Seafood Pizza

I made this pizza last week, I had planned to make grilled fish for dinner but the kids started whining and complaining that they wanted Pizza. Finally, I relented, but I made Pizza entirely out of stuff they don't like [insert evil laugh here]. In the end the joke was on me, they ate two pieces each, and Mario and I were left hungry for more.

As with any Pizza, the recipe for this can be adjusted depending on what you like.


Seafood Pizza

1 large flatbread (store bought)
1/2 cup of bechamel sauce (recipe follows)
250g raw shrimp, peeled
250g fresh cooked crab meat (or imitation crab meat)
1/2 red onion, sliced
1/2 green pepper, chopped
1 ripe tomato, diced
2 tsbp cilantro, chopped
1/2 cup mozarella cheese
1/4 cup Parmesan Cheese

Bechamel Sauce
1/2 cup milk
1 tbsp butter
1 tbsp flour
dab of dijon mustard
salt and pepper

1. Saute the onion and green pepper for about 3 minutes, add shrimp and saute a few more minutes until mostly cooked.

2. Make Bechamel Sauce: in a microwave safe dish melt butter. Whisk in flour. Stir in milk and dijon. Cook on HI until thickened (a couple of minutes depending on your microwave). Stir and season to taste.

3. Spread Bechamel sauce on flatbread. Add Sauted Shrimp, onion and green pepper. Add crab meat and diced tomato.

4. Sprinkle with Mozarella, Parmesan and cilantro. Bake at 400°F for about 15 minutes (keep a close eye) until everything is HOT and the cheese has started to brown.

Mushroom and Proscuitto Omelet

We are going camping this weekend... Goodness, maybe I shouldn't have said that - if you are a robber reading about omelets, please don't break into my house while we're gone (I have a REALLY MEAN dog, its like a doberman/pitbull/angry bear mix).

Anyway, when we go camping we always make a heart attack special breakfast. It's the best, it is the only time I will ever eat my eggs fried in bacon fat... which is just so good, but you only bring one frying pan camping right?

Since I have spent the last few days daydreaming about breakfast, I decided to post one that I made a couple of weekends ago but never posted. Sometimes I get embarrassed, I can't post THAT, people are going to think I never eat anything healthy. Well, I do eat lots of healthy stuff, it just makes less mouthwatering blog material.

So here is a favorite breakfast of ours for the weekend. FYI, after I took this picture, I split the omelette with one of the kids, because it was enough for two (Okay Okay I might not have cut it even, it was more like a 70/30 split, but they never noticed).


The omelet is served with bacon (overkill, I know), hashbrowns and sliced tomato. To make really good hashbrowns out of grated potato, the trick is to get all the moisture out of them (I squeeze the raw grated potato in my potato ricer), then stir in a tablespoon of cornstarch to soak up the rest of the moisture before frying.

Mushroom and Proscuitto Omelet
Serves 1 really hungry person - multiply as required

3 eggs, beaten
3 white mushrooms, sliced
2 thin slices proscuitto
1/4 cup chopped onion
1/4 cup grated cheddar cheese
salt and pepper
paprika

1. Roll up proscuitto slices and chop up. Saute the onion, mushrooms and proscuitto then set aside.

2. Preheat non-stick frying pan, add a small amount of oil. Beat egg well and dump into frying pan. You can stir the egg around a bit until it starts to set, then leave it alone. Lift the edges gently to let some of the raw egg run underneath and cook quicker (and prevent the omelet from getting too dark on the outside).

3. When the egg is almost cooked, but still runny. Add mushroom, proscuitto, and onion along with the cheese. Cover with a lid and wait (peek every few seconds until cheese is all melted).

4. Sprinkle with paprika, pepper and salt. Fold and slide out of pan onto a plate.

Grilled Garlic Shrimp

I wanted to have shrimp for dinner Tuesday night, and I wanted to try something new. I was hampered by a serious lack of ingredients at home because we were away last weekend and are going away again next weekend so I didn't make my usual insane 2-cart-load trip to the grocery store.

Considering I didn't have much on hand, this dinner turned out quite nicely. I wanted to grill the shrimp on the barbecue in the grill basket, but we discovered that we were out of charcoal. So...onto Plan B...everything came in the house and went under the broiler instead. I had envisioned that the breadcrumbs I mixed in with the shrimp would get crunchy but they didn't. They were still delicious, but maybe on the barbecue they would have browned better.

Pictured with the shrimp are tomatoes and onions that I brushed with olive oil and seasoned with salt and pepper before broiling. The spinach vermicelli is tossed with a tiny bit of butter, Parmesan, garlic, lemon and pepper.

