favorite recipes from this week

Alex made us Fettuccine Alfredo for our Valentine's Day dinner. This was the first dish that he made for me when we first started dating, and has made it a couple of times since. It has never come out as good as it did last night.

Alfredo Sauce
1/2 cup heavy whipping cream
4 oz (half a brick) cream cheese
1/4 cup (2oz or half a stick) butter
1 cup Parmesan cheese
3-4 cloves garlic, minced

Melt butter and add garlic. Add the rest of the ingredients and cook over low heat for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally. When you're just about ready to eat, turn it up to med-low heat to thicken. Serve over fettuccine, or whatever pasta you like.

We also made green beans. They rocked! Did you know that adding wine makes them better? True story.
1/2 lb fresh green beans
3 cloves of minced garlic
olive oil
1/3 white wine (we used riesling)

Heat the oil with garlic on medium heat. Add green beans and stir to coat them with the oil and garlic. They will start to get brown/black on some parts. Add some white wine and cover. When the wine dries up, add a little more and cover. Continue until your desired tenderness is achieved.


The other thing I love right now is fresh oatmeal. You know, the giant thing of oats that you pick up at the store when you want to make oatmeal cookies? Those ones. Not the ones that come in packets.
Around the house we've been kind of following a sort of diet to help us eat better and hopefully lose weight. It's kind of a combination of two ideas that we got from two different books. I won't go into it now. But, one of the books has recipes and one of the breakfast ones is chocolate oatmeal. It was just OK, but a bit too chocolatey for me. So, this morning, I decided to do something different.

Blueberries and Cream Oatmeal
1/3 cup oats
24g scoop of Muscle Milk's blueberries & cream powder
1/2 cup of water

Mix the oats and powder together before adding water. Microwave until oats are cooked (1-2minutes).
Eat it!

You can do this with any protein powder, I'm sure, but this one is my favorite so far. Tastes just like the blueberries and cream oatmeal that you get out of the packets. The only difference is that this is better for you (more vitamins, less sugar).

burrito bowl

Because I've been trying to get rid of these 10 pounds that I've put on since being back in the States, I've been working out and trying to eat smaller, more frequent meals.

One of my favorite things right now is my burrito bowl. I have these little bowls that are the size of my palms combined and I use that for portion control. I make sure to only fill the bowl up to the top, and not overfill it.

I've posted my bean and rice recipe. We made extra this past week, so I've been using the left overs for my bowls. My dad's girlfriend, Cate, made some pulled pork, and I've been using a little of that as well.
Put some cheese on it.
Microwave it.
Eat it.
SOO good!

You can do this with non-homemade products as well. The idea is to get your protein in, a little bit of carbs, and a little bit of fat.
I am not a dietitian or anything, but it seems pretty healthy!

macaroni and (three) cheese

Besides hanging out with friends and family and catching up on our TV, we've been up to nothing. I need to get on photo editing, but I've been so busy doing NOTHING.
I'm sure you know how that goes.

The other night, while Alex and I were dog sitting, we decided we wanted macaroni and cheese. There was no Kraft, so I checked out what The Pioneer Woman had on her site.
Now, I used her recipe as a starting point, but there was a bunch of cheese in the fridge, and they all sounded so great, so I used them all. Cheddar. Brie. Asiago.


I didn't take pictures, so here is the direct link to the recipe: macaroni & cheese

I didn't have dry mustard, so I used mustard from the fridge. I put about three squirts in, whatever that means.
I also used the optional spices of cayenne, paprika, and thyme,

Our sauce had a lot of flour taste to it, so I added a lot of spices, but I think I should have used more.

We put the cheddar in like the directions said. Then I added a pretty big slice of brie in. Make sure if you're going to use brie to peel the rind off. We also added ours in little chunks as to help it melt a little better.

To top everything off, we added shredded asiago.


It's a pretty easy recipe, both for ingredients and skill. Be careful - it is delicious but definitely not all that nutritious (for the calorie content). Buen Provecho!

tomato cream sauce

If you want to put a little twist on the ol' pasta dish, a tomato cream sauce is an easy way to do it. 

I got the recipe from the Pioneer Woman (as usual) but couldn't follow it exactly because I didn't have everything.

Here's what I used:

- Big bag of little pasta shells

- 2 Tbs of butter

- Spoonful of minced garlic from a jar

- Big can of spaghetti sauce

- 1 cup of heavy cream

- Sugar, Salt, Pepper to taste

- little packet of cream cheese

- basil from a shaker

So, if you compare the ingredients lists, they are not the same. A lot of stuff was from cans or jars, but whatevs. It turned out good enough to eat, and that's what really matters.

Heat the butter, allowing it to melt. Add garlic and let it soak for about a minute. Add tomato/spaghetti sauce, taste, add spices to taste, taste, let simmer for 30 minutes.

I personally started cooking my noddles after about 20 minutes of simmering so that everything would be ready about the same time.

After simmering time, add the cream and (cream) cheese. Taste. Add spices as needed. 

Pioneer woman says to mix the two, but we just pour the sauce on our individual bowls since we each like different amounts of sauce. It's up to you.

It's a super easy recipe to try when you're in the mood for pasta. 

