Recipe - Quesadilla Waffle aka Pinterest....You're a Bad Enabler!

So who else spends A LOT of time finding all sorts of things on Pinterest??? I'm definitely guilty of that! Most of my pins seem to be recipes or crafts. I've been on a cooking kick recently so I've had several food posts to kick-off this blog.

I've pinned several ideas on using a waffle maker for non-waffle uses. On impulse one day at Wal-Mart I picked up a cheap waffle maker. I'm easily influenced I guess :-)

Before trying any ideas or recipes, I first skimmed through the owner's manual and promptly ignored the following warning:

I decided to try something simple first and thought a quesadilla would be a good start. I took two Carb Balance flour tortillas and spread a thin layer of Chipotle Mayo on both. Added about a serving of fiesta blend cheese to one and put that on the waffle maker. Added the second tortilla and closed the lid. After a few minutes I had a nice melty and crispy quesadilla. Plus, I had built-in lines on where to cut it into pieces. Success!

I served the cheese quesadilla with steamed veggies and Tex-Mex potatoes. The potatoes were another Pinterest find and the original recipe can be found here. I made a couple changes to the recipe. I used Mrs. Dash Taco Seasoning to cut down on the sodium content. I also used Light Ranch Dressing. Finally, I tossed about 4 green onions in prior to cooking and then sprinkled more at the end....I like green onions :-) This was an easy to prep, tasty recipe that I will make again.

Recipe - Buffalo Wild Wings Sauces aren't just for wings!

I eat at Buffalo Wild Wings (aka BW3s, BDubs) regularly. I'm there once a week with coworkers and some weeks more than that. I usually end up taking part of my meal with me and because of that, I end up with a collection of little sauce cups in my fridge.

It seems like a waste to not use them up, so I've been experimenting and trying them out in different ways. A couple recent keepers include Parmesan Garlic Cauliflower and Salt n Vinegar Potatoes.

For the Parmesan Garlic Cauliflower, I cut up a head of cauliflower into bite-size pieces and tossed it in a bag with some leftover Parmesan Garlic Sauce. After it had marinated a little bit, I dumped the bag onto a baking pan that had been greased with some canola oil. Then popped it into the oven to roast. I think I went with 350 degrees until golden brown. Turned out great....tasty way to get some veggies in!

The Salt n Vinegar Potatoes used one of BW3s dry rubs. I cubed a few potatoes, tossed them with some Salt n Vinegar rub, and roasted them at the same time as the cauliflower. I love salt n vinegar potato chips so this was like a hot version of them!

The potatoes went great with dinner...Sauteed cabbage with Kielbasa and steamed broccoli and cauliflower.

Morale of the post.....always ask for lids for leftover sauce when you're at your favorite wings place :-)

Recipe - Squash with Noodles

So...trash day for me is Thursday which means Wednesday evening I'm always cleaning out the fridge and deciding what goes, what stays. It also usually means I'm throwing random stuff together for dinner from leftover bits and pieces prior to the final clean out. Sometimes the concoctions are good, sometimes not so much.

Today was one of the good concoction days...I took a partial onion, a few green onions, and a couple summer squash, marinated them for awhile and then stir-fried everything. I finished the dish off with some already prepared noodles and a splash more of the dipping sauce I'd used as a marinade.

Some of the ingredients I used...

And the final dish...

I love it when a a few thrown together ingredients turn out to be a tasty dinner!!!

Recipe - Baked Crab Rangoon Pizza

I seem to have a love-hate relationship with cooking. I'll spend a few weeks trying lots of recipes and thoroughly enjoying the time in the kitchen. Then I'll get sick of it and live on frozen/easy food for awhile. Then lather.rinse.repeat the whole cycle :-)

I guess I'm amping up for another round of cooking because this past weekend I tried out a recipe I found on Pillsbury's website for Baked Crab Rangoon Pizza. It was tasty and there's only a couple tweaks I'd make in future preparations. The original recipe can be found here.

I always like to follow the original recipe as close as I can the first time I fix it. That seems to make it easier to keep track of any tweaks I'd like to make. Of course, this is providing the first time around turns out tasty enough to warrant making a second time!

I made the following tweaks/substitutions :

• I used imitation crab meat (8 oz.), not real. I always have some in the fridge and never have canned crab meat in the cabinet. 
• I skipped the cornmeal step.
• I used light cream cheese and light mayo.

I would keep those same tweaks and add the following changes the next time I make this pizza:

• Increase the cream cheese a bit...maybe go from 4 oz. to 6 oz. The topping mixture seemed a bit skimpy when I was spreading it to the edges of the pizza. Maybe add an additional tablespoon or so of mayo as well.
• Decrease the green pepper to 1/4 cup and increase the green onions.
• Finely, finely, finely chop the green pepper.
• Mix it up ahead of time and let it set in the fridge so the flavors can develop.

I fixed this as a main dish, but I think it would be great cut up in small squares and served as an appetizer too!

Finally, here's a picture of the finished dish.Yum Yum!