SQUASH IT!

LASDI©

Cooking is my love language to others. Food itself is one of my own love languages. I think this is so for most of us. This is the reason I wrote the book A Life of Flavor. It is a book about finding the joy in the dark times life brings us, with matching recipes for comfort. Everything we DO revolves around food, and for my family, we are usually talking about the next meal to come during the one we are sitting together for!

One of the things I really like to do for The Hubster is cook a Saturday morning breakfast. There are very rare times we have a free Saturday morning, so when we do, I like to express my love for him by making something awesome to commemorate the opportunity!

Also, because I want to keep him around for as long as possible, I try to make it as healthy as possible. I’m not ALWAYS able to do so - #RealLife - but do the very best I can. I am the low-carb girl of the family, so I also do my best to keep it that way for him, too. All of those things do not make for an easy-but-awesome breakfast.

Challenge. ACCEPTED.

Here we have a bacon (uncured with no nitrates or preservatives, of course!), egg, and cheese breakfast sandwich. The clencher? The “bread” is butternut squash panny-cakes!! And boy-oh-BOY were they delicious and perfectly bread-like!

I know it is really easy to take a couple of slices of bread out of the package or whatever bread of your choice for a morning sandwich; hear my cry!! This is SO EASY, and SO WORTH YOUR HEALTH.

PS It is PERFECT for September as we transition out of Summer and into the Autumn season!

So try it! Let me know how you like it!

BUTTERNUT SQUASH PANNY-CAKES

2 cups butternut squash

extra virgin olive oil

1 cup almond flour

4 eggs

sea salt, to taste

pepper, to taste

1/2 tsp baking soda

coconut oil

For my butternut squash, I bought pre-peeled and cubed at the grocery store. It’s just easier and faster. I tossed them with a little bit of evoo and placed them on a baking sheet. I broiled them for about ten minutes until they were cooked through, and then put them into a standing mixer bowl. If you don’t have a standing mixer, a hand mixer will do just fine! Place all other ingredients up to coconut oil into mixing bowl and mix unil blended into a loose batter consistency.

Heat heavy pan (I use my cast-iron griddle, flat side!) without oil for about two minutes. Add about a tablespoon of coconut oil before each panny-cake prior to cooking, and adjust heat with each one accordingly. Ladle or pour desired amount onto pan and cook over medium heat until browned. Just like a regular panny-cake, when you see the bubbles on the upside, flip it carefully and cook the other side until brown.

NOTES: This was to be bread for the breakfast sandwich; however, if you would like a sweeter panny-cake, add 1 teaspoon of sugar to the batter and add your favorite syrup after cooking and prior to eating! I just squashed the bacon, egg, and cheese right between two huge pieces and watched it disappear with a smile on The Hubster’s face!

I LOVE WAFFLES

.....and The Hubster.  I love him enough to do THIS to his waffles.  I mean, let's be real here: marriage is hard work in order for it to be successful, and the only extra time this took was about a minute longer to use a cookie cutter to cut them out.  That's not hard work.  That's love, if you'll pardon the cliché.  I used a mold for the egg and fixed the plate up all purty-like and he loved it!  And he loves me.  And I'm ever-so-grateful.  Grateful enough to share my vanilla waffle recipe with you!!  It's fast and easy, and you'll love them!  (And maybe you'll learn to love me, too.)

VANILLA WAFFLES

2 cups flour

1 1/2 tbs baking powder

1/4 tsp sea salt

2 tbs sugar

2 eggs, beaten

2 tsp vanilla

1-1/2 cups milk

1/4 cup canola oil (or other medium-to-high heat oil)

Get your waffle iron going by preheating it while you make your batter.  Combine the flour, baking powder, salt and sugar.  Make a hole in the center of your dry ingredients and and add the eggs, vanilla and milk. Stir like a crazy person until well-combined, though your batter may be just a tad lumpy.  Add the oil to your batter and stir again.  Using a ladle, pour desired amount of waffle batter onto your preheated waffle iron, and cook until desired brown-ness (is that a word?).

