Kelsey's Banana Bread

by

Foodie Fish

Sorry it’s been so long since my last recipe! Who likes bananas? My close friend Kelsey is absolutely obsessed with them. She especially loves them adding both for flavor and moisture in banana bread! So I decided to invite her and some of my other friends over to make some. This banana bread recipe is the most moist you’ll ever get. The secret? Sour cream. Trust me on this one.

BANANA BREAD

2 cups flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

½ teaspoon baking powder

1 stick of butter, softened

1 ½ cups sugar

½ teaspoon salt

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

4 tablespoons sour cream

4-6 bananas, mashed

semi-sweet chocolate chips (optional)

· Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit

· Sift the flour, baking soda and powder

· Cream the butter with the salt and sugar

· Add eggs, vanilla, and sour cream to the mixture

· Then add the dry, sifted ingredients

· After the mixture is a smooth consistency, stir in the desired amount of chocolate chips

· Place the mixture in a bread pan and bake for 1 hour

What really did it for me is adding semi-sweet chocolate chips. We use a delicious organic high-end chocolate chip from Princeton’s Whole Earth Center.

Weekly Sandwich: "Grilled Brie"

by
Foodie Fish

Is it sweet? Is it savory? Is it breakfast? I don't know. All I know is that this delicious grilled cheese is gooey and flavorful.

Personally, I love cinnamon. The aroma is PROVEN to lift one’s spirits. Well cheese naturally makes me happy, and with cinnamon? Ah, heaven in a bite. I love the way the cheese oozes out of a grilled cheese and it just melts as your eating it. This may not be your conventional all-American grilled cheese, but if your adventurous and looking for new flavors, you have got to give it a try.

INGREIDIENTS

· 12 ounces of quality brie (choose one with a mild and buttery flavor)

· 4-6 thin slices of a Granny Smith apple

· 2 slices of oatmeal bread

· 1 tablespoon of butter

· 2 teaspoons of cinnamon

· 2 teaspoons of clover honey (or any type of non-flowery honey)

DIRECTIONS

1. Build the sandwich with the brie, apple, and bread

2. Place in a skillet over medium heat. Cook until the bottom is golden and the cheese begins to melt. Carefully turn the sandwich and cook until golden and the cheese has melted completely

3. Plate the sandwich, and while it is still hot sprinkle the cinnamon on the sandwich and drizzle the honey over it

One Smart Cookie!

by
Foodie Fish

No, finals are not known for being something to look forward to, but fueling your brain on brain-nourishing foods is always fun! This weekend, I made a flourless cookie with brain super foods proven to be good for your brain and possibly even improve concentration. Perfect for finals :-)

• 1 cup mashed bananas
• ½ cup peanut butter
• ½ cup sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 egg
• Semi-sweet of milk chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Spray/oil/ butter a baking sheet.

Combine banana, sugar, and peanut butter. Beating with an electric mixer is heavily recommended. Add vanilla, a beaten egg, and baking soda. Continue to mix until smooth and creamy. Fold in chocolate chips.

Shape the cookies into round balls then flatten them a bit on the baking sheet. (I like to make my cookies nice and big.)

Bake for about 10-15 minutes.

You can also make these cookies marbled, which is where you melt the chocolate before mixing it in the batter for those cool chocolate swirl

These cookies are moist, cakey, and they have the texture similar to banana nut muffins or a black and white cookie. They have awesome balance between peanut butter and banana. The chocolate chips are just the icing on the cake!

They are called smart cookies because peanut butter has healthy fats for your brain and omega-3’s come from the egg. Bananas are also said to be good for your brain, and cocoa powder in the chocolate is proven to improve concentration. The Aztecs used to eat chocolate like medicine to make them smarter!

I hope you consider whipping up a batch before your next exam to fuel your brain, as well as relieve some of that stress from studying.

Easy Turkey Bolognese

by
Foodie Fish

So I went to our local Pennsylvania Dutch Market Saturday and got fresh ground turkey meat. After we got home, we realized that night I had a birthday party to go to (with 16 courses, yum!) Then I wondered what to do with the ground turkey so that I could cook it, not have to freeze it, or eat it that night. Then I thought Bolognese sauce.

There is an Italian market in our area named D’Angelo’s with the best fresh pasta around. Then I stopped by this super healthy grocery store called Whole Earth Center to get some organic ingredients. I wanted something nice and easy, so I stuck with the basics.

INGREDIENTS

• Ground turkey
• 1 can of organic roasted canned tomatoes (not strained)
• 1 can of organic tomato paste
• ¾ of a minced onion
• ½ a clove of minced garlic
• Rosemary
• Oregano

Put all the ingredients in a slow cooking pot and mix. Place the pot on the stove on high to bring it to a boil. Once the sauce is boiling, put the fire on low and let it simmer for about half an hour.

Serve with your favorite pasta such as bowtie, penne, or spaghetti. You can even layer it with lasagna sheets with ricotta and parmesan cheese in between! Just bake the lasagna in the oven at a pre-heated 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 25 minutes covered with aluminum foil, then another 25 without the foil.

I love the aroma that comes out of that pot when cooking! I hope you enjoy!

Quick, What's For Breakfast?

by

Foodie Fish

It sure looks like a cookie, it sure tastes like a cookie, but it’s breakfast! Introducing a super-easy no-bake breakfast cookie. Simple, quick, and nutritious.

