Pizza Games, Anyone?
If you and your family, especially the kids in the family, love pizza, then I’m guessing you will all love building pizzas online too. I did. I haven’t shown my kids yet because I wanted to test out the games myself first. I had such a great time building my pizzas. First one is the virtual version of a meat lover’s pizza using a square dough. I filled it up pepperoni, bacon, sausages, then cheese. There are options for veggie lovers pizza too of course. or you can combine meat and veggies. The adventure here is being able to pick the style of the dough, different meat or veggie toppings, and how you want to load the cheese. The possibilities are endless. You can put whatever you want, or don’t put the toppings you don’t like at all. Just load it with pepperoni or just cheese if you want. Who’s going to stop you? No one, that’s for sure.
Ghirardelli’s EAT…BLOG…REPEAT!
Imagine my excitement when I received an email from Ghirardelli Chocolate asking me of my address so they could send me samples of their new chocolate products and flavors as part of their 160th year celebration campaign, EAT…BLOG…REPEAT! How can a chocoholic say no to that?
Domino’s Artisan Pizza: Spinach & Feta
I “won” this Domino’s Artisan Pizza 2 weeks ago through Facebook. Finally, I was one of the lucky ones who got the timing correctly. There’s a certain hour when you could enter and get 1 free pizza but it’s all about great timing. It doesn’t last all day and they give it to a certain number of entries.
White Chocolate Decadence Cake
I wish I could say I made this White Chocolate Decadence Cake so I could brag profusely about my cake decorating skills, but alas, I didn’t. I bought it at Wal-Mart for $7. As much as I love cooking and fiddling in my kitchen, I’m not ashamed to admit in buying store-bought cakes once in a while. Especially when it looks good such as this one and the price is right.
Got Milk? Chocolate Magical Milk Straws
My children received this pack of Got Milk? Chocolate Magical Straws back in January from their grandmother in New York. I’ve never heard of it until that day. Nan knows all the cool stuff. The magical straws are basically straws with flavored bits inside. No need to cut the straw at all. You just use it like a regular straw.
Pastini Pastaria
Have you heard of Pastini? It’s a Portland, Oregon Italian restaurant which offers more than 30 authentic pasta dishes using fresh and local ingredients. Some of their pasta dishes include Ziti with Winter Squash and Gorgonzola Sauce which has roasted butternut squash, gorgonzola cream sauce, leeks, garlic, nutmeg and thyme, over ziti pasta. Another one of their delicious pasta offering is a Chicken Cacciatore with Rigatoni dish. The chicken is simmered slow in the traditional cacciatore sauce, cremini, porcini mushrooms, carrots, red and yellow peppers and white wine. Besides the main entree of pasta, there are also antipasta, salad, soup, and authentic Italian desserts.
Pastini is also a place that offers gluten free Italian restaurant menu. And if you’re looking for a Portland Italian catering, it’s available at Pastini as well via the lunch specials catering. Their combos are only less than $10 each but they’d be happy to help you out in creating a menu for office parties, seminars, and other events
You can find Pastini if these following Portland locations: Northwest 23rd, downtown, Northeast Broadway, Southeast Division, Cedar Hills Crossings in Beaverton, Bridgeport Village in Tigard, The Old Mill in Bend, and NW 9th St in Corvallis.
Check out Pastini if you’re ever in those areas.
DiGiorno Tuscan Style Chicken Crispy Flatbread Pizza
I like thin crusted pizzas. I prefer that over the regualr crust actually. So I got excited with this DiGiorno Tuscan Style Chicken Crispy Flatbread Pizza. Thank God it’s not delivery, hahaha. Errrmmm….. whut? Never mind….
Lunch At Mi Casita’s
We went to lunch at Mi Casita yesterday over in Dunn. A perfect way to welcome the 81° weather to match our blue spring dresses. That was our first time to eat at Mi Casita. Our usual Mexican digs are La Cocina and Fiesta Mexicana. There’s another Mexican restaurant in Dunn that we went to months ago but it’s so terrible I can’t remember the name anymore. It’s either Las Brisas or El Charro. Maybe the acid reflux I got afterwards is contributing to my memory loss.
Anyhooo, the second we entered Mi Casita I knew I was going to like it. The ambiance is fresh, smooth, and quiet. The seating is booth style with tall back wall. Tall enough to keep kids away from the other booth. I’m sure you know what I mean. There’s a bar just like the aforementioned Mexican restaurants but it’s not that close to the booths. I like the open space going to the booths. Unlike at La Cocina or Fiesta Mexciana where there are added tables and chairs in the middles of the walking area. I can’t help but feel awkward when walking to my table at those places. I try to walk sideways to avoid accidentally hitting someone in the head with my huge and full purse. There’s also that awkward feeling not to look at a table while walking just in case a person is chowing down something and couldn’t help but have an open-mouth at that exact moment. Know what I mean?
Salmon & Penne Alfredo
This Salmon & Penne Alfredo was inspired by the seafood with pesto cream penne alfredo from Ragazzi’s Italian Restaurant. The seafood with pesto cream involves basil with walnut pesto blended into penne alfredo sauce with sauteed shrimp and fresh salmon. It’s $14.99 a plate which I’m telling you is sooooo worth it coz it’s soooo good and you get so much of it. I can only eaT half of the plate then save my leftovers for lunch the following day. Delicious creamy pesto with alfredo sauce, and large pieces of shrimp and chunks of salmon. If I could somehow name a kid from this dish, I would.
My own version of course is very much simplified. It doesn’t have the creamy pesto sauce coz I didn’t have the stuff to make it(basil, walnuts) and I also omitted the shrimp coz we just had shrimp last Sunday. It was delicious nonetheless. I just love creating my own version of restaurant dishes that I love even though I don’t create the exact same thing all the time. I just have fun working in my kitchen with a particular dish to copy in mind.
Next time I’ll make it the Ragazzi’s way, but for now, here’s my simplified version.
Rabbit Stew(Caldereta)
I had no idea how to cook rabbit so I turned it into a stew with Filipino flavors. This is more like Rabbit Caldereta with a sweet and tangy tomato based sauce. FYI, this recipe was originally posted in b5media when I used to write for their Lifestyle site. I’m posting the recipe here in Feistycook for my archives. I bought the frozen rabbit from a Farmer’s Market in Raleigh.
