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Five Delicious Asparagus Recipes – done in no time flat!

Asparagus is in season in these parts and that means a drive out to the North Fork of Long Island for asparagus, as much of it as I can afford and think we can eat in a few days. Leandro and I love it and usually just break off the bottoms, smear in olive oil and put under the broiler for ten minutes. We sprinkle them with salt and eat them with our fingers.

But sometimes, sometimes, we get a bit more fancy. Just a bit. Not complicated, because we don’t do a lot of complicated stuff, but just dressed up enough to make it special. Here are five terrific recipes for this springtime delight!

Savory Asian Asparagus Steak Bites! (Click on image for the recipe)

Frittata with Asparagus (duck or hen eggs) Click image for recipe!

Leek and Asparagus with eggs (Click image for recipe!)

Zippy roasted ped pepper dipping sauce and roasted asparagus (Click image for recipe)

Zippy roasted red pepper dipping sauce and roasted asparagus (Click image for recipe)

Ready to roll: Hummus, Roasted Asparagus and Tomato Wraps! Click image for recipe!

Tags: asparagus recipes, cooking, food, recipes, seasonal spring

Comments 12 Comments
Categories CSA, Food, gardening, Recipes, salad, Side Dishes, Vegetarian

Strawberry Rhubarb Shortcake – A Crowd-Pleaser, Homemade or Not!

11 May

It is spring and the rhubarb is out and the strawberries are actually in season (even though the season is in California and not here just yet) so it’s time to make fresh strawberry rhubarb jam and smear it over everything you can! So welcome to Strawberry Short Cut.

Mind you, I did it the long way. We were invited to our first barbecue of the season (Thanks to the Orr-Ciarlo’s for a wonderful evening!) and charged with bringing dessert. Me being me (and having made strawberry-rhubarb jam recently), I thought it would be a great idea to do a pound cake berry pile-up topped with whipped cream. And then of course I had to make the pound cake myself…and then wouldn’t it be fun to have the kids make the whipped cream?

And it was. So…here’s how

Make or buy strawberry rhubarb jam (What is rhubarb? you ask? Click the image for my easy Strawberry Rhubarb Jam recipe — no pectin required– and a run-down on Rhubarb – one of Hot, Cheap & Easy’s top posts ever! ).

We’re jammin’. we’re jammin’, hope you like jammin’ too

Make or buy pound cake

Homemade pound cake – click image for recipe!

Buy some strawberries (if you can’t afford or find organic, make sure to wash thoroughly and take out the white core — I have heard tell that that is the part that holds a lot of residual pesticides), core, slice and marinate in a teaspoon of sugar (or not)

Whipped! Click for easy recipe!

Whirl up some fresh whipped cream (don’t buy this if you don’t have to…fresh is much, much better, so, so, easy, and so entertaining for the kids!!! They all had a turn at the non-electric hand beater –there’s no school like the Old School)

Then pile them up in bowls and enjoy the prettiest, sweet-tartiest, creamiest, lightest, fruitiest, just-rightiest dessert spring has to offer!

Strawberry Shortcake…a crowd pleaser!

Tags: baking with kids, cooking, cooking with kids, desserts, food, pound cake, recipes, spring, strawberry rhubarb jam

Comments 10 Comments
Categories Entertaining, Food, Party Snacks, Recipes, Vegetarian

Hearty Vegan Veggie Soup in Three Stunningly Simple Steps (plus non-vegan tortellini option)

27 Apr

Is everyone’s family as kooky as mine? Wait, don’t answer that.

But truly, when I look at how many different dishes we sometimes have at the same table, I do feel like we are more diner than family-style when it comes to meals. There’s my dad with the tattered but still crazy vegan diet that says you shouldn’t combine vegetables that grow above ground and below ground in the same meal (wtf?), my child who eats well, but rejects most soups and has a limited vegetable acceptability quotient; my mom who likes what she likes when she likes it and is not always easy to predict, and me, who eats mostly salad and picks at everyone else’s when she doesn’t really mean to and then complains about weight management. Four people, four different meals.

Ridiculous.

But then, sometimes you hit on something that is one dish that everyone can eat and modify to their liking.

