Beer 'n' Cheese Mac

I was so distraught over how to name this recipe, combining beer, cheese, caramelized onions, bacon. Beer Mac 'n' Cheese... Mac 'n' Beer Cheese ... Mac 'n' Cheese with Beer 'n' Bacon, Beer-Cheezy Mac (yeah, with a z)... so that's the ever-so (not) creative title I have. Beer, bacon, cheese, caramelized onion, awesomeness... can you dig it?

This recipe is a great example of accidental ingenuity. I often start out with one idea in my head that turns into something completely else once I start cooking (and realize I don't have half the ingredients I need in the house), or I will have no idea what I want to make and just start looking for food that needs to be used up in the kitchen. I was going to make mac 'n' cheese... but then that ever so important ingredient just happened to be missing, MILK. So beer and flour it was. It's days like these I wonder if I could be on top chef or chopped one day... and then I come back to reality (and realize I took an hour to make everything and the timer would've run out light-years ago... not to mention I'm not the first person to ever make this food).

A natural pairing for this recipe is whatever beer you cooked with. I used a run-of-the-mill light beer because it's what I had on hand, but lager would probably be best to cook and drink. But if you must pop the cork, opt for a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc.

Caprese Salad Bites

These little appetizers are yummy, fresh-tasting, and perfect for your next dinner party. Moreover, you don't have to use your oven, crockpot, or skillet. Just chop, skewer, and refrigerate until the guests arrive. This little app' is very versatile when it comes to wine pairing so just pick your favorite bottle of Italian red or white to make it the Italian feature of your next wine/dinner party.

Sweet & Tangy Veggie Kabobs

One of my favorite parts of grilling season is grilled veggies. Marinate them and grill 'em up til they get a nice light char - eating your vegetables has never been so easy. You can plan to spend a lot of prep time on any kabob dish so take this into account when preparing for dinner: you'll need to wash and cut your veggies, marinate them, and then the oh-so tedious task of skewering them. But when it's done, you'll be thankful for such a yummy feel-good dish.

Summertime makes me think of crisp, light white wines. Most of these will pair great with this veggie selection.  Reach for a bottle of Pinot Grigio, Muscadet, or Sauvignon Blanc ... or plan ahead the day before and make a pitcher of white sangria (so you can get your daily servings of fruit, too, of course).

Happy grilling!

Buffalo Chicken Chopped Salad

If you like hot sauce, this is your recipe. If you don't, don't even bother reading on (and shame on you... I never understand a dislike of all things spicy unless of course for medical reasons). Yummy chopped salad full of healthy vegetables such as broccoli, cucumbers, and carrots gets topped with spicy pan-fried buffalo chicken strips and blue cheese. Drooling, yet? Because I am (yes, I confess I drool at the sight, smell, thought of hot sauce). Sometimes I get an unbelievable craving for buffalo wings, but don't feel like leaving the house or consuming the calories of deep-fried butter-and-hot-sauce-laden chicken wings. This recipe uses skinless boneless chicken breast cutlets, a light coat of breading, and pure hot sauce to get that lip-puckering, mouth-burning taste I crave. Meanwhile, the salad and blue cheese helps cool down the fire in your mouth.

Hot sauce and blue cheese poses a difficult wine pairing. Spicy foods pair well with a glass of semi-sweet Riesling. For a bottle of red, opt for Zinfandel. Otherwise, reach for a bottle of hoppy IPA (India Pale Ale) - if that's your thing, I'm not a fan - or a "sweeter" beer such as Blue Moon or a variety of Belgian Wheat.

Grilled steak two ways

With weather warming up, grilling season is well on its way, and nothing tastes better fresh off the grill to me than a juicy steak. Here, I will present two ways to top off your steak: a cabernet balsamic sauce from Guy Fieri or blue cheese & chive butter. Both these steak recipes will go great with a bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon.

