Recent Recipes

I had a request in the comments a couple of weeks ago for my chicken lettuce wraps recipe - thought I would take the opportunity to recommend a couple of others, too...

Chicken Lettuce Wraps
We looked for a copycat recipe after falling in love with the famous appetizers at P.F. Chang's--and we think this one is pretty dead on! I'm sure if you had theirs and then ours, you'd totally be able to tell the difference, but if you haven't been there in a while, ours satisfy the craving. The recipe requires the purchase of a couple of special ingredients, which is why I didn't make it for quite a while after I found it--but they are things that last forever and definitely worth it. These wraps are also really labor-intensive with all that mincing (and trying to peel whole leaves of lettuce off the head is a giant pain), so we don't have them very often, but they definitely hit the spot for us recently.

FYI, I couldn't find "garlic and red chile paste" - I found "red chili paste" in the international aisle at Kroger and then used a clove of minced garlic. Also, you'll want to cut the special sauce recipe in half, unless you have some other use for it.

Black Bean Pumpkin Soup
Sounds weird. Does not look particularly appealing (mine did not look like her pictures). But it was from one of my favorite food blogs, Smitten Kitchen--Deb is a fabulous writer and photographer as well as cook--and I was intrigued. When I ladled it into bowls I was skeptical...when I took my first bite I was excited. Her description is quite apt: "This soup is loud. Beefy, spicy, smoky, textured and complex, ten times better than I even knew pumpkin soup could be." Yes. I'll make this again.

Sausage and White Bean Soup
This is my friend Marjorie's go-to meal for new moms. She brought it to us in November (along with some whole wheat rolls that were to DIE for...I threw five of them in my freezer and am saving them for a special occasion, oh yum...and these cookies which I ate far too many of). Anyway, Marjorie and her husband have SKILLS in the kitchen and this soup was so wonderful. It has a really distinctive taste, different from all the other tomato-based soups I make. I tried my hand at it a couple of weeks ago, and while it wasn't quite as good as hers (maybe because she uses homemade stock and sausage, maybe because I didn't have to make it, maybe a little of both) it was still quite satisfying.

Cream Biscuits
Another Smitten Kitchen recipe I printed off forever ago and just finally got around to trying. I always end up with heavy cream leftover when I make fettuccine alfredo, and these biscuits seemed like a perfect way to use it up (it was exactly the right amount). Healthy they are not...heavy cream is the *only* liquid in the biscuits...but oh my. Just make them. And freeze half before baking them or you'll just eat them all.

We've still got food in our freezer because of how nuts I went last summer/fall before Jude was born, but now that we're settling into life with two kiddos I'm enjoying being back in the kitchen some.