My Favorite Couscous

Hello there! A while back I showed you my favorite Summer pasta salad. Today I'll be showing you a recipe I love just as much and is even easier! (For that reason, I might just love it more!)

Here is what I use. First, I use packaged couscous. I like to buy the pre-seasoned variety (roasted garlic & olive oil here) because I love a lot of flavor but the plain is good too. Then, I use crumbled feta, kalamata olives, marinated artichoke hearts and tomatoes. I love cherry tomatoes but the grape tomatoes are just a little bit sweeter and I like that to balance the saltiness of all the other ingredients.

I slice my grape tomatoes lengthwise.

...and do the same with my olives.

...quarter my artichoke hearts lengthwise.

...and add all of it to my couscous cooked according to package directions.

Toss in your feta...

Mix well and serve!

 

This is good warm or cold but I actually prefer it cold, right out of the fridge. I also like to serve it with a sweet fruit, like kiwi here, just to help balance the saltiness.

This really is one of my favorite things to make but my family isn't too fond of it so I don't get to make it often.

What do you love to make? Are you in love with these Mediterranean flavors like I am?

Summer Pasta Salad

Around here, Summer seems to be the time for potlucks. Here is my go-to dish for all those Summer parties. Trust me, this is about the easiest thing you can make!

Here is what I use. A package of tri-color rotini, a bottle of Italian dressing (I find that Wishbone has the best flavor), a red onion, some tomatoes (I prefer cherry tomatoes but Roma are so much less expensive), black olives, pepperoni, cheese (feta or shredded Parmesan - not the shaker type) and cucumbers (not pictured).

Cook your noodles according to package directions. Rinse with COLD water until the noodles are actually cool.

Thinly slice the red onion.

Seed and chop the cucumber. I peel and halve it first.

Then halve it again lengthwise.

Then slice off the layer of seeds.

Viola.

Slice again lengthwise...

...cut into about 1/4 inch pieces.

If you're using cherry tomatoes, either halve or quarter them. Grape tomatoes I usually halve and roma tomatoes I dice into about 1/4 inch pieces.

Pepperoni...I am not a huge fan but it does give this salad great flavor. I've done it meatless and also used grilled chicken, diced ham or salami.

I like the vacuum package because I can cut it right in the package.

I peel the slices of pepperoni apart and add it to your bowl with all the other ingredients. I forgot to take a picture here of how I cut the olives but really, you can do what you like. I quarter them lengthwise, you can slice them or leave them whole...it really doesn't matter.

Add about 3/4 your bottle of dressing and mix well.

Add about 3/4 of your cheese and mix again. I like to let this sit overnight but really it only needs an hour or so. Right before serving, add the rest of your dressing to give it more "squish" and sprinkle remaining cheese over top of salad.

This really is a hit and so easy to make. I love that you can vary the recipe according to your taste. This would also be great with cubed ham, peas and cheddar cheese...hmmm. What other variations would you try? Do you have any go-to recipies like this? Share in the comments below!

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Little Brick Ranch

Corned Beef & Cabbage

I've said before that St. Patrick's Day is one of my favorite holidays and I stand by that. Also, corned beef and cabbage is one of my favorite meals :)  Here is how I go about making it.

Start with your corned beef brisket. What makes corned beef brisket special is that it is wet-cured in a brine (typically) spiced with mustard seeds, cloves, allspice, peppercorns and/or other pickling spices.

Put the brisket in a stockpot with included spice packet and enough water just to cover.  Bring to a boil and reduce heat, simmering for 2 1/2 - 3 hours.

When you have about 15 minutes remaining, add a quartered onion, some quartered potatoes and large carrots, sliced.

I didn't have any carrots on hand so I just skipped them. Yes, it did feel like it was lacking something but I think it was mostly color I was missing.

When potatotes and onions have been cooking for about 15 minutes, remove brisket to a warm pan, covered, and to the pot add a cabbage, quartered.

It was so tender I shredded it trying to take it out of the pot!

The potatoes and onions, half cooked in the broth from the brisket.



Allow cabbage to cook for 15-20 minutes and transfer to platter.

And there you have it - a super easy, yummy dinner...best of all? It only takes one pan!  If you're lucky and have leftovers you can make corned beef hash for breakfast the next morning...I'll show you that next :)

Do you like corned beef? 

Roasted Garlic Mashed Potatoes

Welcome back! I hope everyone had a fantastic Christmas :) Ours was fantastic. We are so blessed and truly thankful for having everything we could possibly need. This Christmas was special for me - I have a brother in the Air Force who is stationed at Osan AFB in South Korea. He's 26 and attended college away from home but this was the first Christmas he hasn't been able to make it home and our first Christmas where we weren't all together.

