FoodFash

Adventure Begins in the Kitchen

Blackened Chicken Kale & Romaine Caesar

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Blackened Chicken Caesar Salad

Once upon a desire-to-recreate-a-recipe time, I looked up how to make blackened chicken and wrote it off as a smoky mess hassle.  Months {and an extreme blackened chicken caesar salad craving} later, I decided to scroll further down Google search results and find a recipe that used a stovetop rather than the oven.

Homemade Blackened Chicken

I purchased all six spices from the bulk department, spending a whopping 40-ish cents on seasonings. And I generously coated the chicken breasts per this blackened chicken recipe, wishing later that I was a bit more generous.  I could have used more of that crispy blackened crust I was hoping for.

Side note: I’m seriously considering tossing my spice collection and going the bulk route from now on.  So fresh, so cheap!

Homemade Blackened Chicken 2

When the chicken was finished, I filled a large bowl equally with bite-sized pieces of kale and romaine.  And then I used my hands to mix in homemade caesar salad dressing {a recipe that I plan to perfect and share soon} until all of the greens were lightly coated.  After topping with the sliced blackened chicken, it was the exact salad I had been craving for so long.  And without a single sound from the smoke alarm!

Homemade Dr. Praeger’s Spinach Cakes

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Spinach Turnip Cakes

While diving back into Pinterest land for bedroom inspiration, I allowed myself the more-than-occasional food pin distraction.  And during one of these food tangents, I was drawn to a pin showing a stack of spinach pancakes.  I clicked on it, secretly hoping the post would outline a homemade recipe for Dr. Praeger’s spinach cakes {one of my favorite freezer staples}.  And it did!

Turnips

I really liked Meg of Veggie Staple’s recipe, but knew immediately that I wanted to try a few things differently.  Like more spinach {puréed} and turnips in place of potatoes.

Spinach Pancakes

The turnip version yielded a lower carb, lower calorie, higher calcium-containing cake. And puréeing the spinach made for the most vibrant cake in all of the land!  I’ve enjoyed them solo as a quick snack or topped with an egg for a nutrient-dense breakfast.

Turnips have a slight bitterness, so if you’re not a turnip fan, try replacing half of the turnips in this recipe with a white or sweet potato.

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Vegan Mashed Potatoes With Garlic Chives

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Vegan Mashed Potatoes

My entire life, I’ve been fooled into thinking that mashed potatoes take so long to make and are so special that they are a side reserved only for Thanksgiving and Christmas.  And even after years of being one of the kitchen leads during the holidays {knowing that mashed potatoes are not tough} they still feel like a special occasion thing.

Boiled Potatoes

With that said, nothing particularly special happened today to warrant mashed potatoes.  I’m about to finish my first restaurant project {the construction portion}. And I’m about to head to Italy for the trip of a lifetime.  But nothing out of the ordinary happened that called for mashed potatoes today.

Mashed Potatoes

But as I wandered around Whole Foods after yoga {an atypical 40-ish minutes of wandering}, I kept thinking about potatoes.  And not quite the holiday potatoes I’m accustomed to, but vegan potatoes with garlic chives that I would later confuse by pairing with a steak.  Vegan potatoes with garlic chives that my steak-eating roommate said was the best part of his meal.

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The Quinoa Archives

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Quinoa Stuffed Grape Leaves

Other than the occasional quinoa with onions and green veggie side I’ve been making, I haven’t been too creative with quinoa lately.  So I decided to dig through the archives for some inspiration from FoodFash past.  And what I landed on were three recipes that I can’t wait to re-integrate into my meal rotation over the next few weeks!

Quinoa Stuffed Grape Leaves {pictured above}

Breakfast-Quinoa1

Better Breakfast Quinoa

Quinoa Tabbouleh

Quinoa Tabbouleh