The Main Event

After months of planning, The Bride and her Main Man made it official in front of friends and family.  She was absolutely stunning! She knows how to throw a party, and even convinced hubs to dance with me (a request usually saved for the kitchen or the deck!)
With an early afternoon arrival we nibbled on chicken salad while waiting on the Glam Squad to come do their magic.
Though I haven't done it yet I think it would be equally amazing to go all veg with it and substitute Chickpeas for chicken...

This made enough for  6 people, plus leftovers for post reception noshing!

Leave 5 skinless/boneless chicken breasts marinating in Italian dressing for 4+ hours.
Cut into strips and grill.
Place chicken breasts in food processor  and pulse for a quick chop of the chicken.
For the dressing mix the following together before pouring over chicken;
1/2 cup Mayo (I love the reduced fat with Olive Oil!)
1/2 cup Greek Yogurt
3 Tbsp Olive Oil
1/4 cup apple cider vinegar (tweak to your liking of zingy-ness)
1 packet Good Seasonings Zesty Italian mix
2 tsp Agave Nectar
3 Tbsp water
2 Tbsp Onion powder
2 Tbsp Garlic Powder
1/2 tsp dill
2 Tbsp basil
Mix well, and pour over chicken!  Enjoy on whole wheat wrap, or fluffy soft bun!

Have cheese, will travel!

Blogger says this is my 102nd post.  Missed the big 100 post party... oops! Guess I'll have to make up for it by blitzing the blog to get to 200 posts... and really get down!

Today is the wedding day of a very awesome childhood friend.  We met 20 years ago when my family moved into our suburban utopia, and her family was right down the street!  Cue bike riding, park days, pool playing, and sleepovers that laid the foundation of youth into adolescence!
A couple of weekends ago we celebrated The Bride in Charlottesville style- a rented car took us to wineries and we finished up the evening with dinner and drinks! Needless to say more silly memories were made and random fits of laughter spontaneously erupts when the bride, her sister, and I are able to get together!

To balance out the wine we were tasting I packed some cheese and crackers. I love the versatility of goat cheese. It pairs equally as well with sweet fruits as it does savory herbs.  The spread for crackers originally was a blend of chopped roasted almonds, and dried cranberries, mixed in with goat cheese, and drizzled with honey!

With an early primping start to today's wedding festivities I'm loading up a cooler with chicken salad (recipe soon....mmm) and some easy snacks! Today's goat cheese medley has roasted pecans, dried cherries, and an agave drizzle!  Its tasty AND pretty- with a slight pink hue after spending a brief couple of seconds in the food processor.  Easy and tasty always make a wonderful match.

In an oven set at 400 degrees roast chopped pecans for 5- minutes.
In a food processor, pulse dried fruit (cherries today), pecans, and goat cheese.
Form into ball, or log, or whatever fanciful shape you desire...a goat cheese dove perhaps?!

Time to get ready for some celebrating!  Congratulations to two wonderful people! I feel so incredibly lucky to be there to celebrate the day with you!

A rainy Saturday night

While running Saturday errands, we decided to do smaller nibbles for dinner. Without the desire to settle for 1 particular style, we opted for an assortment of foods that would typically be meal starters.  To kick off a rainy evening of grilling, guitar, wine, and beer, we ate smoked salmon sushi rolls.  The smoked salmon with red peppers, cucumber, and avocado were perfect with  wasabi soy sauce. Ever the novice sushi roller, several attempts were made to create the rolls cylindrical appearance.  They were a great way to start the night with my favorite person!

Spring Back

With Spring's arrival it was time for our annual backpacking trip- see hubby's recap! Easter weekend offers one of the first chances for us to get away, sleep in our tent- jam packed with 2 pups- that kicks off our year of travel! Energized by a quick birthday hiking adventure last weekend, we set out to push a little further, hike a little harder, and sleep amongst towering trees and brightly lit stars.



While trips are amazing, so is the feeling of getting home to the creature comforts we've been without for a few days that makes us appreciate them that much more, and planning the next adventure.  So with screaming calf muscles and serious cravings for anything not from a wrapper or crammed into bar form, I loaded us up on protein tonight.

I made these amazing meatballs a few weeks ago- a spin off of burgers one of my dear friends created a few summers ago!  Tonight's version was tweaked a bit more.  One of hubby's friends hooked us up with fresh ground deer burger- not a fan of venison, leave it out!  Feeling adventurous, seek it out! What is more perfect than something so free range and organic...?!  I'll jump off that soapbox!

When prompted with meatballs for dinner, a lukewarm reception is expected. Nothing is sassy and exciting about a meatball. It conjures up vision of crockpots, toothpicks, and indigestion inducing sauce.  But throw in some roasted garlic, fresh spinach, and a grill and the luke warm reception is replaced with mouthwatering, and second helpings! 


