Pico de Gallo

Pico

In honor of Taco Tuesday, I am sharing my quick and simple Pico de Gallo recipe.  I love Pico and all types of salsa. The best thing about both of them is that chips can be used as the vehicle, and I have never met a chip that I did not like. The secret to a great Pico is to keep it simple.  When I first started making Pico de Gallo, I would always try to sass it up with fancy ingredients and it never tasted quite right. What I found was that the best Pico came from fresh and simple ingredients.  Enjoy!

Ingredients

  • 3/4 C White Onion, minced (about 1/2 medium onion)
  • 1 1/2 C plum Tomatoes, seeded and finely chopped (about 4 large tomatoes)
  • 1 TBS Jalapeño Pepper, stemmed, seeded, and minced (about 1 pepper)
  • 1 Clove Garlic, minced
  • 1/4 C Fresh Cilantro, minced
  • 2 TBS Freshly Squeezed Lime Juice (from 1 small lime)

Directions

Combine ingredients in a medium bowl and season well with salt. Add more lime juice as desired.

Try to make this a couple of hours before you need it, so that the ingredients have time to hang out with each other.  Now go and make some tacos!

This Pico de Gallo will last up to a week in a tightly sealed container in your fridge.

*Note – Make sure you taste the jalapeño before you use it.  Some of them are not spicy and others will make you sweat for hours.  Also if you like a little bit more spice, save some of the jalapeño seeds and add them to your pico to taste. Don’t forget to wash your hands after handling the jalapeño ;)*

Posted by & filed under Garlic, Jalapeno, Tomatoes. This post has 2 comments.

Holiday Wreath

Holiday Wreath

The holiday craft bug has definitely bitten me.  For Halloween in order to let the kids in our building know that they could trick or treat at our door we had to decorate it.  I did a last minute thing that involved completely wrapping our door in reversed Xmas paper and putting flying baby ghosts made out of gauze all over it.  See baby ghost hanging out with a roller skating unicorn below…

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The chaos that I created on the door got the point across to the kids, but it was not my best work.  So as I start to gear up for holiday crafting season, I wanted to make sure that my door was successfully celebrating Thanksgiving.  This is where the Turkey Wreath comes into play.  I had a 25% off Michael’s Craft coupon that was burning a hole in my pocket, so I headed to the craft store for inspiration.   While I was floating through the craft store in search of wreath supplies, I got sucked into the Martha Stewart glitter tunnel…no joke!  I left a little dazed, glitter somehow had gotten into my hair and I had an intense need to buy copious amount of glitter.  I don’t really have a need for glitter (yes, I do) at this moment, but the colors are soooooo Bee-U-Tee-Full that it makes me feel like I need it.  I am sure I could sprinkle a little glitter on the Turkey Wreath and it would make it all the better!

Martha Stewart Glitter…sooooo pretty!

Martha Stewart Glitter…sooooo pretty!

I talked myself down from the glitter ledge, but I am still brainstorming crafts that I can make this holiday that would justify me buying a crap ton of glitter.

I finally found the wreath section and found 2 different sizes of hay rings.  I got a large one and two smaller ones so that I could make some turkey babies. I bought the cheapest yarn that I could find in turkey colors.  You know, turkey colors…brown, red, orange and yellow.  I picked up similar colors of felt…yellow, red and white and a bag of googly eyes for good measure.

wreath suppliesSupplies – Makes at least 3 wreaths.

  • 1 Large Hay Ring
  • 2 Small Hay Rings
  • Yarn: 1 Red, 1 Brown, 1 Orange, 1 Yellow
  • Felt Sheets: 2 Red, 1 White, 2 Yellow
  • 1 Pkg Goggly Eyes
  • Glue gun and push pins if you don’t have some at home

The first thing I did was take the plastic off of my hay ring.  Just then, Derika walked in the door and asked me why I didn’t just leave the plastic on the ring since I was covering it up with yarn.  So smart she is! I am going to blame this hiccup on my glitter induced daze and pushed through the crafting mess that I had created.  Whatever you do, do not remove the plastic from the wreath or your house will look like this!

Messy Messy Messy!

