Salami with Cracker

Merry Christmas! It's past midnight where I am, so technically it's Christmas :).

This blog post was unplanned, so I do not have a picture of the recipe. This is an appetizer that my friend reintroduced me to. It's seriously delicious and easy! Serve it during a New Year's party or tomorrow if it's not too late.

Please note that it's not a calorie friendly snack and that it's the holidays, so go ahead and reward yourself.

Salami with Cracker (Yes, I'm lame and didn't know what to title it.)

Ingredients

- Thinly sliced salami
- Cream Cheese with Chives (any kind of non-fruit cream cheese will work fine, but the one with chives taste best with the salami in my opinion)
- Ritz or Townhouse crackers (buttery crackers)

Directions

1.  Cut the salami into small slices that fit perfectly on the cracker. Oh by the way, Ritz have cute snowflake shaped crackers that you can use to make the appetizer more festive.
2. Spread cream cheese on crackers. Layer with salami. Feel free to add some form of vegetable if desired, such as cucumber slices.

Serve and enjoy!

Spanish Inspired Fried Chicken

I love fried food, which is really bad. I try to limit myself to a specific amount and will fight the bad with something healthy, such as a salad or grilled foods. The other night I had an intense craving for fried chicken, so my roommate and I decided to make some. It was finals week and I think we deserved it. We ate the fried chicken with a delicious side salad and a bit of stuffing. We don't really have a recipe for fried chicken, so we crafted our own. Actually, the wet and dry batter we used for this recipe, we have used twice in the past already when we made chicken tenders. So yes, you can use this recipe to make chicken tenders instead, which are also delicious.

This recipe is special because we love Spanish food and including a product from Goya to give it a delicious flavor. (I need to learn from my boyfriend how to cook Dominican food, yum.) We invented the recipe by experimenting for our first group dinner. It was a very successful experiment. I'm craving some right now. Unfortunately, I don't have the ingredients at home and it's snowing out. The recipe below will make extra batter, but I feel that it's better to have extra batter than not enough batter :). This recipe includes two different batters for extra flavor and crispyness.

 Fried Chicken

2 servings.

Ingredients

- 2 chicken drumsticks (you can use chicken breast and cut them into tender pieces)

- 3 packets of Sazón Goya (with Garlic and Onion)

- 4 cups of flour

- 3 tbsp. minced garlic

- 2 tbsp. garlic salt

- 2 tbsp. onion powder (you can use fresh onion if you want)

- 2 tbsp. oregano, chopped finely

- 2 tbsp. rosemary, chopped finely

- 2 tsp. basil, chopped finely

- 1 tbsp. lemon pepper seasoning

- 3/4 cup of skim milk (You can use whole or 2% if you please.)

- Pepper

- Salt

Directions

1. In a bowl, combine together 1 1/2 cups of flour, 1 packet of Sazón, 1 tbsp. minced garlic, 1 tbsp. garlic salt, 1 tbsp. onion powder,  1 tbsp. oregano, 1 tbsp. rosemary, 1 tsp. basil, 1/2 tbsp. lemon pepper seasoning, a healthy dash of pepper (as much or as little as desired), and a pinch of salt. Mix thoroughly.

2. Add the milk to the mixture from above. Mix thoroughly. The batter should be very much like a liquidy dough. If mixture is too dry, add 1/4 cup of milk and mix. This is your wet batter.

3. Place the chicken in the mixture. Make sure chicken is covered in this batter. Cover and place in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.

4. In a different bowl, combine together 2 1/2 cups of flour, 2 packets of Sazón, 2 tbsp. minced garlic, 1 tbsp. garlic salt, 1 tbsp. onion powder, 1 tbsp. oregano, 1 tbsp. rosemary, 1 tsp. basil, 1/2 tbsp. lemon pepper seasoning, 3-5 dashes of pepper, and a pinch of salt. Mix thoroughly. This is your dry batter.

