the eibls

Soba Noodle & Sweet Potato Soup

Patrick and I made this dish about a month ago at the beginning of the year when our bodies were wanting some fresh, clean foods and a palette cleanse after all of our holiday travels. This soba noodles and sweet potato soup hit just the spot on a cold evening! We were able to use sweet potatoes held over from our CSA. They're great to store in the pantry. Soba noodles are also something we typically keep in the pantry and homemade chicken stock is always in our freezer. After picking up the remaining vegetables on a weekly grocery store run we were able to make this without any trouble. With one small exception! The grocery store didn't have miso so I was forced to omit this.

Soba Noodles & Sweet Potato Soup inspiration from "A Clean Slate" cookbook
Serves 4
Ingredients
2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 tbsp ginger, peeled and small dice
4 scallions, whites and greens separated and sliced thin
3 garlic cloves, minced
4 oz shiitake mushrooms, thinly sliced with stems removed
1 sweet potato, peeled and 1/2" cubes
3 cups chicken stock
3 cups water
4 oz soba noodles
2 heads baby bok choy, sliced into 1/2" pieces
1/2 cup miso (we omitted)
1 tbsp fresh lime juice

Directions
Heat oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add ginger, scallion whites, and garlic; cook, stirring, until fragrant (about 2 minutes). Add mushrooms and cook, stirring occasionally, until tender, about 2 minutes more. Add sweet potato and toss to coat. Add the stock and water, and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer until sweet potatoes are tender, 6 to 8 minutes.
Meanwhile, cook soba according to package directions. Drain and rinse under cold water.
Add bok choy to sweet-potato mixture, and cook until leaves are just wilted and stems are crisp-tender, about 2 minutes. Stir in cooked noodles. Remove from heat.
Remove 1 cup hot broth, and whisk in miso until smooth, then stir into soup. Add lime juice, and season with salt. Serve soup immediately topped with scallion greens.

Meal Plan Monday Post

Alright! We are back on track with some regular meal planning. Last week it took us awhile to return to normal after the snowstorm but a trip to Costco over the weekend allowed us to stock up on produce. We are really enjoying being back in the kitchen and cooking. We've still got a few more things to use up here at the beginning of this week but most of the produce has been hardy enough to last in the fridge for the week.

I usually type up these meal plan Monday posts on Sunday night since obviously they're a weekly post and feature Sunday night's meal. Well the Super Bowl put me a little behind and I'm finishing it up Monday morning! Patrick and I aren't die-hard Panthers fans but we were certainly rooting for the home team! I was a little disappointed on two fronts - first, the outcome of the game and then also the commercials. I thought they were lacking a little bit this year. But there were still some awesome ones! The Toyota Prius 4 "Longest Chase" commercial was my favorite (did you see the follow up one after the game concluded). I thought the Helen Mirren Budweiser commercial on drinking responsibly was awesome as well as Colgate's Save Water one.

Now here's the meal plan!

Meal Plan for Monday February 1 - Sunday February 7

Monday - One pan bake - honey dijon chicken, potatoes, and broccoli
Tuesday - Salmon, beets, avocado and brussels salad

Wednesday - Zuppa Toscano Soup

Thursday - Mushroom farfalle

Friday - Bonus breakfast Omelet with spinach and mushrooms, apple

Dinner Snapper and corn fritters with sauteed tomatoes

Saturday - Brunch Bananas Foster Crepes
Dinner Spinach salad topped with red peppers, avocado, pepitas

Sunday - Brunch Pancakes with fruit bowl and cottage cheese

Dinner Super Bowl party

Quiche Updates

It's no secret that Patrick and I turn to quiche for a brunch option. We typically reserve quiche for when we're having guests over because we can bake it the day before. Although we will sometimes make a quiche for a weekend brunch for just the two of us and enjoy the leftovers over the next couple of days.

Today we're updating the blog with some quiche thoughts. Over time we've altered the recipe a bit - primarily with the liquid because it overflows out of the pan a lot. And for the first time, with this quiche shared in this post, we used a homemade pie crust that we had frozen. I'll include all of our tried and true tips for quiche making at the end of the post!

