Black Beans and Rice DuJour

I was stumped for dinner and turned to the pantry. I had some jasmine rice and saw a can of black beans. I'm sure real bean connoisseurs go with dry beans and do the whole overnight soaking and hour boiling thing, but having only discovered that beans are not evil recently, I haven't gone that far. Canned suits me just fine.
While cooking the rice per the package instructions, I sauteed some chopped onions and garlic in a pan with olive oil. Then I added some fresh spinach that I happened to have on hand in the fridge and let it wilt. I rinsed the beans well so they wouldn't "muddy" up the rice and added them to start heating. When the rice was done, I added that, and some butter. I finished it off with some salt, pepper, a "table blend" of seasonings and some cumin.
It was delicious, cheap, and it can be switched up in numerous ways. Today was spinach, next time... who knows?

Best. French toast. Ever.

I splurged on an expensive loaf of cinnamon swirl bread from Idylwilde. I've bought this before. It is sooooooo good. It's made within a couple days of purchase at the most and the ingredient list on the label has only a handful on things- mostly flour, eggs and cinnamon. I decided to use it for french toast this weekend and it was phenomenal. I sliced it thick and let it soak in my egg and half and half mixture (which also had a splash of vanilla extract added to it) for about an hour before putting it on the griddle. The end result was super flavorful and like a soft custard on the inside. Fantastic!

This is a vegetable?

I discovered spaghetti squash after seeing someone cook with it on TV. Basically, you just put it in the oven whole and when it's fork tender, cut it in half, remove the seeds and then use the fork to pull the spaghetti-like insides out. My first time cooking it, I did not cook it enough and the insides were not letting go of the sides, and what I did get out was still crunchy. Properly cooked, it comes out easily and is only slightly more "al dente" than pasta. At first I went simple with some butter and parmesan cheese, which is quite tasty. This time I decided to take it up a notch and see how far this squash could substitute for pasta. I found these gorgeous, thin, fresh asparagus on sale and made a cream sauce for these two veggies to swim in. I prepared the asparagus but breaking the ends off with my hands (the spear will let you know where the end gets tough if you just hold it by each end and bend it in the middle till it snaps) and steaming them until just tender with a fork. This dish was rich enough to be a main course, and also reheated quite well. Plus, it was really nutritious (aside from a bit of fat and calories with the cream sauce, but that could easily be cut down). Here is info on all the good things about asparagus http://www.nutritiondata.com/facts/vegetables-and-vegetable-products/2316/2
and spaghetti squash
http://www.nutritiondata.com/facts/vegetables-and-vegetable-products/2655/2.
Suffice it to say, you get a lot less calories, more fiber and vitamins with two veggies than pasta. I think I'll let the cream sauce sneak by ;)

Scallop Scampi(ish)

At the seafood counter today they had nice looking scallops on sale. I hadn't cooked scallops in a long time so I was inspired. When I got home I looked around and came up with a game plan for them. I started with scampi style over angel hair pasta as my jumping off point. Then I thought some color and added veggie would be more appealing visually and texturally, not to mention, add some nutritional value. My hand passed a can of diced tomatoes in the cabinet and I grabbed that, and I remembered an opened bag of fresh spinach in the fridge. The dish then came together in my head.

First I put some butter and olive oil in a skillet and added some finely chopped garlic. Then I added the scallops and browned them on both sides. I added some white wine and squeezed half a lemon into it. After that, I put in the can of diced tomatoes (drained) and the fresh spinach and cooked it all till the spinach wilted and the tomatoes were heated through. I wanted it to thicken slightly, so I added a bit of flour and stirred vigorously to avoid lumps. I seasoned the dish Old Bay, seasoning salt and pepper and then tossed with the pasta.

It was very pretty on the plate. If I were to go back and change something, I would have just seared the scallops off first and removed them from the pan, then built my sauce and added them back in with the spinach and tomatoes. They didn't get quite enough crust on them for my taste and were slightly overdone by the time the rest of the dish came together. Instead of tossing the pasta with the sauce, you could certainly put the pasta on the plate first and then lay the sauce over it.