Langostino Sopes. I’m a seafood gal, so I really love this! Ben kinda made it up one day and it is so yummy! We’ll have to put together a recipe to share because this really is one of my faves. No joke. It’s in my top 10 fave dishes for sure.
Tilapia Poke. I used this recipe, but substituted the tuna with tilapia. It’s just as good in my opinion.
It’s been almost a month since I shared our meals and that’s because I haven’t been cooking that much. We had various things pop up over here that required my attention, so sometimes Trader Joe’s is just the key to survival. I have to weigh it all out and remember something said in “The Good Mom, “My kids care far less about how presentable their dinner is and far more about how healthy their mom is.”
True’s allergic to dairy. We figured this out when she was about 6 months old, since then she’s been a soy milk drinker. We have dairy milk in the house too, but the other girls naturally gravitate to that carton of soy milk that’s sitting in the fridge. Actually, I do too and I have a cup every morning! I add some protein to it and it gives it a thicker consistency that makes it extra creamy (silk soy milk is already pretty creamy!). I used to have a cup (or 2) every afternoon too, but I was going way overboard in my intake of milk products, so I cut back and stuck to drinking it in the morning. Even though I limit myself to drinking it in the morning, it doesn’t stop me from serving my girls with some soy milk in various ways throughout the rest of the day.
I think it’s that little bit of sweetness that gets us. Besides having it with cereal, it is best for mixing in with smoothies or making popsicles (or just pairing it with some cookies!). You’ve got the natural sweetness from the fruit combined with the subtle sweetness in the vanilla Silk Soy Milk, and it’s come out perfect. No added sugar needed! We’ve tried other soy milks and Silk Soy Milk is the absolute best. The other ones tend to have an earthy flavor, but Silk really is silky. My husband thinks Silk is the gold standard of soy milks when it comes to flavor. The yumminess of it all makes my girls (even me!) do a jitter dance.
Silk Soy Milk and Strawberry Popsicle makes about 8 – 10 popsicles (depends on your mold)
Blend and pour into a popsicle mold (this one is ours), let freeze overnight, then enjoy!
Silk Soy Milk, Peach and Strawberry Smoothie makes about 4 small servings
2 cups Silk Soy Milk vanilla flavor
1 cup frozen peaches
1 cup fresh strawberries (or frozen)
Just blend, pour, and drink!
This post is brought to you by Silk. Take the Tastemaker Challenge on facebook.com/silkUS. Thank you for your continuous support of this space and my sponsors. I’m really grateful because these opportunities wouldn’t be possible without you!
Korean Burger with Kimchi and Egg My online friend, Jenn Kirk, instagrammed this burger that she was about to devour. It looked amazing so I asked her what was in it. This is my version trying to recreate that yumo looking burger!
Ingredients (pictured below):
1. 1 cup of kimchi (each burger used about 2 – 3 pieces, but can use more if you love the stuff like I do!)
2. Strips of dried seaweed
3. Marinated turkey patty (I used 3 lbs of ground turkey and mixed in the marinade)
4. 1 egg per burger
5. Whole wheat buns
6. 1/4 soy mayo
7. 1/4 cup sambal oelek garlic chili
8. 1 tbsp sesame oil
For the meat marinade (taken from this recipe):
3 lbs ground turkey
1/2 cup soy
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup water
1/4 sesame oil
1/4 cup sake
2 tbsp minced garlic
1/4 green onions finely chopped
2 tbsp sesame seed
sprinkle of black pepper
Directions:
1. Combine the ground turkey with the ingredients for the meat marinade and refrigerate overnight. Gently form the meat into patties about 3″ wide and 1″ thick, but this size will also depend on the bun size you use. Season patties with salt and pepper. Pan fry the patties until they are cooked through. I cooked ours on a cast iron skillet.
2. Make the spicy sauce by combining the 1/4 soy mayo, 1/4 cup sambak garlic chili, and 1 tbsp sesame oil. Set aside. 3. Cut your seaweed strips and pan fry your egg and set both aside.
4. Serve the patties on the buns; top with kimchi, egg, seaweed strips, and spicy sauce. Take a giant bite and enjoy!
I love Korean food, so I was totally all about the burger. Ben isn’t a big fan of kimchi, though he had his with it, he went without it for his second one. He also didn’t like the egg, so he left that out of the second one too. The girls didn’t like it too much, which surprised me because the meat had a sweetness to it that I was sure they would love. I served it again to them the next day for lunch with ketchup, and they ate that up, so maybe it’s just that they’re not quite into fancy burgers just yet. Or maybe it was the ketchup. These girls of mine LOVE ketchup!
Easiest Posole. This recipe came from It’s All Good by Gwyneth Paltrow. We have made posole for Christmas two years in a row and it takes hours until it’s finally ready to eat. This one really is the easiest posole! We all loved it!!! In my attempt to lessen the spice, so that the girls could eat it, I used one serrano pepper instead of 3 like the recipe called for, and that one pepper really gave a big kick! That was one strong pepper. Ben and I loved the spice, but I just gave the girls the hominy without much soup and that help eliminate some of the heat for them. I made so much that we ate it 3 nights this week and never got sick of it!