One reason I love keeping quiche in the brunch rotation is because the filling options are limitless! We've made ham and caramelized onions, sundried tomatoes and spinach, butternut squash and caramelized onions, ham and cheese, leek and sun-dried tomatoes, only cheese, and most recently spinach, mushroom, and goat cheese. Below is our updated information for making quiche!

Spinach, mushroom, and goat cheese quiche in a homemade crust

Quiche

Make the crust
We're still loving the Martha Stewart Classic Pie Crust that is made with butter, flour, a bit of sugar and salt, and some water. Here's the recipe:

In a food processor pulse together
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp sugar
Then add 1 stick butter (cold, unsalted and cut into pieces) and continue to pulse until mixture resembles coarse meal, with just a few pea-size pieces remaining.
Sprinkle with 2 tbsp ice water and pulse until dough is crumbly but holds together when squeezed with fingers. If needed add up to 2 tbsp more ice water, 1 tbsp at a time. I usually find that I need the additional water.
Turn dough out onto a work sugar and form into a 3/4" disk. Wrap tightly in plastic and refrigerate until firm. Martha recommends an hour but I don't always do that.
After the dough has been chilled, flour your work surface and place the disk here. Roll dough to a 14" round. Gently place over the pie plate. Trim overhang to 1" and fold under to form a uniform edge around the rim. Refrigerate for an hour.
We usually always blind bake a crust now. To do so place pie weights (or dried beans) into the crust and bake in a 350F preheated oven for 20-30 minutes until slightly golden. This prevents the dough from becoming too soggy. The crust is now ready for filling!

As mentioned in the introduction we've had success with freezing this crust. In December when I was making a quiche I made two crust and froze the second one. Two days before making this quiche I removed the crust from the freezer and let it thaw in the refrigerator. Rolling it out and eating it seemed just like a freshly made crust! From now on I think I'll be making two crusts every time I need one.

Assemble the filling
After the crust has been made and blind baked we assemble the filling. We find it easier to layer the filling on the bottom of the pie before pouring the egg mixture over it. This ensures that the filling is evenly distributed throughout the quiche. After spreading the vegetables and protein we sprinkle cheese over top. If a vegetable contains a lot of moisture like mushrooms we like to saute those first before layering on the crust. Sometimes we'll also place cheese under the vegetables / protein.

Prepare the custard
Finally we top the quiche filling with this egg custard from a local cookbook.

Combine and whisk together: 4 eggs, 1 cup dairy* (may use milk or half & half or a combination), dash of salt and pepper. Other seasonings as they complement the filling.
*The original recipe calls for 1 cup milk and 1/2 cup half & half. We've reduced the dairy to 1 cup to prevent the custard from overflowing the pie crust. Our pie pans are not deep dish and I imagine this is not necessary for deep dish shells.
Pour over filling. To prevent making a mess place the pie pan on a baking sheet to help move the quiche to and from the oven. The last quiche we made had a little bit of overflow that was baked on to the pan (and fortunately not dripping in the oven). Patrick suggests placing the quiche on the extended oven rack, pouring in the custard, and pushing the rack back into the oven but when I tried this the movement of pushing the oven rack in caused the custard to splash out. Just some extra info!

Bake the quiche
Bake the quiche in a preheated 375F oven for 45 minutes or until firm and brown. Allow quiche to set up for at least 30 minutes. Enjoy!

Peanut butter and chocolate chip cookies

Are you on the hunt for a new go-to cookie recipe?? Well I was a few weeks ago and decided to make these peanut butter and chocolate chip cookies from Sara Foster. They were delicious and my husband says they're the most amazing cookie ever! They merge the best of peanut butter cookies and chocolate chip cookies so you can't help but take his word for it.

Before the snow storm hit the other week we had neighbors over for dinner. I wanted to make something for dessert but didn't want to fuss with a cake despite my new plan for amping up my baking skill set. I thought a cookie would be just perfect. Patrick and I usually turn to the Toll House chocolate chip cookie recipe that's on the back of the bag but those flatten out so much and we thought something else would be better. Not wanting to be flooded with random recipes from the Internet I turned to my cookbooks and the peanut butter and chocolate chip cookie from Sara Foster's Fresh Every Day cookbook fit the bill.

Typically when I make a batch of homemade dessert goodies the surplus get sent with Patrick to work. Knowing that the snow and ice would derail Patrick from going to work the next day I decided to be super crazy and double the cookies so I could take the surplus to all the neighbors on the street as a snowed in treat!

