Product Placement Wednesday - Trader Joe's Carefully Curated Collection Flavored Olive Oil

Yes, Product Placement Wednesday is back! Think of it as a recurring character in the cast that is my blog rather than a series regular. Too many things to blog about and not enough time to do it! For this "PPW" I have a GREAT item. One you will not want to miss!

Trader Joe's Carefully Curated Collection Flavored Olive Oil

Our friends at Trader Joe's are starting to fill their shelves with their fall seasonal items (pumpkin lovers take note!) and one of my favorites from last year is on the shelves ahead of schedule! I was told that this just arrived this week which was perfect timing as I am running dangerously low on all three flavors. So what are these wonderful flavors? Included in this pack you received Basil, Lemon & Hot Pepper. You can see some of Trader Joe's recommendations via the link above but here are some of my favorite uses:

Basil - Toss with whole wheat pasta, fresh tomatoes and your cheese of choice.

Lemon - Drizzle on a salad of butter lettuce, Parmesan cheese, avocado and blueberries.

Hot Pepper - Try this oil with the Jalapeno Chicken Sausage, brown rice, sauteed tomatoes, and feta cheese.

Keep in mind these are finishing oils - not cooking oils. I have experimented with all of them and the combinations are endless. I recommend adding a bit of nice salt to bring your dishes to life.

You can find the Carefully Curated Collection Flavored Olive Oil either in the olive oil section and/or in the new product section depending on your store. These oils have a great date on them (mine is 2015) so if you cook for a crowd you may want to pick up more than one! They would also make a great gift for the chefs in your life.

What are your favorite combinations with the flavored olive oils? I would love to hear from you!

The Bachelor Pad Dinner, Part 1

First off, I will admit that the title of this post is misleading. While the train wreck known as Bachelor Pad is currently airing, this recipe (and those to follow) are actually from LAST summer. Yes, I'm a recipe hoarder. The good news is that if the items were in season last summer, they certainly are in season THIS summer! I've got a few great meals that you're not going to want to miss! They make even the worst reality tv delish.

Smoked Sea Salt Salmon
1 large piece of salmon
Trader Joe's Smoked Sea Salt
black pepper, finely ground
3 slices of lemon
3 cloves of garlic

1. Top salmon with the rest of the ingredients.
2. Bake to desired temperature. (I wasn't the one doing the baking so hopefully the salmon chef will weigh in on oven temperature. Otherwise I would just use your favorite salmon recipe for guidance.

Mediterranean Green Beans
2 cups French style green beans
1 cup mini heirloom tomatoes, quartered
1/4 cup fat free feta cheese, crumbled
4 basil leaves, chiffonade
olive oil
sea salt, finely ground
black pepper, finely ground

1. Cook green beans according to directions (this will vary depending on whether the green beans are fresh or frozen. Fresh is preferred).

2. Top with tomatoes, feta, and basil.

3. Drizzle with olive oil and finish with salt and pepper to taste.

Sweet & Spicy Summer Salad
4 cups butter lettuce
1/2 medium orange, cut into small pieces
1/2 avocado, chopped
1/4 cup wasabi almonds, finely chopped
lemon olive oil
sea salt, finely ground

1. Toss lettuce, orange, avocado and wasabi almonds with lemon olive oil. Salt to taste.


A super easy and light summer dinner is served!

Iron Chef West Hollywood, Part 4

I can't believe how many recipes I have yet to post! There are still some from The Bachelorette and Bachelor Pad plus at least one picnic! Today's post was a recent dinner Katie and I made. It was not completely Iron Chef style like we've done in the past but we did still somewhat throw it together.

Meatless Meatballs and Vegetable Saute

8 meatless meatballs

10 baby zucchini, chopped

1/2 cup frozen leeks

1/4 cup white onion

1/4 cup red onion

1 tablespoon garlic

dried rosemary

coarse sea salt

Trader Joe's Flower Pepper

garlic olive oil

parmesan cheese

cooked brown rice or whole wheat pasta

1. Saute onion and leeks in a bit of water to help soften.

2. When onions start to look clear, add baby zucchini and garlic and continue to saute until zucchini softens. Add more water if needed.

