Category: Uncategorized

The Lighter Side of Minnesota

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For this week’s stateside adventure, we’re revisiting Minnesota. Well, sort of anyway. We bought this squash on a recent trip to Minnesota at a local farm, but it’s really Japanese in origin. That said, we’re calling it our state night recipe this week. 

The farmer that we purchased the squash from described it as having a nutty and sweet flavor which instantly made me think that this would be perfect in a soup. You see I’ve been somewhat obsessed with soups after making Geni’s Sweet Potato Soup and I thought this squash might be a fun way to mix things up. Not to mention, after our major feasting last week, we’re looking to eat a bit more healthy – and so we bring you Uchiki Kuri Soup. Continue reading →

Happy Thanksgiving and Giveaway Winners

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Happy Thanksgiving! For those of you that celebrate the holiday, we hope you are having a wonderful day with great food, great family and great friends. We’re certainly thankful for all of our readers and everything that we have learned about different cultures, different countries, different states and each other in the past 11 months. Now without further adieu…

We have two winners of the recipe rock.

Mr. N shook up the bucket for the first winner. 

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Going Against the Grain – Quest for the Best Banana Bread (And Giveaway!)

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Up until now we’ve kept our banana breads on this quest pretty traditional, using all-purpose flours, white and brown sugars and even excluded nuts. Today, however, we’re going against the grain by going with the grain! Whole grain that is. Kelly over at Inspired Edibles was gracious enough to put together a recipe on our behalf that is entirely composed of whole grains and raw sugars. In case you didn’t know – Kelly is awesome (and so is her banana bread)!

Now, you can bet Miss A was excited to make this new recipe, especially when I told her that it had oatmeal in it. She loves oatmeal. So she and I gathered our dry ingredients including whole wheat flour, ground flaxseed, whole grain oatmeal, ground allspice, walnuts (just for you Kelly), baking powder, baking soda and turbinado sugar. 

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Rockin’ the Pumpkin

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We’ve got one more pumpkin recipe for you before we head back to sampling recipes from the Philippines. This particular dish makes use of the leftover roasted pumpkin we had from our risotto and makes for a great lunch or side salad. If you don’t have any leftover pumpkin on hand, it’s simple to roast up a fresh batch, just allow for an extra hour of cooking time.

So what is this easy, tasty and refreshing pumpkin recipe? The Pumpkin and Couscous Rocket Salad. Yep, it’s healthy and offers some much-needed freshness after all the Halloween sweets and treats. We started by preparing our couscous. We used a whole wheat couscous, chicken stock, dry white wine, fresh sage, lemon zest and lemon juice. 

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A Shining Date Night

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We interrupt this regularly scheduled Filipino recipe week for a few seasonal dishes. Now pumpkin has been all over the blog world for weeks – pumpkin muffins, pumpkin bread, pumpkin bagels, pumpkin waffles, pumpkin pancakes, pumpkin-banana bread….I could go on and on. So we figured we’d jump on the band wagon, for the rest of this week anyway.

Last night’s Halloween festivities were a blast. The kids had so much fun collecting candy, playing with their friends and having a pizza night. Mr. N was our brave knight this year, 

and Miss A, well I’m sure you can guess what she was for Halloween. A princess of course. Continue reading →

Jeet?

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Or in non-Rhode Island speak, have you eaten yet? Yep, it’s state night and we’re sticking with our “island” theme for the week. Okay, it’s not an actual island as Mr. N now knows, but we’ve already done Hawaii, and besides we miss New England.

As for Rhode Island, well we knew right away what meal we’d whip up for this adventure. Any guesses?

Alright, how many of you guessed Rhode Island Clam Chowder? If you did, yay! You’re right. Now, how many of you knew that Rhode Island Clam Chowder is not a red chowder, not a white chowder, but traditionally a clear broth chowder? That’s right, tourists often go for and favor the traditional New England white clam chowders, but Rhode Islanders can be found digging in on a version that puts the clams center stage.

Now a true Rhode Island Clam Chowder uses quahogs, but we couldn’t find any so we’re making due with chopped canned clams in clam juice. Continue reading →