After easily prepping the dough, baking these to perfection, and my husband declaring them the most amazing cookie ever I've decided they're my new go-to cookie recipe!
Try 'em and let me know what you think!

Sara Foster’s Peanut Butter & Chocolate Chip Cookies from the "Fresh Every Day" cookbook
Makes about 20
Ingredients
1 stick salted butter, softened
1 cup dark brown sugar
3/4 cup creamy peanut butter
1 large egg
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp kosher salt
1 1/2 c semisweet chocolate chips

Directions
Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Grease two cookie sheets. In a large bowl, cream the butter, sugar, and peanut butter until fluffy. Beat in the vanilla and egg until combined. Meanwhile, in a smaller bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, and salt. Stir this into the butter mixture in thirds, stirring until the flour is no longer visible. Stir in the chocolate chips and drop onto a baking sheet, using an ice cream scoop, several inches apart. Bake, rotating about halfway through, about 14 minutes. Cool slightly, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

And if you, too, make a double batch and want to share with neighbors, colleagues, friends, family, your mailman, or whoever this is how I packaged them up. In an effort to not only deliver something sweet I wanted to include something healthy. Something healthy ended up being two clementines. I wrapped up four cookies in plastic wrap and put them into the bag with the clementines. Then I finished the bags by adding a "happy snow" note. I thought they turned out really cute! They were also well received.

Costco Shopping

I thought it would be fun to share what produce we purchased on our most recent Costco trip! We typically don't purchase this quantity of produce at Costco since the large Costco quantities can be hard for just us two to use up. However when our CSA is not in session we are in a definite need for obtaining produce from other sources! The state farmer's market I've been going to is about a 40 minute drive away and it's just really hard for me to want to make weekly trips out there. I'm going to try to be better about that though since I think it's important to support our local farmers and the produce is always of great quality and very reasonable prices.

Some of this grocery haul will be frozen for later use, some of it will be to replenish pantry staples, and some of it will be to consume this week. Read on to see what it is and be on the lookout for what was utilized in the meal plan next Monday!

In some sort of order [left to right, top row to bottom]
Frozen margherita pizza This is the first time we've ever stocked frozen pizzas! Lately our schedules have been a bit different and we've got a need for a better stocked freezer with ready made dinner options. Until I can make some freezer casseroles this will have to do! I've been having Junior League meetings one or twice a week which makes getting dinner ready harder. And since we've painting the house on the weekends it's challenging to pull ourselves away from working to prep in the kitchen for dinner. Hopefully we won't eat all of these in one month though!
Cheerios Patrick's new favorite breakfast
Spinach We've knocked out one of these Costco-sized bags of spinach before and we're up for the challenge again! We'll be using a lot of it for spinach side salads. I've got this soba noodles with peanut sauce and spinach in the meal plan as well.
Old fashioned oats Making homemade granola is something we're tackling these days! I've made two batches and have a post in the works for what I did. Needless to say the oats are used up quickly in the granola batches. I'm curious to see how long this will last.
Ground turkey The turkey was reportioned into 1 lb packets and frozen. We'll use this over the coming months. Thai turkey chili is one of our favorite things to make with ground turkey.
Country style pork ribs Patrick's favorite way to consume pork is in a crock pot recipe. These will be portioned into 1 lb packets and frozen for future use in the crock pot!
Sliced almonds These are one of most reached items for salad toppings. I'll also be using some for homemade granola mix.
Frozen berry blend The berry blend has strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, and blackberries. Patrick most prefers berries for smoothies so this was a great combination. We'll use these primarily as smoothie ingredients.
Sweet onions We go through onions rather quickly with all of meal planning and cooking at home.
Honey We'll be using the honey in the granola recipe!
Brussels sprouts I have a new recipe to try with Brussels sprouts and grabbed these. The bag certainly has two meals worth in it though so I have one of Patrick's requests for how to use Brussels, these brussels spring rolls which will be served with the soba noodles with peanut sauce and spinach.
Red peppers I always think the red peppers are super expensive at the grocery store and they're much cheaper at Costco. I prefer red peppers over green peppers so usually pick up red peppers at Costco. One of our new favorite recipes is this pasta peperonata which calls for 4 peppers - we made this recipe on the first night with all this produce (and served it with a side spinach salad).
Extra virgin olive oil Pantry staple that needed to be replenished on this trip.
Avocados Another produce item that always seems to be pricey at the grocery store. We'll use these on salads, for breakfast, or with a Mexican night. I've got a huevos rancheros planned for a weekend brunch to use an avocado!
Butter All of our butter is typically used in cooking / baking preparations (versus buttering rolls or toast) but it seems to go quicker than I always think it will. Having butter on hand is always nice and plus it saves us some money to buy it at Costco.
Cherry tomatoes These will be great for our salads. I've also got a penne pasta with asparagus and cherry tomatoes on our meal plan as well as a fish dish with corn cakes and sauteed cherry tomatoes. We'll plan to squeeze these in however we can!
Mushrooms I always seem to be grabbing mushrooms every few trips to the grocery store. We really like them in different dishes. I've specifically planned for this mushroom farfalle for this meal plan; I'm sure some of them will be used in our favorite fake bake.
Cheddar cheese I purchased a block of 2 lb cheddar cheese on a prior Costco trip and froze it in 1/2 lb portions. It worked really well to pull it out and shred it in this portions and then use throughout the week as we needed it. So I'm doing it again!
Parmesan cheese I'm sure you've noticed on our meal plans that Patrick and I love a good pasta dish. Pasta typically occurs at least once in every meal plan so for this reason we go through a lot of Parmesan. Like the cheddar cheese we'll shred about 2 cups at a time and keep it in the fridge to use throughout the week.
Apples Gotta keep the fruit bowl full!