Messy Messy Messy! Leave the plastic on the wreath!

Open the brown thread and make a little yarn ball with it. You don’t have to make a yarn ball out of the whole thing, I am too impatient for that.  If your yarn ball runs out you can always add more to it.  Tie the brown string around the ring and begin to wrap the ring with the brown yarn.  Take some care with this and try to be a little bit neat.  Cover a little less than half of your ring with brown yarn.

Make a red yarn ball and start to add a red section to your ring.  Use your best judgment. You want to leave enough room on the ring so that you can have a red section, a yellow section, and orange section and then repeat.

2013-11-07 16.46.30Once your ring is completely covered in yarn, it will totally begin to look like a turkey. 🙂 Next take the white felt and cut out some eyes. Use the yellow felt to cut out the beak and the feet, and use the red to cut out the gobbler.

2013-11-07 17.22.45

Have fun cutting out these pieces.  They don’t have to be perfect and I think that each of the turkeys that I make will end up having their own unique personality.

Next begin heating up your glue gun, while you place the felt pieces onto your wreath with pushpins to get the placement right.

push pins

Place your felt pieces where you like them so that you can begin to see a turkey, secure them with glue from the glue gun.

Once all of your felt pieces are secure, your turkey will have a bit of a death stare going on…get rid of it! To add a little more personality and to get rid of the creepy eyes, I added some googly eyes, but you could use buttons, something glittery or whatever your little heart desires.

I tied a little string onto the top to help with the hanging process…and there you have it, my fabulous turkey is complete.

Turkeys hanging out with each other before they find their forever home.

Turkeys hanging out with each other before they find their forever home.

Now go spread some turkey love!

Update 12/9/13!

Here are some latest photos of my snowman wreath.

SnowmanThe assembly of my snowman wreath was very similar to the turkey wreath.  I covered the whole hay wreath with white yarn.  I then rapped a section with read yarn, and tied orange and yellow pieces over the read to make it look like a scarf.

Snowman1

After the wreath was completely wrapped with yarn, I then cut out the pieces for the snowman face, hat and I made his arms out of pip cleaner.

snowman pieces

I attached his hat, his eyes noes and buttons and I glued his arms on the back of the scarf with a hot glue gun.  Once the arms were dry, I added google eyes so that he had a little bit more personality and voila, you have a snowman wreath!

Happy Holidays!

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World Map Art

finished map Edit

For a long as I can remember Derika and I have been talking about how we would love to have a world map that we could put pins in to mark where we have traveled.   Why haven’t we made this dream a realty!? Here are some of the hold ups…I have yet to find a map that I really love, but I don’t know how hard I have actually been looking.  Also getting things framed can be a bit pricey, and the maps that I have found have all been huge (of course they are huge, it is a map of the WORLD)!  I also do not want glass on the framed map, because I want to stick pins into it.  So this is how this idea of making my own world map art came about.  I found a really great and simple map at Barnes and Nobles so I bought 2, because I knew that I would mess up 🙂 and started to brainstorm.  Derika was in Brazil for the week, so I knew that I could comfortably take over our small NYC apartment with my craftiness.  Usually when I start a project I have this grand idea of how I want it to turn out, but then once I am in the craft store I get distracted by all of the glitter and sparkles and my project begins to morph. After 3 trips to Michael’s Crafts and a few evenings watching documentaries, drinking wine and trying not to get spray glue on my wood floors this is what I came up with.

Map Supplies

Supplies

I got all excited and wanted to get started right away, but when I got home I realized that I would need to flatten the cork and the maps for a least a day or two.  Fail!  I laid the map and cork out on my living room floor and let some books hang out on top of them for about 24 hours.

After everything was flat I cut the cork board to fit my canvases and glued the cork to the canvas with the E-6000 glue.  It was not sticking right away and according to the directions it needed to sit overnight for best results.  So back under the books these canvases went. You don’t have to add the cork to the canvas, but I was not sure how well the pins would stay if I was just sticking them into the canvas.  The cork also made my canvases about 1 inch thick. This is where the 2 maps came in handy.

