Stuff I cooked before Thanksgiving

January 12, 2020 8:14 AM

Happy New Year! This time I really haven't posted in a while. But I still took pictures of the food I've been making, and we're going to see how good my memory is. All of these things were made before Thanksgiving.

Bulgogi Tacos

In the previous post I made some bulgogi. Any time I make a new meat dish I have to see if it'll work well in a taco. It always works well in a taco.

Udon Noodle Soup with Chicken & Mushrooms - The Woks of Life

I've been on a no-instant-noodle diet since July (and until this coming July), because at the time I ate some really spicy instant noodles and totally regretted it, and I figured I was eating way too much instant noodle already that year. The problem is sometimes I just really want some noodle soup. This isn't a dish I'm completely comfortable with yet, so I looked for a super easy noodle soup recipe I could try. This was very good and very easy to make.

Ravioli with Sage Brown Butter Sauce - Budget Bytes

I actually make this dish all the time (in fact I'm eating it right now!) so at this point I don't even take a picture every time I make it. Sometimes when I'm at Aldi I look at all the interesting raviolis they have and I buy it just to make this recipe.

Quesadillas

What kind of quesadillas?! I don't even know! My guess is that it's barbecue chicken, because I think I had chicken left over from those noodles, and that looks like bbq sauce reside on the side of the plate. Oh by the way, that guac is homemade too. But not the pico de gallo. I bought that from Aldi. Aldi's pico is really bad. I don't recommend. But my quesadilla and guac? I'm sure it was delicious.

Carne Asada - Damn Delicious

I don't know how to cook steak. I don't really know why I have so much trouble with it, but this was such an ordeal to cook. The recipe said to put it in the broiler and cook for 5 minutes on each side, and I did that and it was still way below medium-rare temperature. I just kept cooking it longer, but it wasn't helping so I moved it to the stovetop. Maybe there's something wrong with my broiler. Maybe I'm not using the broiler correctly. Anyway, at the end of it, it was still delicious, and I made some great burrito bowls (plates?).

Taco Party

And for this last section, I had a lot of guests over, and you know what that means. Tacos! Tacos are delicious. What else can I say.

Mostly Mexican Food

October 19, 2019 5:16 PM

I've been so busy at work that it's consumed my brain, and I haven't had a lot of mental capacity left over for really giving my cooking as much thought as I'd like. Which means I end up forgetting to take pictures of things. But, I looked at my phone, and it turns out I have enough pictures to write a post on some random things that I made over the past two weeks.

Chicken Fajitas - Budget Bytes

I had gone home to visit family for a week, in which I accompanied my mom in grocery shopping. She bought a ridiculous amount of vegetables that she wasn't going to be able to finish, so she gave me a whole bunch of stuff to take back to my place. Part of that was a lot of onions and bell peppers, so naturally, I had to make some fajitas. I've made these fajitas so many times, and they're always delicious.

Chili Rubbed Pulled Pork - Budget Bytes

Speaking of things wrapped in tortillas, I also made these pulled pork tacos. I don't have a picture of the initial batch of pulled pork, but I actually made it in non-taco form for my mom and her friend when they visited me. I also made cilantro lime rice (which you can kind of see in the tacos) and brussels sprouts and broccoli. Yes, there was a lot of flailing that day as I kept going back and forth between working and cooking.

Cilantro Lime Chicken Thighs - Damn Delicious

I see cilantro and lime together, and I'm like "YES. I WANT THAT." So what happens is I buy those things for tacos, and then I just end up making more Mexican food because Mexican food uses a lot of cilantro and lime. (At least the kind I like does) These chicken thighs were really good, though I think using the cast iron pan was more trouble than it was worth for this. Next time, I'll just stick to one of my normal pans.

Oh, and obviously, I need to have some sides too, so I cooked some sweet potatoes and veggies. I didn't really use a recipe for them. I just cut them up, drizzled olive oil, and sprinkled various spices on them.

Chorizo and Sweet Potato Enchiladas - Budget Bytes

Yeah! Even more stuff that I wrapped in a tortilla! I just really like tortillas, okay? But, the heading for this is totally a lie, because when I went to the store they were completely out of chorizo, so I had to settle for just "sausage" instead. To be honest, I'm not a huge fan of enchiladas, but I had sweet potatoes, and I had been just roasting them so I wanted to do something different. This was good, but I think I just need to take a break from the Mexican food now.

Three Cheese Pizza

Yeah I know, this is totally random and why this post is only mostly Mexican. Hey, I had some pizza dough and pizza sauce in the freezer, so why not. I had cheddar, mozzarella, and parmesan, so that's why it's three-cheese. This wasn't bad, but I'm going to have to improve on my pizza-making game. I definitely put too much sauce compared to cheese.

Odds 'n Ends

October 6, 2019 1:44 PM

I had a really busy past couple of weeks, so much so that I didn't do any cooking. My body definitely was not happy with all the fast food I was putting in it, so I've been able to get back to cooking again. What I haven't really been doing is taking nice pictures, so I'll just show a few things I've cooked in the past few months that somehow haven't made their way onto the blog yet.

