Sweet Potato Crusted Quiche {+Asian Food Fest}

Posted in Breakfast, Casseroles by Cavities & Cravings

I cannot believe that I have less than 6 weeks left of residency at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital. Eeee! I feel like it was just yesterday that we moved to Cincinnati for this journey and now it’s almost over. Earlier this month I took my pediatric dental board exam and have been in the process of finalizing the details for my job. Once I am done with residency we will be staying in Cincinnati and I will be working at a couple of pediatric dental offices in the area, I cannot wait!

Husband and I are pretty excited about staying in the area; we will be calling Cincinnati home for the time being. One of my favorite things about the area is all of the festivals. With the weather finally warming up, festival season has begun. Wohoo! Last weekend we went to the Asian Food Festival downtown and we ate our way through it. Do not judge. All that food, got in our bellies and everything was delicious.

Le’s Pho: Pho & Crab Rangoon
Revolution: Kimchi Poutine & Thai Wings

For dessert we waited in a forever long line for some mediocre bubble tea & a basil mango Street Pop that was on point. Overall Asian Food Fest was a success!

Moving on to todays recipe! Husband was out of town one night so I decided to try a recipe I knew he wouldn’t be too excited about. I’ve been itching to try this sweet potato crusted spinach and feta quiche recipe and it turned out fantastic! The sweetness of the potato and the salty feta were a perfect balance to one another. Also! It reheated really nicely the next day at work. Give this recipe a try, it will not disappoint.

Ingredients:

2 medium sweet potatoes
1 teaspoon olive oil
1, 5-ounce bag baby spinach
1/2 cup skim milk
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper
4 large eggs and 2 large egg whites
1.5 ounces crumbled feta cheese

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Peel and thinly slice sweet potatoes. Spray pie dish with cooking spray and layer the dish with sweet potato slices. Lightly season with salt and pepper; spray again with cooking spray and bake in oven for 20 minutes.

2. To prepare the filling, heat a nonstick skillet over medium heat. Sauté spinach for 3-4 minutes. Remove from heat and allow spinach to cool. Place sautéed spinach mixture over sweet potato crust.

3. Combine milk, salt, pepper, red pepper flakes, and eggs in a bowl. Pour egg mixture over spinach and top with feta crumbles. Bake in oven for 35 minutes.

22Nov2013

Sunday Morning Breakfast Casserole

Posted in Breakfast by Cavities & Cravings

Ahh breakfast, my favorite meal of the day. What’s not to love? Breakfast casseroles are pretty fantastic because they are easy to throw together and they satisfy that need for egg-cheese-biscuits-sauasage all in one bite. Mmm mmm good. I wanted to share this recipe because it is so easy and convenient to throw together! This is a great recipe to have handy during the holiday season to feed the masses.

Enjoy 🙂

Ingredients:

1 can buttermilk grands biscuits
1 lb pork sausage
8 eggs
3/4 cup of milk
1 green pepper, chopped
1 tomato, diced
1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
Salt and pepper to taste

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

2. Brown pork sausage and drain. Place in casserole dish.

3. Open biscuits and cut in to bite size pieces. Place in casserole dish.

4. Mix together eggs, milk, cheese, green peppers, tomatoes, salt and pepper. Add egg mixture to casserole dish and mix well.

5. Bake in oven for 30 to 35 minutes. Let dish sit for 5 minutes before digging in.

27Aug2013

Blueberry Cream Cheese Muffins

Posted in Breakfast, Dessert by Cavities & Cravings

My favorite muffin is a blueberry muffin, but adding cream cheese to the mix seems to have changed everything! These muffins turned out delic, so moist that they nearly melt in your mouth.

Hurry up and try this recipe before blueberries are taken over by all the boring winter fruit.