Cork on Canvases

Cork on Canvases

After the canvas and cork was dry, I was ready to begin cutting.  The first cut I made was the piece that included the US, because that is where we have traveled the most.  I wanted to make sure that I was not slicing through it.  This map is really great for this project,  because the grid lines on it make it easy for cutting. After I cut my first piece.  I turned that piece over, covered it with spray adhesive and smoothed the map over the cork canvas evenly. Wrap the sides like a present, using spray adhesive to seal them. You will have a decent amount of excess paper on the backside, we will get to that later. I flipped my recently mounted canvas-back over to see where I would need to begin my second cut.  This is where the second map comes into play. Since I did not want to lose too much of my map, I went to the second map and made my cut for the middle canvas and followed the same instructions on mounting.  I cut my third piece of the map from the first map.  This ended up working our perfectly and I lost very little of the map.

This is what the back of my canvas looked like after I finished mounting them.

Unfinished - Back of Map

Unfinished – Back of Map

I let these maps hang out like this under some books for a few hours to seal the adhesive. After the adhesive was sealed I went back and tidied up the back of the maps, by securing and removing some of the excess paper.

Finished Back of Maps

Finished Back of Maps

Once the map was completely finished we inserted small push pins that I got from a girl on Etsy.  I got 2 multi-color packs and 2 yellow packs. I wanted to color coordinate where we have lived and were we have traveled together. These push pins worked great and were perfect because they are small enough to work in the areas where we needed to put a lot of pins. Below is the finished product hung on the wall with some of the push pins in it.

World Map Art

Happy Crafting!

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Magical Green Smoothie

Magical Green Smoothie

Magical Green Smoothie

Happy Halloween!!! I cannot believe that tomorrow is November 1st, and that Derika and I have been living in NYC for 2 months already…where has the year gone!?  The weather is starting to get chilly in NYC, and it is really starting to make me miss sunny San Diego and the amazing farmer’s markets that happen all year there.

When Derika and I lived in San Diego, we use to go to the farmer’s market twice a week to pick up this green smoothie call the GreenFix.  We were totally addicted, so much in fact that this addiction was costing us about $50 a week!  This little habit is what led us to buy a Vitamix We figured that with the amount that we were spending every week on GreenFix, we could use that towards paying for a Vitamix.  I am so happy we did.  I make a batch of green smoothies about twice a week.  It will last about 4-5 days in your fridge, but don’t worry about that because just like homemade almond milk, it won’t last that long.  We usually drink a big glass of green smoothie in the morning and during the day if we are feeling snacky.  My recipe seems to change a little every week depending on what greens are in season and on sale.

Ingredients

*Note –  the quantities below are rough estimates*
  • 6 Stems of Curly Kale
  • A Fistful of Spinach
  • A Fistful of Parsley
  • 4 Stems Dandelion Greens or Collard Greens
  • 2 Leaves of Romaine Lettuce
  • 1 Apple, minus the core
  • 1 Banana, peeled
  •  Purified Water, I use my Brita

Directions

1.  Wash all of your produce and place all of the ingredients listed above in you amazing Vitamix.

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2.  Once you have your ingredients in the blender, fill it halfway with purified water.

3.  Put the lid on the blender, turn it on at the lowest setting slowly working your way up to top speed.  Let it blend for 1 to 1.5 minutes.

VitaMix hard at work.

4.  Once your smoothie is done blending, transfer it to a container for storage.  I use an old glass milk jug.

finished smoothieYou smoothie is ready to enjoy.  Now if you want to get sassy, and really impress the heck out of yourself. Pour yourself a glass of green smoothie, add a splash of homemade almond milk and a splash of O.N.E. Coconut Water(my favorite)…oh my god so good!

Enjoy and have fun trick or treating!

*Note – you can learn how to make almond milk with a blender here or with a Vitamix here.*

Happy Halloween!!!

Happy Halloween!!!

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Homemade Almond Milk ~ VitaMix

Homemade Almond Milk Made with a VitaMix

Homemade Almond Milk Made with a VitaMix

About a year ago I posted a recipe on how to make homemade almond milk with a blender or magic bullet.  It is a simple recipe, but there is some soaking of the almonds, some straining of the almond meal and a decent amount of mess. Since then I have been fortunate enough to acquire a Vitamix . They are a bit spendy, but totally worth it. The first thing I did with my Vitamix was make almond milk, and I was shocked at how easy it was.  It is so easy that I feel like I am doing something wrong.  This milk will last 4-5 days in your fridge, but it is so good and so simple to make that it will not have a chance to last that long.

