Cinnamon Sugar Cookies
*adapted from this recipe, yields about 24 large cookies

Ingredients:
1 cup granulated sugar
1 cup unsalted butter, softened
4 tablespoons milk
2 tablespoons vanilla extract
2 cup all-purpose flour
3 teaspoons baking powder
2 tablespoons cinnamon
2 pinches of salt

For coating:
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1/4 cup granulated sugar

Directions:
1. Preheat the oven to 350°F.
2. In a mixing bowl, combine the butter and sugar and mix until it is light and fluffy. Continue to add in the vanilla extract and milk into the butter mixture.
3. In a separate bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt.
4. Using a spatula, gradually add the wet ingredients into the bowl of the dry ingredients and combine. If the dough is too wet, add some flour a tablespoon at a time (it usually takes about 4 tablespoons).
5. In a small bowl, mix together the remaining sugar and cinnamon for the coating.
6. Using a tablespoon to scoop, roll dough into balls, then roll each ball in the sugar and cinnamon mixture to coat, and place onto un-greased cookie sheets. Lightly flatten top of the cookie with a fork or a spoon (we chose a fork). If desired, sprinkle more cinnamon on top.
7. Bake in the oven for about 8 – 10 minutes, or until golden. Let stand on the cookie sheet for a couple minutes, then transfer to wire rack (or just eat it warm and soft with ice cream because fresh baked cookies are amazing that way!).

The girls wanted to bake, but we were out of eggs, so this is what we made and our tummies were quite happy with ourselves. It’s pretty much like the recipe linked above, but I always opt for more vanilla than a recipe calls for, and we threw in cinnamon because we really love cinnamon. They sprinkle it on their oatmeal and O’s breakfast every morning!

Black Bean Chili and Chip Salad. Easy, yummy, and great for Dinner Club Thursdays. Thursday almost guarantees some sort of bean dish variety because it’s the most cost friendly and easy to whip up for a large group.

Week of 4/21 – 4/25
Monday: Ben’s on dinner duty
Tuesday: Soba Noodle Sesame Salad
Wednesday: Spaghetti and Meatballs
Thursday: Leftovers
Friday: Disneyland!

Last week I cooked all week long, but Ben worked a few late nights, so evenings were really hectic for me and we didn’t have any family dinners together. Our time together at the dinner table is something I look forward to and we all chat about our day. The girls like to give us every single detail about their days that sometimes one girl takes 1 hour (with interruptions from the rest of the family) to tell her whole story. It’s hilarious!

Pad Kee Moa. Thai cooking is something I want to conquer next. I couldn’t find the wide noodles for this, but this one tasted just as good. I’ll keep hunting for the wide noodles though. I used a seafood mix, but next time I think I’ll just use shrimp. I didn’t like the mussels in the mix, it was too grainy. I also used carrots instead of bell peppers, but it tasted just the same. The yumminess is in the sauce and the spice. Oh the spice! My nose was running, and that’s when I know it’s just right. The girls eat a non-spicy version, though Brave did have some of ours.

Spicy Tuna Taco on Rice Paper Shell. There’s a local restaurant that makes something similar and I tried my hand at recreating it. I first made this recipe on Valentine’s Day (and didn’t like it much, but I think it’s cause I was just so tired and not hungry), I liked it more the second time, and this time around, on the third try, I loved it! Ben, on the other hand, loved it the very first time. It’s another added into our repertoire of homemade sushi, and I have a recipe to share for it soon!

Week of 4/14 – 4/18
Monday: We promised the girls a trip to Incredible John’s Pizza for dinner, so it’s an eat out night (we eat out about once a month) for us.
Tuesday: Homemade Pizza
Wednesday: Spicy Seafood & Udon Stir Fry
Thursday: Black Bean Chili
Friday: Sushi night

What’s on your dinner menu this week. Do you have any favorite Thai dish recipes to share?

Shrimp Tacos with Chipotle Sauce. The shrimp looks fried, but it isn’t. Ben was convinced I fried them, but that panko coating really makes it look that way. I mixed some cayenne, chili powder, cornmeal, and panko to coat the shrimp. The flavor sort of got lost with all the other things going in the taco, so next time I’ll try marinating the shrimp, and adding more heat to the breading to see if that helps the flavors pop out more. My chipotle sauce is spicy, just the way we like it. Brave started putting it on her tacos too. She totally loves spicy foods!

White Bean and Soyrizo Tacos with Chipotle Sauce. I made this for our Dinner Club Thursday. Who needs real chorizo when soyrizo does a totally good job?! I actually made two sauces this evening, my spicy chipotle and a creamy lime chili one, which was much more mild.