Enjoy 🙂

Ingredients:

4 ounces cream cheese, softened
1/4 cup white sugar
1/2 teaspoon lemon zest
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 eggs
3/4 cup milk ( I used skim)
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/3 cup white sugar
3 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 pint blueberries

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Prepare muffin tins.
Mix together cream cheese, 1/4 cup white sugar, lemon zest, vanilla, and 1 egg with an electric mixer. Set filling aside.
In a large bowl, mix together flour, 1/3 cup white sugar, baking powder, and salt until well blended. Beat remaining egg, and stir in milk and oil; pour into flour mixture, and stir until moistened. Fill muffin cups about 1/2 full. Spoon 1 teaspoon filling onto batter. Top with batter to 3/4 full.
Bake 30 to 35 minutes.

11Aug2012

Greek Yogurt Oatmeal Pancakes

Posted in Breakfast by Cavities & Cravings

I have been a bad blogger lately, somehow the time has just escaped me. How is it already August? I have so many recipes that I have made over the past few weeks that I haven’t gotten around to posting, but I will catch up eventually!

It’s that time again for us dental students, final exams week. Yayyy. Personally, I’m pretty burnt out from school and I am lacking some serious motivation, I know I just need to make it through Wednesday. 3 days, 5 exams … not so bad compared to our usual exam schedule. Let’s just get this over with. I am definitely looking forward to the few days we will have off before starting fall semester. Husband, Diesel, Leo and I are all heading to NJ to visit my parents, one big happy family!

I woke up this morning craving pancakes. What’s the rush? Studying can wait. So I made some AWESOME greek yogurt pancakes. Oh the things you can do with greek yogurt. In my last post, I used greek yogurt in my chicken recipe. It’s such a great cooking ingredient that I never really thought to use before. These pancakes were super easy to throw together and tasted awesome. Not to mention, they’re healthy! Husband started a new diet recently so I’ve been really making an effort to cook healthier. I hope you enjoy these as much as we did 🙂

Nutrition facts for the curious minds: Serving: 1 pancake; Calories 124; Total Fat 5.2 g; Total Carbohydrate 14.0 g; Dietary Fiber 0.8 g; Sugars 4.6 g; Protein 5.5 g

Ingredients:

1 large egg, lightly beaten
1 cup Greek yogurt (I used strawberry and blueberry Chobani Greek Yogurt)
2 tablespoons canola oil
1/4 cup reduced-fat milk
1/2 cup quick-cooking oats
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Instructions:

1. In a medium bowl, whisk together the egg, yogurt, oil and milk, then add the oats.

2. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon.

3. Add flour mixture to oats mixture. Mix with a spatula, just until combined. Batter will be thick.

4. Pour 1/4 cup of the batter per pancake onto a heated griddle and cook over medium heat until puffed and lightly golden on both sides, about 3 minutes per side. I topped mine with some fresh strawberries and a little bit of syrup. Yummm.

Now that my belly is all full and I have coffee in me, it’s time to start studying, unfortunately I can’t avoid it any longer. Happy Saturday! Hope everyone has a fabulous day.

Recipe from: Voskos.com

14Dec2011

Apple Cinnamon Waffles

Posted in Breakfast by Cavities & Cravings

After failing at trying to convince myself to go to the gym early last saturday morning, I ended up making these delicious apple cinnamon waffles for breakfast. They turned out extra tasty.

Just a heads up, the batter turned out extra thick but as long as you spread it out so that it covers the entire waffle griddle, they will turn out perfect.

This recipe was modified from one on illustrated recipes

Enjoy!

Ingredients:

¾ cup sugar
4 large eggs
2 ¼ cup flour
2 large apples
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 tablespoons apple cider

Instructions:

1. Mix all ingredients using an electric mixer, except for the apples.

2. Add the grated (or chopped!) apples, along with the juice they leave.

3. Heat the waffle iron. (Medium heat if it has different heat levels). Spray with cooking spray. Cook your waffles!

27Nov2011

“Buttermilk” Waffles

Posted in Breakfast by Cavities & Cravings

Before sitting down for a long “fun-filled” day of studying husband and I decided to make an awesome breakfast. He was in charge of the eggs, bacon and sausage, whIle I took care of the waffles!