My dad ended up making the journey to Korea to be with him (which is special in and of itself!) so my mom came to celebrate Christmas (her first without my dad since they were married) with us at our house. We had a great evening on Christmas Eve with dinner, presents and a surprise Skype session with my dad and brother :) 

Anyway...to compliment our traditional Christmas Eve dinner of shrimp, I made roasted garlic mashed potatoes and orange glazed carrots. Since I know some people are intimidated by roasting garlic, I thought I would share the process. ( I don't know why anyone would be intmidated by this - maybe because it sounds yummy?)

I started with three whole bulbs garlic.

and sliced the top off (leaving the root end intact to keep the garlic together)

I rubbed some olive oil into the cut end making sure it was totally covered.

I wrapped each bulb loosely in foil. One easy way to do this is by putting them in muffin tins and looosely covering but I guess my husband threw away all of our muffin tins. Hmm. I wonder why.

 

Bake at 400 degrees for 35-40 minutes, remove from oven, unwrap and allow to cool enough to handle.

I don't know how it happend but a few of these warm, yummy cloves ended up in my mouth before they even hit the bowl...

There are so many things you can do with these - mash into some softened butter to use on garlic toast, add them to a salad or pasta, mash them directly on crusty bread...oh, the possibilites are endless!

I mashed mine in with a brick of softened cream cheese to add to my mashed potatoes.

I added a little fresh ground black pepper...this mixture by itself was so good and would have made a fantastic dip.



Oh yeah. This post was about mashed potatoes...I got kind of carried away with my garlic :)  I washed, peeled and diced about three pounds of potatoes. I know that Yukon Gold or Russet make the best mashed but this is ND. We're serious about our red potatoes.



Put your diced potatoes (about one inch pieces) in a large pot and add enough cold, salted water just to cover. Simmer until fork-tender, about 15 minutes.

Put drained, hot potatoes in a big bowl with cheese/garlic mixture, about 1 cup warm milk and 1/2 stick butter, softened.  Mix well.

I don't have any pictures of the finished product, mostly because they looked and smelled so good that we couldn't wait to eat them :)

I hope you all had a great Christmas. Do you have any traditional meals for Christmas Eve? 

Beans



If you have kids, you know just how picky they can be when it comes to what they eat.  I have a beautiful two year old and although she likes a lot of different side dishes, she's not so into her veggies :(  I have NO idea where she got this because neither my husband nor I have ever met a veggie we didn't like.  The one exception for her is BEANS.  She loves 'em!  Even LIMA beans.  Who knew?  Anyway, I was paging through a magazine and saw an advertisement for Bush's Beans with recipes when a picture caught my eye.





(click here for more)

 

I know, I know...it just looks like a big pile of beans.  Well, I got to reading and there are veggies hidden in with those beans!  I figured it would be worth a try so I went and bought a can of pinto beans (I always have black and kidney beans on hand).

Ingredients

2 tablespoons olive oil
1 small onion, chopped
1 small celery stalk, chopped
1 small carrot, chopped
1 clove garlic, chopped
1 can kidney beans, rinsed and drained
1 can black beans, rinsed and drained
1 can pinto beans, rinsed and drained
1/2 cup chopped canned whole tomatoes
1 teaspoon fresh thyme
2 teaspoons white wine
Salt and pepper to taste

Okay, so I didn't have any canned whole tomatoes but I always have these yummy tomatoes from Hunt's on hand.  However, I didn't use them. (more on that later)

Chop your veggies (onion, carrots and celery).  I chopped them pretty small so they wouldn't take too long to cook and so they wouldn't be so obvious in with those beans.

Heat your oil in a pan set to medium

Add veggies to hot oil

Sautee until the onion starts to get transparent, you can add salt and pepper to taste any time in here.  Just remember that canned beans are already kind of salty, you probably don't need to add a lot.

Add your chopped garlic for the last two minutes.  This is important because you don't want your garlic to burn as it can really taste bitter.  Here I actually tripled the amount of garlic the recipe calls for.  Hey - I already told you I LOVE GARLIC!

Add your tomato.  I decided to seed and chop a fresh tomato I had on hand instead of opening up a whole can for just a half a cup.

Add your beans

Add your thyme and white wine.  (you can sub water or chicken broth for the wine)

Yum!  The kid loved them and because they're such a great source of fiber and protein, they're so healthy.  Bonus!

What food quirks do your kids have?  Do you have any tricks you use to get them to eat healthier?  I can't wait to hear!