Easy Lunch

Cucumber, Avocado, and Tomato Salad

1/2 avocado
1/2 cup cucumber
2 grape tomatoes or 1/2 cup(cut into fourths and cubed)
1/2 teaspoon lemon juice
1 taplespoon cup greek yogurt

cut your avocado in half, drizzle lemon juice on the other half for preservation, cube and smash well. Deskin your cucumber and cube it. Cube your tomatoes. Add greek yogurt and lemon juice and mix well. Set aside

Pan Pita Bread

(Hopefully someone else will have better luck with these)

1/2 package yeast
3/4 cup water
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cup flour
1 tablespoon garlic (divide equally for 3 pitas)
1/2 cup olive oil or butter

Dissolve your yeast in your water, stir in salt and flour to form a soft dough. Knead well on a floured surface. Divide into three small balls and knead those for a minute. Using a rolling pin (which I desperately need) roll your balls into 5 inch circles. Cover and let them rise for 45 minutes. Using olive oil and a bit of garlic, cook as you would a pancake.

I used my pita bread, if you wanna call it that, to dip into my salad. As funny as they looked, they tasted decent. You can also bake them but I'm trying to cut down on the baking.

Apple and Brie Pancake

God bless the person who discovered that brie and apple taste well together. I bought some brie on Friday, but had no idea what to do with it so I bought an apple and voila! Apple and Brie pancake.

Pancake (which was supposed to be pie crust)

1 cup of wheat flour
1 tablespoon agave nectar (or sugar)
1/2 tablespoon salt
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 cup of melted butter
1/2 cup of ice water (too much water is what made my pie crust a pancake)
1 tablespoon Greek yogurt (the recipe called for sour cream but Greek yogurt tastes like sour cream)
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

Blend all the ingredients well and sit aside while you prepare your apples and brie.

1/4 cup apple
1/4 cup of brie
1/4 tablespoon of cinnamon
1/4 tablespoon of lemon juice

Combine with your pancake mix and cook well. I seared it without anything in the pan but you can add butter or oil.

My First Vegetarian Meal/Mushroom

1 portobella mushroom
1/4 teaspoon of garlic
1/2 teaspoon each rosemary,oregano, basil, sage
1/4 cup of acv(apple cider vinegar)
3 tablespoons oil
salt and pepper to taste

cut the stem off the mushroom, wash and put in a container. Mix your oil, garlic, herbs, and vinegar and pour over your mushroom. Let sit for 15 mins. Your mushroom can sit for an hour if you like, mine sat for about a half hour. Turn your oven on broil, or prepare your grill, and cook each side for about 10 minutes. I made mine into a sandwich complete with lettuce, ketchup, and mayonnaise.

My Homemade Macaroni and Cheese

1 cup of noodles(the shells are my favorite but any type if noddle will do)
1/2 tbsp of butter(yes I use butter, and no you may not use margarine)
1 cup of any cheese that you chose ( I love Havarti, cheddar, and mozzarella cheeses but I'll use Muenster cheese. Try to use melting cheeses)
1/4 cup of cream or milk (I often have cream)

Cook the pasta al dente style. Drain the pasta and add the butter, milk/cream, and cheese. Re-heat to melt all the ingredients stirring occasionally. Once cheese is melted, remove from heat and serve. As easy as making it from a box.

Cream Biscuits

I found this recipe of foodnetwork.com and it's fairly simple but I made a few modifications

2 cups of self rising flour (I used 1/2 cup of wheat flour)
1 1/2 cups of cream (I used about 1/2 cup, I originally planned to use 1/4 up but the biscuits were very dry)
1 tablespoon of sugar(I don't use sugar when I cook but I swapped it out for 1 tablespoon of butter)

I mixed the batter by hand until I got 2 very interesting looking biscuits. I then put them on a piece of aluminum foil and baked at 500*. I baked them for ten minutes, then I added I tried to bake a piece of chicken because I figured, "hey the oven's already on, so why not kill two birds with one stone." Cooking at 500* is only good for ten minutes. They were no fires or smoke but the smoke alarm went off warning me, of what I'm not sure. I took the chicken out, turned the oven off, and opened the backdoor. No major damage.

The biscuits were very good and moist. I probably wouldn't make them for anyone else besides myself.

Ancient Aztec Xocolatl

I found this recipe in Amazing Wellness magazine winter 2010 issue and I thought I'd try it as a post shovel treat. Of course, I modified the recipe for one person.

2 whole vanilla beans( I used vanilla extract and almond extract and used a splash of each)
2 cups milk (I used a cream/water combination about 1/2 cup together)
2 ounces of bittersweet chocolate (I used a handful or 1/4 cup of nestle dark chocolate chips)
1/3 cup coca powder( I used about 1 1/4 tablespoons)
1/4 teaspoon of chilli or chipotle powder (I used a dash of chilli powder)
1 teaspoon of cinnamon (I used 1/4 teaspoon)
2 to 4 tablespoons of honey (I used 1 tablespoon of Agave Nectar)
4 sticks of cinnamon bark(I didn't use that)

I combined my cream/water with vanilla and almond extract and I let it simmer for 5 minutes, I then turned down the heat and combined my chocolate. Once that simmered I added my chilli powder, cinnamon, and agave nectar. I mixed it with a fork and let it thicken. I put the still hot mixture in a cup and let it cool. The recipe says to add the cinnamon bark to the complete hot chocolate.

Maybe I didn't use a lot of chilli powder because it didn't have the punch I expected but this is not too sweet. It's about a 3.5/5.

Homemade Tzatzki

(These ingredients were decreased to one serving)

3 teaspoon olive oil (I used one teaspoon)
1 tbsp vinegar( I used apple cider vinegar because that's all that was available)
2 cloves of minced garlic( I used 1/4 tsp of minced garlic)
1/2 teaspoon of salt (I used a dash)
1/4 teaspoon of white pepper(again I used a dash)
1 cup greek yogurt ( I decreased to 1/4 cup)
1 cup sour cream(I also decreased to 1/4 cup)
2 cucumbers peeled(I decreased to 1/2 cucumber, I didn't peel or remove the seeds)

I mixed the yogurt, sour cream (which kind of taste alike), salt, pepper, apple cider vinegar, garlic, salt, and pepper. I added the cucumbers but I didn't chill for two hours as instructed. I dipped my garlic bread from Trinacria, which still smelled fresh after two days, in my dip. It was good but made me lightheaded a half hour later. I gotta perfect that recipe.

Decadence

Have you ever had fresh hot chocolate? Or homemade whipped cream? If you haven't, you should. This morning I made homemade hot chocolate. No packets, just coco, cream, milk, water, chocolate chips, and whipped cream I made yesterday. A few weeks ago, I began looking for a hot chocolate recipe and I came across one of divascancook.com. I love Monique, the blogger, who creates the best homemade recipes. My modified recipe:

1/2 cup of water
1/4 cup of cream
1/4 cup of milk
1 tablespoon of coco
1 handful of chocolate chips
a splash of almond extract
a splash of vanilla extract
homemade whipped cream
add all of the ingredients to a sauce pan, mix well, and bring to a boil.

Homemade whipped cream:

1 cup of whipping cream
1/4 cup of coconut milk (I have leftover coconut milk and I'm looking for an excuse to use it)
1/4 cup of agave nectar
a splash of white Zinfandel
2 drops of almond extract

whip until the texture is very thick and fluffy- about 20 minutes. Store the extra in Tupperware.