Pizza Braid

A quick and tasty lunch. Packed with all our favourite pizza toppings, loads of cheese and zesty pizza sauce. Rolled up and baked and ready to go. What not to like? This is my kind of food. No table setting or plating required. Just slice and serve. You can eat at the table, or on the couch watching TV or outside either in your backyard or when you are out for a walk! Believe me, I like to grab a munchi when I go out for a walk. Serve this with your fav salad and you could have a nice, light meal. 

Here’s how I made it 

Pizza Braid

Ingredients 

For Basic Pizza Dough:

1 pkg. dry yeast
3/4 c. warm water
1/4 tsp. salt
1 T. oil
1 tsp. sugar
3 c. flour

Mix ingredients together, adding flour last. Cover and let rise 1 hr.

 for braid:

1 cup pizza sauce

2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese

About 20 pepperonis

¼ cup each julienned peppers, onions

Sliced mushrooms

Milk wash

Garlic powder and Italian seasonings to sprinkle on top 

How to:

heat oven to 425° F.

roll the pizza dough into 12” circle.

Place it on a cookie sheet.

Now spread a thin layer of pizza sauce.

Top with all the toppings, finishing with cheese.

With sharp knife, make slits on both sides of the dough, about an inch width apart.

Now start braiding the roll.

Tuck the top and bottom portions inside the roll.

Brush the entire roll with cold milk.

Sprinkle garlic powder and Italian seasonings on top.

Bake till golden brown, for about 25 minutes.

When warm, slice the roll and serve with marinara sauce.

Enjoy!

Taco Bake!

 

This is money! I am telling you the truth. As soon as I pulled the baked tacos from the oven, I heard the complements like this looks so good and smells so good. And boy, once they had these tacos, more oohs and aahs! Like so simple and yet so filling and satisfying. We should make this once a week dinner and all.  For me, it was the best dish to make as my family don’t make tacos themselves. I have to fix their tacos and thus, I end up eating last!  With this taco bake, that wait has eliminated. I can have my tacos with them and I can still put the fixings on their tacos but I don’t have to wait to make each taco separately.

Give it a try. I am sure your family would love it as well. I used ground chicken. You can use refried beans only with other toppings.

Here's how I made it.

Baked Tacos

Ingredients

10 hard shell tacos

1 lb. ground chicken

1 tsp salt

1 tbsp Mexican oregano

2 tsbp chilli powder

1 tbsp cayenne powder

1 tbsp garlic powder

1 tbsp onion powder

¼ cup water

Shredded cheese about 1 cup or more

Lettuce, sour cream, guacamole, salsa etc toppings as required

How to:

Preheat oven to 375° F.

Heat the skillet and add chicken, all the spices and water and cook till chicken is cooked through and water has evaporated.

Place tacos in 13x9 tray side by side.

Fill up with chicken mixture, top with shredded cheese.

Bake for about 10 minutes until cheese melts.

Serve warm with your favorite toppings.

Enjoy!

 

Mixed Veggie Red Curry with Tofu and Chicken

Well, this is what I call everything but the kitchen sink dish! Literally, when you have a little bit of the vegetables, chicken and tofu(sometimes) remaining in the fridge, that you can’t use them to prepare a single dish out of, what a girl to do? Well, a girl, especially me, would throw everything in one pot and make another dish out of it. That’s exactly what happened with me and this dish was born. I am not going to say this is Thai recipe just because I used red Thai curry paste in it. I HAD to use it up as well so I just dumped in the pot. And again, the end product was simply awesome. We all enjoyed it so much with fragrant Jasmine rice.

Here’s how I made it.

Mixed Vegetable Red Curry with Tofu and Chicken
 

Ingredients

½ cup boneless chicken cubed

½ cup tofu pieces

Vegetables of your choice, I used broccoli, red pepper, green pepper, carrot and celery

2-3 tbsp red Thai curry paste

4-5 small pieces of dry red chilies

¼ cup oil

1 small onion, diced

3-4 cloves garlic, chopped

How to:

Heat the oil in a wok.

Add onion and garlic and saute till fragrant, for about 3 minutes

Now add red curry paste and dry red chilies and saute till oil floats on the top.

Add chicken and cook till almost done. paste should coat the chicken pieces.

Now add all the veggies alongwith tofu and about ½ cup of water and cover.

Let it cook for about 3 minutes or until veggies are crisp tender.

Immediately remove from heat.

Garnish with cashews, cilantro etc.

Enjoy!

 

Teriyaki Glazed Chicken

This was my first attempt to make Teriyaki sauce and glaze from scratch. Until now, I have been using bottled teriyaki sauce and for some reason I never really liked it. I saw this recipe on a TV cooking show and very next day gave it a try. And it really didn’t disappoint. It came out perfect, slightly sweeter for my taste so next time I have to reduce the amount of sugar. That’s abut it. I don’t think I would change anything in this recipe at all. The chicken came out very juicy and moist and we all enjoyed it with Jasmine rice and glazed mixed vegetables.

Here’s how I made it.

