Recipe: Winter Cobb Salad with Crispy Shiitakes and All-Purpose Baked Tofu

Winter Cobb Salad

Crispy Shiitakes

All-Purpose Baked Tofu

Martha Stewart Living Magazine

5 stars

Another new "bowl" favorite to add to the rotation! It includes all of my favorite things, though I didn't have a soft boiled egg with this (forgot!).

Winter Cobb Salad Ingredients: kale, avocado, cherry tomatoes, Crispy Shiitakes, All-Purpose Baked Tofu, blue cheese, eggs, red wine vinegar, extra-virgin olive oil, garlic, Kosher salt, pepper

Crispy Shiitakes: shiitake mushrooms, extra-virgin olive oil, Kosher salt, pepper

All-Purpose Baked Tofu: extra-firm tofu, extra-virgin olive oil, reduced-sodium soy sauce, smoked paprika, cornstarch

Tips:

• Add farro to make it a heartier dish next time
• Depending on how much you make overall, potentially make 1/2 of the vinaigrette
• For the shiitakes, cook them for about 10 less minutes than what it calls for
• For the tofu, make double or triple!

Recipe: Mushroom Cuban Quesadillas

Mushroom Cuban Quesadillas

Food & Wine Magazine, Mar 2021, p. 45

5 stars

We loved this easy dish especially as we're eating more plant-based foods. Granted, there's Swiss cheese in this, but it was good and filling! The portobello mushrooms have great flavor.

Ingredients: flour tortillas, portobello mushrooms, Swiss cheese slices, hamburger dill pickles, Dijon mustard, ground cumin, garlic powder, orange zest, canola oil, Kosher salt, black pepper, scallions for garnish

Tips:

• The only drawback of this dish is that you have think about it ahead of time -- marinating the mushrooms for 8-14 hours
• Didn't necessarily fry these
• Didn't top with scallions though that would've been a nice added layer of flavor

Recipe: One-Pan Spring Tuscan Quinoa Bake

One-Pan Spring Tuscan Quinoa Bake

HalfBakedHarvest.com

4.7 stars

For a vegetarian quinoa dish, this was pretty good. We had this along with Sausage-Spiced Cauliflower Steaks (also vegetarian). Lots of flavor but we amped up the flavor a little bit even while leaving out some ingredients.

Ingredients: quinoa, red bell pepper, ricotta, mozzarella cheese, roasted marinated artichokes, sundried tomato pesto, pickled pepperoncinis, kalamata olives, garlic, dried basil, dried oregano, dried parsley, dried dill, red pepper, pecorino cheese, olive oil, salt, pepper; cherry tomatoes, fresh basil

Tips:

• Use much less oil than the 1/3 cup to cover the bottom of the baking dish
• We bought a small jar of pesto that was a little more than the 1/4 cup it called for. Use all the pesto!
• Use only 1 cup of uncooked quinoa
• Use more ricotta than it calls for
• Didn't add olives or dill to the dish
• Didn't add tomatoes and basil on top

Drink Recipe: Frozen Hula Hoop

Frozen Hula Hoop
Food & Wine Magazine, Jul 2021, p. 51
5 stars

I love this drink so much -- great drink for pool time! It's kind of like a frozen daiquiri but better.

The recipe in Food & Wine Magazine was for 4-6 people (more like 4 people).

Their recipe is at the link above, but I adapted it for 1) 1 person and 2) with what we have in the house -- plus my proportions are a tad different.

Blend up:

• 2/3 cup of ice cubes
• 1/3 cup of frozen pineapple
• 2 Tbsp of dark rum
• 1 Tbsp Aperol
• 1 Tbsp red wine
• 1.5 Tbsp of maraschino cherry liquid from the jar (I prefer Tillen Farms Merry Maraschinos that seem less artificial as they are free from artificial colors, flavors, dyes, corn syrup and preservatives -- This is not an ad!) 
• 1 Tbsp lemon juice

Enjoy!