Smashed Potatoes

The easiest recipe to follow and the easiest side dish ever. Smashed potatoes are just what the name says ... potatoes that you smash!

Submerge your potatoes in salted water and make sure they are completely covered. Bring to a boil and then simmer. You're going to want to boil your potatoes until they are cooked, about 20 minutes. You don't want them to be too soft so that they'll fall apart when you add pressure to them.

Once your potatoes are cooked, drain them. I let them sit for about 15 minutes so they weren't scalding hot.

Preheat your oven to 475 degrees F and starts smashing those babies!

I used a meat mallet but you could also use your hand (or whatever you have handy, really).

Add some extra virgin olive oil to your baking sheet; you're going to want the bottom of the sheet covered in oil. Using a spatula, transfer the smashed potatoes to the baking sheet. Drizzle some oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper.

Bake for about 25 minutes. The inside is going be really soft and the outside will be all crispy.

I added a bit of paprika to the top of mine, but you could use whatever seasoning you like. I also had some home made turkey burger patties frozen so we had a BBQ turkey burger and smashed potatoes for supper. It was really good and so fast and easy to make.

I seen this recipe on TV actually and it looked so easy, I just had to try it. You can go here for the TV version:
http://www.cbc.ca/inthekitchen/mobile/touch/blog/2012/10/crispy-smashed-paprika-potatoes.html

Split Lighting

I love photography. I am amazed by the beautiful pictures that some people can take. Learning your camera can be very tricky and takes so.much.practice!!! I'm really going to try to focus (pun intended!) more on my camera and practice as much as I can. I always say I'm going to do this but then I get frustrated and give up. But not this time!!

 I came across a website that has been very helpful in providing photography tips. It's called Click it up a Notch (http://clickitupanotch.com) and the blogger has soooo many tutorials that can help you learn your camera. It's a pretty fantastic website, actually.

After looking at some of her tutorials, I decided to try something called Split Lighting. It's basically when the sun is hitting half of your face, which causes one side to be lit up and the other side to be dark. I grabbed my camera, tripod and remote flash and tested it out. I put a chair in front of my window and threw some pillows on it (so I could focus on something before I got in the picture). I removed the pillows and sat at a 90 degree angle so the sun/light was only getting half of my face. I was so surprised to see that after one shot, it actually worked!! I took the picture a few times, trying to make sure I was in focus and getting a shot I liked.

Here is the final picture ...

 I know it's not perfect but I think it turned out pretty good. When I try it again, I will probably use Photoshop to brighten one side and darken the other. In this picture, both sides are bit dark, but you get the point! Hopefully my sister will let me practice on her - it's hard to take pictures of yourself sometimes!! 

Happy Shooting!

Orange and Maple Grilled Salmon

I honestly don't know what I would do without Pinterest in my life.

How did I eat before it? I have no clue. But I've had some goooood eats since it has come into my life, haha.

Anywayyy ... the other day I grilled some salmon on the barbecue that had been marinated with an orange and maple glaze. I found the recipe on Pinterest (of course) and this is where the original recipe came from:

http://iowagirleats.com/2012/04/23/maple-grilled-salmon-with-skinny-rice/

I try to eat healthy most of the time. I love junk food and sometimes I just give in but for the most part,  I try to make things at least healthier.

Luckily, this recipe is pretty good for you so there was no adjusting.

Ingredients:

1/4 cup of rice vinegar

3 Tbs of Maple Syrup

3 Tbs of Orange Juice

4 Salmon Fillets (I only used 2)

Dash of Salt and Pepper

What to do: 

In a bowl, combine the rice vinegar, maple syrup and orange juice. Add the mixture and the salmon to a zip lock bag and marinate in the fridge for 1-3 hours.

Once your salmon has been marinated long enough, heat up your barbie (and pretend your Australian) on high.

Pour the marinade from the Zip Lock bag into a small sauce pan and heat until the it reduces by half. I used medium heat and then turned it down a bit after it started to bubble. 

The original recipe called for spraying both sides of the salmon with non-stick spray before placing on the barbecue. I don't like using this spray so I put it on the BBQ without it.

However, this caused it to stick too much so I eventually placed it in tin foil for it to cook the rest of the way.

You're going to want to cook your salmon for about 4-6 minutes on each side (or until it's cooked all the way through .. obviously!!). The time it will take to cook the salmon will vary depending on how thick it is. Mine actually took a little bit longer.

You're also going to want to brush the salmon with the marinade (that you have reduced) every couple of minutes. When you flip it, keep marinating!

My salmon had a weird thing going on with its tail.

Once your salmon is all cooked, put 'er on a plate and season with salt and pepper to taste.

I served mine with brown rice and broccoli (that I threw in the frying pan for a couple of minutes). 

My salmon started to fall apart on the BBQ, which is why I ended up wrapping it in tin foil. It would have looked prettier otherwise, haha.

And there you have it, not too shabby for healthy food ;)

Lasagna Chicken and Spinach Rolls

Over the weekend I made delicious lasagna rolls that I stuffed with ricotta cheese, spinach and chicken. I'm horrible when it comes to measuring things. I pretty much just wing it and throw stuff together. Basically, I'm too lazy to measure.

But luckily, I haven't fooled things up too much. Yet!

So here is the best shot of the measurements that I think I used.

Ingredients:
2 boneless, skinless cooked chicken breasts
1 can of Spaghetti Sauce or approx. 2 cups of home made sauce
8 lasagna noodles
1 1/2 cups Ricotta Cheese
1/4 cup of Parmesan Cheese
2 cups of spinach
Dash of salt and pepper


First you make your sauce (or use store bought - whatever works). I had some home made sauce frozen in the freezer, so I thawed that out.