NOTES: Since carbs, sugar, and flour are a treat in this house, I at least use all-organic ingredients, including the oil, but this is not a necessity in order for the waffle to taste crazy-amazy.  #LoveYou

PASTA LOVE

SHE2016©

It is a Leap Year so we got an extra day in February!  So because this was the last Sunday in February I had to make sure it was a Sunday Supper of Love to remember!  I decided - even as the Low-Carb Girl in the house - to go all out and make The Hubster home-made pasta!  I topped it with chicken Parmesan and made a side of squash stacks of eggplant, yellow squash, and zucchini, and some lovely garlic knots.  I finished it off with almond-liquor raspberry-topped cheesecake and a Bishop Burgundy cocktail.  It was nothing short of amazing, but was still pretty easy!  Who would you like to show some love to?  The way to the heart is through the stomach, no?  

SHE2016©

FAST & EASY HOME-MADE PASTA

3 large eggs
1/4 teaspoon salt
a pinch of black pepper
1/2 teaspoon olive oil
1 cup flour

Add the eggs, salt, pepper, and olive oil to a food processor fit with the blade attachment, and pulse two or three times.  Add half the flour, and pulse until it is absorbed into the eggs and you have a bit of a paste. Add the rest of the flour, and continue to run the blade until you see a ball-shaped mass of flour and eggs bouncing around the processor. If the dough is still too sticky to the touch, add an extra tablespoon of flour. If it's a bit dry, then add a little water as needed.  Take the pasta dough out and roll/shape according to what you're looking to accomplish with your dish.  For us this time around, it was fettuccine-shaped with marinara sauce.  I cooked it in the sauce for about five minutes, as fresh pasta takes a lot less time to cook.  And it was incredible.

NOTES: Carbs doesn't mean unclean in my house.  I still use organic ingredients, including the flour and olive oil.  I really do believe in this particular case, it makes for a better-tasting pasta.  Happy eating! 

Here Comes the Bride! (A Shower of Love)

This image is © 2015 by Life As She Does It. Please link back or credit if any content or images are used. 

Last Saturday, we had a bridal shower for my Daughter-In-Law (to be!), Kiren.  The Daughts (Miz Chelsea Erickson of Beauty by Chelsea), our sweet friend, Dixie Moreau, and I, did NOT do too shabby!  The two of them worked the Shampps (our word for champagne) Bar, and EVERYTHING ELSE.  I handled the cooking and baking!  We had creamy pasta salad, lemon thyme bars, crudité, crack sammiches (see past post Man Food, which obviously became Woman Food), two kinds of quiche, cinnamon rolls, bread pudding, fruit salad, mini panny-cakes (my own word for pancakes) with blueberries on top, orange cranberry muffins, and cucumber-radish canapés, along with three different juices and fruits for the Shampps Bar to go into the sugar-rimmed glasses!  Whew!  So you can OBVIOUSLY see why I am only going to post one recipe, and probably the easiest, and yet super-chic: canapés.

This image is © 2015 by Life As She Does It. Please link back or credit if any content or images are used. 

These little beauties were DELISH!  The wedding is boho-chic, and these went perfectly with the theme!

1 pkg white bread (I know, I know.  I preach against it all the time.  But this is a MUST to make these successfully)

1/2 stick butter, softened

2 cucumbers, washed and sliced thinly

1 pkg radishes, washed and sliced thinly

1 cup sour cream

dill, for garnish

Take the bread and with a round cookie mold (or some other kind of pattern that will mold two small rounds out of one slice - a small glass, perhaps?) make two small rounds without crust.  Lightly butter each round, then pile cucs and then radishes on them.  Place a very small dollup of sour cream on the pile and then garnish with the dill.  Sounds too easy to be delicious?  Try it and see for yourself!

I appreciate all the hard, HARD work Dixie put in.  She is a MACHINE!

Please do not copy this photo - all rights reserved through the Moreau Family

(I seem to be focused more on the food and less on Dixie Doodle! - sorry Pretty Girl!)  And of course, The Daughts and all HER HARD WORK!  (#hostesswiththemostess)

Below is the Love Fest among The Daughts, The DIL, and me (She!)

This image is © 2015 by Life As She Does It. Please link back or credit if any content or images are used. 

And last but certainly not least: THIS gorgeous bunch of crazies!

This image is © 2015 by Life As She Does It. Please link back or credit if any content or images are used.