Ingredients

  • 1 C Raw Almonds
  • 2 Pitted Dates
  • 3 C Purified Water

Directions

1.  Place the almonds, 2 pitted dates and 3 cups of water into your Vitamix.

Ingredients in VitaMix

Ingredients in Vitamix

2.  Turn on your Vitamix at the lowest setting and slowly work you way up to top speed.  Let it blend for 30 seconds to 1 minute.

Making Almond Milk

Making Almond Milk

3.  After 30 seconds to 1 minute, you magically have almond milk….easy peasy and really too good to be true!

I store my almond milk in a plastic jug from the container store.  It will last 4-5 days, but it won’t last that long so you won’t have to worry about it.

Enjoy!

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Noodle Free Lasagna

Noodle Free Lasagna

HAPPY BIRTHDAY Glitter Spice! Today is the one-year anniversary of glitterspice.com, I can’t believe that I have been blogging for a year already!!! I wanted to do something nice for Glitter on her Birthday, so I have decided to start her a Facebook Page!  Go check it out HERE and don’t forget to like it!  In addition to starting a Glitter Spice Facebook page, I decided to share a lasagna recipe or is it a lasagne recipe!  I prefer to spell it lasagne so that I can then say the word “La-Sag-Nee” over and over again to myself while I am cooking :). Words get stuck in my head for days, just the way songs do. If that word is going to hang out for a few days, I prefer it to be a fun word to say. So as a result, I decided to share a lasagne recipe with you in honor of Glitter Spice’s Birthday. 🙂

It has been chilly in NYC, and I have been craving all things soupy, cheesy and comforting. Most of the time the cheesy and the comforting things leave me feeling kind of gross after. Boooooo! So with this recipe I decided to keep the cheese, just lighten it up a bit and get rid of the noodles. I love cheese way too much to get rid of it, so the noodles had to go!  I was pleasantly surprised, this noodle free lasagna can hold her own…so don’t knock it until you try it!  Now let’s make some La-Sag-Nee!

Ingredients for Noodle Free Lasanga

Ingredients for Noodle Free Lasagna

Ingredients

  • 1 White Onion, diced
  • 1/2 Bag of Quorn Crumbles or 1 LB of Protein of Choice
  • 1 15oz Can Crushed Tomatoes with Basil
  • 3 TBS Tomato Paste
  • 3 TBS Italian Spice Blend
  • 1 Tsp. Granulated Garlic
  • 1 Tsp. Salt
  • 1/2 Tsp. Pepper
  • 4 Cloves Garlic, diced
  • 1 LB of Zucchini and/or Yellow Squash, cut into thin medallion rounds
  • 1/2 C Goat Cheese or Skim Mozzarella, shredded
  • 2 C Greek Yogurt
  • 1 Head Broccoli, roughly chopped
  • 6 Stalks Curly Kale, leaves removed from stems
  • 1 Egg
  • Patience

Directions

  1. In a large skillet or sauce pan, heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil and add the diced onions. Sauté on medium-high until softened, about 3-5 minutes.
  2. Add your protein of choice, canned tomatoes, tomato paste, spices, salt, pepper, and diced garlic. Continue to cook all ingredients until the protein is cooked through. Set the sauce aside when done.
  3. In a medium bowl, combine goat cheese or mozzarella, greek yogurt, broccoli pieces, and egg. Mix well.
  4. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Lightly grease the bottom of an 8 x 8 or 13 x 9  deep baking dish (depends on how thick you want your lasagna to be). Place a layer of zucchini and squash rounds evenly across the bottom, making a squash liner of sorts.
  5. Add a layer of tomato sauce on top of the zucchini. Top that with some of the broccoli and yogurt mixture. Top that with a thin layer of kale leaves (place the leaves flat). Continue with this layering process until you have used all of your ingredients.
  6. Top the entire dish with more shredded cheese.
  7. Bake for 45 to 60 minutes. Broil the last few minutes if the cheese on the top is not a golden brown.
  8. Remove from oven and allow to sit for 10 minutes before serving. This is a key step for this recipe and it is where your patience comes into play. If you don’t wait, you will end up with noodle free lasagna soup.  Do it for the cheese and let the La-Sag-Nee hang out for 10 mins.
  9. After you have patiently waited, cut it into pieces, use a spatula to get it onto your plate and top that beautiful noodle free lasagna with some fresh parmesan. You can never have too much cheese 😉  Enjoy your La-Sag-Nee!!!

