.candygram for mongo.

Well, at 20 weeks now I am a week behind in my bump update. Eek! For week 19, however, the bebe was the size of a mango. Mangos are definitely a most delicious fruit. It's also a fruit that just takes me to a beach, with some Jimmy Buffet playing, and maybe a pina colada in my hand... virgin of course. I've never really been one to eat mangos in any sort of recipe though.

After thinking about what I could make, I decided to just keep it simple. Simple and delicious. So I made an awesome mango, pineapple and blueberry smoothie. Too easy and so delicious. Although, despite being only a small portion of the smoothie the blueberries turned it completely blue. Very pretty, but not super indicative of mango... oh well.

I don't have a specific recipe I use for smoothies. I just put in a good amount of fruit, in this case frozen mango and blueberry with fresh pineapple, and roughly 1/4 cup of plain yogurt with up to a cup of light vanilla silk, depending on how thick I want it. Blend it all up and enjoy a delicious smoothie anytime!

XO

.thanksgiving in march.

Well, kind of. For this week's bump update blog I am using an awesome (adapted) recipe from The Smart Kitchen. This week the bebe is the size of a sweet potato and a few days ago Ms. Smart posted a delicious looking recipe of stewed beef, sweet potato, cranberry sauce and greens.  Perfect recipe for the week!

I decided this would be a great way to try to break in my crock pot some more- as I am a bit intimidated by it and haven't used it much since the wedding. Yikes. I bought a 2.5 pound roast and went to work. I added a medium onion, chopped, 2 sweet potatoes, peeled and chopped, a can of whole berry cranberry sauce, cinnamon, salt and pepper and a few cups of beef broth. Then I cooked the whole thing on high for 5 hours.

I'm going to come on out and say it.... my roast was a little bit dry. I attribute this to a few things: I didn't sear it before putting it in the crock pot, there was no way I was going to risk the smell, and I also think I added too much broth. Aside from the slight dryness, however, the flavors were incredible! Cranberry sauce cooks really well with beef, giving it a subtle sweetness and the sweet potatoes were a nice, unusual, addition to the roast. Plus, I just love sweet potatoes so, you can't go wrong there. On top of all this awesome, there is enough leftover for 3 lunches for the man. He's happy.

I also served the whole thing with some Sister Schubert's rolls. OMG. If you have not tried these, go do it, right now. They are the lightest, airiest, fluffiest, most delicious rolls. I pretty much ate half of them all by myself. Hello baby weight. 

XO

.taking a trip to the outback.

I'm over halfway done with week 17 (can I get a big HELL YEAH!) and I was excited to do something for my bump update when I found out the bebe is the size of an onion this week. One of my favorite vegetables. After spending a long weekend with the in-laws I only had 2 more days though, and I told the man I didn't think I was going to cook anything with onion, because I just didn't want to spend a lot of time in the kitchen cooking something fancy schmancy. I had been thinking about making a french onion soup, or an onion tart, or something delicious like that.

Well, the man was not having me not doing my update so he suggested I make a blooming onion. Outback is one of his favorite places... mainly because of said onion, so if I could recreate it at home I would pretty much be the best wife ever. You know, more so than I already am.

I scoured the internet (read: Looked up recipes for 2 minutes) and found a few recipes for a baked onion. Sounded interesting and possibly a winner. I didn't have any of the exact ingredients needed so I kind of just made up my own little mix. I used this lovely recipe as my starting point, and took a few tips from the other recipes that I saw as well.

This would make an awesome appetizer for a small get together and, at less than 250 calories for the whole medium sized onion, it's really a guilt free dish! Granted, those calories are not counting the dipping sauce so, be careful there. This doesn't taste exactly the same as the sinful, fried Outback onion (which you probably don't want to look up the calorie count for) but it has a nice amount of crispness on top, and the creole seasoning I use gives the flavor excellent spiciness. It was really tough to get the breading into all the crevices and whatnot though so I am thinking next time I make this I'm going to go ahead and cut the onion completely, separate all the pieces, bread them, then bake them on a sheet pan. Not exactly "blooming" but that's okay.

Blooming Onion serves 2-4
1 medium onion
1 egg
2 tablespoons milk
1/3 cup bread crumbs
1 tablespoon Tony Chachere's Creole Seasoning
Garlic powder to taste
Chili powder to taste

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Mix the dry ingredients and the wet ingredients in two separate bowls.

Peel the onion and cut the bottom flat, but try not to cut too much off so the core stays intact. Then cut the onion as many times as desired, but do not cut all the way to the bottom. I made 4 cuts, resulting in 8 sections of onion. Ideally the onion will stay together (cause you didn't cut all the way to the bottom, did you?) but I did have a piece or two pop off, I just threw it in later.

After cutting, dip the onion into the wet mixture, try to gently open the "petals" so the mixture gets in all the crevices. Next put the onion in the dry mixture and try to fully coat and much as possible. Like I said, this was hard for me and I think I'll try a different way next time

Lightly grease, with cooking spray, a casserole dish. Place the onion in the dish, spray with a little bit more cooking spray. Bake for 45-55 minutes.

Serve with a dipping sauce like honey dijon dressing, ranch, thousand island or whatever you prefer!

XO

.week 16.

Whew, I am on top of things this week! I'm actually cooking with my bump update fruit or vegetable at the beginning of the week instead of the end. I feel productive. I also tried out a brand new food! It was an exciting night in the .baking and wine. kitchen.

This week the baby is the size of an avocado. Which happens to be one of my favorite things. I was oh so happy to cook with the delectable little fruit. I also decided to try out a wonderful grain called quinoa. I was pleasantly surprised by this as well. I've been seeing quinoa all over the blogosphere and found a delicious quinoa salad recipe over at Oh She Glows. I really loved this salad. The quinoa doesn't have a whole lot of flavor by itself, but when added with other things and a nice, light dressing it is delicious. Even the man liked it pretty good, although he did say it was "interesting." Which it is, particularly the texture, but it's a good interesting.

Additionally, for you Alaska folks, the man and I thought it reminded us of Bear Tooth burritos! Kind of weird, ha, but it did. I bet this salad would be great in a tasty, wheat tortilla. Next time this will be what we try. I think it would also be great with tomatoes. The man thinks it would be better with some cheese sprinkled in, or some sour cream as well (he has burritos on the brain I think!). In the meantime though I switched up the recipe a little bit. You can find the original recipe at the above link. Here is what I put in it.

Red Quinoa and Black Bean Vegetable Salad serves 4
1 cup uncooked red quinoa
1 (14 oz) can black beans, drained and rinsed
1 yellow bell pepper, chopped
2 green onions, chopped
2 small avocados, chopped

Dressing
Juice from 2 small limes
Pepper to taste
Garlic powder to taste
1/4 cup olive oil

Start by cooking the quinoa according to the package. Every quinoa recipe I've seen has stated how important it is to rinse it under cold water multiple times, and the packaging does the same. The quinoa only takes 15 minutes to cook, which is nice.

While the grain is cooking, chop up all of the vegetables and add them together in a bowl. Whisk the dressing together in a separate bowl.

When the quinoa is done add the vegetables to it, drizzle the dressing over it, and mix to combine everything. The salad wasn't completely cooled but was almost at room temperature when we ate it, which worked out pretty well. We also used some Trader Joe's Soy and Flax seed Tortilla chips to dip into the last bits of the salad in the bowl. Crazy tasty! So, basically, this dish could be a salad, a burrito filler, a dip for chips.... and probably tons of other things. It's full of healthy fats and tons of protein, which really filled both of us up.

Two thumbs up for quinoa!

XO