Simple Delicious Pasta Salad

An easy weeknight side dish perfect for warm weather days, or picnics. This recipe is good for picky eaters too, as there are no tomatoes or olives present in the salad, and it's not too salty or vinegary.

1. Boil pasta according to the package instructions. It's best to use minimal additional salt as the dressing already contains the perfect amount. When the pasta has finished boiling, drain the remaining water and set it aside.
2. Meanwhile, whisk or stir together mayonnaise, mustard, sugar, vinegar, black pepper, cayenne, and garlic powder; taste before adding salt, then taste again. The dressing should taste just a little bit too salty, since it needs to provide flavor for an entire pound of pasta. Once the dressing is seasoned to your preferences, set it aside.
3. Use a food processor to mince the onion, pepper, and celery until fine. It's best to mince each vegetable individually to avoid over-encumbering the food processor. Place your minced vegetables in a large salad bowl.
4. Add the drained pasta to your salad bowl followed by dressing,  gently stir until everything is thoroughly combined. Taste for salt and pepper.
5. Serve and enjoy! Feeds a lot, and even better the next day.

Easy Egg Recipes

We have gathered together a variety of tasty ways to get you egg-cited about eating this protein packed incredible edible super-food.

If you want to get a little more fancy try bringing these deviled eggs to a picnic.

A classic side item for breakfast is fluffy scrambled eggs served with a yummy side of bacon .

For a fast nutritious breakfast you can make this easy yet hearty egg omellete .

If you're looking for a new way to eat simple hard boiled eggs then you may want to try seasoned hard boiled eggs with butter. 

How To Hard Boil Eggs The Right Way

If you overcook an egg when boiling it, it gets a sulfuric taste and dark green ring around the yolk. Yechh! Peeling eggs are much harder if they are farm fresh! Eggs a few days old are best, your supermarket's eggs are probably a few days old when you buy them. If you absolutely must use eggs hatched the same day you plan to hard boil them then steam for 20 minutes instead of boiling. They should be easier to peel that way, if they still aren't put in the fridge for a day and they should be fine.

Preparing perfectly cooked hard-boiled eggs are a snap if you follow these simple steps:

1. Put eggs in a saucepan and cover with cold water.
2. Set heat on high and let water slowly come to a boil.
3. When water is at a hard boil remove pan from heat and let sit for 12 minutes.
4. Cool by pouring cold water into the saucepan or by setting the eggs on ice.
5. Store in a covered container in the refrigerator for up to 5 days.

Enjoy!

Rice Cooker Spanish Yellow Rice

A great side for almost any protein imaginable. The rice cooker makes the rice come out perfect every single time.

Ingredients 

1 rice cooker cup of rice
fresh water
1 tbsp olive oil
half an onion diced very fine
half a pepper diced very fine
2 cloves garlic minced
1 tbsp tomato paste
1 chicken bouillon cube
1 packet Sazon Goya

Saute onion and peppers in olive oil for 4 minutes or until softened.
Add in tomato paste and cook 2 minutes more to remove "raw taste".
Dump washed rice into rice cooker.
Add sauteed vegetables, stir until rice is coated.
Add enough water to reach 'line 1'.
Place chicken bouillon cube and Sazon in rice.
Cover rice, set rice cooker to "cook", and cook until done.
Fluff , put top back on rice and let sit for 4 minutes. Serve.
Serves 2.

Alternative Method ****

Try substituting the onion, peppers, and garlic for 3 tbsp of store bought or homemade sofrito .

Sweet Plantain

You may have seen this dish called "platanos" or "platanos maduros". Platanos means plantain, but maduros means mature. This is because the plantain are very ripe, maybe even over ripe when you make this dish. Don't be fooled for recipes that call for sugar, yellow plantains, cooked correctly are sweet enough to serve for dessert. 

Ingredients

2 yellow plantain

2 tbsp butter

1 tbsp oil

Cut plaintains in half lengthwise.

Cut plantain pieces into smaller pieces.

If I'm cooking other components of the dinner I put the plantains in a bowl and cover with a damp paper towel to keep it from going brown. 

When you're ready to fry heat oil and butter in a frying pan until the butter is bubbling. Add in plantain.

Cook each side for about 4 minutes on medium heat, turning each piece around every so often to make sure it's not burning. The sugar in the plantain can be so sweet, or burn so bad.

When the plantain is browned on both sides remove from pan carefully as they will be so tender and fragile. It's best to use a spatula to remove from oil.

Serve warm. Feeds 4

Perfect Easiest Scrambled Eggs

Everyone likes their scrambled eggs a certain way, this recipe is flexible enough for any way you like your eggs...but will still come out pefectly cooked every single time. Give this a try, they go well with our recipe for American style Bacon

Ingredients
6 eggs
1/2 teaspoon salt
dash of black pepper or red (cayenne) pepper
2 tbsp butter (or oil, or bacon fat)

Crack eggs carefully into a bowl. Check for and remove eggshell pieces before breaking egg yolks.

