Noms by Q

I'm excited to cook again after visiting grandparents in Tucson for a week, and today I took advantage of the nice weather outside (was one of the coolest days in a while, only 80 degrees). I've made burgers using a cast iron skillet before, but I think the smoke flavor inherent in grilled food made these way better than the burgers I've made on the stove. I also used ground elk meat for these because I wanted to try something different than the normal bison, and that turned out super good! This meal is also fun for the family because I was able to put together a "burger bar" with all the toppings the family wanted. They got to make their own, which added fun to the dinner and relived stress for me. Ingredients 2lbs ground meat of your choice Burger buns if you want them, my family prefers low carb so I skipped them today. Whatever seasoning blend you like for burgers (I used garlic powder, seasoning salt, white pepper, dried minced onion, cayenne pepper, and garu...

Today was a busy day, my mom and I had 3 hours of driving to attend a painting event, and I didn't have a large amount of time to cook like I usually do. Last week when I was planning the meal for today, I remembered seeing tasty looking wraps using a salad bag, so I decided to make those. Ingredients 12.6 oz (or close) salad kit 3 chicken breasts Seasoning I used for each chicken breast: (you can do whatever you would like, depending on your salad kit) Drizzle of olive oil 1/2 tsp garlic salt 1 tsp balsamic vinegar 1/2 tsp poultry seasoning Optional: Spicy mayo Start by seasoning your chicken and baking it in a 375 F degree oven. I've found that my chicken turns out to be a juicer if I bake it from frozen.  While the chicken baked, I got out the rest of my ingredients. I picked out this salad kit because it looked the best the day I went to the store. The beauty of this simple dish is that it can be so different depending on what salad kit you choose.  Prepare your salad kit...

 I've been trying to refine the family's rice pudding recipe to make it creamy and more like a normal pudding. Usually, it comes out more like a casserole, where you cut out a piece and add some milk. I wanted to make a rice pudding consistency that didn't need milk added to be creamy, and I think I finally got it.  Ingredients: 3 eggs 1 can (13.66 ounces) unsweetened coconut milk. 1 can (11.25 ounces) sweetened condensed coconut milk. 4 cups of cooked white rice. Day old rice works the best. 1 cup salted roasted cashews. 1/2 cup raisins. 2 tbsp vanilla extract 1 tsp mace. I use mace instead of nutmeg, but if you just have nutmeg it won't be a huge difference to use that instead.  1 tsp cinnamon 1/4 tsp cardamom Preheat your oven to 350 F. Start by whisking together your eggs, and then adding your milks, spices, and vanilla extract.  Add in your cashews and raisins, and then stir in your rice. Use your whisk to violently stab- I mean, break up your rice clumps. Whisk...

Arayes are Lebanese pita pockets with a savory meat filling, usually served with a sauce of some sort. I saw them on the internet about a week ago, and I thought of the chicken and cheese pita pockets that I used to love as a kid. The crunchy fried pita coupled with the warm spices in the meat appealed to me, and I knew I had to try making these.  Ingredients: 1 onion, minced very finely in a food processor (The recipes I found said to grate the onion, but my makeup was way too nice for that today) 1 1/4 lb. ground beef, lamb, or bison 1 tbsp garam masala 1 tbsp allspice 5 pita breads, cut into 10 halves Salt and pepper to taste Olive oil for frying I served these with a garlic sauce. I started to follow I recipe I found online, but didn't care for it, so I added things until it tasted good. I don't know the exact measurements I used, so I recommend doing some of your own research for a sauce that will go well with these, or inventing your own. I think a regular fry sauce would...

I hope everyone had a good 4th of July :). I thought about making a more classic American meal outside on the grill like hamburgers or hot dogs, but I just made kebabs on the grill yesterday and my fingertips are still recovering from being cooked medium rare lol. I picked up a longer pair of tongs today at the hardware store, so hopefully grilling will go better next time. I had a couple jars of coconut cardamom curry sauce I was excited to try, some pineapple leftover from yesterday, and a partial bag of potatoes I need to get through, and that sounds like a perfect recipe for a curry to me.  Ingredients 4 medium Yukon gold potatoes 10 ounces pineapple chunks 4 chicken breasts cut into cubes  1 medium onion cut into quarters and then slices 4 minces cloves of garlic 3 green onions, the white part sliced to sauté with the onion and garlic, the green part chopped up for garnish.  16 oz coconut milk based curry sauce 1 tbsp garam masala Salt and pepper to taste Optional: w...

So, I channeled my inner suburban dad today and got out the grill. I don't know if it's the summer heat, the people having fun with their fireworks 3 days before the 4th of July, or my summer allergies getting to my head, but I've been enamored with grilling lately. I've made kebabs before, but I did them in the oven rather than on the grill, and I now fully appreciate how simple the oven is. I know I make fun of my oven for taking 8 years to heat up, but it doesn't cook my fingertips to a nice medium rare. However, the flavor I got on these grilled kebabs is something that would be really hard to replicate in an oven. I have some more refining to do on the method of these kebabs, but the flavors were amazing. Ingredients 3 chicken breasts 1lb small scallops Whatever veggies you like. I used yellow zucchini, mushroom, pineapple, pearl onion chunks, garlic clove chunks, bell pepper, and jalapeno.  3 tbsp avocado oil 1/3 cup olive oil 1/4 cup teriyaki sauce 2 tsp Old ...

I originally wasn't planning on posting today since I made a recipe I've posted about before. I made my chicken almond salad (full post here: https://qsnoms.blogspot.com/2024/05/apple-celery-cranberry-chicken-salad.html ), adding some cashews I had in the pantry just because they sounded good. I whipped together a dressing for my salad, making up my own, however apparently the god of salad dressings smiled upon me today because it was the best vinaigrette I've ever made. I'm making this post not only to share what I did, but to remember it in the future.  One problem with this recipe is that I use a special blackberry infused dark balsamic. We have a local italian restaurant here that makes their own flavored balsamic vinegars, so that's where my vinegar came from. Blackberry balsamic is hard to get, I see some bottles on Amazon, but it would be silly to buy a 20 dollar bottle of balsamic to make a salad dressing lol. What I would do to make this recipe with regular...