Walnut-Banana Cake W/ Buttercream Frosting
I have a Ziploc bag filled with bananas in the freezer that I know I need to use soon so I decided to make a banana dessert. I didn’t want to make a banana bread so I decided to turn it into a cake. I also found a bag of walnuts from my pantry so I figured I’d add that for some texture. I ended up with this walnut-banana cake with buttercream frosting. It was sinfully delicious.
Kids naturally eat anything sweet but when it comes to cakes, it’s the frosting they go for. After that, they’d walk away from the table. My 2 yr old daughter is no different. Until she had this walnut-banana cake. It was the first cake that she ate from frosting to cake. Usually she would just eat the frosting off of birthday cakes. Not this banana cake. Even before I handed her a fork, she already had a piece of the cake in her mouth. Every time she had a slice for dessert on the week that we had this cake, the plate was clean. Oh and yes show knows how to say “cake”. Now let’s see if you can figure out how many times I’ve mentioned “cake” in here. 
Super Bowl Sunday Party Food Ideas
It’s almost Super Bowl Sunday folks. I couldn’t care less which teams are playing against each other, HeHe! We’re a Baseball family(Yankees Baby!). However, I do like the Super Bowl half-time show and of course the million-dollar funded commercials. Some are funny some are, ehhhhh. But most of them are clever and hilarious. That’s what I’m looking forward to. Plus the super bowl party food .
The best things to make for parties like Superbowl are appetizers and finger foods. You can easily buy prepared-stuff from grocery stores but if you’re like me, you prefer making things at home.
Here are a few EASY Super Bowl Sunday Party Ideas that you might want to serve your family and friends. Click the highlighted title link underneath some of the pictures to get the recipe.
Filipino Egg Rolls W/ Sweet & Sour Sauce
Filipino Egg Rolls (Lumpia) are one of the best finger foods for parties like Superbowl. I’m going to post a quick recipe here to add into a roundup I’m currently working on. Enjoy.
These babies need to be wrapped a day ahead. You can find the egg roll wrappers at any Oriental store. Some regular grocery stored have them now too. Also, for the veggies, I suggest you buy the packed shredded carrots and cabbages from the vegetable section. It’s actually the coleslaw pack. Just add chopped garlic and onions at home.
Eye Candy : Lindor Truffles
The second I clicked the “post” button on Ces’ comment box letting her know I couldn’t join the new theme for LaPiS (Lasang Pinoy Sundays), I realized I actually do have something I could enter. The theme this week is Eye Candy. For days I thought I didn’t have anything to add to the round-up until just a couple of hours ago. I remember the pictures of the Lindor Truffles I took when we first got our Nikon D40. My husband likes to surprise me with a bag (or 2) of Lindor Truffles once in a while. He actually bought 2 different bags to fill my Trifle bowl with lots of chocolate goodies last Christmas. The dark chocolate, and white chocolate. The ones on the picture is milk chocolate truffles.
So there you go. My Eye Candy entry for LaPiS. I’m glad I have these saved in my folders.
Lettuce Wraps W/ Ground Beef & Cheese
Here’s a recipe that came to me after watching one of those Food Challenge shows from FoodTV Network. I can’t remember exactly what the episode was but there was a Mom and Daughter team who won a price for making lettuce wraps. I think the challenge was twists on American classics. I don’t know what American classic dish this lettuce wraps got the inspiration from but hey, it looked good. I’m actually thinking more of Mexican dish like oh I don’t know, Tacos? Anyway, the recipe wasn’t featured much during the show. I actually just saw the picture of the lettuce wrapped dish at the end when they announced the winners. I saw them and I thought, “hmmmm, that looks good, easy, and healthy“.
So the other day, I made my own version. I didn’t search the web for recipes. I just did it on my own. How hard can it be to create lettuce wrapped dishes? It’s not. A 10 year old could do this .
White Chocolate Chips Brownies
I love dark chocolate but I also LOVE! white chocolate. When I saw a white chocolate brownies recipe from one of my Cookie cookbook, I knew I had to make it. I actually made this last year for the holidays using white chocolate chips with multicolor stripes. It was good but because I mixed it too much, the brownies ended up not as soft as it should be. I’ve learned my lesson. This time around, these brownies were soft and oh so pretty too .
I changed the recipe a bit because it called for raisins. I really didn’t feel like eating raisins in my brownies so I added white chocolate chips instead.
"Bloody" Steamed Milkfish With Tomatoes & Chili Garlic Sauce
“Bloody” is what my husband called this steamed milkfish with tomatoes and chili garlic sauce when he saw it. I’m addicted to my chili garlic sauce so I pretty much put it in everything these days, like the mussels Mussels, Lobster, Green Peppers, & Tomatoes In Chili Garlic Sauce Stir-Fry. Since I love tomatoes too, I figured it would add another dimension to this steamed fish.
When I bought this frozen whole milkfish at the commissary, really didn’t know what to do with it. A typical Filipino dish would’ve been just to fry it or grill. I wasn’t about to brave the weather outside to grill the fish so that was out of the question. Frying it was also out of the question because I know my husband would’nt like it that way. So I decided to steam it in the oven. My problem was, I don’t have a steamer for dishes like this. I have the one that came with the rice cooker and that’s just not big enough. Not to mention bad idea to steam a fish while cooking rice too. I’m assuming anyway.
So how did I solve this problem?
Sotanghon Noodles With Pork and Napa Cabbage
I had to think of a quick dinner a few nights ago so I decided to make this sotanghon noodles (cellophane noodles) with pork and napa cabbage. That’s pretty much what all the ingredients in this noodles dish. With the addition of onions, garlic, soy sauce, and water, it was quick and easy. Good thing I had this in hand in my pantry for the “just in case” days. Plus the remaining 2 pork chops in the freezer, dinner was made. I don’t have to think hard and be creative for what to serve the family. If all else fails, saute something.
INGREDIENTS :
- sotanghon noodles
- 2 pork chops, sliced in cubes
- 1 medium onion, finely chopped
- 2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
- 6-7 leaves of napa cabbage, sliced
- soy sauce for seasoning
- 3 cups of water
- lemon wedges, optional
Introducing FoodLuscious.com
Here’s a project I’ve been working on, Food Luscious. It is a social/community venture, only it involves food pictures. All you have to do is register for membership, then start adding your food pictures (one/post) linking to a recipe and such. More information can be found on the website so please check it out.
If you are a foodblogger who not only loves to cook, eat and write about food and cooking, then I know you’d love to share and promote your dishes too. I’m looking forward to seeing your food pictures and learning new delicious recipes at FoodLuscious.com.
Organic Salad With Leftover Flank Steak & Red Wine Vinegar Vinaigrette
Hubs found this huge container of organic salad at the commissary the other day which he and I have been eating for lunch and sometimes for snacks. Most people would say salad is boring but Hubs and I are one of the few who actually love fresh salads. Plus it’s healthy. The fact that we also like meat, well, there’s a balance somewhere in our world .
Anyhooo, this organic salad includes : baby lettuces (romaine, oak leaf, red leaf, lollo rosa, tango), red & green chard, mizuna, arugula, mache, frisee, radicchio, parsley, dill, and cilantro. I know it sounds a lot. I told you it was a huge container for about $4.
For my first bowl I dressed the salad with store bought ranch peppercorn dressing. But after that I’ve been making my own vinaigrettes to eat them with.