Tangy Chicken Soft Tacos

When in need of a quick & easy weeknight dinner, look no further than these yummy, tangy, healthy chicken tacos served on whole wheat tortillas. I left the topping choices customizable so that you can use whatever you have in the kitchen or leave off whatever you don't like and control the heat level.

Home-made tacos can be healthy, and not like their widely available greasy fast-food counterparts! Whole wheat tortillas and black beans are a great way to add heart-healthy fiber to your diet. Opting to add cayenne pepper and chili peppers such as jalapeno adds immune-boosting capsaicin and vitamins. Avocado (in guacamole) often gets a bad rap for its fattiness but studies show these fats are actually anti-inflammatory and increase our absorption of fat-soluble nutrients like carotenoids (such as those found in previously discussed chili peppers).

Since I always seem to be opting for spicy, tangy dishes... my wine choices may seem repetitive ... or maybe it's my cooking that's getting repetitive? Whites like Rieslings and Gewurtztraminers are the way to go here to balance the spiciness of chipotle, cayenne, and jalapeno in this dish. Enjoy!

Teriyaki Turkey Burgers

Ground turkey is always a better option than ground beef, and I look for 93/7 lean ground turkey breast. The risk with using such lean meat, especially with burgers, is drying out and blandness. These Asian turkey burgers do not have that problem with the addition of tasty teriyaki sauce, chili-garlic sauce, and plenty of herbs and spices to keep them flavorful. Teriyaki flavors pair well with Riesling and Gewurztraminer, and these wines will also meld nicely with turkey.

Southwest Tuna Burgers with Chipotle Mayo

I've made tuna cakes before, and many times have thought about making them into a sandwich. This recipe differs from tuna cakes, as it makes the patties a bit sturdier (my tuna cakes are always on the brink of falling apart). Next time I might try adding some shredded cheese to the tuna mix and seeing how that enhances the flavor (and the calories...). These patties need a lot of seasoning to prevent them from tasting just like any old tuna fish sandwich, and I was very liberal with applying the chipotle mayo to do the same. Otherwise, you'll find yourself with a very quick and easy dinner that requires no thawing or handling of raw meat - and moreover, tuna is so low in fat that any other ground meat can't even compare (2 g in a cup of canned tuna vs. 19 g in a cup of extra lean ground beef). You'll also get more protein, less calories.

I enjoyed my Southwest Tuna Burger with a glass of semi-dry riesling and found the sweet & tart flavors of this popular wine balance out the spicy flavors of the chipotle. The specific bottle I opened was from Belhurst Winery in the Finger Lakes region of NY state, where riesling is a specialty.

Slow-Cooked Pot Roast with Red Wine Gravy

I love comfort food and therefore, I love my slow cooker. Many people don't want to cook hot food in an oven or over a skillet in the summer, and I think slow cooking is the perfect solution. I stick the slow cooker in the corner of my kitchen, let it do it's thing all day, and the only heat that comes out of it is a steamy aroma of home-cooked goodness when I lift the lid. Then, I sit in the air conditioning and enjoy a comforting bowl of pot roast and egg noodles. This recipe could be enhanced by the addition of veggies such as baby carrots and diced potatoes, which I would recommend adding in the second half of the cooking time as to assure they don't turn to mush (and skipping the egg noodles if you're doing potatoes as to not double up on starch).

For this meal's wine pairing, I would pour a glass of the same red wine you use in the gravy. One of my favorite red wines to cook with and pairs wonderfully with beef is Cabernet Sauvignon. Shiraz would make a great spicy, earthy addition to the meal. Pinot Noir works well too.

Banana Oatmeal Crumb Cake

This recipe for Banana Oatmeal Crumb Cake comes courtesy of Carol at AllRecipes.com. Many of my recipes start by having a bunch of ingredients I want/need to use before they go bad or if because they're all I have left in the house. My only change to the original recipe is I left out the walnuts. I'm not a big fan, nor did I have any around. I had some bananas that were over-ripe, and was craving a coffee cake-like recipe. This cake is delicious, and can be made with stuff you'll already have around the house. However, my topping wasn't very crumb-y like a crumb cake. I'm not sure what to do there, suggestions appreciated. I enjoyed with a nice hot cup of black coffee (how's that for a pairing).

