Honey-Lemon Chicken & "Fried" Quinoa

Oh, heyhellohihowareya?

It's been over a YEAR since I last posted. Lolz.

Where have I been? Here, there, everywhere. Okay, not really. But kinda. Since my last post, I graduated college (yay!) and began working full-time at a job I love(!!). I went to three, THREE, weddings within one month of each other (one in Michigan, one in Chicago, and the last at the Baltimore Zoo!). All of which were beautiful and I really wish I had more pictures but I don't. So I apologize for that. I also managed a day-trip to Notre Dame. I mean, it was on the way back from Michigan, but it still counts right?

But before I get on with the beautiful, amazing meal I made, can I please talk about these weddings?

Little river (pond, lake?) at Anne's Wedding

Wedding One: My BFF Anne married her BFF Luke during a beautiful ceremony up in Michigan, just over the Indiana border. The weather was perfect(!) and the bride looked beautiful. Breathtaking. The ceremony was short & sweet (I'm used to Catholic weddings, so...) & the reception was a blast. Amazing food & they even had local beers and wine! So cool. I got to go with my boyfriend, his
 brother, our friend Bethany and her boyfriend.

Wedding Two: Wasn't really a wedding, I guess. The couple, my friend Jarrett & his wife Kelsey, got married in Hawaii (aww) and they had a reception for all their family & friends in Chicago on the River. In Hawaii, they had this amazing videographer (I should get his name) and he created the most beautiful (the most) wedding video I've ever seen. Tears everywhere. Not a dry eye in the house!

Wedding Three: My cousin married his wife at the mansion in the Baltimore Zoo. Ceremony, again, short and sweet (they "got married" the week before with a traditional Catholic ceremony) and the Priest was awesome. It was great to see my stepmom's side of the family since we haven't seen them in a few years.

On to the food...

Today I am making my take on takeout: a honey-lime chicken and fried quinoa. Uh, YUM. If you aren't salivating yet, you will be. Honestly, this recipe would also taste amazing with shrimp. So do yo' thang. I can't speak for any vegetarian/vegan options (I'm neither!) and beef would be very... weird, so don't do that. I mean, maybe beef would be okay, I'm just not interested. If you are, please let me know if you decide to make this with beef!

Recipe:
For the chicken:
1.5 lb chicken breast, cut into bite size pieces
3T soy sauce
2T rice wine vinegar
Salt & pepper (to taste)
Olive Oil
Honey Lemon Sauce:
3/4 cup chicken stock
1/4 cup lemon juice (I used a fresh lemon!)
3T honey (more or less, depends on YOU!)
2T corn starch
Lemon zest
Ground ginger (to taste)

For the chicken:
In a large ziploc bag (or bowl), mix the chicken, soy sauce and rice wine vinegar. Refrigerate at least 10 minutes, but for longer if you have the time. Strain when ready to cook. Season with salt and pepper and saute in pan, heated with olive oil. Saute 5-7 minutes, until chicken is no longer pink. Remove chicken with a slotted spoon and place on a separate plate.

For the sauce
Whisk everything together in a bowl. In the original pan you cooked your chicken in, bring sauce to a low boil. Add in chicken and mix it all together. Plate & serve! PSA: I doubled the sauce recipe and used it to "fry" my quinoa.

I served mine in a bowl with quinoa fried rice and garnished with thinly sliced green onions. My boyfriend & I loved this so much! I think next time, I'll marinate my chicken overnight and hopefully it'll take up less time. The chicken itself took about 20 minutes from start-to-finish but the meal, including the qunioa, took about 30-40 minutes.

Enjoy!

Flank Steak with Roasted Veggies, Cucumber + Feta Salad

Lately I've been having some major cravings for red meat, and then a quick browse through Pinterest confirmed that I needed to make flank steak this weekend. And so... I did. I wanted steak but then I wanted the rest of my meal to be light; I feel like steak is usually served with potatoes or another starch-heavy food and I did not want any part of that. So, I served my steak with a side of roasted vegetables & a cucumber, tomato + feta salad. Honestly, that was one of the best decisions I've made in a long time! 

One problem I ran into is that I lacked a grill for the steak. Why? Because my parents are in this kind of residence limbo where, they've sold their home but are in the process of building their dream home so they rented another house to live in for the time-being. They have decided that we are not going to be hooking up our nice grill, so I was left grill-less and kind of stuck on how to make this steak. But then! I remembered that my grandma sometimes cooks her steaks in the oven. Or maybe I was just imagining that, but either way, I knew it could be done. So I did it. 

First, I let my flank steak marinade for ~2-3 hours in the fridge, covered. 

The Marinade:

1/2 C balsamic vinegar

1T Worscestershire sauce

2t brown sugar

Salt + pepper

Mix it all up and coat the steaks with it. 

I then set the oven to 425* F and coated a baking dish with no-stick spray. While the oven was heating, I chopped up some vegetables for roasting. Today I used carrots, zucchini, and yellow squash, but feel free to use anything you'd like. In the pan, I placed my steaks, covered with vegetables and then covered it all with the remainder of the marinade. Once the oven was done heating, I popped my steaks in there for 50-60minutes, depending on your oven. 

After the steaks are done, take out of the oven and let sit, covered, for 10-15 minutes before slicing against the grain. While your steak is sitting, you can use this time to prepare a side dish. For me, it was the cucumber salad.

Cucumber + Feta Salad:

Coarsely chopped cucumbers (I used 3 medium sized)

1 whole tomato, chopped

Chopped green onions

Fresh mint, chopped

Kalamata olives, pitted

Feta cheese

The Dressing: 

Extra virgin olive oil

Fresh lemon juice

Salt + pepper to taste

Combine all of the salad ingredients, except for half of the feta and the fresh mint, in a bowl. Coat the salad with the dressing, and then add remaining feta and mint. Serve! 

