Cookie Ball Doughs

I know, It would make MUCH more sense if I said, "Cookie Dough Balls" but for some reason when ever we say them it comes out Cookie Ball Doughs.  I guess it's one of those strange facts of life. :)


And to be honest these are WAY more like a Lara Bar than any kind of cookie but since Kai thinks they're cookie dough who am I to argue?  Facts are facts and these are quick, nutritious and tasty.  So why focus on the name?


APPLE CINNAMON COOKIE BALL DOUGHS


3/4 Cup of your favorite nuts (I used Cashew & Pecan) - soaked for 1-2 hours
7-10 Dates - pitted
1/2 an apple (you can use a whole one of you can keep yourself & helper from nibbling at it)
1 T cinnamon (I LOVE cinnamon)
1/4C-ish of Puff Rice Cereal (Optional but I like to use it to bump up the volume)


Pulse everything but the cereal in a food processor.
Stir/fold in the cereal.
Form balls (use wet hands to keep it from sticking)
Place on a plate & 'flash freeze' in the freezer for 1-2 hours
Put in a freezer bag, store in your freezer and enjoy!

Soak your nuts.... (try to avoid any dirty jokes)

Put your nuts, dates, cinnamon & apple in your food processor.

Pulse, pulse, pulse

Looks doughy!

Add your Puff Rice Cereal to bump up the volume.

Form your balls, freeze & store

The Hubs decided on dinner tonight so we had Salmon Patties and Shells & Cheese.  Of course I can't just follow a recipe.  I HAVE to modify it.  I can't help myself.  Recipes are meant to be altered. :)

SALMON PATTIES - Modified from the recipe on the can

1 can (14.75oz) Chicken of the Sea Salmon - drained

3/4 C Panko Crumbs

1/4 C Chopped Onion

2 Chopped Green Onions

3 T Greek Yogurt

2 Eggs

2 t Lemon Juice

1 T (give or take) dried Parsley

1/4 t garlic powder

Put some Coconut oil in your skillet and heat on med-hi on the stove top.

Mix your ingredients and form into patties (wet hands to keep from sticking)

Cook patties in the skillet until both sides are brown and heated through - I worked in 2 batches.

Mix all the ingredients

Form patties & start cooking.

I made up 9 patties!

In addition to the patties we had Shells & Cheese.  I actually like Velveeta Shells & Cheese, especially compared to Kraft Mac & Cheese, but it's just so salty!  There wasn't anything I could do about the sauce though.  It's premixed and I don't know how I'd go about replicating it with a healthier version so I just went with the flow.

Except I added broccoli.  Hey, If I can't take out the bad, at least I can add some good. :)

But being an accommodating wife I left the broccoli out of the Hubs pasta.  He would not have seen the benefit to it.  Kai on the other hand ate all her broccoli along with the shells so I ended feeling pretty good.

Shells, Broccoli & Cheese + Salmon Patty (full disclosure: I ended up eating a 2nd)
+ Salad: Lettuce, spinach, yellow bell pepper, cucumber, sun dried tomatoes & a drizzle of Balsamic Vinaigrette

Birthday Salads?

This week is my sister-in-law's birthday!!  I love her.  I don't feel like she's an "in-law" at all.  She's really just a Sister. :)


So yesterday we decided to celebrate. :D


Nothing like a birthday to get everyone celebrating.


Of course Saturday night had to happen first...


Around 8:30 I got a call - The hubs went to a convention in Chicago with some friends and on the way home his car broke down.  It was late so they towed it to a shop and walked about 2 miles to find a hotel that was not scary and had a room with at least 2 beds.  The car's still in Chicago but the guys are all home now. 


Around 9:00 a gust of wind hit the Indy Fair and knocked the stage over.  It was intense and scary and everyone was worried.  I think most people are still pretty shaken up.  My prayers go out to those who lost their lives and those who are injured.   I had the news on and it was one of those situations where there's nothing you can do but sit there an be horrified that it happened. 
 :(


Around 10:00 I herd a loud crash from Kai's room.  I ran in to discover she had fallen out of bed.  She had clearly been sound alseep before/during the fall and was more shocked than hurt but it took a bit to calm her down.


I was tired, and stressed, and needed to go to bed.  But I stayed up watching the news a bit more to see if anything changed.  You kindda' hope that the original reports wouldn't be confirmed.


So at midnight I went to bed, glad the day was over.


Sunday would be a new day.  A better day.  A PARTY day. :D


I had a few goals that I was doing on my own.  I don't know how single parents do it! 
1.  Clean faster than Kai trashed.  
2.  Get to the grocery store.  
3.  Make some salads.


1.  This is an on going challenge and never truely gets checked off any list.  But it's always there.  Someday my house will be clean and I'll be sad because she's all grown up and in her own place.


2.  I don't do the grocery shopping.  The hubs does.  He's Mr. Budget and I was really stressing about staying within the budget.  I went on-line to find coupons.  I made a list.  As I shopped I crossed things off and marked the prices.  I came out only $6 over!!!  Hell Yeah, I'm the MAN!!  *fist pump*


3.  I made some DELICIOUS salads...

Tomato & Cucumber

Mix Together:

3-4 Ripe Tomatoes - chopped

2 small cucumbers - chopped

Italian Dressing*

Sprinkle of Parmesan cheese

* Don't have Italian dressing?  Me either. 

This is the recipe I used:  Italian Dressing Mix 

I used 1/2 t instead of 1T (and 1t for 2T, etc..)

