Weekly Recipe Wrap-Up

Apparently Brad's been bragging about my food, and is sad I didn't put up pictures of one of our dinners this week he told Jonathan about. I guess if it doesn't end up on the blog, it didn't happen! So I shall do a little weekly dinner wrap-up Wednesday's meal and tonight's.

Wednesday I was experimenting and it actually turned out really well. Brad voted for shrimp as a protein and I thought of a salad topped with shrimp. Brad asked that the shrimp "have a little color or crunch" so the best I could think of was a slightly breaded shrimp fried in a little half butter/half olive oil mixture for some browning action. I was skeptical about the shrimp, since they tasted almost a little sweet, but pairing with the spinach and sliced bell pepper salad was a lucky break. Everything ended up marrying really well. A thick homemade balsamic vinaigrette finished it off.

As for our cheap wine of the week, I wanted something with some acidity and that wasn't too heavy to pair with the shrimp salad. Whole Foods had this white bordeaux on sale, it's a 2008 Chateau Lamothe de Haux Bordeaux Blanc. It's a 40% Sauvignon Blanc, 40% Semillon and 20% muscadelle blend. Very light (we both agreed it was "almost like water" and way too easy to drink), and a great pairing with both seafood and the crispiness of the peppers and spinach. For $10.99, I'd buy this again. We're not big white people but for a meal like this, we needed it.

For tonight I needed a protein-rich meal. I've been tracking my daily calories and exercise using SparkPeople, which has been great. It's a good way to stay aware of what I'm putting in and what I'm working off. And today, SparkPeople said I needed a lot more protein for dinner if I was going to get enough for the day. So I made chicken, serrano chili, and white cheddar quesadillas. Good protein, and great flavors. Here's the recipe from Food Network. A good reminder of the southwest and home. And I made some guacamole, which never used to be a big deal, but out here it has been impossible to find good avocados. My first attempt, they were super green. My second attempt, they looks and felt great but were all brown and spotty inside. Finally today, they worked out perfectly. Yummy yummy guac, Hamilton style.

For the quesadillas, I got to break out my huge stainless skillet and flip these massive 14" tortilla sandwiches in them instead of just folding the tortilla over. Making them in the skillet helps give that great color on the tortillas as well. They were spicy (next time I'll seed the serranos before chopping them), but very good.

Hope you all had great weeks! We did, and, as you can see, we enjoyed our food!