A delicious and easy lunch

A few years ago my friend Stephen introduced me and Casey to one of our favorite easy to make lunches. The best part about this lunch is how versatile it is! You can make it with any ingredients you like!

Yep, it is a simple wrap...with a few special touches. Here is how to make it:

Get a tortilla.
Put some cheese on it (we used chopped provolone...yum).
Put some lettuce on it.
Put some lunch meat on it (we used pastrami...again yum).
Chop up some tomatoes and some red onions, place them in a bowl and toss them with a little olive oil, salt, pepper, and a vinegar of choice (we used red wine vinegar).
Spoon the tomato and onion mixture onto the wrap.
Wrap and enjoy!

It is really yummy and super easy. Try it!

I've been extremely lazy in updating my cooking...

but here are a few highlights of things I have made recently:

cheese and chile tart

tilapia and mashed yams with pancetta-sage breadcrumbs

:)

lamb chops with dried cherries and port

Oops! I just realized I forgot to update my blog with this recipe that I made Monday night. It has been quite a crazy week, and I have only cooked once. Last Friday I had LASIK laser eye surgery and I have been spending the majority of my time and energy caring for my eyes. I am constantly putting in eye drops or resting them from being tired. However, every day keeps getting better and the surgery has already changed my life so much. I encourage any of you thinking about getting the surgery to go for it and do it! It is incredible and I can already see more clearly than I ever did with glasses or contacts.

Despite being consumed with post-operative eye care, I did find the time (and eye energy!) to cook on Monday night. I did have to wear goggles to protect my eyes from getting anything in them during cooking, which was a hilarious sight!

I made lamb chops with a dried cherry and port reduction. It was really great, though not my favorite lamb recipe that I have made. The lamb was cooked PERFECTLY though! I simply cooked the lamb with a little bit of olive oil in a pan over medium-high heat for about 10 minutes, turning often. I will definitely cook lamb again this way. On the side I served spiced basmati rice (not pictured) which was not my favorite rice dish, a little more bland than I usually like.

Overall the dish was still a success and I enjoyed it a lot!

salmon with lentils and mustard-herb butter

For quite a while now I have avoided cooking salmon, in fear of it not living up to my step mom Cindy's incredible salmon. While still no salmon can be as great as Cindy's salmon, this dish came pretty darn close.

I made french green lentils sauteed with leeks, butter, fresh lemon juice, and a homemade mustard-herb butter. The mustard-herb butter consisted of butter (surprising, I know!), fresh chives, fresh tarragon, grainy mustard, and a little fresh squeezed lemon juice. Then, I simply sauteed the salmon with a little bit of butter, salt, and pepper and topped the salmon off with a little more of the mustard-herb butter. I really enjoyed this dish and it felt decently guilt free, if you ignore all of the butter that was in it..:)

steak with parmesan butter, balsamic glaze, and arugula

This might be the best recipe I have ever made. Casey and I are in food heaven right now.

I have to make the picture large because of how beautiful this dish was. On top of a bed of arugula, I placed sliced ribeye steak cooked medium rare, slathered with a grated fresh parmigiano reggiano and butter mixture. I also shaved fresh parmigano reggiano on the salad and topped the whole salad off with fresh lemon juice and a glaze made of shallots, balsamic vinegar, and dark brown sugar.

This meal was beyond incredible.

chicken with mustard mascarpone marsala sauce

Tonight I made a pasta sauce that was out of this world good.

Like the title says, I made the sauce with dijon mustard, mascarpone cheese, and marsala wine. The sauce also included white onions, cremini mushrooms, garlic, and fresh parsley. It was so creamy and delicious. I will definitely make this dish again!

chopped salad with salsa verde dressing

Tonight for dinner I made something unlike anything I have ever made before with ingredients I have never used before. And it was unbelievably delicious.

I made a chopped salad with salsa verde dressing. The salad included romaine lettuce, green cabbage, tomatoes, jicama, corn, avocado, and a little feta cheese. I made the salsa verde dressing by pureeing tomatillos, cilantro, lime juice, jalapeño chile, garlic, green onions, and a little vegetable oil. Before this recipe, I had never cooked with jicama or tomatillos before, and I am now obsessed with both. The light sweetness of the jicama and the mild sour flavor of the tomatillo really made the salad great. This salad was really healthy and still BURSTED with flavor! It was so good.

dark chocolate cupcakes with chocolate cream cheese frosting

I am on vacation in Florida and tonight, Casey and I had an extreme chocolate craving. We drove to the nearby icecream shop but there was a long line that we did not want to wait in! So, I decided it would be fun to satisfy our chocolate craving through baking something delicious! At Northwestern, there is a great new cupcake place that serves chocolate cupcakes that are out of this world. They use cream cheese in their chocolate frosting which sounds a little bit odd but it is in fact one of the most delicious things I have ever tasted. I attempted to replicate these cupcakes and they turned out REALLY well!!