3. Microwave meatless meatballs per package instructions.

4. Add rosemary, salt and flower pepper to vegetable mixture to taste.

5. Add meatless meatballs to vegetable mixture.

6. Top brown rice or whole wheat pasta (we used rice) with meatballs and vegetable mixture.

7. Drizzle with garlic olive oil and top with parmesan cheese.

Trader Joe's Kale Salad Knock Off

Note - This is a knock off of a new salad that Trader Joe's is carrying. It sounded so good but the dressing had so many calories that I figured I should just try to make it myself! The original doesn't include avocado and does include almonds but I made the substitutions based on what I had at my house. I have made it again with wasabi almonds and it was also delish!

4 cups of kale

1/2 cup edamame, shelled

1/2 avocado, chopped

1/2 cup dried cranberries

1/2 cup non-fat Greek yogurt

1 tablespoon garlic olive oil

1/8 cup fresh lemon juice

coarse sea salt, to taste

1. Combine kale, edamame, avocado, cranberries, (& almonds if you desire).

2. In a separate bowl, combine yogurt, garlic olive oil, lemon juice, and salt.

3. Top kale salad with dressing and mix well to coat the entire salad. The dressing is really thick so it will take a minute or so to combine properly.

Product Placement Wednesday - Airwaves Gum

If you are like me, I love to pick up new food items when traveling. When in Europe, I found myself especially fascinated by the candy selection. While I try not to eat a lot of candy, I adore it. Maybe that's why I still love Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory so much? I would kill to be allowed in that room made of candy! Mmmm candy....

So this week's product - Airwaves (made by Wrigley) is actually considered a "wellness" gum (which I consider candy even though you don't eat it) so it is really more of a health food. I discovered it on a trip to the UK and have become a little obsessed. The gum has a menthol core which is extremely powerful. I love it because it knocks out bad breath and then the flavor shifts to become a delightful chewing gum. I will be honest though that some people find the menthol portion of the gum too intense and liken it to medicine. The Menthol & Eucalyptus is the most common and popular flavor though there are a variety of flavors that vary throughout Europe and Asia. My personal favorite - Spicy Cocktail - has unfortunately long been discontinued. Black Current and Honey & Lemon are other great ones and are currently available in Asia. There are a variety of other flavors I have not had the pleasure to try yet but would welcome feedback from anyone that has tried them!

How do you get this delicious gum? Personally I have anyone going to a country that carries Airwaves to pick me up a few packs. You can also order from Amazon.com or British Delights. I tried writing to Wrigley to see if they would start carrying it in the US and was told "This is a product specially formulated for our overseas consumers." or something like that. Stupid Wrigley.

The Bachelorette Dinner, Part 4

Last week we skipped dinner due to scheduling challenges but that doesn't mean we needed to skip dessert! Popsicles are a quintessential summer treat and so easy to make yourself. Plus homemade popsicles are much more nutritious than the store bought variety. A few months ago, I shared my simple recipe for yogurt popsicles during The Bachelor Dinner, Part 3. This time the pops are dairy free and have only two ingredients!

Simple Strawberry Popsicles

Note - Quantity of ingredients will vary based on the number of popsicles and size of mold.

Fresh Strawberries

Sugar Free Lemon-Lime Flavored Sparkling Water (seltzer water can be substituted but you will need to add a bit of sweetener)

1. Place clean, de-stemmed strawberries into blender.

2. Add sparkling water until the berries are half covered.

3. Blend to your desired consistency and add more water if needed.

4. Strain seeds if desired.

5. Pour into popsicle molds.

6. Freeze.

I created this recipe when I had strawberries to quickly use up but I think it would work well with other fruit/water combos. Blueberry and lemon sound particularly good to me!

My molds were from IKEA but I found these cute molds at Bed, Bath & Beyond and Amazon.com.

Has anyone else created any fun popsicle recipes this summer? Are you too busy or lazy to make your own popsicles? Check out Trader Joe's Peach Pops!

The Bachelorette Dinner, Part 1

As you may recall, Amie and I love our Bachelor Monday dinners! Past dinners can be found here: Week 1, Week 2, Week 3, Week 4, Week 5, Week 6, Week 7, & Week 8. With the new season of The Bachelorette in full and very annoying swing, we are back to our whipping up our weekly dinner delights! Due to schedule conflicts, we did not cook for a few of the first episodes and I am a week behind in posting as well. So without further ado, enjoy our most recent "recipes"!