This dinner was so good and the pictures do not do it justice. Normally, I would prefer to grill my steaks but this cut was so tender and cooked perfectly in the oven! Try it this way, you won't be disappointed! 

Sweet Potato Hash + Eggs

This breakfast is one of my favorites and is by far the easiest to prepare; it contains minimal ingredients and only takes a few minutes on the stovetop. I learned this "recipe" from a Paleo blog a long time ago when I was "living the diet" for a class research project. Since then, it has become a staple in my mornings, and I'll even eat this post-workout as it does a good job of filling me up and keeping me full.

All you need is a few eggs (I use two), 1/2 medium sweet potato, 1/4 sweet onion, 1 garlic clove & any other veggies you like! In this picture, you can probably see something green- I added some zucchini slices to it for a different taste.

Heat up your skillet (medium heat) and put 1tablespoon of coconut oil in there (you can use olive, pam no-stick, etc, I just prefer coconut oil). While that's heating, peel and chop your sweet potato, making sure that the slices are roughly the same size. Then, add your sweet potato to the skillet. Chop your onion, smash your clove and add as well. Saute until your potatoes have reached desired tenderness (I play around with mine for ~10-12 minutes). 

While your sweet potato hash is cooking, crack two eggs in a seperate skillet and fry until your yolk has reached desired runniness (is that a word?). I like my yolks pretty runny so I cook them JUST ENOUGH (~5minutes on low/medium heat). 

Plate the hash and top with your eggs. Serve with a fruit salad, some coffee or a fruit smoothie. Enjoy!

If you are cooking for a special population (children, the elderly or those with compromised immune systems) you must cook the yolk thoroughly and in this instance, I would suggest that you scramble or poach the eggs to be sure. 

Nutrition Info (for eggs + hash, ONLY. Includes coconut oil)
Calories: 351
Carbohydrates: 9g
Fats: 24g
Protein: 14g
Sugar: 6g
Fiber: 3g

Breakfast Tacos!

So this morning I did a thing. With my leftovers from dinner on Monday. Dinner was shredded chicken tacos with homemade guacamole and mango salsa and somehow the guacamole lasted all the way until Wednesday morning. So I decided to do something crazy and threw together some breakfast tacos. The ingredients are simple and probably something you already have in your house, condo, apartment, whatever:

Mango salsa (very easy recipe):

- 1 whole mango (2 if you love mango), cut up (diced?)

- 1 can of whole kernel corn - I used sweet corn

- 1 red pepper, chopped to sizes you like

- The juice of one lime

- Fresh cilantro, salt & pepper to taste

--- In the future, I would throw the pepper and corn on a skillet and warm before mixing, but it's all trial & error right now.

Guacamole:

- 2 avocados

- 1 small, sweet onion, diced (I used a food processor because I can't chop onions without tears)

- Several cherry tomatoes, chopped. 

- Lime juice

- Cilantro, salt & pepper to taste

The tacos:

- 2 warmed up corn tortillas (10-15 seconds in the microwave, flour is fine too)

- 3 eggs, scrambled

- Drizzle shredded cheese once eggs are almost done and let melt (to speed up the process, cover your skillet with a top)

- Spread guacamole on top of tortillas

- Add eggs

- Add mango salsa

- Throw in one (or two) sausage links (or bacon!!)

I think that when I do this again, I'll throw the salsa, sausage (bacon), & eggs into a mixing bowl before putting in the tacos so that everything is mixed together instead of in layers. 

Avocado Toast & its Variations

Avocados are a great staple food as they're high in those good-for-you fats that can keep you full for hours. Avocado toast is one of my favorite snacks but it can get old from time to time. So I've been doing some experimenting and I think I've found my favorite breakfast, that I've made, to date. Eggs and avocado toast.

First, you want to start with a good Avocado. I'm a big fan of Haas avocados because I can get them almost anywhere and they're usually 10 for $10 at my local grocery store. I pick my avocados on the cusp of being ripe and I put them in the cupboard when I get home until I'm ready to use one. Whatever part of the avocado I don't use, I wrap in tinfoil and put in the fridge until the next day.

Then, I grab two eggs from the fridge and 2 slices of my favorite bread for toasting. I like to use Cinnamon Raisin bread, cinnamon raisin English muffins or Irish Soda Bread because I think the raisins add a certain sweetness to the meal and it's something that I really enjoy. You can cook the eggs any way you want but my favorite way is to fry them up in some coconut oil for a few minutes until the yolk holds, but will become runny once you cut into it. Scrambling and poached eggs work really great, too!

After the toast has popped, cover with avocado the way you would with butter, jelly, or cream cheese. Top with the eggs and you're done! Serve with a piece of fruit, some coffee, and some water, and you've got yourself a good, small, meal. If you're looking to add some protein, you can always add thinly sliced steak in between the egg and avocado!

Today, I added garlic spinach to my toast as a way to get some extra greens in. It was a little too garlic-y for my taste, but I will definitely be adding sauteed spinach in the future.

I've also added a chickpea salad to this concoction, a recipe I got from my friend, Genna! It's so good and the chickpeas also provide protein (for those of you who don't eat meat!). The basis of this salad is a can of drained chickpeas, cherry tomatoes, avocado, lime juice, olive oil, salt & pepper to taste, and whatever else you like. Genna has made hers with sliced red onion & cucumbers and that's also SOOOO very good.