5. In a medium saucepan, heat up some frying oil (we save our frying oil in a jar) that is enough to cover most of the chicken in. Dip the marinated chicken in the dry batter. Cover the chicken pieces completely, making sure there is enough flour throughout the chicken pieces. When the oil is hot enough (place a wooden spoon or another utensil in it and if bubbles form, it's hot enough), place the chicken pieces in the oil.

6. Cook for 20-25 minutes. Be sure to turn frequently when outside of chicken is cooked, otherwise it will burn.

Serve and enjoy!

We served our fried chicken with some stuffing that my roommate made and a delicious salad. The salad was comprised of romaine lettuce, 1 boil egged, garlic croutons, baked french onion, Zesty Italian dressing, and a dash of lime juice. The salad made me feel less guilty with the exception of the croutons and french onions.

Soy Sauce Chicken & Garlic Bread

First, I would like to apologize for the terrible quality of the photo. The photo was rushed and frankly, I was starving. This recipe was definitely an experiment. Normally, we have an idea of how a dish will taste, but for this recipe, we had no idea. It turned out to be quite delicious, but a few changes would be made for next time. The chicken was a bit bland, but the rice dish we created and the garlic bread helped the chicken become balanced. I am going to leave the recipe as it is, but I recommend that you create flavorful side dishes, add more salty seasoning to the chicken, or marinate the chicken longer (we were hungry!). However, I know there are people that like a bit of blandness.

Soy Sauce Chicken
 2 servings.

Ingredients

- 2 chicken drumsticks
- 3/4 cup of soy sauce
- Garlic salt
- Pepper
- Dried oregano
- Chili powder
- Ginger
- Olive oil
- 1 small chopped onion
- 2 cloves minced garlic

Directions

1. In a bowl, whisk together the soy sauce, 3-5 dashes of garlic salt (depending on your taste), 2-3 dashes of pepper, 2 tsp. oregano, 1-2 dashes of chili powder, and 1 tsp. ginger.
2. Add the chicken and marinate for at least 20 minutes (we were hungry). Marinading for longer would be better flavor-wise.
3. In a pan, add olive oil and heat up the onions and garlic.
4. Add the chicken and cook the chicken. Turn frequently until chicken is cooked.

Serve and enjoy!

We served the chicken with rice and garlic bread (pictured above). We used a box of white rice, but we added 1 tbsp. butter, 1 small chopped onion, and 1 minced clove of garlic to it. The onions and garlic made the rice very flavorful that balanced out the chicken's blandness.

This post is special because it contains another recipe! Well, it is a very short extra recipe. This was the first time we attempted to make our own garlic bread. It turned out to be quite delicious and saved money. We're college students... we need to save ;).


Garlic Bread
2-4 servings (the mixture, slice more bread to use the remainder if you do not want to dump the leftover mixture)

Ingredients

- 2 tbsp. butter
- 2 tbsp. garlic powder or minced garlic (completely up to you)
- 1 tbsp. grated parmesan
- Grated mozzarella
- 2-4 pieces of sliced french bread (depends on how much of the mixture you put on the bread)

Directions

1. Melt the butter in the microwave for 10 seconds. Stir. If butter is not melted, microwave for 10 more seconds and stir.
2. Add the garlic and parmesan. Mix well.
3. Spread the mixture on the bread. Let the bread sit for at least 5 minutes to absorb the mixture.
4. Sprinkle each slice with mozzarella (as much or as little as desired).
5. Toast in the toaster oven at 350 degrees until cheese has melted and the edges crisp. You can do this in the oven as well if desired. I find the toaster oven faster.

Serve and enjoy!


The garlic bread we have definitely made again. The chicken, we will probably let it marinate for a longer time and add more garlic salt!