The vegan vegetable soup base

Continue reading →

Tags: cooking, food, kid-friendly, recipes, soups, tortellini, vegan, vegetarian, vfamily meals

Comments 11 Comments
Categories Food, Pasta, Recipes, soup

Five Tasty, Terrific, and Totally Easy Mushroom Recipes!

16 Apr

According to Organic Gardening magazine, today is National Mushroom Day (although according to every other source it is not!). Dramatic and sustaining, mushrooms are a quick way to jazz up your basic burger, make a delicious appetizer or add some sexiness to a tapas night. So in honor of the day that may or may not be, here are my top five mushroom posts.

They can all be made with the basic white button mushroom, which tends to be the most economical. Look for unblemished crowns and on the underside, try to get mushrooms which are closed around the stem, not fanning out. Wipe them clean with a damp paper towel (the woman I worked for in France had me peel them one by one, but I don’t recommend that for every day cooking. Too much work!)

Click directly on each photo to connect to the recipe.

One of my all-time top posts: Sauteed mushrooms and onions is the Best Burger Topping. Ever.

Continue reading →

Tags: burger tppings, champiñones al ajillo; tapas, cooking, food, how to buy mushrooms, jewelry party snacks, mushroom ideas, mushrooms, recipes

Comments 8 Comments
Categories Entertaining, Food, Party Snacks, Recipes, Side Dishes, Spanish, Tapas, Vegan, Vegetarian

Crispy Beer Battered Oysters: Delightfully Light, Incredibly Easy

9 Apr

I am not lying when I say you can make these crispy beer battered oysters with just five ingredient in a jiffy. That is, in a jiffy if you either can shuck oysters yourself, or buy them shucked.

If neither of the above is true – as was the case when my friend Ashley brought us two dozen Maryland oysters from her Easter trip back home — Don’t worry! You can either steam, grill or microwave them open, or, if you’re daring, grab anything that looks like an oyster knife, do a quick Internet search on shucking, and give it a go. (Shucking instructions and recipe below!)

Protect the hands in a towel while hunting for the hinge

Me and the dad gave it a go (because we couldn’t help ourselves in the face of the challenge), banishing the moms from the kitchen so she couldn’t see the mess we were making or how we were taking our lives in our hands for the sake of an oozy, slimy, bivalve with no pearl. Lo and behold, a few scary, sweaty minutes later, we had a pile of plump glistening oysters waiting to be fried and a couple of beers waiting to wash them down with.

Continue reading →

Tags: beer batter for seafood, beer battered oysters, cooking, food, fried oysters, how to shuck oysters, recipes

Comments 21 Comments
Categories Food, Recipes, Seafood, Tapas

Top Ten Easy Latin Bean Recipes (Fiesta de Frijoles y Habichuelas)

3 Apr

Some of you have reported hunting down my bean recipes. Well here are some of my faves, all gathered in one place! Just click on the image to get to the recipe.

Make it yourself and enjoy whichever texture you prefer!

Home-made refried beans! (Vegan, but you’d never know)

Five Minute Black beans – I KID YOU NOT – FIVE MINUTE PREP

Garbanzos con chorizo (chick peas and hot dry Spanish sausage)

Continue reading →

Tags: arroz con habichuelas, black beans, chick peas, comida criolla, cooking, Cuban, food, garbanzos, Latin bean recipes, Latin food, pink beans, Puerto Rican, recipes, rice and beans

Comments 11 Comments
Categories Comida Criolla, Food, lunch, Puerto Rican, Recipes, Side Dishes, soup, Spanish

Natural Easter Egg Dye: It Really Worked!

31 Mar

Thanks to two bloggers working together, Leandro and I were inspired to try our hand at natural Easter egg dyes and it was so, so, much fun!

Boil, boil, toil and trouble

The road to this adventure was winding

Out, out, damn spot (cutting beets)

My friend, Ashley, posted a “fun Easter craft” on the Hot, Cheap & Easy Facebook page recently. It linked to Lisa Leake’s 100 Days of Real Food a terrific blog about her adventures, discoveries and triumphs eliminating processed food from her family’s diet. The original post was Natural Easter Egg Dyes and the guest blogger was Christina Le Beau whose blog, Spoonfed, covers her quest to raise children who are literate about food. Women after my own heart.