I love looking back at all the various recipes I have tried. It’s been a fun journey in preparing meals for my family. I’ve definitely learned a lot, but I usually still need a recipe in front of me when I’m cooking something. Cooking doesn’t come naturally to me, but it has encouraged me to experiment a little bit more here and there. What’s your relationship with cooking?
Avocado Toast. This was the easiest recipe in Gwyneth Paltrow’s book and so I made it for lunch. We eat avocado tacos all the time, but I never thought about it on toast! I had it again later in the week without the mayo because avocado has enough fat already, and it’s still good. The girls even liked it, so this will be added to our lunch repertoire.
Meatloaf and Roasted Carrots. I make two loafs, one for the girls with no spice and one for us, with lots of spice! The meal looks boring because it’s a whole lot of orange, but I promise it’s a whole lot of good, even if the word meatloaf doesn’t sound the most appetizing.
Korean Style Burger and Sweet Potato Fries. My friend Jen Kirk instagrammed this yummy burger a couple weeks ago, and since then, I have been wanting to re-create it. It just sounded so good! Mine’s not as pretty as the one she ate, but it tasted pretty good, though I’m sure Jen’s tasted a million times better, but she’s on the east coast, so my guessing through the recipe will have to do. Soul didn’t like the meat, but the rest of the girls seemed to. I will have a recipe for you next week!
Week 6/10 – 6/14
Monday: Spaghetti
Tuesday: Easiest Posole (I didn’t get to make it this week)
Wednesday: Leftovers
Thursday: Black Bean Soup
Friday: Sushi/pizza night
I can’t wait for our summer tomatoes to grow so we can using those in our dinners. What’s your go-to summer dish?
Simple Crunchy Shell Taco. Easy go-to meal when I need fast and delicious. Ground turkey, taco seasoning, cheese, greek yogurt, and whatever greens we have on hand with lots of Tapatio sauce (at least for Ben and me). Ben has his on whole wheat tortillas, but us girls opt for crunchy shells.
Orzo with Feta, Basil and Shrimp. We all really liked it! We made two batches, one had imitation crab meat because True is allergic to shellfish and sans the spice, and then we made another with the shrimp and lots of spice! My only change to the recipe was that I added minced garlic in with the marinade and pretty well doubled the spice for ours. Ben liked all the flavors, but he didn’t like that the orzo wasn’t a whole grain. It’s my first time cooking orzo, so does anyone know if there’s a whole wheat version of it? We also both agreed while it was pretty spot on for flavors, it definitely could have used some vegetables in it. Next time, we’re thinking of throwing in either artichokes or roasted red bell peppers. I think that would add another yummy (and healthful) good dimension to the dish. Or even just cherry tomatoes like Frédérique suggested in last week’s family meal comments.
Week 6/3 – 6/7
Monday: Spaghetti
Tuesday: Leftovers
Wednesday: Homemade burgers
Thursday: Easiest Posele (from Gwyneth Paltrow’s new cookbook)
Friday: Pizza night
I wasn’t able to get my meal plan up at the end of last week, but I still wanted to make sure to do it because it keeps me in check for meal planning this coming week. I seriously use these posts to do our real family meal plan, so during the weeks I don’t share it, I probably didn’t plan and Ben probably ended up cooking. How do you plan for weekly meals?
I have a large growing pile of fabric scraps. I refuse to throw them away because I am sure they can be used for something. I have been seeing different types of interesting necklaces made of buttons, beads, and fabric. Then, I figured why not make one out of my scraps...
I think it made my white shirt a little less boring. This was so quick and easy to make.
How to make a recycled scraps necklace (which is very similar to the straps on my braided tablecloth bag):
1. Take your scrap fabric, I cut a .5''-1'' snip and tear the rest of the fabric down for a nice frayed edge. Used 3 different fabrics for each strand.
2. Take 3 of the torn pieces and tie the ends together with a rubber band.
3. Braid the 3 pieces together and tie ends together with rubber band when done.
4. Repeat steps 2 & 3 for more strands. Remember you can make the strands any length you want, if run out of fabric, just weave more into the braid.
5. Once all the strands you want are braided, gather one end of each strand together and straight stitch together with sewing machine. Repeat for the other ends of the strands. Snip off any excess.
6. Gather ends of the necklace and sew together (snip excess) or a ribbon can be sewn at the ends to be able to tie the necklace closed, but I just sewed both ends together.
7. Voila! A nice way to make use of all your lovely scraps.
Sorry if the directions get you a little lost, but it really is easy. I promise. Maybe I should put some in the shop. Please share any other good ideas you may have of things that can be made with scraps. I would love to hear (read) them!
Langostino Sopes. I’m a seafood gal, so I really love this! Ben kinda made it up one day and it is so yummy! We’ll have to put together a recipe to share because this really is one of my faves. No joke. It’s in my top 10 fave dishes for sure.
Tilapia Poke. I used this recipe, but substituted the tuna with tilapia. It’s just as good in my opinion.