INGREDIENTS:

· 1/3 cup of rolled oats

· 1 tablespoon of peanut butter (or any type of nut butter of your choice)

· 1/8 cup of milk

· ½ cup of mashed bananas (you can use something like canned pumpkin or apple sauce too!)

Mix all the ingredients together to create a dough. Put it on a plate in a flat, round shape. Cover it with plastic wrap and refrigerate it overnight.

Easy right? It’s ready to eat by the next morning. I usually do so with a spoon :-)

Hop In, My Dear!

by
Foodie Fish

I would like to start by apologizing to all you rabbit lovers out there. I, myself, happen to be quite fond of the fuzzy little critters (after all I’m pretty sure my cat is half rabbit). However, I must say that rabbit meat is some good eats.

Our local Pennsylvania Dutch Market has a great selection of fresh, organic, all-natural well-fed meats. This selection includes a personal favorite of me and Mode Mare: rabbit.

My mom’s nutritionist/doctor got her to buy an amazing Japanese pumpkin (kabocha) and sweet potato to make some form of soup. After seeing the rabbit at the Dutch Market, I knew exactly what I was cooking tonight.

Kabocha and Rabbit Stew

· 1 medim-sized chopped rabbit

· ¼ of a diced kabocha, skin on

· 1 pealed and diced sweet potato

· 1 cup of chopped celery

· 1 cup of chopped shallots

· Fresh rosemary

· Salt

· Extra virgin olive oil

· Red cooking wine

Heat the oil in a pan, then add the rabbit. Cook until the rabbit is browned (approximately 3-4 minutes), but not fully cooked. Add some red cooking wine and let that simmer a bit on the side.

In a separate pot, sauté all the vegetables together with olive oil. Once the vegetables are not quite cooked all the way, turn the heat to low and add the rabbit with the liquid from the pan. Fill the pot with water just so it covers everything.

Put the rosemary in a small strainer (like you’d use for tea), and put it in the simmering pot. Season with salt to taste.

Cook the stew on low heat for about 2 hours for the rabbit to tenderize.

This stew makes you think of a painting of a wood hunter’s lodge in the autumn. The sweetness of some of the ingredients really makes this dish special. Small amounts of celery and a touch of rosemary give it a little kick of a whispering flavor. The sweet potato and pumpkin are just so soft and chewy, while meat feels like it is just falling apart in your mouth.

Once again, sorry rabbit lovers!

A Guest To Impress

by
Foodie Fish

Whenever we have guests in our home, let’s face it. We all want to show off a bit. This is especially important to those of us who cook.

My uncle, aunt, and cousin are coming over this weekend before my cousin graduates class of 2011 from UPenn. I really want to cook for them and try to impress them, but at the same time I don’t want a million dishes or anything too fancy for patience.

A great dish to prepare for guests if your going for delicious and simple is seafood pasta. Our local Italian market D’Angelo’s sells the best fresh whole wheat pasta with incredible texture. We use it for the base of our dish. They sell fresh pasta everywhere nowadays, and if you don’t have local artisans like the cooks at D’Angelo’s, Whole Foods offers fresh pasta too!

We boil the pasta in a separate pot while preparing everything else. Watch the pasta carefully since fresh pasta cooks at lightning speed compared to dried pasta. For the rest of the dish, all you really need to do is cook some scallops, clams, or oysters in olive oil and au jus. Then, you add vegetables such as onions and green bell peppers. This is Italian cooking we are talking about, so season to taste with Italian spices such as oregano. Strain the pasta and toss it all together with the seafood and vegetables. Serve it with the perfectly aged parmesan cheese and you have a great home-cooked meal.

PS: I like to play around with different ingredients such as white wine vinegar to add flavor

Weekly Lunch Recipe

by

Foodie Fish

The Mean, Green, Peanut Butter Sandwich

Ingredients

· Ripened Banana

· Kiwi

· Part-skim Cream Cheese

· Organic Creamy Peanut Butter

· Oatmeal bread

Directions

Mash one banana with one tablespoon of cream cheese into a creamy yet chunky mixture. Put the spread/mixture on one slice of bread. Spread peanut butter on the other slice of bread. Peal and slice the kiwi and assemble your sandwich!

Fish Frenzy: Salsa Verde

by
Foodie Fish

I’m using the upcoming Mexican holiday Cinco de Mayo as my excuse for all these blog posts on Mexican food. Although I will admit the talk of Mexican cuisine will probably never end (especially since a Mexican grill is replacing Ricky’s candy store in Princeton)! I forgot to mention that almost no Mexican dish works without the right salsa to go with it. Mexican food is all about the condiments, whether it is hot sauce or mole. My favorite thing on Mexican dishes is of course salsa! Here is a salsa Bill taught my to make that works with almost everything.

Simple Salsa Verde

Ingredients

· Tomatillos

· Garlic

· Lime juice

· Cilantro

· Sea salt

· Black pepper

· Roasted green peppers

Directions

First, pulverize the garlic in the food processor—but not all the way. Add the tomatillos and blend that together. Put all other ingredients into the food processor and season to taste. The secret to a great salsa verde is simply in the amount of garlic you put in. The tomatillos themselves have a mild taste yet creamy texture, so feel free to experiment with other spices and herbs!