Home made cilantro tomato sauce with whole grain pasta

I saw a few recipes online for making your own tomato sauce, so I figured I would give it a shot. I love cilantro, and I know cilantro goes in salsa, so I decided to put it in my tomato sauce too. If you were cursed with the cilantro-tastes-like-soap gene, I'm so sorry. Just leave it out.

Ingredients:

1. one can crushed tomatoes
2. basil
3. oregano
4. 1 tbsp sugar
5. half cup chopped fresh cilantro
6. one shallot or 1/4 cup diced onion
7. one clove of minced garlic

heat some oil in a sauce pan. 

mince up your garlic and onions. honestly I can't believe I haven't chopped a finger off yet--onions make my eyes water and I have a bad tendency to close my eyes while I'm chopping. 

let them sweat in the pan for about 5-8 minutes. 

and dump in the tomatoes!

Now add a tablespoon of sugar to balance out the acidity of the tomatoes. 

and don't spill it on your counter like I did .

now add a good heaping tablespoon of basil, oregano, and salt. 

and then your chopped cilantro! stir and let it simmer for 15-20 mns. 

serve over whole wheat pasta. 

so delicious. 

bonus: you can also serve it with garlic bread for a dipping sauce. I make my own--mix one stick of softened butter with minced garlic, salt, and parsley if you have it. spread it on the inside of a french loaf or sourdough and bake at 275 for 10-15 mns. 

Baked buffalo chicken strips

I have a slight obsession with buffalo sauce. I didn't even realize I liked it until a year ago so now I'm just making up for a lifetime of no buffalo sauce. These chicken strips are super good and not as unhealthy as fried ones, or so I like to tell myself....the jury is still out.

Ingredients:

1. chicken cutlets/tenderloins
2. buffalo sauce (my recipe is posted on this blog, a week ago or so, but its just hot sauce, butter, and lime juice)
3. 1 egg
4. 1 cup flour
5. 1 cup panko bread crumbs

preheat oven to 400. 

crack an egg in a bowl and put some regular hot sauce in there. 

whisk it up. 

Put some bread crumbs in one bowl and flour in another. 

1. coat the chicken in the flour...

2. then in the hot sauce/egg mix...

3. then give it a roll in the bread crumbs. 

put them on a greased oven tray. 

bake at 400 for 15 mns. After ten minutes, you can splash some hot sauce right on them, then let them continue to cook. this will up the buff factor. 

yum!

serve it with your buffalo sauce mixture. 

for extra flavor, marinate the chicken in the buffalo sauce for an hour or two before you begin the recipe. 

Grilled Stuffed Breakfast Wrap

I wanted to make a version of taco bell's doritos locos tacos for breakfast, and here is my attempt! 

Ingredients:

1. scrambled eggs (about 3)

2. egg toppings--veggies, lunch meat, cheese, etc

3. tortillas

Scramble yo eggs. 

chop up your toppings. I used green onion, anaheim pepper, orange bell pepper, green bell pepper, and some cajun turkey lunch meat (because matt bought a whole pound of it for some reason...?!)

Put the eggs and toppings on the tortilla. 

fold it up. in hindsight, I would have rolled it instead. I wanted to be cool and do the taco bell thing and it didnt stay together very well. 

back in the pan on medium-high heat. 

success! You can definitely use cheese too-this one was for matt and he doesnt eat cheese. (I know)

Grandma Florence's pretzels

My grandma Florence used to make these every christmas, and now my mom and I both make them regularly. They take a while in the oven, but if you can wait the 80 mns, it is so worth it. I think Matt and I ate like 4 ziploc bags of them one night over christmas. Oops.

Ingredients:

1. 1 pound bag of pretzels
2. one cup of oil (I used canola, the original recipe calls for vegetable oil)
3. 1/2 tsp of cayenne pepper
4. 1 tsp of garlic powder
5. one package of ranch seasoning

Pour one cup of oil into a mixing bowl. 

and a packet of ranch seasoning....

1/2 tsp of cayenne pepper...

1 tsp of garlic powder....

and whisk!

blend it well. 

Pour it over your pretzels...

And mix it up. 

Spread them over two cookie sheets. 

Bake at 200 for 80 minutes, mixing them up/turning them every 20. 

Its worth it. I promise. 

Everything salsa

Because sometimes you just want to use all of the things. 

Start off with some diced tomato. Roma tomates were on sale for .99/lb so I had a ton and diced them myself, but honestly, winter tomatoes seriously lack in flavor and you would be just as well off using canned diced tomatoes. 

Next I cut up some green onion. These are awesome and have a bit of a different flavor than red or white onion--not as pungant but still flavorful. 

You wanna cut off the little root things on the ends that look like alien fingers....

Then cut the white part all the way up to the green leaves. You can use the green leaves too--they are similar to chives in texture, but I saved mine for egg drop soup I'm going to make, and I also save them for making vegetable stock (that recipe was posted yesterday, check it out!)

I also had shallot, so I minced that up and did some garlic too. I don't usually put garlic in my salsa--I'm a purist in that sense, but I decided this is everything salsa so I'm going to put in everything. 

Green pepper....

dice!

and I had some leftover anaheim pepper from the chili I made so that went in too. 

lime juice (duh)

and a tablespoon of salt. coarse kosher salt is the best to use but I was lazy and used this instead. 

Mix er up...

and its ready to eat! I made a breakfast taco and put it in there. 

Directions:

1. warm a tortilla in a skillet

2. crack some eggs/egg whites over it

3. cover so they start to cook, for about one minute

4. flip it over, egg side down, and let it cook for about 45 seconds

5. flip it back over, egg side up now

6. put salsa, black beans, and chicken on half

7. fold it over and press with the spatula and let it cook

8. flip it to crisp the other side of the tortilla

9. done!