Spaghetti Squash

It’s fall, which means my supermarket is filled with cheap varieties of squash. Spaghetti squash is kind of strange. But it’s also healthy, versatile, easy, and tasty.

is it spaghetti or is it squash?

The best way to extract the stringy-insides is to bake it first. I cut it in half, seasoned it with sprinkles of salt, pepper, and olive oil, and popped it in a 350-degree oven for 45 minutes. After letting it cool enough to be able to handle, all I had to do was take a fork and shred the insides (after removing the seeds in the middle, of course).

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Onion, Spinach, and Mozzarella Frittata

This is probably more appropriate as a breakfast/brunch food, but I decided to serve it for dinner. Everyone likes to eat breakfast for dinner!

This is where I would usually put a photo of the completed product if I hadn’t either forgotten to take one or virtually misplaced it. Please use your imagination.

It’s kind of an omelet, but made in the oven instead of over the stove. And the ingredients are mixed in, as opposed to folded in.

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70 Percent More Edge Blondies

Okay, I admit, the 70 percent more edge part is just based on the pan you use to bake it in, and most people don’t have Baker’s Edge pans. But I do, so that’s what I use to bake mine in. Even if you don’t you should make these blondies in a regular pan. They’re easy, they’re rich and delicious, and they are easily adaptable.

What is a blondie, you ask? A lot of people ask me that question, and the way I like to describe blondies is that they’re chocolate-chip cookies in brownie form.

YUM

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Quesadillas

You can put almost anything inside two tortillas and pan-fry them. The insides get gooey and the outsides get crisp and you can cut them into tiny wedges and they will be delicious.

quesadillas

I prepared six of these in advance, fried them up a few hours before I was ready to serve them, and then heated them on a cookie sheet immediately before serving. Continue reading

Sesame Noodles, Part II: My Own Recipe

Ina Garten’s Szechuan noodles are awesome, but I wanted to see if I could make my own version of sesame noodles. I’ve eaten them plenty of times at restaurants and I’ve tried out enough recipes to be able to reproduce them at home.

Last time I made them, Ricky Dweck mentioned that he likes to put coconut milk in his sesame noodles, so I made sure to try that out.

sesame noodles

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Overnight Cinnamon Rolls

Tomorrow is Yom Kippur, and all I want to break the fast on is cinnamon buns. This recipe is very easy, and though there’s a lot of wait time, it’s worth it.

Can you tell that I really like cinnamon buns?

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The recipe yields a tender dough. The egg yolks make it rich, and the buttermilk adds a hint of tang to the recipe. I changed Alton’s recipe only a little bit because I didn’t have any instant yeast.

Everyone’s really excited to eat these tomorrow after 25 hours of fasting. Continue reading

Kusa Jibben

Remember when we made mehshi kusa and hollowed out all of that squash and zucchini? You didn’t think we’d just waste those precious insides, did you? Of course not. We popped those insides in the freezer for later use. And then gave them to our mom so she could make kusa jibben for lunch.

Kusa Jibben is a classic Syrian dish; kusa, as you know, means squash, and jibben is cheese. So basically it’s squash and cheese.

jibben

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Throwdown Banana Cream Pie

Somebody I know really likes banana cream pie. I really like Bobby Flay. So I decided to make Bobby Flay’s banana cream pie.

It was a lot easier than I thought it would be. Mainly because Bobby’s recipe calls for powdered vanilla pudding mix. Usually his recipes are a bit more complicated than mixes; not that there’s anything wrong with that. At least I made my own graham cracker crust…

banana cream pie

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Emergency Snack Burritos

Sometimes my refrigerator is empty and I have to go out and buy food. It gets expensive and truthfully, sometimes I just really don’t want to go outside. So I don’t. And I get very hungry/grumpy.

I already had some leftover vegetarian chili, and I was at the the supermarket and became inspired; tortillas were on sale and I didn’t want to pay the price of the kosher/vegetarian frozen burritos I saw there. So I decided to make my own frozen snacks. These are my emergency snack burritos:

burritos

Some are prettier than others, but they'll all keep me from starving.

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