Unfortunately, I did not have an icing squeezer so I had to spread on the icing by hand and it looks sloppy. However while pretty ugly, these cupcakes tasted beautiful. They are decadently rich and chocolatey. I love love loveee them. Something interesting to note: while of course the cream cheese is not vegan, the cupcakes themselves are (I did not use any eggs). They had just as much flavor as any non-vegan cupcake I have had. mmm these were so wonderful! I may go eat another one now...

home cooked italian. yum

I have been lazy with updating my blog, oops! But last week I made lasagna from scratch and it was so great. Lasagna is one of my favorite comfort foods and it is so easy to make! What I love so much about lasagna is that it is no boring pasta dish. It has the potential to have so much flavor when made well with high quality ingredients.

I wish I had a better camera to take pictures of my food with (I use my camera phone), but you will just have to trust me when I say that this lasagna, while not pretty, tasted awesome.

I made the lasagna with a combination of ground beef and breakfast sausage, which I found to be a main reason why the dish had so much flavor. In addition, instead of ricotta cheese I used cottage cheese which ended up making the dish a little more salty and rich with flavor. I served the lasagna with garlic bread and a caesar salad, and everything was topped with my favorite cheese of all, parmigiano reggiano.

Red Velvet Whoopie Pies with Cream Cheese frosting

I don't usually bake for two reasons:

1) Baking scares me.  All steps in baking usually require complete accuracy for the final product to be at all delicious.

2) If I were lucky enough to have the final product come out well, I would most likely eat it all in one sitting.

I decided to try out baking last night for fun anyway, and I am so glad I did because these whoopie pies came out perfectly and are IRRESISTIBLE! Thankfully, I have my wonderful boyfriend to keep me from eating all of them in one sitting.:)

These whoopie pies are so divine. They are about the size of your palm so this is not a dessert for someone only wanting a taste of something sweet, this is a dessert for the real sweet tooths out there like me! When you pick the pies up, they smell like a perfect mix of rich cocoa and cream cheese frosting. And when you bite into them, it is like you are biting into a chocolate cloud of happiness with cream cheese frosting rain. They are so good. Maybe I will sneak one right now while Casey isn't looking..:)

Pasta and Chicken bake

Last night for dinner I made a yummy chicken and pasta bake. It was really delicious and super easy!  It would definitely be a crowd pleaser for any taste buds, especially kids. It really reminded me of a homemade gourmet hamburger (or in this case chicken) helper meal. I made the bake with campanelle pasta, stir fried chicken and white onion, garlic, diced tomatoes, mozzarella, and fresh parsley. I mixed all of the ingredients together and placed them in a casserole dish. Then I topped the dish off with a mixture of bread crumbs and parmigiano reggiano. Finally, I added little bits of butter over the top before placing it in the oven to bake (this helped the dish brown beautifully).

chili night

Last night I made the ultimate combination: chili and cornbread!

This was my first time ever making chili and it was very successful! I made the chili with way too many ingredients to list, but it really did come out perfectly so message me if you would like the recipe! The cornbread was great too. :)

Tonight I made an incredibly delicious combination. First of all, this rice is some of the best rice I have ever had.  I made chicken sauteed in mushrooms, butter, and shallots with mozzarella cheese melted on top. Below the chicken is my delicious rice creation. I made basmati rice mixed with fresh parsley, fresh dill, and fresh scallions. This dinner was soo good!

My first post from Northwestern!

As you can see, I changed my blog name since I am no longer in Arizona. And, I changed the old background since I am no longer in the desert so a desert background no longer felt appropriate.

I can't promise that I will post a lot while at school (way too busy to cook a lot here!!),  but I will occasionally feel the urge to cook a nice homemade dinner...like last night.

In my lovely new apartment, I made pasta with pancetta and leeks. The picture does not do this pasta justice because the picture is kind of boring looking and this pasta was anything but boring. It was so incredibly delicious and had so much flavor!

I made a cream sauce with white wine, heavy cream, butter, sauteed leeks, and sauteed pancetta. All of the flavors married perfectly. I even topped the pasta with parmigiano reggiano to really make the flavors pop. It was so good that unfortunately, I have no leftovers (Casey ate them all:)).