baked salmon
Wal-Mart Supercenter has these frozen bags of salmon for about $7/bag. You can cook the fillets separately or cook ‘em as a whole. I decided to do the latter.
Thawed the fish, seasoned both sides with salt, pepper, juice of 1 lemon, drizzle of olive oil, and dried parsley. Let that marinade for about 30 minutes. Then bake in the oven for about 30-40 minutes, in 375°F.
Serve with white rice and asparagus with crispy bacon and toasted garlic. You can either top the fish with mango salsa or avocado salsa right before serving.
STRAWBERRIES & BANANA SMOOTHIE
Using the blender from my Magic Bullet Platinum Pro, I made strawberries & banana smoothie for me and the kids last Friday. Hubs already started drinking beer he didn’t get any 
.
HOISIN MARINATED GRILLED PORK
For a foodie who cooks, one of the best things in Summer is the grilling. I love grilling. It’s fun to experiment with ingredients to marinate your meat in. You can buy the bottled ones of course to save time but it’s really fun to open your pantry and use what you’ve already got.
That’s exactly what I did for this hoisin marinated grilled pork.
CHOCOLATE FONDUE W/ STRAWBERRIES, APPLES AND ORANGES
We had such a great time partaking in our Chocolate fondue with assorted fruits. First, I’m proud to say I found my first ever fondue set at GoodWill for $3. It was still in a box so talk about a good find. It’s a small set but geez, with 4 of us in the family, how much could we possible eat? Besides, if I ever do this with guests, the sectionals are big enough to fill with fruits or bread whenever we use cheese instead of chocolate, that is. Someday I’ll get a bigger set. The sectionals and Lazy Susan didn’t come with the fondue set btw. The former came with a 2-in-one serving/cake tray that I already have while the Lazy Susan is an accessory to my huge round table that my MIL gave me. Just a small one, I intend to find a bigger one someday.
Anyhoooooo, back to the fondue. The kids enjoyed it. Who doesn’t love dipping fruits in chocolate. You know what they say, everything is better in chocolate .
LAPIS #4 : SOFT | BAKED SWEET POTATOES
For this week’s theme of LaPiS, we’re featuring the texture of SOFT. I must admit that the entire weekend I couldn’t find a picture of any dishes that I could enter for this theme. by Monday I’ve decided to pass on this week’s installment.
I just actually made this baked sweet potato as a side dish tonight and as I was cropping the pictures an epiphany came to me. “Oh wait, the sweet potato is soft” HELLO! Talk about a light bulb coming on.
So here it is, baked sweet potato in all it’s glory. I cut 2 large sweet potatoes in half, put ‘em in a cookie sheet and baked them in the oven for about 35 to 45 minutes in 385°. Once baked, the surface would look dry but not really. I peeled them off the sweet potatoes and popped them in my mouth . Run the fork on each half, then added a little bit of butter. Easy Peasy!
BREADED SPICY MUSTARD PORK CHOPS
I learned this recipe from Deb over at Cookerati. We were chatting on Skype one afternoon and another friend, Liberty was asking a quick recipe for dinner. Deb suggested boneless chicken breasts in mustard and bread crumbs, then bake. Easy right? No bread crumbs? Deb suggested mash potato flakes. I knew that one day I will make this chicken dish. Well, when the day came I thought of it, I’ve already thawed some pork chops so I figured I’d used that instead of chicken breasts. Instead of making my own bread crumbs (toasted bread then crushed in the blender), it just happens I have a box of instant mashed potatoes. I prefer making my own mashed potatoes. You know, the peeling and the boiling and the mashing with butter and milk. BUT, I always have instant boxes as reserves for those busy days. Something to whip up when everyone needs to be out of the house for something important. So that’s how I ended up using the potato flakes .
CRASH HOT POTATOES
I stumbled upon this crash hot potatoes recipe from The Pioneer Women. She got it from a friend from Australia and it looked sooo good I just had to make my own. Mine didn’t look as pretty as her crash hot potatoes but they sure tasted soooo good. It was something new for spuds that the whole family loved. So I’d be making these again soon. Over and over again .
APPLE FRIED ICE CREAM
It’s Summer. You know what that means, Ice Cream. We love out sporadic trips to Coldstone (expensive) or Dairy Queen but we always have ice cream in the house. We have our favorite flavors but my husband and I are always trying new flavors. Instead of wine tasting, we do ice cream tasting . So instead of being drunk, we consume calories…hehe.
The ice cream flavor this week is Apple Fried Ice Cream.
Interesting name huh? It’s Cinnamon Caramel, Apple Pie and Cinnamon Sugar Tostada Pieces. The 1st 2 ingredients are delicious but the Tostadas were a little bit disappointing. They’re sweet as they should be but the texture is almost stale. I guess because I associate Tostadas with crispiness. The ice cream would’ve been fine without the tostada pieces actually.
I rate it about 3 out 5.
LaPiS #4 : SOUR : PORK SINIGANG
This week’s LaPiS theme revolves around the flavor SOUR. Interestingly enough, the 1st Lasang Pinoy installation covered your favorite filipino food, or something like that. One of my entries (ILOCANA Chef) were something sour. Pork Sinigang. A filipino soup with sour broth thanks to Mama Sita’s Sinigang sa Sampalok mix. In translation, a sour soup thanks to a tamarind based soup mix.
I make sure I stock up on my mixes whenever I visit the nearby Oriental store. I don’t make it that often but I get my cravings here and there. Gotta have my sinigang once in a while . By the way, the pork sinigang picture is the same picture I used in my Lasang Pinoy entry. I believe we’ve come full circle .
PS : Ilocana Chef is now defunct therefore you won’t find the old entries anymore. When I close a domain, I don’t transfer old files. Coz I’m lazy…LOL.
GRILLED TUNA STEAKS W/ AVOCADO SALSA
I know I know, there’s an “Attack of the tomatoes” going on but I bought these tomatoes before the outbreak made news and I bought them at the commissary where it insisted that their suppliers are not part of the produce exporter that are affected. It’s an Air Force Base, if I can’t trust my military base with my food, then we have big problems..LOL. Anyway, I made this just as the salmonella recall supposedly started making people sick. Well, I’m blogging about the recipe so it’s obvious my tomatoes were safe. *Knock on wood*.
For the grilled tuna steaks, I just drizzled olive oil on them, salt and pepper. Nothing fancy. That’s the best way of not ruining a perfectly good fish. Grilled on both sides.
Avocado salsa recipe after the fold…