Everyone liked it but I still prefer my cucumbers raw. :)

Kohlrabi, Cabbage & Carrot Slaw

Shredded in a food processor:

1 Kohlrabi

1/4 wedge of Cabbage

Handful of baby carrots

Put in a bowl and sprinkle with

2 packet of Truvia Sugar

1/2 C White Vinegar

drizzling of EVOO

Sitr and let sit.  Taste periodically and add sugar or vinegar to taste.

Finally this was my FAVORITE.  I wanted a salad with protein since I wasn't having chicken...

Kale, Apple & Quinoa Salad

*Adapted from Veggie Burgers Every Which Way 

THE CANDIED NUTS:

Toast about 1/4C nuts at 350° for 5-10 minutes

I used Walnuts, Almonds & Pecans

Try VERY HARD not to eat them!

In a small sauce pan put 2 packets of Truvia sugar & heat on low-med heat.

Swirl the pan and wait for the sugar to melt.

* The original recipe called for white sugar which eventually will brown and that's what you're looking for but mine never did - probably b/c I wasn't using processed sugar?  Oh well, it tasted amazing.

Mix the melted Sugar, Toasted Nuts, a pinch of Cayenne Pepper & a pinch of Thyme.

Spread on a greased plate and let cool.  Then chop up and set aside to top the salad.

THE DRESSING:

whisk together

2T Tamari (soy sauce)

2T Agave Nectar

1t toasted Sesame Oil

1/4C EVOO

THE SALAD:

mix in a bowl just before serving...

1 Bunch of torn kale leaves - no stems

1 Gala apple - sliced thin into bite size pieces

1 C cooked Quinoa

The Dressing

The Candied Nuts

And that my friends is one of my FAVORITE salads!

Of course we had other foods too...

I baked BBQ Chicken

(I used Sweet Baby Ray's sauce since this was made at the Hub's "meat" request)

Since it's Indiana, we had to have corn

And my mother-in-law made a fruit salad

(Let's just say I had more than one helping of this and leave it at that)

AND THEN THERE WAS CAKE!

.... I have no picture of the cake!!

WHAT WAS I THINKING?!?

I wasn't.  There was chocolate cake in front of me.  Who thinks when there's chocolate cake?

You'll have to use your imagination.

Chocolate cake with strawberries on top.

Delicious.

Then I went back for another helping of fruit salad.  I CANNOT stop myself.  And since there were strawberries out to put on the cake, I may have added to my fruit salad.  Seriously, someone needs to stop me... Lord knows I'm not going to stop myself!

Kohlrabi

After last night's stuffing I wasn't terribly hungry for breakfast so I decided to juice!  When I first got my juicer, I juiced everyday and LOVED it.  In fact, my search for juicing recipes (like I'd follow an actual recipe!) lead me to all those great foodie blogs and books about nutrition and that's when things started getting healthy around here.  I think back to when I would consider a pile of chips, ground beef, & 8 oz of cheese a complete meal and shudder!


So back to my Green Monster....

3 Kale leaves, 1/2 Cucumber, a wedge of Cabbage and the juice from 1/2 lime...And 1/2 an apple I decided to throw in at the last minute. :)

All Juiced up!

mmmm.... Green Juice

Then I went out to throw the compost into the bin and noticed this...

I think that Kohlrabi is ready to be harvested!

(Please ignore the weeds.  They're frustrating little buggers who just keep growing back.  grrrr!)

I've never grown Kohlrabi before.  Hell, I'd never even heard of it before.  But I was at Menard's earlier this year and the plants were on clearance.  My mother-in-law told me her dad used to grow it and thought it was pretty easy.  6 plants for a buck.  Sure!  So I took 3 and gave her 3.  One of my 3 doesn't look right but the other 2 grew and grew...not like a weed though.  Nothing grows like a weed.  I hate weeds. I pull them out and then they're back the next day. GRRRR!!!!

Ok - focus Emily...it's harvested.  Now what?

Google Search!!  Google is my friend.  So many recipes to choose from.

I decided on my own version of a Kohlrabi & Apple Slaw. :)

Peeled the Kohlrabi with a pearing knife.  

There were a lot of close calls on this one - I'm considering it to have been a success that I came out of it without needing a band-aid.  In the future I'm going to have to find a different way to peel this bad boy!

Shredded/Noodled/Sliced/Whatevered a Fuji Apple and the Kohlrabi into a bowl.

Made up the "dressing":

Measurements are VERY approximate...

Yogurt (3/4 Cup)

Small Squirt of Dijon (1/4 t)

Round the bowl 2x with Raw Honey (2T)

Juice from 1/2 a Lemon

Stir and add to your Apple-Kohlrabi mix.

It tasted AMAZING!

I think next time though I'll add some spinach, kale or maybe mint leaves to it.  I like there to be more color in my foods.  :)

AND since I'm not one to let things go to waste I tore off the greens from the Kohlrabi to use...

Boiled for 2 minutes, Ice bathed & then sauteed in with my okra I made up for lunch.  I thought sauteed greens would be great in a  Grilled Cheese Sandwich.

Hello George....

A Grilled cheese sandwich with American Cheese....

And topped with a tomato from the garden, a pinch of shredded cheese & the greens.

THE FINAL LUNCH:

on each of our plates went:

1/2 a Grilled Cheese Sandwich, okra, slaw, veggies & humus.

I'd love to tell you I have an adventurous daughter who'll eat greens on her sandwich but they were removed first thing.  Oh well, I'll keep trying.  :)