A couple of notes about this week's dinner:

1. It it by far one of the easiest dinners we have made and it was so delicious!

2. It includes another great use for Greek yogurt as previously discussed.

Roasted Chicken Greek Pitas

1 package/2 patties Trader Joe's Roasted Chicken Patties (8oz of cooked chicken or other chicken patties can be substituted)

1 dozen cherry tomatoes

3 tablespoons fresh mint, chopped

1 whole wheat pita

Homemade Tzatziki (recipe below)

1. Heat chicken patties per their instructions (I use the microwave) or prepare chicken as desired. Dice into cubes.

2. Slice whole wheat pita in half in order to make two "pockets".

3. Fill pita pockets with chicken, tomato and mint.

4. Serve with homemade tzatziki.

Homemade Tzatziki

1 cup non-fat Greek yogurt

juice from 1/2 a lemon

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 small cucumber, diced

1 clove of garlic, minced

chopped mint, salt & pepper to taste

1. Combine all ingredients in a bowl.

2. Enjoy!

Sweet & Spicy Salad

2-3 handfuls Trader Joe's Wasabi Arugula

1/3 cup fat free feta

Trader Joe's Orange Muscat Champagne Vinegar (regular champagne vinegar with a little orange juice would probably be a fine substitution)

Olive Oil

Salt

1. Combine wasabi arugula and feta in a bowl.

2. Whisk together vinegar, olive oil and a dash of salt.

3. Toss and serve.

We enjoyed our meal with an appetizer platter of meats, cheese, etc from Trader Joe's and The Cheese Store of Silverlake.

Even though these blog entries are not specifically about The Bachelorette, is it just us or do you all want to throttle Ashley too?

Easy Spring Dinner

I still have two easy dinners from "Bachelor Monday" to share but with these wonderful bursts of warm weather I have been feeling like summer is just around the corner. Well, at least in LA it is (sorry to my Ohio readers who are still having bursts of winter!). A couple weeks ago I threw together a delicious warm weather dinner that was both full of flavor and light on the calories - Lemon Cucumber Quinoa and Grapefruit Avocado Salad.

Lemon Cucumber Quinoa

NOTE: I made an entire batch of quinoa but only used about 1/2 for the preparation below. This allows you to make a variety of salads out of the same batch of quinoa.

1 Cup Red Quinoa (other quinoa can be substituted)

2 Cups Water (broth can be substituted)

Cucumbers

Mint

Lemon

Olive Oil

Good Quality Salt (I like the Pink Himalayan Salt with a grinder from Trader Joe's)

1. Prepare quinoa in water in either a rice cooker or on the stove according to package directions. Allow to cool to room temperature.

2. Based on the amount of quinoa you are using with this preparation, finely chop cucumber and mint. Add to quinoa.

3. Add freshly squeezed lemon juice to taste. You will want to make sure there is a noticeable lemon flavor but not overpowering.

4. Add a dash of olive oil and a bit of salt.

5. Stir and adjust the above as needed.

Makes approximately 8 side servings if all the quinoa is used.

For more great quinoa recipes, check out past posts here as well as The Little Red Apron - my friend Lisa's blog!

Grapefruit Avocado Salad

Butter Lettuce

Avocado

Red Onion

Pink Grapefruit

Trader Joe's Orange Muscat Champagne Vinegar (regular champagne vinegar with a little orange juice would probably be a fine substitution)

Olive Oil

Good Quality Salt

1. Rinse butter lettuce (if needed) and add to salad bowl.

2. Cut up avocado, red onion and grapefruit in proportion to the amount of lettuce used. I recommend that not more than a ratio of 1/3 toppings to 2/3 lettuce be used as these are bold flavors.

3. Lightly salt the salad.

4. Mix together the vinegar and olive oil. I have found the best way to do this is to slowly add the olive oil to the vinegar while whisking. The amount will vary based on how wet a salad you prefer. Personally I feel that this salad is best with just a bit of dressing. Remember, you can always add more if you feel you went too light.

