Monday, February 20, 2012

Valentine's Day Cook Off!!

300 Recipes in 1 Year
Recipes # 31-36

Hope everyone had a wonderful V-Day! I sure did. I've never been a huge V-Day participator. I'm not wildly against it in protest, but I'm not giddy with excitement either...just in the middle. Jake and I usually stay in and cook anyways, so I figured I'd plan a whole night of knocking some of my recipes out. 6 to be exact! :) It was quite an indulgent night, and we started Lost. It was a lot of fun getting to cook so many things together and really helping each other out, when typically its just one of us who cooks. Hope you all enjoy the pics and stories of our night....and try some of the recipes out {maybe not all at once, we had a LOT of leftovers and I didn't even have room for dessert....which is rare!!} :)


Recipe # 31


These were delish! We actually came up with the recipe ourselves! It was inspired by a meal we had at Big Tuna in Norman a couple weeks ago where the shrimp was stuffed with the cream cheese and jalepeno filling. Well, that would of been difficult, and as you may have read with the Cheesecake Stuffed Strawberries...I'm not the best at that. So we improvised. I made the dip the night before and we made these first so we could snack on them while we were cooking. {We didn't end up eating til 9:30....}

What you'll need:
Shrimp
Bacon
1 pkg of softened cream cheese
1/4 cup of cheddar cheese
2 jalepnos

Preheat your oven to 350
First you will want to take out all the seeds of your jalepenos {take all of those necessary precautions...}

Chop the jalepenos up finely, or use a blender/food processor. Combine this with the cream cheese and cheddar cheese. If making it ahead of time just refrigerate until ready to serve.

For the shrimp you will just want to saute them until they are cooked. We used a little olive oil and butter in the pan.

Now, take your bacon and wrap them around the shrimp and secure with a toothpick.

Put on a cookie sheet and cook for about 10-15 min, or until bacon is done. 

Once finished place the bacon wrapped shrimp on a paper towel to drain the grease. While you are doing that, heat the dip in the microwave for about 30 sec, just to soften it up a bit. 

To serve, just dip your shrimp into the cream cheese dip for a scrumptious and spicy appetizer. 


Recipe # 32


I am addicted to amaretto. It is my favorite ingredient to add to a cocktail. You can find the recipe for this {HERE}. It is kind of a morning/brunch cocktail....but it worked out well. Jake liked it too, and we never agree on beverages! If you enjoy pulp in your OJ, you will like this! The way the peaches chopped up created a wonderful fruit pulp, mixed with apple juice and amaretto was amazing! So easy and so sweet! {BTW, we added a bit more amaretto than they suggested, we just kind of eyed it!}


Recipe # 33


Wow oh wow oh wow! This slab of meat was exquisite!! And insanely easy {grill less too, which is great for girls, or guys who aren't familiar with the grill!}. This recipe is found in the Glamour Magazine's "100 Recipes Every Girl Should Know."

Ingredients:
2 12-14 oz boneless rib eye, 1-11/2 in thick at room temperature
Veggie Oil
Salt & Pepper
2 tbsp butter

1. Preheat oven to 500 degrees. Place a cast-iron skillet in the oven and preheat for 5 minutes. Using oven mitts, transfer the skillet to the stove top and heat over moderately high heat. Turn the oven down to 450.
2. Coat the steaks liberally with oil and season well with S&P. Place the steaks in the skillet {no additional oil needed}. Cook, turning once, until well charred, about 5 minutes.
3. Transfer the skillet to the oven and cook for about 4 minutes, turning once, until meat is medium-rare {about 125 at the thickest part of the steak}. Drizzle hot butter over the steaks and let rest for about 5 minutes. Letting it rest helps boost flavor.


Recipe # 34


This is my favorite broccoli dish I have EVER had!! Amazing! I got this recipe from a church cookbook I bought from my co-worker Caleb for his upcoming mission trip. Its a really cool cookbook!! To give credit where credit is due....it was submitted by Joshua Flynt. So whoever you are....thanks!

What you'll need:
2 heads of broccoli, stems removed
2-4 tbsp olive oil
1/4 cup of Parmesan cheese
S & P
Ziploc bag or a plastic bag {I used one that has never been used}

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees
2. Place broccoli and olive oil in the bag. Season with S & P
3. Toss until the broccoli is well coated in the olive oil
4. Add parm to the bag and toss until evenly distributed
5. Cover baking sheet with aluminum foil and spread broccoli evenly on sheet
6. Cook for 12-15 minutes, or until caramelized


It was unbelievably good! Next time I won't use as much cheese, I felt like there was a lot for a veggie dish.


I had to take a couple drink breaks and show off my super cute apron Ashley got me!!


Recipe # 35


I think this was one of my first Pinterest Pins. Who could NOT pin this?!?! This recipe can be found on this super cute blog....{HERE}. Molly was very excited when I brought these back for her!! She said it was her favorite I've made so far! haha


Recipe # 36


Along with what ingredients you need, go ahead and add new pants, belt and milk. This may the the richest dessert I've ever had. Although I was full from dinner, I don't think I could eat a full cookie in one setting. RICH. The recipe for these can be found {HERE}. By the time dessert came around we were so engulfed in Lost that we were messy, and didn't really take our time. Which resulted in us not spreading all of our cookies out enough and therefore this happened....

:) haha! We just cut them out....so it didn't quite produce as many as it should.

We also made quite a mess....



We HAD to get back to Lost!! :)

Hope you enjoyed this rather lengthy post. But I'm so excited that I got so many recipes done, and that I got to share mine and Jake's recipe with you :)

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