*Note ~ I just really enjoy the Quorn Grounds for this recipe, (I am not sponsored by them); feel free to use any veggie friendly or meat protein that you prefer and let me know how it turns out! Also make this recipe paleo, by leaving out the cheese and the yogurt. Use a nut based cheese instead.

YumYumYum!

YumYumYum!

Posted by & filed under Broccoli, Garlic, Kale. This post has 14 comments.

The Double D’s Take on Seattle

The Double D's and Julia the Mystical Traveling Unicorn take on Seattle

The Double D’s and Julia the Mystical Traveling Unicorn take on Seattle

Last week Derika had to go to Seattle for work and I decided that it would be a crime for me not to go with her.  So she went for work and I went for play! Derika and I lived in Seattle for 4 years so I knew that I would be able to get into some trouble while she was at work during the week, and then she and I would stay the weekend so that we would have some additional time to catch up with friends.

This is basically going to be the food I ate and drank recap of our trip, because what else can a girl do when she has so many restaurants and bars to hit with so little time!?

We landed around lunchtime on a Wednesday and we immediately headed to our favorite sandwich place in the city.  In a cute little town called Georgetown, there is an amazing place named Smarty Pants.  Seriously people run to this joint don’t walk!  They have a sandwich there called the Troublemaker…it is what dreams are made of. The most amazing thing about this sandwich is they make a vegetarian version with Field Roast.  I don’t know what the heck they do to this field roast, but whatever it is…IT IS MAGICAL!  Most of my meat-eating friends will order this sandwich with field roast instead of chicken, because it is that good.

Julia the Mystical Traveling Unicorn enjoying a Troublemaker.

Julia the Mystical Traveling Unicorn enjoying a Troublemaker.

Derika had to head to work after Smarty Pants so my roller derby friend Melissa aka Comet Atcha swooped by the hotel and picked me up for a day of fun and cocktails.

Comet and Dee

Dee Troit and Comet Atcha

We headed straight to a great roller derby store called Fast Girl Skates, to visit some of my favorite rollergirls and to try on a pair of skates.  I designed the blue streak box for the new Blue Streak Roller Skates and part of the perk is that I get a pair of new Blue Streak Skates.  This will be my first new pair of skates in 7 years….So Excited!

Me and the Blue Streak skate box :)

Me and the Blue Streak skate box 🙂

After a lot of drooling over all of the amazing skate gear they have in the store, we headed over to Ballard for a little shopping and cocktailing.  When Derika and I lived in Seattle, we lived in Ballard and I still miss it so much.  It has really exploded since we left, and I always like heading to Ballard when we are in town to see what has opened up since I was there last.

Comet was hungry and I always love a good cocktail, so we headed over to a new place called Bitterroot.  It is a Northwest BBQ place in Ballard that has a cute back bar, mac and cheese that was sent from the gods and awesome cocktails made with love….winning!

Magical Back Bar

Magical Back Bar

Epic Mac and Cheese

Epic Mac and Cheese

yummy cocktails

Yummy cocktails

Bitterroot was by far my favorite of all of the new places that I checked out in Ballard!  After  some eating, shopping, and cocktailing, we headed over to my friend Chloe’s house for a little rollergirl get together.  I got too excited and forgot to take photos. 🙁 But i can guarantee you that a merry time was had by all.

On Thursday morning I was on a mission to get to Pike’s Place Market to enjoy a little breakfast.  I met my friend Paris who works near the market for a little coffee and then she unfortunately had to head back to work.  So off to the market I went.