5. Toss and serve.

I served this with the Grilled Lemon Chicken from Trader Joe's however even without the chicken it was a great meal for my vegetarian friend. We enjoyed a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc with our meal however next time I would probably choose a different label. I can't wait for the weather to stay warm and enjoy more meals like this all summer long!

The Bachelor Dinner, Part 5

So as you can see, I'm not really one for recipes. I like to think of them as jumping off points. Well this week I made on of the dishes from an actual recipe! Ok, I made a few small adjustments but more or less followed the recipe. This week we enjoyed Lemon Ricotta Pasta with Arugula, Lemon Chicken, and Green Beans with Red Onion and Creamy Feta Dressing.

Lemon Ricotta Pasta

I didn't follow a recipe when I made this particular dish. I looked at a number of similar recipes online and they all included extra oil, butter or cream. I wanted to keep it light and healthy. This is the closest recipe I could find online after the fact - Lemon Ricotta Pasta for those of you that would prefer a standard recipe. Here is the Gretchen version:

1/2 lb Whole Wheat Rotelle Pasta (Penne, Fusilli, or other similar pasta would be a good substitute)

15 oz Fat Free Ricotta Cheese (I used slightly less because I already ate part of it. :) )

1 Lemon - Zest & Juice (I only used juice from 1/2 the lemon but it could have used a bit more. Adjust to your taste.)

1 Bag of Arugula - rinsed and chopped

Garlic

Salt

Pepper

1. Cook the pasta until it is al dente.

2. While the pasta is cooking, combine the ricotta cheese, lemon zest (do yourself a favor and buy a microplane instead of a standard zester. So much easier!), lemon juice (squeeze through your fingers to catch seeds), garlic (to taste), salt (to taste) and pepper (to taste).

3. When the pasta is done, first scoop out 1/3 cup of the pasta water.

4. Place desired amount of arugula into pasta strainer. The heat of the pasta will wilt the arugula. You may not choose to use the entire bag but I would recommend at least half a bag because it shrinks up a lot.

5. Dump pasta into strainer.

6. Mix reserved pasta water into ricotta mixture until desired consistency is reached. The recipe I linked to above says to use the entire 1/3 cup but I didn't even use half that much. It is up to you how thin you want your sauce to be.

7. Throw pasta and arugula back into pot and top with ricotta mixture.

8. Stir all items together and serve!

Servings - 4 to 6 healthy sides

Lemon Chicken

This was not made from scratch but purchased from Trader Joe's. If you choose to make your own lemon chicken, I recommend using real lemons and not lemon juice from a bottle no matter what the recipe says. I have horrible memories of that flavor from when I was a kid. (Sorry Mom. I know you were just trying to expand our menu options. I will share your amazing Blueberry Muffins in a future entry!) When enjoying pasta leftovers, I made some turkey meatballs and they were also pretty good with the pasta. I nice chicken sausage would probably also be quite good.

Green Beans with Red Onion and Creamy Feta Dressing

As I mentioned, I basically followed the recipe on this on. This recipe is from the I Heart Trader Joe's Cookbook but it is easy to make even if you don't have a Trader Joe's nearby. I'll note my substitutions in parenthesis. Also, I only made about 1/2 the dressing as I wasn't sure how long it would keep and there were only two of us for dinner. It still turned out great!

1 16 oz Package Fresh Green Beans, trimmed & steamed (12 oz Haricot Vert Steam in Bag)

1/2 Red Onion, thinly sliced

Dressing

1/2 cup Plain Yogurt (Fat Free Plain Greek Yogurt)

3/4 cup Feta Cheese, crumbled (Fat Free Feta Cheese)

1 tablespoon Lemon Juice or Red Wine Vinegar (I used the vinegar)

Freshly Ground Black Pepper

2 tablespoons Chopped Basil, for garnish

1. Arrange green beans on a serving plate and scatter most of the red onion slices over the surface, reserving a few.

2. Whisk together the dressing ingredients. Note: The dressing will be thick with pieces of feta throughout.

3. Dollop the dressing over the salad and garnish with reserved red onion slices and basil.

I mixed the onion into the dressing as I was plating up individual portions and it worked just fine.

Servings - 4 to 6

We enjoyed a rose wine with our meal though I think I crisp white would also be good.

This meal was SO easy and pretty healthy. I hope you'll try it out soon. Please let me know what you think!