted butter, cut into small pieces 

4 small tomatoes, diced

I also added some salt, to taste, but the recipe did not call for it.

For the scallops:

2 Tablespoons unsalted butter

1 pound sea scallops

Seasoned bread crumbs

1 Tablespoon grated lemon zest (J~ skipped this, but you could use a splash of lemon juice if you do not feel comfortable with the zester)

Instructions:

1. In a small saucepan, combine the wine, vinegar, shallots, bay leaf and pepper. Cook over medium heat for 8-10 minutes, or until reduced by half.

2. Add the cream and leeks and cook for 3-5 minutes more, or until the leeks are nearly tender.

3. Whisk in the butter, one piece at a time, and stir until smooth. Add the tomato and cook for one minute. Reduce heat to low to keep sauce warm.

4. Preheat the broiler. 

5. In a large ovenproof skillet, melt 2 Tablespoons butter over medium heat (stove top). Add the scallops and cook for 2 minutes on each side, or until opaque.

6. Sprinkle with bread crumbs and lemon zest and place under broiler, 4 inches from the heat source for 2-3 minutes, or until the crumbs are lightly browned.

7. Serve scallops with sauce.

Soul Baring and Salmon Cakes

When I started this blog I didn’t intend to only give you food, but a bit of myself as well. (Food is boring without personality, and I have personality in spades.) I do not want to be one of those bloggers who glosses over their life and makes everything sound like it is perfectly fabulous all the time. Life just is not that way. So I will share the good, the bad, and the ugly with you. Honesty is the best policy, right? I am only human after all. As you may already know I am working to lose some weight; it is one of my New Year’s resolutions. Growing up I danced ballet and was quite fit and in shape. In fact I was rail thin. Too thin sometimes, but I was proud of my body, especially my abs. I do not believe I owned a shirt that covered my stomach. I worked really hard to look that way; ballet is not an easy sport (yes, I said sport). I dreamt of being a professional dancer. Two bad knees and the threat of surgery caused me to give up that dream and only dance a few classes in college and eventually just around the house.

As much as it pains me to disclose the next fact to you, especially my readers who knew me in those glory days; I am no longer rail thin. (I find this humiliating) Not even close to thin, though not unattractive, just outside the “norm” or current standard of beauty. It started when I was diagnosed with Crohn’s disease; they give you steroids to treat “flare ups” and apparently my body and steroids do not agree with one another. On the plus side I finally developed a chest, and could put away the “chicken cutlets” I had been using to fill out my bra. The downside is I become ravenously hungry for those long periods of steroid treatments. Each time I am put on a steroid treatment I gain weight and every time have to work the weight back off. This last summer (for my 30^th birthday) I was in the hospital again and back on steroid treatments and took some home for further treatment. This time I gained around 30 pounds without even trying. I fell into a deep depression because I hadn’t finished getting the last weight gain off from the previous treatment. I swear to you I could eat anything and gain weight. A bag of carrots could mean five pounds. It is insane what steroids do to my metabolism. I have come to the conclusion that the next time I have a flare up I am going to refuse steroids and tell them to work their medical magic some other way. So now I weigh around 200 pounds, though no one believes me when I reveal that fact, I guess that is a good thing… it means I carry it well. (I am pretty tall for a girl. My measurements remain proportionate, which is a plus.) However having a bra size that could be a vowel except for my refusal to accept that… is all getting to be a bit much and I do not believe I should feel humiliated by my body if I can change it.

I am also working to give up another bad habit… I tend to turn to smoking when I get stressed out. (Bad habit I picked up when I lived with a total loser). Smoking is bad for anyone, but especially “foodies” because it alters how you taste foods. (Also makes you stinky, which as a perfume junkie I find repulsive, don’t ask me how I got started in the first damn place.) It is especially bad for me and my Crohn’s disease. My quit date is set for the 31st of January… I am working a program online.  So this New Year is full of changes! Good ones. I look forward to sharing my progress with you along the way.

Being a foodie queen however there are certain things I cannot give up entirely. For example Fat Free cheese is just nasty plastic and I refuse to eat it. You will also not find me ever buying skim milk unless I am having a house guest who drinks it. Skim milk is not milk, in my opinion, it is blue water. I will still use butter when necessary, but not as much. I have given it up all together except in baking, or if a recipe specifically calls for it. I also refuse to give up my “mini” cokes. I love Coca Cola and I am not ashamed to admit it. While I have certainly decreased the amount I drink; 12 fl. Oz. is a far cry from the liters of it I could drink in my younger years. Increasing my intake of water and Crystal Light has really helped me cut that habit. So if you are still reading at this point then you probably know more about me than you ever bargained to. But this is what my life is, and what drives my cooking.

Without further ado, my recipes for Salmon Cakes and Cucumber and Grape Tomato salad.

Salmon Cakes

Ingredients:

2 5 or 6 oz. cans of Boneless Skinless Pink Salmon, like Bumble Bee.

1/3 cups dry bread crumbs (plain)

3 tablespoons chopped green onions

1 tablespoon chopped fresh dill (or dried, I didn’t have any fresh)

1 large egg

½ cup finely chopped pine nuts (can increase or decrease this based on preference)

Salt and pepper to taste

Garlic Powder to taste

How to:

1.) Combine ingredients in medium bowl. Make sure the chunks of salmon are good and broken up and all ingredients are mixed well.

2.) Shape mixture into small patties.

3.) Heat about two tablespoons of either canola or olive oil in large skillet over medium high heat.

4.) Place patties in heated oil, they should sizzle, cook patties until browned; about 4 minutes on each side.

I serve these with a quick and easy Low Fat Tzatziki Sauce. They would be equally good alone though.

Serves three to four people based on how big your patties are.

**Worth 9 Weight Watchers points.**

Cucumber and Tomato Salad

Ingredients:

1 package (1 pint) of grape tomatoes, halved.

1-2 large sliced cucumbers (based on your preference)

½ cup 2% Mozzarella Cheese Shredded (Or you could buy the really good stuff and slice it into chunks)

2-3 tablespoons of lemon juice (based on your taste)

1-2 tablespoons of fresh chopped basil (again more or less based on your taste)

2 tablespoons of olive oil

Salt, pepper, and garlic powder to taste.

How To:

1.) Mix your cucumbers and tomatoes in a bowl

2.) Add seasonings, including chopped basil

3.) Pour lemon juice and olive oil over the salad and mix well.

4.) Stir in Mozzarella cheese.

5.) Allow to sit for a while. (Frankly this was even better the second day!)

This will serve about five people and is worth an amazing 2 Weight Watcher points! Thus the reason I serve it with the higher point salmon cakes!

Quick and Easy Tzatziki Sauce

Ingredients:

¼ - ½ cup of plain low fat yogurt

1 peeled, seeded, and grated cucumber

½ teaspoon grated lemon rind

1-2 tablespoons lemon juice (based on how tart you like it)

Salt to your preference

(The recipe does not call for it but I always throw in some dill, because I love, LOVE dill.)

How to:

1.) Combine all ingredients in a bowl.

2.) Serving size to stick with points is ¼ of a cup. (Though you could use up to a half cup)

**Worth 2 Weight Watchers points. **