You'll also want to cook your chicken at this time as well. I fried 2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts that I had cut into small chucks. Shredding it would have been good, too.

Boil your lasagna noodles for about 10 minutes. I used 9 noodles (which was way to much for just me and my fiancée). Throw on some garlic bread and you can expect it will serve 3 or 4 people (depending on appetite).While your noodles are cooking, you can make the cheese mixture.

In a medium bowl, combine 1 1/2 cups of ricotta cheese, 1/4 cups of Parmesan cheese, cooked chicken breasts chunks and 2 cups of spinach. I always use fresh spinach but you could use the frozen kind too if it's thawed and drained. I added a dash of salt and pepper to this as well.

Once your lasagna noodles are cooked, remove them from the water. I used tongs to remove them individually and placed them on a baking sheet for about 10 minutes. I ran them under cold water before placing them on the sheet so they wouldn't be all starchy. You can pre-heat your oven to 375 degrees F about now.

I lined a 13x9 inch baking dish with parchment paper (because I'm lazy and hate the mess) and spooned some of the spaghetti sauce evenly on the bottom of the dish.

Once the noodles had cooled off, I spooned the cheese mixture on the bottom half of the noodle and rolled them up. You'll want to place them seam-side down into the dish and cover with the rest of your sauce.

Of course, don't forget to add some extra Parm on top!!!

Cover (with foil) and pop that baby into the oven and cook for about 20-25 minutes.

If your anything like me, you can add a little bit of extra Parmesan cheese on top and viola!

Here you have it ... delicious!

Reese's Peanut Butter Cup Cheesecake

So last month for my boyfriend's birthday, I made him a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup Cheesecake. If you like peanut butter and chocolate, then this ones for you. However, I will warn you that it gets costly to make!!

Here is a picture I took right before serving (it was hard trying to get a picture with everyone drooling over it!)

Crust:

1 full tray of Oreos (crush in food processor)
1 cup of chopped roasted peanuts (crush in food processor)
1/2 cup of  butter, melted

Filling:


4 packages of 8oz cream cheese, softened
5 eggs, room temperature
1.5 cups of firmly packed brown sugar
1 cup of smooth peanut butter
1/2 cup of whipping cream
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
10-12 Reese's Peanut Butter Cups - broken into pieces

Topping:

3 ounces of sour cream
1/2 cup of sugar
a bag of Mini Reese's Peanut Butter Cups
a handful of semi-sweet chocolate chips and remaining whipping cream


What to do (you'll need to make this a head of time because the cheesecake needs to be refrigerated for at least 4 hours - I kept mine in the fridge over night):

Crust:

• Combine the crushed Oreos and peanuts with the melted butter
• Pat into bottom of springform pan and up sides. (The recipe I used said to use a 10 inch pan - I just used whatever one I had home, no idea of it's size)

Filling:

• Beat cream cheese in a bowl (using paddle attachment) until smooth. I added each package one at a time.
• Add eggs, one at a time, making sure they have been beaten well before adding the next one.
• Add sugar, peanut butter and cream; mixing until smooth

side note: *make sure you get all of the lumps out of cream cheese mixture - I had to mix and stir, mix and stir a few times before all the cream cheese lumps had disappeared*

• Stir in vanilla and then fold in your broken peanut butter cup pieces
• Pour your delicious filling into your prepared crust.

next side note: *cheesecake is cooked in a water bath*

• Place springform pan into a larger baking pan - I used a square roaster. I wrapped tin foil all around the bottom and sides of my springform pan so that no water could get into the bottom of my pan.
• Pour hot water into larger pan so that water is about 1 inch up the side of the springform pan.
• Put that cakey happiness in the oven and bake at 275°F for 1.5 hours. 
• Make sure the cake is cooked in the middle - it took about 1 hour and 45 minutes for mine to cook. 
• Be veryyyy careful removing the cake in the water bath from the oven- it will need to be returned to the oven if you decide to use the sour cream glaze.

Topping:

• Combine the sour cream and sugar and spread on the cheesecake.
• Return to oven for about 5 minutes. 
• Remove from the oven and let cool for an hour
• I ran a knife along the edge of the pan to loosen the cake, placed it on a cake tray and refrigerated over night
• Before serving, I chopped my mini Reese Peanut Butter Cups in half and placed them all around the cake (they will stick because of the sour cream glaze)
• I then melted my chocolate chips and whipping cream in a bowl over a boiling pot (but I'm sure the microwave will work too) and drizzled that goodness all over the cake.

And ta-da:

A collage of happiness ;)

To see where I discovered this recipe, check out this link to Food.com

http://www.food.com/recipe/ruggles-reeses-peanut-butter-cup-cheesecake-114907

Happy Valentine's Day!

For someone new to the blogging world, I have to say, coming up with a name has to be the hardest thing ever! Finally, once I thought I had a great name, I put it in the "check availability" box and of course "sorry, this blog address is not available". How many times did I see this?! Too many to even count!

Anyway, I wanted to name this 'under the sun', as i really wanted to be able to talk about everything - shoes, clothes, food, crafts, and everything else under the sun, but of course - taken. And that's when i decided to check everything else under the sun and BAM - here I am. So hopefully this will be the beginning of something fun - a place where I can ramble and talk nonsense :)

But this next declaration will make sense - happy valentines day! And in honor of valentine's day, I decided to wear my bright pink blazer and a ruffled top. I seen a blazer like this on pinterest a while back and just had to have one. So when I seen one in the store the other day, I immediately grabbed it off the rack.

                              Here is the original picture:                       Here is mine:

Mine is obviously brighter - and I probably should have cleaned the mirror first, but oh well - I love it :)