Sunday Lovin'

Sundays are my absolute favorite. I love spending time with my church family, my real family, relaxing and cooking.

Andy and I love to cook together, especially on Sunday's when we're not rushed. This past Sunday, I made brunch and he made dinner. Both were wonderful so I thought I'd share.

For brunch, I made stuffed bell peppers topped with fried eggs over easy. Here's what the finished product looks like:

 

Can you say yum? This is a fairly cheap and easy meal. The ingredients that you need to make a serving for two are:

• 1 can of black beans
• 1 can of rotel
• 2 large, red bell pepper
• 4 eggs
• 1/2 avocado
• 4-6 oz of cheese (I used habanero cheddar--so spicy and good!) 
• OPTIONAL:
• Black Pepper
• 1/5 a White Onion
• Salsa
• Sour Cream

Other items needed:

• Pam/Cooking Spray
• Cutting Board
• 1 Small Pot
• 1 Baking Dish (11x7 or larger)
• 1 Frying Pan (Medium to Large)
• 1 Knife
• 1 Spoon
• 1 Spatula

 

Cooking this meal takes less than 30 minutes too! Here is what you do:

1. Preheat your oven to bake/350 degrees
2. Wash your 2 red bell peppers, cut the tops/stems off of them (don't discard) and pull out the seeds. Cut the bell peppers in half long ways (remember you're going to be stuffing these!). Place all four halves in your pan (after you've sprayed the pan with Pam). Let bake/cook while you prep the rest of your ingredients.
3. Cut the red bell peppers from tops/stems into small chunks and cook them in your small pot (which you've already coated with Pam) on medium heat.
4. OPTIONAL: cut 1/5 of a white onion and add it to the small pot.
5. Add 1 can of black beans and 1 can of rotel to your pot and turn on low.
6. Take your bell peppers from the oven. Stuff them with the bean/rotel mixture from the pot and top them with cheese. Place them back in the oven until the cheese melts. Keep an eye on them so that the cheese does not burn.
7. While you're waiting for the cheese to melt, spray your pan with Pam and turn the heat on high. Once the heat is on high, add all four eggs. OPTIONAL: Season eggs with black pepper. Turn the heat to low and cook the eggs over easy. I suggest turning the heat off once you've flipped them.
8. While you're waiting for your eggs to cook, cut 1/2 of avocado into long strips for easy serving.
9. Begin plating your bell peppers. Top them with the fried egg and avocado. Serve extra beans on the side of the plate. OPTIONAL: Top with salsa and/or sour cream. Enjoy!

For Andy's dinner, he made roasted garlic bulbs, bread, corn on the cob and crab legs. It was SO good. Here's what it looked like:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This meal is kind of expensive because of the crab, but it is still much cheaper (and better!) than eating out at a lot of restaurants. Here's how he did it:

1. He preheated the oven to 350
2. He cut the tops of the garlic bulb off of three garlic bulbs
3. He let them soak in olive oil, pepper and salt while the oven preheated
4. Once the oven preheated, he wrapped each bulb individually in aluminum foil and stuck them in the oven.
5. In the left over oil, pepper and salt mixture, he rolled the corn on the cob in it. He added extra pepper and tony's to the corn and wrapped it in foil and placed it in the oven. All four items (3 garlic bulbs and 1 corn on the cob) need to bake 30 minutes.
6. After 15 minutes of baking, he brought a large pot to water on top of the stove. On top of the water, he steamed the thawed crab legs. They needed to cook for 12-15 minutes.
7. While they were steaming, Andy cut more garlic and placed it in a small pot. He added 1/2 stick of butter and allowed it to melt on low for our crab dipping sauce.
8. Before everything wrapped up, he cut the French bread in small pieces and added it to the oven for 2 minutes to toast.
9. Everything finished at the same time, so he plated it all together. We dipped the bread in more olive oil/pepper mixture. Ate the garlic bulbs by themselves or on the bread and we dipped the crab legs in the butter/garlic mixture.

This was a delicious meal for under $50 and it took less than 45 minutes to cook everything. GREAT at home date night meal!

 



Turnt Up

Just kidding...I did cook with turnips for the firs time though! I used them as a replacement for white potatoes in my homemade vegetable soup. I have to say, I was very closed minded to the experience. I was 100% sure that I was not going to enjoy it, but to my surprise, I loved it! Here's what the finished veggie soup looked like:

 

 

I love to make vegetable soup when it's cold out and I have a lot of unused vegetables in my fridge. This past week has been extremely cold in Texas and I've been very busy. Without a lot of time to cook my vegetables were starting to go bad. Here is what I used in this batch:

 

• 2 boxes of vegetable broth (2 quarts total)
• Turnips
• Carrots
• Bell Peppers
• Onions

Other times, I've used things like:

• Tomatoes
• Potatoes
• Noodles
• Green Beans

You can nearly put any vegetable in your soup and it's very easy to cook. Here's the simple recipe that I followed:

1. Pour both quarts of the vegetable broth in a large pot and start warming on medium
2. Add a bag of miniature carrots (or anything small that doesn't need any chopping)
3. Chop the Onions and Bell Peppers into long strips then add them to the pot
4. Chop the Turnips into small pieces/chunks and add them to the pot
5. Add a few dashes of tobasco if you like it hot and crushed black pepper for flavor
6. Put the lid on the pot and let it cook for roughly 30 minutes; stir occasionally
7. Poke all of your veggies with a fork to make sure they're thoroughly cooked. If cooked after 30 minutes then enjoy! Otherwise, let it continue to cook on medium/medium-low.

This vegetable taste wonderful reheated. I usually make a large batch and freeze several tubberware since it reheats easily. Stay warm, friends!