Category: Side Dish

Like Father, Like Son

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It’s that time of year, when we set our clocks back, and gain that extra precious hour. Most people, myself included, typically relish the extra hour of sleep this can provide. This year, however, I woke up promptly at 5:30 (what would have been 6:30 yesterday) and thought about how this could also actually give me an extra hour to get things done today. I’m always saying there are never enough hours in a day. Besides Mr. N and Mike were already up and at ’em. They are the early risers. And they do not move very gingerly about the house. 😉

Well, when we left off it was Halloween and we had some crazy good French toast. We also had a crazy good Halloween! Continue reading →

Best Laid Plans

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We had another Romanian recipe planned for today. Only it didn’t turn out very well. In fact, it didn’t turn out at all. You know how that goes sometimes, you have everything all laid out – your plans for the day, the recipe, the ingredients and then somehow time sneaks up on you, you’re in a rush, the recipe goes completely haywire and all you have are some prep pictures and no finished result. This is when I take a deep breath and am reminded of that old saying, “The best laid plans of mice and men often go astray.”

But that’s life isn’t it…it’s gunna throw stuff at us. It’s full of uncertainty, and sometimes it’s okay to just throw your hands-up and move on. Now even though we pushed this recipe aside for today, we do plan on trying it again. You could say that it’s become a personal challenge of sorts. I will figure this one out! Until then, we thought we’d share this simple Watermelon-Ginger Salad that we whipped up to go with Mr. N’s birthday meal a few weeks ago. It’s simple, it’s fresh, is a great summer side, and most importantly it’s no fail! Continue reading →

Gettin’ Down to the Nitty Gritty

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We’re back and today we have our last recipe from North Carolina. After all, we’ve got to get rolling with some Romanian dishes here soon too. In fact, stay tuned early next week for our first taste of Romania – it’s a twofer!

Now before we cross the Atlantic, we’re going to round out this culinary tour with a classic Southern dish inspired by our favorite restaurant from North Carolina, the Tupelo Honey Cafe. The moment I saw “Fried Green Tomatoes- served over goat cheese grits with basil” on the menu, I knew I was going to be sold. Sure enough Tupelo didn’t disappoint. The dish was fantastic! So of course we had to see if we could recreate the magic at home.  Continue reading →

Let the Good Times Roll

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It’s been a while since we featured a random recipe, so before we launch off to a new country and the next state in our rotation, we thought we’d share this gem of a salad. You see, we’ve been on something of a roll with goodness lately (Yep, I have a song for this one too.). In fact, the kids haven’t even complained about what’s on their plates in nearly two weeks.

While we will take some credit for a few of the recipes winning them over, several of you deserve the credit too. In the last two weeks we’ve enjoyed recipes from Raymund at Ang Sarap, Courtney at Misadventures in Cooking, Charles at Five Euro Food, Sawsan at Chef in Disguise, John at From the Bartolini Kitchens, and Mary at Inside a British Mum’s Kitchen.

I kid you not, the kids have eaten all of these meals, enjoyed them and asked for more. We even heard phrases like, “Can we eat this every night?” and “Mom, you’re the best cook in the world.” I’m really astounded at this latest turn of events, especially considering none of these have been dessert recipes. Now I have no doubt this streak will come to an end, but until then, we wanted to share this Southwest Farro Salad with you all.  Continue reading →

Back to Business

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The business of food of course! Now that we’ve settled back into our daily routines and rolled through the mountains of laundry (Well, it’s almost all folded anyway!),  we’re back in the kitchen working our way around the world. For the next few weeks we’ll be sampling various recipes from the country of Armenia.

A former republic of the Soviet Union, Armenia is a mountainous country and lies in both Western Asia and Eastern Europe. The cuisine in Armenia is really rather varied, but almost always includes an extensive amount of fresh ingredients. For our first recipe we went with an Armenian side dish that we thought had a chance of winning over Mr. N and Miss A, an Armenian Chickpea Salad. Continue reading →

Cool Beans

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We’re all running a bit behind this week and things have gotten a little hectic. Thankfully it’s almost the weekend, and fortunately we’ve had some fabulous beans to use throughout the week in various dishes.

We first whipped up this recipe for the popular Nicaraguan Gallo Pinto last Sunday with our Nicaraguan steak and Mormom Johnnycake, and the leftovers have graced our table ever since. Gallo pinto is a traditional Nicaraguan dish of rice and beans cooked together.

For this particular version, Mr. N selected black beans – his favorite. We soaked our beans according to the package directions and then simmered them for an hour and a half in a sauce pan with about 8 to 10 cloves of garlic and water.  Continue reading →