Julia the Mystical Traveling Unicorn enjoying Pike's Place Market for the first time.

Julia the Mystical Traveling Unicorn enjoying Pike’s Place Market for the first time.

I had to show Julia the ropes so I immediately took her to one of my favorite spots at Pike’s Place. The Beecher’s Handmade Cheese store…It was basically breakfast time at this point and who am I to pass up a little spicy Mac and Cheese for breakfast 🙂

Julia the Mystical Traveling Unicorn enjoying some Beecher's Spicy Mac and Cheese at 10am.

Julia the Mystical Traveling Unicorn enjoying some Beecher’s Spicy Mac and Cheese at 10am.

After that I walked around the rest of the market to walk off the mac and cheese, and then headed to downtown Seattle for a little shopping while I waited for Comet to join me.  Comet swooped me up around 1pm and we headed to the Facebook offices to check out where Ethan works, and to join him for lunch.

Ethan and Comet enjoying lunch at the Facebook office

Ethan and Comet enjoying lunch at the Facebook office.

We had so much fun and the offices were so so amazing.  It was exactly what you would expect from Facebook.  Amazing free food, a hot tub full or balls for staff to relax in, super friendly staff and amazing views.

Julia the Mystical Traveling Unicorn enjoying the views at her Facebook lunch.

Julia the Mystical Traveling Unicorn enjoying the views at her Facebook lunch.

We left Ethan and did a little bit more shopping. One of my favorite places to shop at when I am in Seattle is Laura Bee Designs in Ballard.  It is a little wonderland full of homemade bags and jewelry by Laura Bee herself and her pug Otis.  Definitely stop by this place on your next visit or simply order the bag or your dreams online.  After that we joined Comet’s friend Stephanie for dinner. We did a Dine Out event and enjoyed a bunch of tapas at a bunch of amazing Fremont and Ballard restaurants.  Once again I got too excited and forgot to take photos…but we had fun!

The next day I got to hang out with Paris, she picked me up in her amazing sky blue mini bus and we got to zoom around Seattle in style.

Julia the Mystical Traveling Unicorn riding around in style.

Julia the Mystical Traveling Unicorn riding around in style.

You should have seen the look on the valet’s faces when she pulled up to my hotel…priceless.  Paris and I spent the rest of the day catching up, shopping  and zipping around town.  We eventually joined her husband The Greg and Derika for dinner at our favorite Italian place in Seattle…Bizarro Italian Cafe.  This is a must whenever we are in Seattle, and I think that I can safely save this is one of the best Italian restaurants that I have ever been too.  The food is amazingly fresh and homemade, the staff is super nice, and the atmosphere is fantastic.  They have so much going on with the decor in this place that I see something new every time.  When I am there I always get their margarita pasta dish.

Margarita Pasta...sooo good!

Margarita Pasta…sooo good!

This pasta consists of delicious tubes of pasta tossed with fresh basil and their world-famous marinara then it is topped with mozzarella and baked to a golden brown.  Soooooo good!  Derika swears by the Elk Bolognese and Paris loves the Puttanesca…just go there and you won’t be disappointed.  We rolled ourselves home and had a nice evening with Paris, The Greg and their pups Wookie and Jo Jo.

Saturday consisted of an amazing brunch at Meanders with our friends Jenny and Ethan.  I got too excited and forgot to take photos, but Meanders has amazing home cooked brunchy things that are a must try.  Derika and I then headed to Ballard where I talked her into stopping into a brewery for an afternoon beverage.  In addition to a ton of new bars and restaurants popping up in Ballard, the breweries are popping up by the tons.  Our first stop was at Populuxe Brewing.

Julia enjoying some tasty beers at the Populuxe Brewery

Julia enjoying some tasty beers at the Populuxe Brewery

Populuxe is a cute small brewery in Ballard that has a great patio with tons of seating, yard games, and food trucks…how can you get any better!?  The beer was good and we really enjoyed sitting in the sunshine with our tasty beverages.  After we finished our beers, we were headed to downtown Ballard so that Derika could check it out, but I got sidetracked and made her stop into another new brewery called Peddlers Brewing Company.  This brewery went into the old location of the Jolly Roger Taproom and I just had to check it out. They had a great bike themed atmosphere with a small patio and a great beer selection.  We decided to try a sampler.