Fish tacos with citrus-avocado salsa

Here's an easy take on fish tacos! This recipe caught my eye while flipping through the "Clean Slate" cookbook from Martha Stewart Living. Patrick and I both really loved it! It's fresh and simple and the perfect way to brighten up a gloomy winter evening. The fish is lightly fried in the pan but it's not breaded and topped with a citrus-avocado salsa that has a bit of kick from red onions and jalapenos. We served on whole wheat tortillas for extra fiber.

Fish tacos with citrus-avocado salsa inspiration from Martha Stewart's "Clean Slate"
Serves 4

Ingredients
1 orange, segmented and cut into 1-inch pieces (may substitute grapefruit)
1 avocado, halved, pitted, peeled and cubed
2 tbsp red onion, diced
1/2 jalapeño chile, finely chopped (remove some ribs and seeds)
juice of 1 lime (~1 tbsp fresh lime juice)
1 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
4 skinless cod fillets (about 4 ounces each - may substitute halibut)
8 6-inch whole wheat tortillas
1 cup shredded napa cabbage
1 small roma tomato, diced
sour cream, for serving if desired
salt and pepper

Directions
Combine grapefruit, avocado, red onion, cilantro, jalapeño, and lime juice in a bowl. Season with salt. Set aside.
Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-high. Season halibut generously with salt and pepper. Cook until golden brown, 2 to 3 minutes. Flip and continue to cook until golden and flaky, 2 to 3 minutes more. Remove and let cool slightly, then flake with a fork.
Warm tortillas. Top with cabbage, roma tomato, fish, and salsa, dividing evenly. Finish with a dollop of sour cream. Serve immediately.

Meal Plan Monday Post

Whew! We made it through this week - it was a tough one! The week started with some remnants of snow and ice on the ground and the refrigerator had been depleted of all produce and yummy things. And even though the pantry and freezer still had staples in them they needed some other ingredients to round out meals. Unfortunately I wasn't able to get to the grocery store until Friday so meals at the beginning of the week are a bit of a wash. We did takeout twice and then threw together the best we could for the other meals. Then we had a date night planned that included a meal with Triangle Restaurant Week. Needless to say this was a very unusual week for us with all of the takeout/restaurant food. We're back on the flip side and welcoming February with a very full fridge and lots of colorful produce to eat! Looking forward to making up for this past week.

Meal Plan for Monday January 25 - Sunday January 31

Monday - Moe's takeout
Tuesday - Brinner! Breakfast for Dinner! Chorizo-egg bake
Wednesday - Baked ziti with salad from Pulcinella's
Thursday - Slow cooker pork and creamy onion sauce, steamed broccoli
Bonus Afternoon Smoothie - banana, frozen cherries and pineapple, yogurt, orange juice