A Carrot Craving Turns into a Darn Good Side Dish

The word "craving" can be viewed as negative, if  you're on a diet and craving chocolate. It can be a positive thing, though. I was craving glazed carrots one day. By the time supper rolled around and it was time to cook, my brain had added a few more things to the carrots. The recipe is at the link, if you'd like to try it.

Carrot & Turnip Saute with Mango Glaze 

Carrot & Turnip Saute with Mango Glaze--Garnish: Spicy Toasted Sunflower Seeds

Eat More Salad!

I have to mangle Forrest Gump's quote a bit: "Salads are like a box of chocolates, you never know what you're going to get."

Very true when you are dining out: Salads can be very good, very bad, or any point between the two.

They can also be very ugly, but as long as the ingredients are fresh, I'd chow down! But, if they are ugly as in: Rusty lettuce, dried out vegetables, looks like someone took them out to the parking lot and ran over them before service, well....Run, Forrest! RUN! 

Keep a good supply of veggies and fruits at home--that's your best bet. It takes minutes to throw a salad together and it's definitely worth it in the long run.

The stars of this yummy salad are: Leaf lettuce, baby greens, kale, broccoli, cauliflower, cucumbers, turnips, zucchini, carrots, red bell pepper, red onion, grape tomatoes, black olives, avocados & fresh mushrooms.

Go make yourself a salad right now!

Another shot of this kick-ass salad.

Fun Food, Fast Preparation

Here's a little something I whipped up that turned out to be interesting visually, so I decided it needed to be on the blog.

The taste was excellent, too.

Story is: I had some leftover spaghetti sauce that I made for us the other day. I didn't feel like eating pasta, but wanted to have more of a pizza-type dish instead. But not pizza. I also had some of that delicious rolled mozzarella left over, (the one with prosciutto & basil). 

So...I just needed some bread. French bread or baguettes. I didn't feel like baking any of those and driving to Katy was out. Wal-Mart was definitely out. That left the local grocery store, which is where I buy the majority of food items between trips to H.E.B. and other good stores in Katy & Houston. Support your local merchants!

Okay, the grocery store, Bill's, used to have a bakery but after they moved back to their old location a few years ago, they didn't have the room or the equipment. They purchase baked goods from a bakery in Houston. The items from this bakery are okay. I don't buy them that often. When I decided on this little endeavor, the baguettes that were available were in horrendous shape. They were under-baked and had weird looking spots on them, as if something was dripped into the baguette pans before the dough went in. So those baguettes were out.

Next best thing? At Bill's, that would be: Alexia's Garlic Baguettes. These baguettes are really, really good. They are partially baked and you do the rest at home. Bill's started carrying these...let's see....last year? The year before? It wasn't terribly long ago.

First, they had single baguettes. I noticed that they were almost always low on these when I went through the frozen section while shopping. Now they have double packs of this bread, plus some Alexia Dinner Rolls (the whole grain version). Good! Maybe we'll see even more Alexia products at Bill's in the future!

Back to the original story:

Of course the garlic baguettes already have garlic and butter, but I thought they would be okay for some pizza action. I opened the package and one of the loaves was broken in half. Dang it! I was going to cut them lengthwise, even though they are partially cut into slices.

Okay, so I ended up with two slices and four sections cut lengthwise. No problemo, Ahnuld.

Added "pizza" sauce and a slice of the mozzarella roll on each piece, then popped them into the oven until the cheese melted pretty good.

So here is the result. With the Superbowl coming up and all, I figured, enh...why not post it? It's a fast, fun food for a party, even when it's not Superbowl time. It looks impressive and it's really easy to make. It only took.....(how many paragraphs now?)....a little bit of yakking on my part to finally get to the point. Ha ha!

I suggest doing this next time instead of wasting money on frozen pizzas or frozen french bread pizzas. Those things have a LOT of crap in them, and frankly, they aren't really that good, even the more expensive brands. And yeah, pizza delivery. Convenient, but not all places have French bread pizza and really, there's a lot of junky-monkey crap in those products as well. Make it yourself whenever you can! You'll be eating less junk (chemicals, etc.) and have more flavor, even if you use a bottled sauce (as long as it doesn't have a lot of junk in it).

Okay, I will shut up now. Here is the photo of the baguette pizza:

Baguette Pizza

Salad: Everything but the Kitchen Sink...

Did I go overboard with these salads? Nahhhhhh!!!

The salad base, which is almost completely covered, was: Romaine lettuce, kale, a mix of baby greens, cucumbers, zucchini, turnips, carrots & cauliflower.

Top layer: Cheddar cheese, boiled eggs, smoked turkey, tomatoes, avocados, Black Forest ham, mozzarella (rolled with prosciutto & basil), Muenster cheese, provolone, bacon & red onions.

Sprinkled some chia seeds on top as well. Do you think adding the chia was too much? NAH! :)

Then we had: t-bone steaks, loaded baked potatoes, sauteed green beans and New York cheesecake for dessert. Just kidding! We had the salad and that's it. Sure didn't need anything else!

What can I say? I didn't have time to eat all day so this covered 3 meals for me. :)

"Everything But the Kitchen Sink" Chef Salad

Salad Base

Yes indeedy! There were two. Each completely consumed.

A shrimp po-boy is a thing of beauty...

I don't dine out very often. Recently I had the opportunity to eat at "Antone's," and that opportunity was one I grabbed with both hands and with great enthusiasm.

It was hard to make a decision because Antone's has expanded its menu over the years.

The shrimp po-boy won the coin-flip this day. At first glance it appears that there isn't enough shrimp in the sandwich. Let me assure you, there was. It had the perfect amount.

It was DEEEEEEEEEEEEEEElicious!!! If the shrimp had been a little spicier, I would have been happy but the coating was still good. The vegetables were super-fresh and the French fries were nice and hot. They were generous with those puppies, too.

On this same day, I heard the sad news about Antone's closing its original location in Houston. I haven't confirmed this news yet, so don't quote me on that. However, I encourage you to stop in for lunch anytime you can, particularly at this location, which is at 610 and T.C. Jester in Houston.

Shrimp Po-boy