Southwest Mac & Cheese

Everyone loves mac & cheese, right? I wanted to make a meal out of this well-loved classic and make it a little more grown-up. This recipe is spicy, flavorful, and packs a lot of protein by adding chicken breast and black beans. If you'd rather go vegetarian, you can leave out the chicken and still get plenty of protein from the black beans and cheese. I would leave out the hot sauce if you're serving to kids and save it on the side for adults to add, if desired. I debated adding chopped spinach to the mix at well, but I didn't want to add so many things that it stopped looking like mac & cheese.

As far as wine pairing for the adults, my go-to wine for spicy dishes is a nice Riesling or Gewürztraminer, which are both sweet German wines that work well to balance out the heat of this dish.

Chicken Parmigiana

If you haven't figured it out yet, I love cooking Italian dishes, though I'm not Italian. There's something very comforting about these Italian classics, not to mention they're easy to make. This recipe for Chicken Parmigiana is loosely based off of Bobby Flay's, though I use more spices and seasonings, and it is the best I've ever had. I think what makes this recipe particularly delicious is the thinness of chicken breast, so if you trim and pound out chicken breast halves, make sure they're thin. Or, you can also buy a package of thin sliced cutlets and I would recommend pounding them out a little more so they're extra thin.

My wine pairing for Italian dishes is becoming pretty predictable as well, I love an Italian sangiovese or chianti, but you can mix it up by trying different red Italian wines in your local wine store and you'll almost always have a good pairing.

I also served up this dish with a simple caesar salad with romaine lettuce, croutons, shredded carrots, tomatoes, and light caesar dressing (my favorite is Ken's).

Easy Apple Cobbler

Using short cuts such as boxed baking mix and a short list of ingredients makes this recipe quick and easy, and not to mention delicious. Apples can be macintosh, gala, honeycrisp; whatever you have on hand. Pair this recipe with a a scoop of vanilla ice cream and a hot cup of coffee!

Buffalo & Blue Cheese Stuffed Turkey Burger

Buffalo wings are one of my favorite foods, so I though why not figure out how to make a "buffalo wing" burger, emulating the flavors of a basket of buffalo with a cup of blue cheese dressing for dipping. Plus, bacon never hurts the flavor of any dish, especially a burger. Not only is ground turkey breast leaps and bounds healthier than ground chuck typically used for burgers, I think the poultry flavor lends itself to being more similar to buffalo wings. Using low fat blue cheese and low-sodium bacon, you can enjoy this burger guilt free.

Slow-cooked Sweet & Spicy Sloppy Joes

The sloppy joe has been a staple of the budget-conscious family for years, but if you're from a family that grew up with this in regular rotation at the dinner table - have you even thought of making sloppy joes since? It's time for Sloppy Joe to grow up, get a job, enhance his resume. It's time for an adult sloppy joe - a sloppy joe with sweet, savory, and spicy flavors that a sophisticated palate can appreciate. Do not be overwhelmed by the list of ingredients for the sauce, it will be well worth the flavors you'll get from this grown-up 'joe - and keep in mind it will give you a lot of HEAT hidden beneath it's sweet bbq sauce taste.

I love to hide veggies in recipes where they easily go undetected. I've snuck more than 3 cups of veggies into this recipe by using my mini food processor to make them the same size and texture as the ground beef. Covered in this recipe's sweet & spicy sauce, hungry eaters will be none the wiser.

I typically make a lot of sloppy joe and then freeze portions for nights I don't feel like cooking or nights I'm not home so Mr. B. has something to eat. This recipe makes a lot of sloppy joes. Please feel free to cut down this recipe to a half or a third, if you don't have room in the freezer and are only cooking for a few.