Julia the MTU enjoying a sampler at the Peddler Brewing Company

Julia the MTU enjoying a sampler at the Peddler Brewing Company

I was excited to see another brewery pop up into this location.  The beers were great and I will definitely be back.  We finally headed to downtown Ballard to grab a quick bite to eat before we met our rugby friends later that evening.  We headed over to La Carta de Oaxaca….this place had the best mexican food and margaritas in Seattle…so of course we had to get a margarita.

Best Margaritas in Seattle

Best Margaritas in Seattle

We enjoyed some amazing Mexican food that I forgot to take photos of….Fail. But I really love the Chili Relleno and Derika likes the Carnitas Tacos.  You are just going to have to go there for yourself…you won’t be disappointed.  After all of this amazing food, we then headed over to Kickin’ Boots so that Derika and I could meet up with her rugby friends.  Kickin’ Boots has one of the biggest whiskey selections that I have ever seen, if whiskey is your thing head there on your next visit.

Derika and her rugby ladies

Derika and her rugby ladies

We had a great evening and it was just so great to see everyone. 🙂

On Sunday, our last half day in Seattle we headed to the Ballard Farmer’s Market so that I could get some amazing wood-fired pizza from Veraci Pizza and stroll around the market.  I love love love the pizza here and the Ballard Farmer’s Market, just makes me so happy.  After I ogled all of the produce, we sadly headed to the Seattle airport for our planes, trains, and automobile ride home.  So much fun! I am going to try to come back to Seattle again next October, I think that it is becoming one of my favorite times to visit. 🙂

Hopefully you are able to make it to some of my recommendations on your next Seattle visit.  Enjoy!

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Spaghetti Squash Pad Thai

Spaghetti Squash Pad Thai - DF,GF,V,P

Spaghetti Squash Pad Thai 

Pad Thai is usually my go to dish when I am trying out a new Thai restaurant.  If they mess that dish up, then I don’t have high hopes for anything else that is going to come out of that kitchen.  That being said, I have never had much success at making pad thai at home, and I stopped trying since I have been cutting back on my noodle intake lately.  🙁

I have been using spaghetti squash in some of my favorite Italian recipes and it has been working like a dream. I love the versatility of spaghetti squash and thought that I would give my pad thai recipe a try minus the rice noodles, plus the squash.  I was surprised at how good this turned out.  You will notice that this dish does not have the wonderfully chewy rice noodles, but I didn’t seem to miss them.  I think that the spaghetti squash adds a nice twist to this dish…it was so good we that to my disappointment we didn’t have any leftovers.  Have fun with this dish!

Spaghetti Squash Pad Thai Ingredients

Spaghetti Squash Pad Thai Ingredients

Ingredients

  • 1 Large Roasted Spaghetti Squash
  • 1 C Bok Choy, diced
  • 1 C Carrots, thinly sliced
  • 1 C Broccoli, chopped
  • 1 C Green Pepper, diced
  • 1 Clove Garlic, minced
  • 1/2 Brick of Tofu ~ Crispy Tofu
  • 1/4 cup Veggie Broth
  • 2 TBS Peanut Butter
  • 1 TBS Rice Wine Vinegar
  • 1 1/2 TBS Tamari or Bragg’s Soy Sauce
  • 1 Red Chili Pepper, diced
  • 2 Eggs, scrambled

Garnishes

  • 2 TBS Dry Roasted Peanuts, chopped
  • Green Onions, chopped
  • Cilantro
  • Lime wedges

 Directions

  1. In a large nonstick skillet coated with cooking spray, sauté garlic for 1 minute.
  2. Add the bok choy, broccoli and carrots and sauté over medium-high heat for 3 minutes.
  3. Move sautéed veggies to a plate and set aside.
  4. Add veggie broth, peanut butter, tamari sauce, rice wine vinegar and red chili pepper to the skillet you used to saute your veggies.
  5. Heat sauce until smooth.
  6. Return veggies to the skillet, as well as the spaghetti squash.
  7. Add in crispy tofu or protein of choice and scrambled egg, and heat over medium heat for 5 minutes or until sauce has coated everything.
  8. Divide among 2 plates/bowls and top with peanuts, cilantro, green onion, and lime wedge.

