We’ve been Tofu Paté fans since way back, but hadn’t ever really gotten around to giving it a from-scratch whirl until Mom & Dad Cook went all vegan on us. Mom Cook is a phenomenal home chef and once we had a sample of the Tofu Paté she was making we just knew we had to give it a go ourselves. Continue reading
This is yet another divine vehicle for what can only be described as The Best Balsamic Vinaigrette in the World. This also happens to be one of the most eclectically delicious salads Julie has ever cobbled together.
Everyone in our family knows we eat a ton of salad and, as usual, it was requested of us that we bring one to dinner at Mom & Dad’s. Also as usual we applied ourselves nary a bit to preparing anything ahead of time and so we had to go with the stuff that was in the fridge/pantry – which was Baby Spinach, Fresh Figs, Green Olives, Blue Cheese Crumbles, Roasted Sunflower Seeds, and our standby Balsamic Vinaigrette.
The dressing is really what makes all this work, and you’ll impress the snot (ew) out of your friends when you lie and tell them the dressing was really hard…it’s not. Continue reading
At the very least this dish proves that you can put just about anything you have on hand in Pasta Salad and wind up with a winner…even if it does sound vaguely like something MacGyver would make out of old snowblower parts.
Anyhoo, in this particular case we’d had quite a few odds ‘n ends lying around that we really wanted to eat – Sweet Chicken Apple Sausage, Farfalle, Radishes, etc. – but, though they sounded great individually, they didn’t really seem like they went together all that well until we struck upon the whole Pasta Salad idea. Continue reading
Giada recently had a deliciously different and simple salad on her show that needed only sliced fresh Mushrooms, shaved Parmesan, and a very simple Lemon Juice & Olive Oil dressing. It was so elegant and fresh tasting that we loved it right away, and leaving the Mushrooms raw gave it a lighter than air texture.
Of course it’s us, so we immediately began to think of ways that we could tweak it by adding a little of this or that. Julie right away struck upon the idea of adding Orecchiette pasta, White Beans, and some sweet little Green Peas to build it up a bit and our new favorite summer Pasta Salad was born.
So, we had/have this favorite dressing from a popular brand and we were ordering cases of it and they were very expensive and we got to thinking…what’s in this incredibly delicious dressing that we love so much and can’t live without, anyway?
Turns out, not too much. Apple Cider Vinegar, Tamari, Sesame Oil, Sesame Seeds, and Olive Oil to be exact. Ok, that and shiitake mushroom bits but honestly they don’t really do much for the flavor as far as we can tell. And they used Canola Oil, which has no flavor whatsoever so why bother? Continue reading