Can we just take a moment to remember this amazing sketch from SNL featuring Chris Farley and Adam Sandler? Sloppy, sloppy joes...

Sweet & Simple: Strawberry Ice Cream Cakes

Dessert is as simple as scooping out some vanilla ice cream and convincing your guests they're eating gourmet food. Strawberries, vanilla ice cream, and dessert shells make for an affordable, delicious, and light tasting dessert. This recipe would work well with almost any berry or a mix of berries.

The sponge cake dessert shells used in this recipe are usually found in your grocery store's produce section (check near the berries). Six dessert shells ran me about 2.29 (or about 38 cents a shell). If you make this recipe in the springtime, strawberries are usually on sale - I bought them for buy one get one free and ended up paying $4 for 2 lbs of strawberries (you only need 1 lb). Finally, vanilla ice cream will cost you roughly $4-$5 and you'll have plenty leftover for late night snacks. Overall, you're looking at $1.48 for each yummy serving.

Spaghetti & Meatballs and garlic toast

The other night, I revisited a classic: spaghetti & meatballs. Spaghetti & meatballs is actually one of my favorite comfort foods, there's nothing like a big fork-ful of pasta and a carmelized meatball. I try to make this a bit healthier with the use of lean ground turkey and whole wheat spaghetti. Many "light" recipes call for only using the egg white instead of the whole egg. If you want to watch your fat and cholesterol, you may, but I hate being wasteful (and I have nothing against the egg yolk). Rolling into about 2 inch meatballs, you will yield approximately 18 meatballs that will fit nicely into a 12 inch cast iron skillet. The whole meal should feed about 4 hungry people, or if you serve with a caesar salad (which I originally intended to but filled up a bit too much on spaghetti and garlic bread), you can stretch it to feed 6.

This meatball recipe could be matched with either a white, due to its herb-y nature, or red. Avoid Chardonnays, as they do not like to be paired with tomatoes, and match up with acidic red such as Malbec or Sangiovese.

Mexican Chipotle & Beef Stuffed Peppers

Stuffed peppers were one of my favorite meals as a kid. However, it is time to kick up the traditional stuffed peppers recipe a notch with a spicy tomato sauce using chipotle and adobo sauce. This recipe is super easy and super yummy. It can also easily be adjusted to be healthier, using ground turkey, brown rice, and less cheese (but I can't say no to cheese). This recipe would be great to have for a Cinco De Mayo dinner or party and would make a great alternative to tacos or another stand-by Mexican dish.

The bell peppers should be large and round, as they will be the container for beef, rice, and chipotle goodness. The average person will eat 1-2 pepper halves. This recipe makes 8 pepper halves. Enjoy the few ingredients this recipe requires and the money it will save you! We enjoyed this recipe with a bottle of corona and a lime wedge.

Asian Shrimp & Noodle Salad

Continuing with my salad theme, here's a great, healthy, Asian-inspired salad. This recipe is taken from Kraft and enhanced with changing up some ingredients and adding shrimp. I only had 1 lb of shrimp on hand, but using 2 lbs would provide even more of the yummy little morsels. Leave out the shrimp, and you have a great vegetarian dish. I've posted this recipe previously, but I didn't have pictures at this time so I'm giving it a revival.

Wine? Make it light and crisp. Riesling, Soave, or Sauvignon Blanc.

Broccoli Salad

You won't have any problem eating your fruit & vegetables when it comes to this broccoli salad. The ingredients will cost you less than $11, and if you opt for pre-packaged real crumbled bacon, you won't have to cook a thing! Plus, you'll have grapes left over to snack on for the next week. This recipe will make about 9 cups of broccoli salad, costing you barely over a dollar per serving. However, if you're my husband, this salad won't last more than 2 days in the house. So bring on the picnic, and prepare to love eating your broccoli.