Teriyaki Glazed Chicken

Ingredients

½ cup soy sauce

¼ cup water

1 tbsp brown sugar

1 tbsp granulated sugar

About 2 tsp each minced ginger and garlic

Glaze:

1 tbsp cornstarch

1 tbsp water 

How to:

For sauce:

Mix all the ingredietns in a sauce pot on medium heat and cook until the sugar is dissloved.

At this point, you can use the sauce as a marinade for chicken, beef, tofu or any other protein or as a dipping sauce.

Glaze:

Mix cornstarch with water and add to the boiling sauce. Simmer till thickened.

I used this glaze to marinate my chicken, grilled the chicken and then serve with sprinkles of toasted sesame seeds. Used the same glaze to marinate and roast the vegetables.

Apple Pie Cups

First of all, I forgot to take pictures of the final product! And I am not happy about it. It looked and tasted so wonderful, I missed that final picture. At the same time, because it looked and tasted so wonderful, we just devoured these Apple pie cups!  Well, you get the idea. So let’s move on! 

I love to use wonton wrappers as they are so versatile. You can make savory as well as sweet dishes using these babies. They come in very handy when you are pressed for time or you just want something to grab and go. So when I am in the mood for pie and don’t want to make pie crust or to save on fat and calories content of the pie crust, I go for wonton wrappers. And so far, they haven’t disappointed me a bit. So on to these delicious pie cups, 

Here’s how I made it.

Apple Pie Cups
 

Ingredients

12 wonton wrappers

2 green apples, cored and cubed

½ cup firmly packed brown sugar

2 tbsp lemon juice

1 tbsp butter

1 tsp cinnamon powder

½ tsp cardamom powder

½ tsp nutmeg powder 

How to:

Preheat the oven to 375° F.

Heat butter in the skillet

Add brown sugar and slowly caramelize the sugar.

Add cubed apples in lemon juice, all the spices and cook till apples are tender and moisture evaporates.

Brush 12 muffin cup pan with butter.

Brush 12 wonon wrappers with butter and arrange them in the muffin pan.

Divide apple mixture equally into muffin cups.

Bake for about 20 minutes or until the edges of wrappers are brown.

Serve warm with Vanilla Icecream

Enjoy!

 Note:  you can top the apple cubes with strips of wonton wrappers or your favourite crumble topping before baking.

 

Quick Tiramisu and Have a safe summer!

Remember that easy Pound Cake from last week? Well, this “Tiramisu” is just an extension of the leftover pound cake. It is a very quick dessert, tastes almost like old fashioned Tiramisu and it only costs pennies to make compared to expensive ingredients one has to purchase to make authentic dessert. Whey don’t you give it a try?  I am sure you will love this dessert, the taste and rich feel of it. 

Here’s how I made it.

Quick Tiramisu
 

Ingredients

1 cup chunks of Pound cake

¼ cup strong brewed espresso

2 Hunts Vanilla pudding cups

2 cups Coolwhip light, thawed

Cocoa powder to garnish

How to:

Arrange Pound cake pieces in a bowl or parfait cups in a single layer.

Brush with the espresso until the chunks are completely soaked.

Mix pudding and thawed Coolwhip Light and layer on top of pound cake pieces.

Dust with cocoa powder.

Chill until ready to serve.

You can make layers of this and serve as Tiramisu Parfaits.

Enjoy!

SEE YOU IN SEPTEMBER!

Pound Cake

This is the cake that always takes me down memory lane. Every Christmas mom used to make this for us. It was something about the sweet smell of vanilla and eggs and sugar baking in the oven that screamed to us Christmas! I still remember one cake loaf was not enough. Mom used to put one loaf in the oven, as the ovens that time were round shaped and not quite large to hold big cakes and then she would start mixing up another batch so when the first loaf is out, another one is ready to go in. Every one in the neighbourhood would get the piece of the cake and they all loved it dearly. Now that I have the large oven, I could really make 10 loaves at a time. But I have still stuck to mom’s recipe and hence, only 1 cake at a time! I really don’t mind it. I know I should use the oven space and the electricity and all that. But I don’t want to double or triple up the recipe and make big batches of cake.  And this recipe is so sweet. A lovely loaf of pound cake from scratch in 3 simple steps. Perfect for busy moms for those busy times desserts. And this rich and sweet pound cake still hits the spot! 

Make sure all the ingredients are at  room temperature. 

Here’s how I made it.

Pound Cake

Ingredients

1 cup(2 sticks) unsalted butter

2 cups AP flour

1 cup sugar

1 tsp baking powder

4 large eggs

2 tsp Pure Vanilla extract

A pinch of salt 

How to:

Preheat oven to 350° F.

Cream butter and sugar with an electric hand mixture until light and fluffy.

Butter the loaf pan with leftover butter paper.

Add eggs one at a time and beat well

Add vanilla.

Now in another small bowl, mix AP flour, baking powder and salt and mix well.

Incorporate with the butter-sugar mixture with the hand mixer on low speed.

Don’t overmix.

Bake for about an hour or until toothpick comes out clean if inserted.

Let cool down on wire rack for about 15 minutes and then slice and serve.

Enjoy!