Grilled Garlic Shrimp

30 raw shrimp, peeled
2 cloves garlic
1 tbsp olive oil
1/4 cup fresh breadcrumbs
2 tbsp cilantro
2 tbsp fresh lemon juice
1/4 tsp paprika
salt and pepper

1. Toss all ingredients with the raw shrimp.

2. Spread on a broiler pan and broil for about 2 minutes per side.

Layered Party Sandwich

I made this sandwich last week for a Canada Day Potluck lunch at work. This is a great recipe for a crowd and it is really easy to make. A couple of people asked me how I got all the sandwich fillings inside the bread. I told them that my method was even more highly guarded than the "Caramilk Secret". But, as most of my close friends could tell you, I've never been much good at keeping secrets...

The entire time I was making these sandwiches for work (I made two), Mario was hovering around, eating some of my cheese and coldcuts. I have to say it is a major pet peeve of mine, when Mario comes into the kitchen and starts picking or tasting what I am making before it is done. He has come very close on several occasions to losing his fingers to the end of my fork.

I promised that I would bring home the leftovers, but there were none.

Layered Party Sandwich

2 tubs (250g) garlic and chive cream cheese
1 package each deli roast beef, pastrami, and turkey breast
9 slices each swiss cheese and cheddar cheese
2 tomatoes
1/2 sweet onion
olive oil
vinegar
salt and pepper
loaf pumpernickel bread

1. Cut slice off top of loaf and remove inside (freeze insides to make breadcrumbs later).

2. Spread a thick layer of cream cheese all over the inside and the top of the bread. Make sure no bread is showing as this is what keeps the sandwich from becoming soggy.

3. Begin to layer ingredients. Start with cheese layer (swiss then cheddar), coming up the sides slightly.

4. Add a layer of each type of meat.

5. Add a layer of tomatoes and sliced onion. After each addition of tomato and onion, drizzle with oil, vinegar and add salt and pepper.

6. Compress very tightly as you go.

7. Chill for at least 1 hour before serving. Slice each loaf into 8-12 wedges. (you can make this a day in advance and it stays perfect)

Asparagus wrapped with Proscuitto

Mario and I went to a cottage party this past weekend with about 15 friends (and no kids - YAY!). Each couple brought their own food... things like souvlaki, kebobs, pasta salad, green salads, chicken breasts... People were commenting, "remember back in the day when we used to bring only hotdogs and hamburgers? We must be getting old, everyone brought VEGETABLES". Pan over to Mario and I... we brought hotdogs, hamburgers, and canned beans. Well my excuse is that not only was I taking the weekend off from blogging and being a Mom, I was taking the weekend off from cooking too!

To redeem myself in the eyes of my peers, I have decided to post a vegetable recipe today.

I like this recipe for serving to guests because you can parboil the asparagus ahead of time and then get it all ready to pop into the oven for 5-10 minutes just before dinner is served. Actually, I have been making this recipe for so long that I do it from memory. I guess that was a bad thing, because when I dug out the original recipe to type out for this post, I noticed that I was supposed to dust the finished product with paprika. This is a step that must have gotten lost over the years, but the picture in the recipe book sure did look purty.

Asparagus Wrapped with Proscuitto
from Williams-Sonoma "Vegetables"

16 Asparagus Spears
4 thin slices Proscuitto
2 tbsp butter
freshly ground pepper
1/2 cup grated Parmesan
1/2 tsp paprika
1 lemon quartered.

1. Fill a frying pan with enough water to cover the asparagus and bring to a boil.

2. Trim the asparagus and add to the boiling water. Cook uncovered for about 3-4 minutes.

3. Divide asparagus into bundles and wrap 1 proscuitto slice around the middle of each bundle.

4. Place the bundles in a greased casserole dish. Dot with butter and sprinkle evenly with cheese and pepper.

5. When you are ready to serve, bake at 350°F for 5-10 minutes until cheese starts to brown. Remove from the oven and dust with paprika. Serve with lemon wedges.

Fajitas and Spanish Rice

Yesterday, one of my new friends in the blogging world wrote an incredible review of my site, and I am just so excited about it that I wanted to share it with everyone. Please visit KeMari's site to check it out... Phattitudes.

OK - well that is probably enough horn-tooting for one day (I'm awesome - sorry that slipped). I was thinking that since I started this blog (I rock - oops) in March I haven't missed a daily post yet. But, I am going to be away until Monday at a Canada Day weekend cottage party, and so I am hoping that for the next two days I will be too tipsy to type out my blogger ID or password. But don't worry, I will leave you with a couple of recipes to keep you busy in your kitchens until I'm back.