Ready, steady, go – note the glorious colors already on the Restoration Farm Eggs

Continue reading →

Tags: coloring eggs without fod coloring, cooking, Easter egg dye, Easter eggs, food, holidays, natural alternatives to holidays, Natural coloring, no chemical Easter egg dyeing, no food coloring egg dyeing

Comments 22 Comments
Categories egg salad, eggs, Entertaining, Food, Recipes, Vegetarian

Fish on Friday: Five More Fab Seafood Solutions

28 Mar

Spanish tapas: Mussels vinaigrette (make ’em the night before)

The last Friday in Lent is coming up. Why just pan-fry filets (again), when you could try some of these much more entertaining and tasty takes on seafood? This is Part Two of my Lenten seafood series. I know you’ll end up making them all year long. I certainly do!

Shrimp and Avocado Salad, Spiked with Chipotle (charming served in an avocado shell)

Pasta al Tonno: One of the fastest pasta sauces known to man. (switch out the green olives for black) Deeply flavored

Pasta al Tonno: One of the fastest pasta sauces known to man. (Feel free to switch out the green olives for black and skip the capers) Deeply flavored!

Creamy, sweet, tangy, chunky, light Swedish Skagen Salad (the best shrimp salad EVER)

Cioppino Latino…A San Fran Seafood Stew Classic with a special Latina twist

For more seafood recipes, click here!

Tags: cooking, Easter food, fish on Fridays, food, Lenten recipes, recipes, seafood, shrimp ideas, tapas

Comments 12 Comments
Categories Comida Criolla, Entertaining, Food, Italian, lunch, Party Snacks, Pasta, Puerto Rican, Recipes, salad, Seafood, Spanish, Tapas

Baked Cauliflower Macaroni and Cheese: Is there any pay-off in pandering to a kid?

27 Mar

This was not at all a sneak attack. This was a straightforward “Hey little dude, do you think you would like cauliflower if I made this recipe?”

Oh, yes, yes, I would eat it up, it looks delicious, definitely make it Mommy, make it right away, blah, blah, blah.

Baking bacon!

So there is no reason why, after troubling myself to get all the ingredients and getting my unwilling, intermittently vegan dad into the process, and committing myself to joining my son in eating a stodgy, creamy, cheesy, bacon-y mess of a fantastic casserole that in no way advances my desire to look good in a bathing suit by summer…there is absolutely no reason why said five-year-old little dude should be allowed to not eat the damn cauliflower, whether he likes it or not.

Mustard seed and rosemary, crushed

But of course, you know what happened. Continue reading →

Tags: baked pasta, buffet ideas, cauliflower macs and cheese, cooking, food, Jamie Oliver, kid friendly vegetable recipes, macaroni & cheese, macaroni and cheese, potluck ideas, recipes

Comments 10 Comments
Categories baking, Entertaining, Food, Italian, lunch, Pasta, Recipes

Blueberry-Strawberry Mini-Muffins

25 Mar

Another Perfect Mom Moment gone astray. I had the blueberries. I had the jam. I had the flour, the sugar, the butter, the cinnamon, the eggs. I had the kindergartener signed on to the project. But oops (oops being a euphemism for the words I actually used when I realized), I did not have the yogurt for our favorite blueberry-lingonberry mini-muffins.

A favorite for tea, lunchbox or thoughtful treat for neighbors, caregivers and friends

Usually we do blueberry-lingonberry muffins with yogurt – light and lifty

But, snow falling on the first day of Spring told me that baking had to be. So Iron Mom took over from Perfect Mom (who I don’t like very much anyway) and made from lemons lemonade. Or in this case, a different muffin. As Temple Grandin’s mom used to say, “Different, but not less.”

Sweet and petite blueberry mini-muffins

Continue reading →

Tags: baking with kids, blueberry muffins, cooking, easy recipes, food, mini-muffins, muffins, recipes

Comments 9 Comments
Categories baking, Food, Recipes, Vegetarian

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