Enjoy!

Posted by & filed under Spaghetti Squash, Tofu. This post has 4 comments.

Veggie Tacos with Gluten Free Tortillas

Veggie Tacos

I love mexican food and wish that every day was TACO TUESDAYYYYYY!  I would eat chips and salsa and tacos and chips and guacamole and chips and tacos and salsa and hot sauce and tacos and cheese and chips and salsa every single day if I could.   I have been playing around with these tortillas for months and I think I finally got it.  These gluten-free tortillas are sturdy enough to hold all of your taco goodness like cheese and beans and salsa and things, without cracking down the middle. They are also still thin enough to make you feel like you are eating a real tortilla…soooooo exciting!  Now go forth and rock they heck out of that Taco Tuesday!

Gluten Free Tortilla Ingredients

Gluten Free Tortilla Ingredients

Tortilla Ingredients

 Makes about 6 tortillas

Taco Filling Ingredients

  • 1/2 TBS Coconut Oil
  • 1/4 C Vidalia Onion, chopped
  • 1/4 C Broccoli, chopped
  • 1/4 C Zucchini, chopped
  • 1/2 Jalapeño, diced
  • 4 Cloves Garlic, diced
  • 1 C Crispy Tofu, cubed or 1 C Quorn Grounds or 1 C Cooked Protein of Choice.
  • 1/2 Lime
  • 1 TBS Taco Seasoning (low sodium)

Simple Southwestern Black Bean Ingredients

  • 1 Can Black Beans, drained
  • 1 TBS Taco Seasoning (low sodium)
  • 1/4 C Water

Directions For Tortillas

  1. Crack the eggs into a medium-sized bowl and whisk in the melted coconut oil.
  2. Add the dry ingredients and beat well to combine.
  3. Add in your chives or scallions, mix well.
  4. Grab a small 8 inch or tortilla sized non-stick skillet and heat it over medium heat.
  5. Pour in about 1/4 cup of the batter and immediately roll it around to evenly coat the bottom. You want his batter to just thinly cover the bottom of your pan.
  6. The tortilla should start to pull away from the edges as it cooks. This is where your patience comes in.  If the tortilla does not begin to pull away, you added to much batter.  Don’t freak…just practice. 🙂Tortillas cooking
  7. 
Cook for about 1 minute on each side. Cook until deeply golden, and the edges of the pancake are beginning to curl and lift. Flip, and brown the second side.
  8. Place on a plate lined with paper towel and cover with a paper towel to keep them warm and toasty while you make your way through the rest of the batter, or even better, serve immediately.
  9. If saving for later, cool completely and store in a plastic bag. Then when you are ready, just heat up a non-stick pan and toss one tortilla at a time into the pan until they are all heated. Returning the tortillas to the paper towel plate as your work your way through the stack.

Gluten Free Tortillas

Directions for Veggie Taco Filling

  1. Heat the coconut oil in a deep skillet
  2. Add the onions and saute until fragrant, 1-2 mins.
  3. Add the rest of the veggies, the tofu or cooked protein of choice, taco seasoning and lime.
  4. Saute until veggies and protein are cooked and seasoned to your liking.  I usually cook my veggies and protein for 8-10 mins.

Taco Filling Amazingness

Directions for Simple Southwestern Black Beans

  1. Drain 1 can black beans in a colander and rinse.
  2. Transfer black beans to a small sauce pan, add taco season and water, mix well.
  3. Bring the beans to a boil and simmer for 10-15 mins uncovered. Some of the water will begin to evaporate. Simmer longer is you like your beans less soupy. Cover and let stand until you need them.

Simple Southwestern Black Beans

To build your Tacos…you so know how to do this.  Transfer all of the tasty things that you just made into cute little serving bowls.  Shred some cheese, lettuce, cilantro, chop up some avocado and grab your favorite pico de gallo and hot sauce and go to town.

Tacos

Happy Taco Tuesday!

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