Week of 4/7 – 4/11
Monday: White Bean Burger with a Cilantro Sauce
Tuesday: Pad Kee Mao (I still haven’t found the right noodles, that’s why I didn’t make it last week.)
Wednesday: Leftovers
Thursday: White Bean Chili (always the easiest thing for me to do for a big group)
Friday: Sushi night

Last week was totally taco week and I didn’t follow any recipes. It was all just experimentation, but really, can’t go wrong with tacos, right?! We will still have white beans leftover from Thursday that I think I might try my hand at turning them into burgers for Monday, fingers crossed they come out edible. I really am having so much fun in the kitchen these days (and I’m getting faster too)!

Korean Fried Chicken. Yes! Soooo good! Obviously, we love Korean dishes and spicy food, so it’s no surprise that we loved this dish. I made this two weeks in a row since I had leftover sauce, and the girls got a batch without all the spice. I changed up the recipe to give the meat some breading, but while it looks fried, it totally isn’t. Oven fried chicken is bomb I tell you. You totally won’t even miss real fried chicken! Promise.

Black Bean with Corn Salsa Rice Bowl. While I share a lot of meat dishes here, actually, we only eat it about twice a week, maybe three times. Most other days are seafood or straight up vegetarian. This was another good meal to make for a big group on our Dinner Club Thursdays. Put giant dollops of fresh salsa in and you’re good to go!

Week of 3/31 – 4/4
Monday: Shrimp Tacos
Tuesday: Pad Kee Mao (I want to try my hand at Thai cooking!)
Wednesday: Leftovers
Thursday: White Bean Chili
Friday: Sushi/pizza night

Since we put in an official weekly grocery budget in place, we’ve done so good at not wasting food. We don’t have excess, but just enough, and we really think through our grocery purchases. Budgeting, as painful as it feels sometimes, is so great!

Korean Pork Roast Sesame Leaf Wraps (Bossam)
about 6 servings

Ingredients
For the Bossam (pork roast):
About 2 lbs. pork sirloin tip roast
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup plus 1/3 cup brown sugar, set aside the 1/3 cup
1/2 cup plus 1/2 tbsp salt, set aside the 1/2 tbsp
1 beer

For the Ginger Scallion Sauce, mix all the ingredients in a bowl and set aside (best made the day before):
3 bunches of green onions, chopped
5″ piece of ginger, skinned and minced.
1/8 cup of vegetable (canola) oil
1 tsp soy sauce
1 tsp rice vinegar

For the Ssam Sauce, mix all the ingredients in a bowl and set aside (best made the day before):
2 tbsp chili paste
2 tbsp soybean paste
1/8 cup canola oil
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar

For the Pickled Carrots, mix all the ingredients in a bowl and set aside (best made the day before):
1 cup granulated sugar
1 1/2 cup white vinegar
2 tsp salt
2 cups warm water

For serving:
Sesame leaves, about 6-10 per person (or red leaf lettuce or steamed cabbage leaves removed from core)
Rice (brown rice would be our choice)
Kimchi
Directions
For the overnight marinade:
Mix together the 1/2 cup granulated sugar, 1/2 cup brown sugar, 1/4 cup salt in a small bowl. Place the sirloin roast in a large bowl, rub and coat it completely with the sugar mixture. Cover the bowl tightly and refrigerate overnight.

To cook the roast:
Rinse the pork and place it in the crock pot with the liquid from a full bottle of beer. Cook the pork on low for 8 hours. Once it is done, heat the oven to 500 degrees and mix the remaining brown sugar and salt together. Completely coat the pork with the sugar mixture and put it in the oven for 10 minutes. This gives the pork a salty and sweet coating.

Serve the pork with rice (our choice is brown rice), some sesame leaves (or cabbage leaves), kimchi, and all the side dishes in this recipe. Just layer them all together on top of a sesame leaf, and enjoy it as it’s packed with so much good flavor. Typically, this is made with pork shoulder or pork butt, but we make it healthier by using pork sirloin. It lacks the fat (and crunchy skin) that the other parts have, but we enjoy it so much more knowing we’re doing without all that extra fat. It tastes really good to us this way that we aren’t interested in trying it with a fattier meat. My BFF said this would be the more traditional way of making bossam, so if you’re wanting to go really authentic, I would try it that way.

It looks so similar to the Mackerel Stew as it has some of the same ingredients, but it has a completely different flavor altogether. I’m totally addicted to cooking Korean dishes. The flavors in the sauces are so good that if you’re vegetarian, just leave out the pork, maybe use some tofu, and it would still taste just as delicious.