We got a new handy-dandy waffle maker on black friday from Target. 20 bucks!! It’s pretty great. It was one of many great deals we got that night!

These waffles turned out delicious! I didn’t actually have buttermilk so I had to make some substitutions. Apparently 1 cup of milk + 1 tablespoon of lemon juice or vinegar = 1 cup of buttermilk. So I went for it, and it worked! I got the original recipe from food.com. It made 8 waffles. Although the first time we filled the waffle machine up, we had a minor explosion when we closed the lid. (Over-filled, oops!) Lesson learned. So I think that this recipe would’ve actually made more had we been a little smarter than the machine. 🙂

Enjoy!

Ingredients:

2 cups of flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 eggs beaten
2 cups of buttermilk (2 cups of milk + 2 tablespoons of lemon juice)
4 tablespoons of butter (or margarine, melted)

Instructions

1. In a mixing bowl, add flour, baking powder, salt, and soda; stir to mix

2. Add in eggs, buttermilk, and butter; mix well.

3. Pour batter into a preheated prepared waffle iron; cook until steaming stops and waffles are crisp and golden.

15Sep2011

Chocolate PB Oatmeal

Posted in Breakfast, Recipes by Cavities & Cravings

I recently discovered a new blog, Katshealthcorner and found an oatmeal recipe on there that I just had to try! I’m pretty much obsessed with any chocolate-peanut butter combination and this chocolate PB oatmeal, was no exception. It’s a simple recipe and something I will be making again!

Ingredients:

1/3 cup oats
2/3 cup water
Pinch of salt
1/2 teaspoon splenda
1/4 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 tablespoon cocoa pepper
Spoonful of peanut butter
Extra chocolate chips for topping

Instructions:

1. Put oats in to bowl. Add water, salt, splenda (if you like your oatmeal on the sweeter side), and vanilla.

2. Cook your oats on either the stove top or in the microwave. (I was in a hurry so I put mine in the microwave for a bout 1 min, 10 seconds).

3. After they are done, separate evenly in to separate bowls. In one bowl add cinnamon and in other bowl add cocoa.

4. Now, in the bowl you will be eating out of, combine cinnamon and cocoa oatmeal. Keeping them on separate sides of the bowl. (On the original recipe, she made a pretty swirl with the two).

5. Melt a spoonful of peanut butter (about 20 seconds in microwave) and spread over the cinnamon side of the oatmeal.

7. Top with as many chocolate chips (I used dark chocolate chunks) as you’d like and enjoy!!

5Sep2011

Fresh Peach Muffins

Posted in Breakfast, Dessert, Recipes by Cavities & Cravings

I think breakfast might be my favorite meal of the day. But I typically don’t get the chance to really enjoy breakfast as classes start most mornings by 7:30. So, I try to make muffins or other quick, on the go breakfast type items at the beginning of the week. Today I made peach muffins since I had a couple of really ripe peaches. I found a recipe on allrecipes.com but I as usual I couldn’t help but tweak it a bit. Before peaches are completely out of season, I definitely think these are a must-try!

Ingredients:

1/2 cup light margarine
3/4 cup sugar (or Splenda)
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1/2 cup yogurt (I had peach greek yogurt, so I used that)*
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon honey
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda*
1 1/2 cup chopped fresh peaches (Be sure to remove peel from peaches)

*You can substitute the yogurt for sour cream, in which case you wouldn’t need to add the baking soda

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

2. In a mixing bowl, cream butter, white sugar, and brown sugar. Add egg, yogurt, vanilla, and honey, mix well.

3. Combine flour, baking powder, and baking soda; stir into creamed mixture just until moistened.

4. Fold in peaches. Fill greased or paper-lined muffin cups three-fourths full.

5. Bake at 400 degrees F for 20-25 minutes. Cool for 10 minutes; remove from pan to a wire rack.