Add in salt and pepper. Grate onion over egg mixture.
Use a whisk or fork to beat eggs until the yolks are broken and mostly combined into one yellow mixture.

Heat butter, oil, or bacon fat in a pan on medium.

Add in eggs, continuously stirring so the bottom of the pan does not cook too fast. This is why I used a deeper saucepan.

At first mixture will look ugly as little pieces of cooked egg are stirred into the raw egg.

Keep stirring. Then= eggs will get thicker, resembling cottage cheese but tasting much better. Now turn your heat to low if you like your eggs drier, and off if you like your eggs more moist.

Continue to stir eggs using the residual heat from the pan until your eggs are at the "dryness" you prefer. They will always be prefectly creamy and delicious using this method.

Serves 3

Simple Foods For A Picnic

Beverages

Homemade Lemonade
Ahhhhh.... lemonade in a jar...so thirst quenching...so easy.
Bring a cup of sugar and a cup of water to a boil, take off heat and add a cup of lemon juice. Now just add enough water to dilute to your liking (3 to 4 cups is usually best), or half water half ice into a jar. Stir or shake it up well, and keep very very cold until picnic time.

Entrees

Classic Sandwich
Get a huge baguette or french loaf, cut down the middle horizontally. Now layer the inside with your favorite meats and cheeses, some good examples are ham, pork, turkey, chicken, or even lobster. Add some thinly sliced onion and tomato, drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper. Now close everything up and cut into smaller sandwiches, for ease of eating during picnic time.

Fried Chicken
So delicious hot or cold. If you want to go real old school American then Fried Chicken is the way to go. We have a great recipe for delicious crispy juicy fried chicken here.

Picnic Deviled Eggs

Ingredients

6 eggs
2 tbsp mayonnaise
1 tsp Dijon mustard
1 tbsp sweet pickle relish
salt and pepper to taste
paprika for garnish

1. Boil eggs until hard-boiled. Set aside in ice until cool enough to handle.
2. Peel eggs and slice in half lengthwise, scoop out yellow yolk and add to a bowl.
3. To the bowl with the yolks, add the mayonnaise, mustard, relish, salt, and pepper.
4. Combine until very smooth.
5. Scoop or use a pastry bag to fill the empty "cups" of the egg whites.
6. Dust with paprika and serve!

Serves 6 people.

This dish can easily be complimented with our other Simple Picnic Foods recipes.

Eazy Peazy Potato Salad

An inexpensive and delicious meal isn't too hard to find, because I will be showing you some in the coming posts, but a dish THIS delicious and THIS inexpensive deserves some recognition. Potato Salad is the vice president of the American BBQ, a laughably easy way to get children to consume vegetables, and also a dish they make in Germany hot, or so I heard. I don't like to think of that last one, so I'll go back to the first point.

Make this dish for a BBQ, party, potluck, Christmas, or make a regular weeknight a whole lot more tasty. This particular recipe is really called Ensalada Rusa, so a Russian potato salad recipe that was given to me from a Dominican lady that made it every single night for her family. I kid you not, and it's by far the best potato salad I have ever had.

Stew is Short for Guisado

The easiest way to use up vegetables and possibly tough inexpensive cuts of meat is with a stew. Here is my staple all purpose Latin American Stew, or Guisado. You can use any kind of meat you want, and really any vegetables, I listed some vegetables I use as a starting point. Feel free to add peas, corn, squash, etc.

5 Tips : How To Eat In For Less

You may have noticed during your last visit to the supermarket that food can be very expensive. Expensive enough to make a shopper waltz right over to the frozen aisle and stock up on 3 dollar burritos, or maybe grab a few TV dinners. You know the food is junk, it tastes terrible, you REALLY don't want to nourish a growing child or adult with it, yet the low price makes you come back again and again. One of the main objectives of this site is to teach others how to cook to eat well, but cooking starts with the ingredients, and I have 5 tips for the novice grocery shopper to help you keep a well stocked pantry. Junk food optional!

Start With The Basics (Like Basic White Rice)

Learning how to cook can be like learning to ride a bike, it feels un-natural at first but as soon as your body has the rhythm down you have a lifelong skill. Starting with a dish as simple as plain rice is great because not only does it go with almost any protein, vegetable, or legume...it's also a cinch to make! Here's how:


1 cup long grain rice
2 cups water
1 teaspoon salt 
1 teaspoon butter or oil (optional) 


Directions: 
1 In a saucepan with a lid ready bring water, salt and butter to a boil. 
2 Add rice and stir for one minute. 
3 Cover and reduce heat to medium low, if there's nuclear-cloud-sized steam leaking from your pot, you should probably set it to low. 
4 Cook for 20 minutes, without removing lid.
5 Remove from heat and fluff with fork. Cover pot and let sit 5 minutes.