I served mine with sauteed onion, mushroom, and asparagus quinoa- and substituted israeli cous cous for hubby's quinoa! 

Grilled Spinach and Feta Meatballs
1 lb. ground chicken
1/2 lb. ground deer burger
1/2 cup feta
1 1/2 cups chopped fresh spinach
2/ Tbsp olive oil
3 cloves roasted garlic (chopped)
1 Tbsp freshly ground pepper
1 tsp sea salt

Mix well together and roll into 2 inch balls. Place on foil sprayed with cooking spray.  Heat grill to high heat and cook meatballs on foil, on the grill.  Roll every five (or so) minutes until they are well cooked.  Mine were on about 20 minutes.

If only all of life's ordinary- at times boring- situations could be solved by a grill... what a tasty world it would be!

Hollandaise

This winter has lacked that whole "wintery feel" with repeated weeks of 50 and 60 degree temps. So what better time to start a yard reconstruction project than on a Saturday night- by the glow of truck headlights- only to finish during the only snowstorm we've seen this year.  Totally normal right?!  The  true feat of the weekend has been the relaxed vibe that settled in, sometime Friday afternoon-while a stylist set free the split ends of my hair!!  One dinner date at Emilio's later, with sangria obviously accompanying the boiled octopus tapas and the stress of the last few weeks drifted away.
Enter Saturday morning. While cruising cooking light online, I came across and ultimately started craving this.  Not having Canadian Bacon didn't discourage my morning masterpiece. Not really feeling the heaviness of traditional Hollandaise sauce, my goal was to create something lighter while keeping the full flavor intact.  Thankful to the many vegan recipes dedicated to egg/butter free Hollandaise Sauce- this blend of ideas was created and savored, mentally stored for my next fancy feeling feast- and 1 less chicken loses it's life! Win-win for everyone, don't you think

Holy Healthy Hollandaise
1/4 cup drained and rinsed Chickpeas
1/4 cup Plain Greek Yogurt
3 Tbsp Lemon Juice
2 Tbsp Nutritional Yeast
Splash Worcestershire
Salt, pepper, and cayenne pepper to taste
1/2 Tsp Turmeric
3 Tbsp Coconut Oil
1/4 cup water

Give it some alone time in the food processor- enough to take the grainy texture from the chickpeas and make it smooth.  Warm in a sauce pan and server over everything... eggs.

Valentine's Day

I dig my blog, obviously or I'd never sit down to write it. I love looking back to see what was happening last year- or even almost 2 years ago. Recently reading last years post of Valentine's Day, made me realize (again) somethings never change. I'm still the same Valentine's Day Scrooge! Not that I don't want to share romantic evenings with my hubby, I just don't want the preset version of when, where, and how. Hallmark standard is buy me things, take me out, do this on February 14th. I'd rather have my version- build me something beautiful, cook with me, do so whenever the mood strikes you. We did spend the 14th in the kitchen. We did create something special, but for no other reason than it's been a hell of a busy past 6 weeks and we wanted to hang out. After spending 6 weeks searching for a replacement vehicle for my "purchased at 21, driven all over God's creation, buttons popping off daily" Jetta, we brought home our newest mountain chasing, beach cruiser. Major life todo for 2012- checked off (stress slowly lowering)! Work life went all cra-zay for a minute there, as it does every mid year- and that too slowly settled. So after a pretty long work meeting on a no different that any other Tuesday night we cooked.

Honey Sriracha Glazed Salmon over Israeli Cous Cous

Over medium high grill, place salmon. In last few minutes of grilling glaze with equal parts honey-sriracha.  Season with salt and pepper.  Top with olive oil lemon sauteed calamari.  Serve over Israeli cous cous with sauteed fennel and spinach- and loads of fresh garlic and onions!

Now pour some wine, light some candles, turn on some music- and pass me the Russel Stovers!

Strawberry Soft Serve

Something I saw the other day stuck with me and I haven't been able to shake it- strawberry ice cream.  Not normally my go to choice, I'm more of a chocolate girl, but I have been CRAVING some strawberries in a major way.  As luck would have it the only sugars passing my lips this week come from fruits and veggies, and soft serve is as easy as a frozen banana. After dinner- a Clean Eating Magazine recipe won again- a lightened up version of taco bowls for me, and enchiladas for my main man, I attacked my TRX with a vengeance.  My arms are jello, and my legs are shaking- but that didn't stop me from whipping up two bowls of homemade strawberry soft serve- by whipping up I mean I had to hit the pulse button a few times, complicated stuff we have going on!  Into the food processor went 2 frozen bananas, and a  handful of frozen strawberries.  It did it's food "processing" for a few minutes, and viola- creamy, cold, strawberry soft serve without any additional sugars added! No extra sugar... no big deal!