This was a simple weeknight dinner that we had on Wednesday. This meal highlighted an interesting phenomenon... When I serve out a healthy plate of dinner for my kids, they whine and moan about eating the vegetables or "green stuff" and often leave a lot of the best parts behind. But when I put everything out in the middle of the table, for a serve yourself type meal, they pile everything up onto their plates... and then EAT it all!! Maybe it has something to do with giving them the power to decide themselves what to eat that encourages them to make wiser more mature choices... who knows, I won't question it too much.

This Spanish rice is a really nice dish, I tried several versions of a spanish/mexican style rice before I found this recipe and I've been making it ever since. I have also included the recipe for the guacamole. I did make the salsa too, but I had to make a few substitutions because I didn't have all my usual ingredients on hand, so I will wait until the next time I make salsa to post that recipe.

Beef and Chicken Fajitas

2 boneless skinless chicken breasts
1 lb steak (I used sirloin)
1 tbsp olive oil
Mexican Seasoning Mix
1 onion
1 green pepper
10 6" flour tortillas

1. Wrap tortillas in foil. Place a couple of sheets of dampened paper towel in with them to prevent them from drying out. Place foil packet in the oven at about 300°F to warm up while you get everything else ready.

2. Slice chicken and beef into strips. Sauté chicken in olive oil until almost cooked.

3. Add green pepper and onion. Sauté until soft.

4. Add beef and cook until desired doneness. Sprinkle with Mexican seasoning mix to taste. Keep warm.

5. Serve with warmed tortillas, sour cream, grated cheese, salsa and guacamole (recipe follows).


Guacamole

3 ripe avocados, peeled
1/4 cup sour cream
1/4 tsp salt
1/8 tsp pepper
1/4 tsp hot sauce
1/4 tbsp garlic
2 tbsp chopped onion
1 tbsp lemon juice (or more if you like it tangy)

1. Place avocados, sour cream, salt, pepper, hot sauce garlic and onion in a food processor. Process until smooth.

2. Add lemon juice to taste.


Spanish Rice

2 cups water
1 1/2 cups chopped green pepper
1 cup chopped onion
1 tsp salt
1 can (28oz) diced tomatoes
1 1/2 cups rice
2 tsp chili powder
1/4 tsp black pepper
dash hot sauce
fresh cilantro
1/4 cup grated Monterrey Jack

1. In a medium saucepan combine water, pepper, onion, and salt. Bring to a boil and simmer for 5 minutes.

2. Stir in undrained tomatoes, rice, chili powder, black pepper, and red pepper sauce.

3. Return to boil and simmer covered for 20-25 minutes until rice is tender and liquid is absorbed. Place rice in a serving dish and sprinkle with Monterrey Jack cheese.

Olive Cheese Bread

It seems like my biggest challenge lately with posting my recipes has been competing with my 7 year old, Claire, for computer time. Anyone ever heard of Webkinz? Well Webkinz World is sort of like Facebook for kids. Claire is standing over my shoulder right now, rushing me, so she can get back on the computer.

The recipe that I am posting today, was something we had on the side with our dinner last weekend (you can see it in the background of my Chicken Orzo picture). It was so good.

I got this recipe from a blog called The Pioneer Woman Cooks. It is a fantastic site, but don't go there if you are on a diet! Seriously, you should check it out, it is funny and there are step by step photo instructions for this recipe.

I adjusted the amounts slightly so I could reflect them in "cups" instead of "cans" (I always have trouble with recipes from the US that call for a 6oz can of something, since in Canada that would be ??ml)

Claire just asked me to type out "it was yucky", but I would urge you to try it for yourself first!


Olive Cheese Bread

1 loaf french or italian bread
1 cup chopped pimento stuffed olives
1 cup chopped black olives
2 green onions
2 cups grated Monterrey Jack Cheese
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1/2 cup butter, softened

1. Roughly chop the olives and green onions. Mix with grated cheese, mayonnaise and butter.

2. Slice the bread in half lengthwise and half pile the mixture on top of each half of the loaf.

3. Bake at 325°F for about 25 minutes, until melted and started to brown on top. Cut into slices and serve.

4. This is really filling, so you may only need half the loaf, the other half can be wrapped and frozen (before you bake it) for later.



P.S. Thanks to everyone that voted in my "Should Janet be allowed to drive the new car" poll. There were 193 votes cast and I won with 64%!!