Buen Provecho!

I love Thursdays

I love Thursdays for three reasons:
1. It's almost the end of the week.
2. I don't have to teach anymore little kids. On Wednesday, I have a very full day which includes teaching all of my classes. I have 3rd, 4th, and 6th grades, plus my usual 7th, 8th, and 9th grades. It's usually not a very good day for me.
3. It's bread day!!

It starts with Doña Olga. She gives us some kind of bread every week on Thursday. Usually, it's these babies.

I have no idea what they're called. Today, she called them "pansitas" but I'm pretty sure that's not the real name.
They are quite dry, so dry that it's dangerous to eat them without water. And have a little bit of a sweet flavor to them. Alex doesn't like them so much, but I think they're delicious.


Then, if we've remembered to put in an order, we go pick up our order of bread from one of our student's aunt's. She cooks bread every week and sells it only on Thursday. We've been told that many people come to buy this bread, even from an hour or so away from here. It's pretty delicious, especially with coffee.

Oh, what do we have in this bag?

Oh, "samitas de trigo". These are out favorite samitas.

A little bit of sugar on its hard outside, soft crumbs on the inside.

YUM.

Oh, well, here is another bag...

OH! More samitas and a torta!

These are "samitas de arroz". 

They are also good, but a bit more dry than the samitas de trigo.

Oh, and the torta...

The "torta de mantequilla" is the perfect bread for coffee.

Moist. A little bit of sugar.

Melt in your mouth goodness. 

As you can see, I cut into that torta right away. We decided that since we had just bought more coffee, and now we had bread, that it would be a good idea to just indulge immediately. It just felt right.

And for 100 lempiras ($5 usd) for all that bread, boy, was it right. Delish!

Thanksgiving part 2

Just to ensure you all that we did not starve on Thanksgiving, here is the picture to prove it:

Though, because we had to work on Thursday, we celebrated on Sunday when we could actually make the food. There was no turkey, stuffing, cranberry sauce, pie, cake, rolls, or most of the really yummy stuff, but we made due.

Not gonna lie... for out first big holiday away from our families, I think it turned out pretty all right!

layout

As you can probably see, unless you're color blind, I have changed some things around the site. Actually, I changed just about everything.

New layout, new colors, new fonts. What have you.
I was using an older layout, and it wouldn't let me update it with the new features, so I just decided I'd just go for it and change everything. It kind of needed a face lift.

The only thing that's bothering me right now is that I can't get the darn picture at the very top of the page centered. I have no idea why. I'm investigating, though, because it's really driving me crazy.

Alex asked me why I changed it now, since I'm probably going to be switching over to wordpress. I don't know, is the real answer. Mostly, I think, I just wanted to change some things, and I couldn't without changing most everything.
Darn present layouts. If only I were better at HTML. But, that's another story.

In other news, Alex and I bought chicken today for the first time since we arrived. First we didn't have a fridge, and then we moved to the new place that had a fridge, I was afraid that I'd have to take the guts out of a whole chicken. But, alas, they have chicken parts by the pound and that's what we got.
Tonight on the menu: Fried Chicken and French Fries.

I'm going to be buying some vegetables this weekend that I haven't seen in the States. I will probably put up pictures and recipes, though you won't be able to use them. It's payback for all the recipes and dinner descriptions I have to look at while I'm here and don't have the proper ingredients to make them.

Orange Carrots and Green Pataste

Pataste. The first time I had this, it was in soup form, served in its outer shell. I was unsure at first, but grew to like it over the course of the meal.
These are in their raw, though steamed, form sprinkled with a little salt. Absolutely delicious! They are firm yet melt in your mouth. The taste is unlike anything I've had while living in the United States.

Boiling Yuca

Yuca. It is a root, much like the potato but with the texture of hardy potato and sweet potato mixed. I don't know if that actually true, but that's the best way I can explain it right now. Most times, this root is boiled in water, then fried for a loooong time until it's golden brown. Then you eat it!

When I make these this weekend, I will post pictures and give recipes. It ought to be delicious!

Oh, chicken's done!! Must feed my face.

beans and rice

I now understand why the Latina's I've seen cook don't use measuring cups... there are none in 3rd world countries.

Beans -
- 1 lbs beans (that's two cups people)
- 4 cubes of garlic bouillon (or two table spoons of minced garlic)
- 2 small tablespoons of salt (not all the way full)
- 2 tablespoons of chicken bouillon
- a bunch of cilantro... there is no way to know how much, but it was a lot
- 2 packets of cumino (each packet is about a palm full)

Rice -
- 2 cups of rice
- 3 cubes of garlic bouillon
- 3 juicy limes
- 1 three finger pinch of salt
- a bunch of cilantro

Put the rice in a pan with some oil (enough to cover the rice, but not so much as to drown it) and lightly brown. Put all of the other ingredients in a pot with four blue cups of water (our cups here are blue.... I don't know how big they are or how much they hold!) and taste, adjust if necessary, and then put the rice in. Well, you people know how to cook rice...


Disclaimer: We have not tried the food that has come of these recipes. I will take this post down if it is terrible. I will add if our burritos turn out delicious!