Southwest Turkey Meatballs turned Enchiladas turned Tacos. What?

Every Saturday morning I sit down and plan out a dinner menu for the upcoming week in advance of our weekly trip to the farmer’s market and grocery store.  As much as it pains me sometimes to put thought and effort into the menu, I never regret having done so when I get home from work and need (and want!) to get a home-cooked, delicious and fairly quick dinner on the table during the week.

Sometimes I find so many yummy recipes that I want to try and I start to make my grocery list before I’ve 100% confirmed what I’ll cook that week.  Then once I decide on the menu, I forget to edit my list.  Oops.  This was one of those weeks.  I had found three Mexican recipes I wanted to try, but after more thought I decided that all of these in one week might be a little much.

So, I scaled back on the fiesta week theme and settled on these Southwest Turkey Meatballs which were on the menu tonight.  While gathering everything for the recipe, I discovered I had a few extra ingredients on hand that were meant for those other meals that didn’t make the cut.  No problem, I love to improvise and create and wouldn't want these items to go to waste!

I followed the recipe pretty much to the letter (except for: using bread crumbs instead of panko, adding more cumin than it called for and no lime zest, just lime juice) and it was looking good.  

But then... instead of adding chicken broth, I added – wait for it – enchilada sauce.  Oh yesssss.  I let that simmer and cook down till the meatballs were cooked through.

 

I know one wouldn't normally associate turkey meatballs with corn tortillas, but I thought, why not!?  I heated up a stack and we built our meatball-tortilla-enchilada-taco-thingies on our plates with shredded Monterey Jack cheese (another item that wasn’t meant to be on this week’s list), salsa, sour cream and avocado. 

The hubs and I ate ours with a knife and fork, the teen rolled his up taco style, and the toddler, well he just went at it with his hands.  It was definitely a winner and I will make it again. 

Do you like to improvise and create in the kitchen or are you a stick-to-the-recipe kinda cook? 

Avocado Berry Smoothie

I absolutely love avocados for many reasons, not the least of which is how nutritious they are. I have a board dedicated to my avocado love on Pinterest and have recently found myself pinning all kinds of avocado smoothies, so I decided to try one for breakfast this morning!

I didn't follow a recipe, per se, but I did have ingredients in mind based on recipes I had seen. This is basically what I included:

1/4 cup (approx) plain Greek yogurt

Half a ripe avocado, sliced

A handful of blueberries

5 strawberries, sliced

1/2 cup (approx) milk 

1 teaspoon (approx) vanilla extract

I threw everything into the Baby Bullet (love this little blender!) and mixed it up.  The verdict:  very thick, but very tasty!  I would add a few ice cubes and maybe a bit more milk next time.  I ended up eating it with a spoon out of a glass.  It was super filling and Baby O kept coming back for more too.  

I will definitely try this again and experiment with the ingredients. I bet a little honey and some raspberries would make yummy additions!

Have you ever made an avocado smoothie?  How did it turn out?  I'd love to hear about it!

Sunday Lunch!

I made a delicious lunch today, so thought I’d share!  I don’t usually go all out for lunch, but we were having my mother-in-law, Linda, and her lovely mate, Alois, for a visit, so I thought I’d prepare something yummy.

On the menu was Avocado Chicken Salad on bakery fresh bread and a Pear, Blue Cheese and Candied Pecan Salad with Pear Vinaigrette.

I’m having a bit of a love affair with avocados lately and the Avocado Chicken Salad is becoming my new favourite thing.  I borrowed the recipe from the blog Becoming Betty and it's so simple to prepare.  Quantities aren’t specified, but you’ll basically need some cooked chicken breast, the juice of one lime (give or take), fresh chopped cilantro, an avocado, S and P, green onion (optional - have made it with and without) and a dollop of mayo.  It’s really filling and is best served as an open-faced sandwich.  

Hubs picked up a fabulous fresh loaf of bread from De La Terre Bakery’s stall at the Hamilton Farmer’s Market to have with the chicken salad.  This bakery is amazing.  He also texted me while he was there asking if I’d like one of their date squares.  Um, yes please!  They are to DIE FOR.  So are their cookies.  And muffins.  And cinnamon sticky buns.  I could go on… And the best part is, they make lots of gluten-free products and everything is organic!  Score!

I have a confession to make.  I’m cheating on avocado with blue cheese.  My love affair with this smelly delight is going strong.  A little goes a long way and it sure makes a salad complete!  I also recently tried making candied pecans and now I’m loving those too.  So simple.  Just melt some sugar on the stove top, toss in the nuts, get them out *quickly* with a fork and put them on parchment.  Oh, and parchment and waxed paper are two VERY different things.  ‘Nuff said. 

We received some pears in our Plan B Organic Farms CSA share this week and in the newsletter that comes by email there was a recipe for Pear Vinaigrette.  It sounded like the perfect accompaniment to my salad, so I whipped some up in my Baby Bullet.  Oh my, I may have never tasted a better salad dressing!  And I digress, but that little blender is fantastic and I use it for a lot more than just baby food - thanks Dad!  I also got to use my fancy-shmancy new salad dressing mixer-pourer-storing thing that I got for my birthday – thanks Mom!  

Like I said, lunch isn’t usually such an elaborate affair in our house, but I had fun making it and it was great to share with my family!