Tuesday's Greek Night

Opah! Although I live in a predominantly Greek town, I do and eat very little Greek. My husband is not a super fan especially of citrus in our food. Totally bummer I know! But, sometimes he just has to go with the flow...Tuesday night will be one of those nights!

I had a Pork Roast in the freezer, so, I pulled it out to defrost in the fridge on Sunday. Then, Tuesday morning I will put it the marinade before cooking. Here is my plan:

Pork Roast:
Marinade: 1- 1.5 cups lemon juice ( I will use 1 cup and save some lemon slices), 3/4 c olive oil, 1- 1.5 T minced garlic, 3T minced rosemary and oregano, Salt and Pepper.

Marinade meat for 3-5 hours. Place in a roasting pan covered with a few lemon slices and bake at 325 degrees for 2-3 hours (depending on the poundage).

Roasted Potatoes:
1lb. little  red potatoes, 1/4 cup lemon juice, 1 T olive oil, 1/2 T minced garlic, 1 t oregano, Salt and Pepper,
1/2 cup water, Feta cheese

Cut up potatoes. Then, mix up sauce of lemon, oil, garlic and oregano. Cover baking sheet with aluminum foil and potatoes. Cover potatoes with lemon sauce and season with salt and pepper. Add water to the pan and bake at 400 degrees for 40-45 minutes. Sprinkle with Feta before serving.


My Village Greek Salad:
1 Cucumber, peeled and chunked;  2-3 Roma tomatoes, cut into wedges; ½ Cup Kalamata olives (optional for us since we don't eat olives); 1 Roasted red pepper, sliced; 1 bell pepper, chunked; 8 oz Feta cheese
Dressing: ¼ cup white balsamic vinegar, ½ cup olive oil; Fresh oregano; Salt & pepper to taste

Combine all veggies and dressing. Can be served over Romain lettuce or with potato salad, but ours will be plain!
 
 
Do you think I over did it with all the garlic and lemons? Hmm...we shall see!

My Menu for the Week

This week I thought I would not only clean up some of the meat in our freezer and food in our pantry, but I would do it while throwing together a few new recipes. So, here is what I have come up with so far...

Sunday- Spaghetti and Meatballs with a Salad and homemade Pull Apart Garlic Bread
Monday- Left overs
Tuesday- Pork Roast with greek Seasoning, Roasted Potatoes and a Village Greek Salad
Wednesday- Cube steaks with Mashed Potatoes and Gravy and Fresh Green Beans
Thursday- Potato Soup and Monte Cristos
Friday- Asian BBQ Thighs over rice or with Lo-Mein
Saturday- Left overs or go out to dinner?
Sunday- Chicken Paprika with Egg noodles and a salad

In addition to this weeks menu, I look forward to making Blueberry Crumb Bars. I can't get enough of the blueberries while they are still in season. Lately my attempts at Blueberry muffins have come up...powdery. I think i can taste the baking powder in the muffins and it is totally a turn off. I am blaming it on my super pregnancy taste buds obviously it is not my cooking!

I will post some recipes for this week as we get to them...so keep checking back!

And today I want...

I am finally getting my bake on...again! I have been making a lot of simple, delicious dinners lately, but have been craving more! I definitely think that is the baby talking. Finally my sweet tooth has kicked in, but it is different this time around. This time I crave pastry and cake along with fruit. In that sense it is not overly sweet per say as it is just crumbly goodness.

So, Here are a few recipes I have found while perusing over the last few weeks. I hope to get to all of these within the next 2 weeks.

1. Blueberries. Since blueberries are in season here...I have been stocking up. It is one of the few fruits my son will eat, plus I LOVE blueberries. I have already made a homemade blueberry sauce that is dying for a nice cheesecake. Yet, in the meantime it is smothering every waffle and pancake I can get my grubby little hands on. So, to mix it up I found Bree. She has this delectable Blueberry muffin recipe on her blog Baked Bree. I can't wait to bake these like delights!

Here is her beautiful picture of the Blueberry Muffin.

2. Apple. What is more American the Apple Pie...right! When 4th of July came and went I was so disappointed not to have this classic American treat on hand. I can see those glorious gooey apples smothered with with melting frozen goodness! MMmmm....excuse me while I drool! Thus, while at the market the other day Apples topped my list. I found two delicious recipes I can't wait to dip into!

The first is a classic apple crips...I grew up on apple crisp with its scrumptious little oatmeal crispies...Cory over at Culinary Cory has recipe I can't wait to dive into! The vanilla ice cream is already in the freeze waiting...

Here is his picture of this simple American dessert.

Yet, one apple dessert is never enough. Remember that I said I was also craving cake. Well, I couldn't resist this recipe the moment I saw this picture.

See what I mean! It just screams crumbly gloriousness. Ohhh...I want some now. So, thank you to the mother and daughter cooking combo over at Russian Season. I can't wait to bake my own!

3. Pineapple. Usually this is not a fruit high on my list of delights, but recently I had some fresh pineapple at a playdate. It was so juicy and delicious, I gorged! So, since I love pineapple on my pizza I knew I would love this recipe. (I will just have to make a separate pizza for the boys! LOL!

Thank you Barry at Rock Recipes for posting this sensation pizza-pie!

I can't wait to dive into these treats...Not to decide which ones to start first!

Breakfast: Oatmeal Medley

I personally LOVE fruit with my oatmeal. My favorite is peaches and cream, but instant oatmeal is expensive and full of sugars. So, instead of the instead sludge, I decided to throw a Baked Oatmeal Medley together this morning for breakfast. It is wet, and dreary outside, so what is better to start off the morning.

Oatmeal Medley

2 cups oatmeal ( I used steel cut oats)
2/3 c brown sugar ( I actually used a bit less)
1/2 t apple pie spice (or plain cinnamon is fine)
5T butter
2 eggs
1 1/3 c coconut milk (or plain milk is fine)
1 1/2 t baking powder
1/2t salt
Fruit of your choice: Apples, Peaches, Mangoes, Apricots, cranberries, raisins, walnuts
(This is a great way to use up very ripe fruit. I made mine this time with peaches, apples, cranberries and walnuts)

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Then, combine all ingredients into a bowl and mix. Pour into a greased baking dish (13x9 or 9x9 will work). Bake for 20-25 minutes. Serve warm alone or liven it up with a hint of milk (or cream if you dare!)

***This recipe was adapted from the Baked Oatmeal recipe at Pennies on a Platter.