Baked Honey Mustard Chicken Breasts

Honey mustard is easy – equal parts honey and mustard, stir to combine, done. I preheated the oven to the high side of 350, line a brownie pan (8 x 8” square) with foil, place boneless skinless chicken breasts in the pan and drizzle with the honey mustard, cook for 30 minutes (or until done – check with thermometer!!!)

Onion and Swiss Quiche

2-3 large Vidalia onions, sliced thin and caramelized
Thyme/salt/pepper
Pie crust
6-8 large eggs
6-8 oz shredded gruyere cheese
Splash of milk

Preheat oven to 375. Press the pie crust into a pie plate (go for a deep one!) then dump the cheese and onions into the shell. (More info about the onions and spices to follow below.) Beat the eggs and the milk together until combined and then pour over the fillings in the crust. According to most quiche recipes you can simply dump the egg over the top and bake, but I like to give it a gentle stir to combine and make sure you get all the flavors in every bite. From here, pop it in the oven for about 45 minutes – you will know it is done when it is set and starting to brown.

Now, about those onions … they need to be caramelized with olive oil, salt, pepper and thyme. You can do this in a pan on the stovetop if you like, but if you plan ahead a bit, there is a much easier way! I use the crock pot. I slice up all of the onions (you will want enough to nearly fill the crock – you can freeze them for future use if you have more than you need) toss them with olive oil, salt pepper and thyme and set them to cook: you can place them on High for about 4 hours (or more) or Low for up to 24 hours. Stir occasionally, but not too often – you want to keep the heat in the crock! They come out perfect – no worries about burning them!

Tabouleh

½ C Bulgur (medium grain
Less than 1/2 C Cold water
2 large bunches of flat leaf parsley
3 seeded and chopped roma tomatoes
1 peeled, seeded and chopped cucumber
2 whole scallions, chopped finely
¼ C fresh lemon juice (1 monster sized lemon)
1 pinch kosher salt
1 Tablespoon olive oil

I soaked the bulgur in the cold water before I started the chopping – didn’t take long at all to get fluffy. As mentioned before, all of the recipes I found online advocate putting the bulgur in boiling water to cook it, but my Cypriot coworker was horrified by this. Her technique of just letting it soak in cold water is so much easier and so much cooler – one less boiling pot on the stove!

I chopped all of the veggies and herbs – I like chopping and “playing” with my knives, the secret is having a really sharp knife and really fresh veg – so much easier! I added these to a large container as they came off the cutting board, dumped in the now-fluffy bulgur and gave it a good stir to combine. Then I mixed the lemon, salt and oil together and poured it over the tabouleh and gave it another good stir. Most recipes call for mint, but the last time I bough mint at the grocery store it was flavorless, so I didn’t bother this time around.

Strawberry Smoothie

It’s easy and tasty – I just toss the following in the blender and let it work its magic:

2-3 ice cubes
8-12 frozen whole strawberries (depends on size of berries)
½ Cup of low fat vanilla yogurt
½ Cup of low fat milk

Salmon on the Foreman Grill

I rubbed the steaks with olive oil, salt and pepper and tossed them on for about 3 minutes and then flipped them and gave them another 2 – they turned out perfectly! Grill marks and everything. The grill didn’t close completely because of the bone, but it was perfectly done and still nice and juicy.

Mustard Marinade for FGrilled Pork Tenderloin

2 Tablespoons of Nasturtium vinegar (Fred's mom makes it! I guess a light red wine vinegar would work too)
2 Tablespoons olive oil
salt and white pepper to taste
2 Tablespoons Grey Poupon mustard
1 Tablespoon Molasses

I mixed well and then spread it on both tenderloins then left them to marinate in the fridge in a bowl. I had already removed the excess fat and silver skin from the tenderloins - this is a very important step and should not be skipped - the end result is so worth the effort. After about 20 minutes it was time to put the tenderloins on the grill - Al told, the tenderloins were on for about 15 minutes, turned 3-4 times.

Ice Cream

2 Cups of 2% milk
1 Cup of Half and Half
1/3(+) Cup of Sugar
2 eggs (yes, raw – or buy pasteurized if you are worried about it)

Blend the eggs and sugar together, blend in the milk and half and half, add suitable flavor (more sugar for sweet cream, 2 T matcha for green tea, etc.) Pop it into the ice cream maker for about 30 minutes, toss in freezer to ripen. Finis.