Tacos!

I rarely make ground beef tacos, since it's one of my least favorite taco meats, but it is easy. I used Budget Bytes' Taco Seasoning recipe which I think tastes way better than those pre-made packets.

Crispy Potatoes with Lemon Dill Tahini Dressing - Budget Bytes

I was really proud of myself for making this recipe, not because of how it tasted, but because I finally used and washed my cast iron skillet! The whole, having to re-season it was kind of intimidating to me, so I always had my sister wash it when she was staying with me. The potatoes were good, though!

Sweet Potato Tacos with Lime Crema - Budget Bytes

This is one of my go-to easy, vegetarian recipes that I use. Sweet potatoes as a taco filling work surprisingly well, but I think it's the lime crema that makes this recipe really good. I'm not a huge fan of sour cream, but if I mix lime, garlic, and some salt in it, it's delicious.

Candied Bacon

I had been wanting to make candied bacon for a while, and since I had a few slices of bacon leftover from some other recipe, I figured I'd give it a try. It was delicious and super easy to make. I think I'm always going to candy my bacon from now on.

Odds 'n Ends

October 6, 2019 1:44 PM

I had a really busy past couple of weeks, so much so that I didn't do any cooking. My body definitely was not happy with all the fast food I was putting in it, so I've been able to get back to cooking again. What I haven't really been doing is taking nice pictures, so I'll just show a few things I've cooked in the past few months that somehow haven't made their way onto the blog yet.

Tacos!

I rarely make ground beef tacos, since it's one of my least favorite taco meats, but it is easy. I used Budget Bytes' Taco Seasoning recipe which I think tastes way better than those pre-made packets.

Crispy Potatoes with Lemon Dill Tahini Dressing - Budget Bytes

I was really proud of myself for making this recipe, not because of how it tasted, but because I finally used and washed my cast iron skillet! The whole, having to re-season it was kind of intimidating to me, so I always had my sister wash it when she was staying with me. The potatoes were good, though!

Sweet Potato Tacos with Lime Crema - Budget Bytes

This is one of my go-to easy, vegetarian recipes that I use. Sweet potatoes as a taco filling work surprisingly well, but I think it's the lime crema that makes this recipe really good. I'm not a huge fan of sour cream, but if I mix lime, garlic, and some salt in it, it's delicious.

Candied Bacon

I had been wanting to make candied bacon for a while, and since I had a few slices of bacon leftover from some other recipe, I figured I'd give it a try. It was delicious and super easy to make. I think I'm always going to candy my bacon from now on.

$30 a week

July 12, 2019 5:21 PM

I feel like I keep telling people about this $30 a week challenge that I really want to try, but keep failing at. Well, this past week was the first week in a while that I could actually cook, and so I tried the challenge again. And I did it! I spent $27.79 on food, and that's even including eating out once. And this "week" actually started Thursday night of last week, and went til today. So it's technically longer than a week.

Okay, so maybe this was cheating, but I had a bunch of frozen seafood already on me. Including crab legs, which I bought a month ago since they were on sale. It was a good thing I had them, plus romaine lettuce because that meant when I drove back from my family's place, I didn't have to buy groceries that same night.

And wow, romaine lettuce really does keep for a long time in the fridge. I'm pretty sure they were sitting there for a month, but they still seemed perfectly fine for eating this past week. I was able to make a few Caesar salads with shrimp (yup, I also had that in my freezer already). I considered buying croutons, but then I had this wonderful idea to just toast a bagel (that I did buy this week) and cut it up into little cubes. It turned out great, but I definitely need a break from romaine lettuce for a while.

Look, I had scallops already in my freezer too! But only scallop pieces, because I'm cheap like that. (Yep, this definitely feels like cheating) I looked up scallop recipes and decided to make Garlic Butter Scallop Bowls from Damn Delicious. (Technically, I used Budget Bytes's Cilantro Lime Rice recipe) I still don't quite understand the key to making good scallops, though the fact that I used the scallop bits and pieces probably didn't help. I really liked the flavor of them though. I wasn't as huge a fan of the pico de gallo. I feel like it had a little too much lime, so I'll have to look for a different recipe for that next time.

In trying to really stay under budget, I decided to make some shrimp burrito bowls, since I could utilize some of the unused pico de gallo, cilantro lime rice, and romaine lettuce. All I needed to buy specifically for this dish was a can of black beans. I used the shrimp and black bean parts of Budget Byte's Chili Lime Shrimp Bowls recipe. It was delicious.

Okay, not everything I made utilized impulse-bought seafood from the past. Of course I had to make some tacos too. I used Damn Delicious's Mexican Street Tacos recipe. Instead of using skirt steak, I actually found pre-cut beef at Aldi, which was also cheaper than their skirt steak, so win-win. I also used sweet onions instead of red onions because I think sweet onions are far superior.

So, I will be attempting to stay under $30 again next week. And maybe it'll feel less like cheating with less seafood already in freezer.