Chorizo con Huevos

I adore Spanish food. I never attempted to make this before, but I had plenty of chorizo left in the freezer. We decided to make breakfast out of it. Just so you know, the picture will look extremely meaty because we only had five eggs. I modified the recipe to include a lot more eggs, so the meal won't be so meaty. Feel free to modify the amount of meat or eggs! Oh and if you haven't guessed by now, chorizo con huevos translates to chorizo (a Spanish sausage) with eggs. This recipe is extremely simple and delicious. We actually attempted to make Spanish rice with this meal, but it turned out horribly because my friend did not follow directions :).

Chorizo con Huevos
 4-5 servings.

Ingredients

- 10 eggs (the idea is 2 eggs per person, which we couldn't do)
- 3 chorizo sausages (we used a store bought type)
- 1/2 cup of salsa (make your own or use a store bought jar)
- 1 green bell pepper, chopped
- 1 small diced onion, diced
- 1 garlic clove, minced
- 1/2 cup of grated cheese (we used cheddar and mozzarella)

Directions

1. Cook the sausage in oil (any kind you desire). Break up the sausage into pieces while you're cooking.
2. While the sausage is cooking, crack the 10 eggs into a bowl and whisk.
3. When the sausage is cooked, pour the egg mixture over the sausage.
4. Add the 1/2 cup of salsa and mix.
5. Add the bell peppers, onions, and garlic. Mix and scramble into your liking. Add the cheese
6. When egg is finished cooking and cheese has melted, serve!

Tortillas go great with this dish, especially if your dish turns out as meaty as ours :p. You can also serve it with rice as well.

Baked Spaghetti

This dish was created two weeks ago, but I haven't had time to blog because it was the end of the semester. Luckily, I'm finished with the semester since last night! Because of my lack of time to blog, there will be several posts added today.

I dislike the texture of normal spaghetti. I find it to be boring. I'll eat it and be fine, but I prefer other pastas. This recipe is delicious and we used thin spaghetti instead (for my sake). Oh and we were too hungry to wait for the dish to cool completely. If you actually wait for it to cool completely, you can serve the dish in blocks, which is kind of fun :). This recipe makes a lot.

Baked Spaghetti
6-10 servings.

Ingredients

- 1 pound of spaghetti (we used thin spaghetti)
- 1/4 pound of ground pork (you can use ground beef or turkey if desired)
- 1 green bell pepper, chopped
- 2 cups of grated mozzarella 
- 1 cup of grated parmesan
- 1 26 ounce jar + 1/2 cup of pasta sauce (We used Prego's Chunky Garden Tomato, Onion & Garlic. 26 ounces was not enough for how much spaghetti we used, so we added about 1/2 cup more of pasta sauce.)
- 1 small onion finely chopped
- Pepper
- Salt
- 1 cup bread crumbs
- 2 cloves minced garlic
- Olive oil

Directions

1. Boil the spaghetti al dente. Remember, the pasta will continue to bake in the oven.
2. While the spaghetti's boiling, in a medium saucepan, add olive oil, the ground meat, some pepper (to your liking), some salt (to your liking), the minced garlic, and half of the chopped onion. When meat is no longer pink, add the green bell pepper. Stir until cooked.
3. When the pasta is finished boiling, drain as usual. Rinse through cold water to stop the cooking process and set aside.
4. Boil the pasta sauce with the remainder of the onions, 1 cup of mozzarella, 1/2 cup of parmesan, and add pepper and salt to taste. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.
5. When pasta sauce tastes nice to your liking, add the ground meat and bell pepper combination. Stir and make sure the meat is evenly spread.
6. In large casserole dish (ours was 13x9), add the spaghetti and combine with the meaty pasta sauce mixture and 1 cup of breadcrumbs. Spread sauce evenly.
7. Top the dish with 1 cup of mozzarella and 1/2 cup of parmesan. Wrap the dish tightly in foil. Cook for 20-25 minutes or until cheese has melted.

I recommend letting it cool for at least 15 minutes, so you can serve it in blocks unlike what my friend and I did :).