Oven Fried Zucchini

This side dish/appetizer is inspired by the fried zucchini at Maggiano's, where my bestie, Regan, had her rehearsal dinner a few weeks ago (hey, girl, hey!). Our entire table was OBSESSED with this zucchini, and I immediately knew that I wanted to try to make it at home. I'm not a huge fan of frying things in oil (except for fried chicken, recipe soon to come), so I tried oven frying it in panko. It turned out well...although you definitely need to eat it with a fork (I don't think you can really get that handheld quality without frying in oil). Here's the recipe!

Ingredients:

2 large zucchini, thinly sliced into ribbons

2 c. panko

1 tsp. sea salt

1 tbsp. pepper

2 tbsp. italian seasoning

1 tbsp. garlic powder

2 eggs, whisked

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400 F. Individually, dip zucchini into egg and then into panko, salt, pepper, garlic, italian seasoning mixture, making sure to coat thoroughly. Place each coated piece onto a half baking sheet. After coating every piece, sprinkle remaining coating on top of zucchini. Bake at 400 for 10 minutes, then broil (or bake as high as your oven will go) for 10 minutes. Serve with lemon aioli.

Lemon Aioli

Mix 1 tbsp. mayo, 3 tbsp. lemon juice, 1 tsp. parsley, 1 tsp. garlic powder, salt and pepper until smooth.

Chicken Wrapped in Bacon

Have I blogged this before? I don't know. It doesn't matter, because whatever I may have blogged before was crap compared to the chicken wrapped in bacon that I made tonight. It may be the 2 glasses of wine talking, but this was the BEST version of this dish I have ever made. I made it for John the first time he came over to my apartment for dinner. What better way to lure a man into your clutches, er, I mean, let someone know that you think they're great than to make stuff chicken wrapped in BACON? Vegetarians....sorry 'bout it. Here you go-

Ingredients:

1 LARGE chicken breast, pounded to 1/4 inch thickness

1 /2 package stuffing that took you 5 hours to make and DEFINITELY not the Wegman's brand Chicken flavored stuffing....(make sure you cool it first)

5 piece of bacon

Directions:

1) Preheat oven to 350

2) Stuff chicken with stuffing (about 1/2 c.)

3) Wrap bacon pieces around stuffed chicken breast, making sure that entire surface is covered.

4) Place in square baking dish sprayed with olive oil cooking spray.

5) Bake for 30 minutes

6) Broil (or set oven to highest setting) for 5-10 minutes.

7) Remove from oven and let sit for 5 minutes before serving

We found that this made 1 John sized serving, 1 Emily sized serving, and 1 left-over serving.

Enjoy!

Pesto Pasta

Quickie post about my lunch today. This morning was one of those mornings when you look in the fridge and say "I have NOTHING to eat..." This notion, however, is almost always false. Usually, it just means that we're out of salad fixin's and I start to panic about my lunchtime options. So, here is what I came up with!

Leftover linguini
1 tbsp. prepared pesto
10 sliced green olives
1 diced plum tomato
2 slices cooked bacon, chopped

Mix all together, microwave for 2 minutes, top with parm. SO good, and I ate a tomato. Plus!

Cooking for Two-Chocolate Spiced Pork Chops

I think that we have been pretty good at the whole "cooking for two" thing. We've been cooking together for about 3 years now, and most of those times were just for the two of us (although sometimes we would cook for his house/my apartment/our families/random strangers). Last night was one of those successful times!


Chocolate Spiced Pork Chops

1 tbsp. brown sugar
1/2 tbsp. italian seasoning
3/4 tsp. cocoa powder
3/4 tsp. garlic powder
1/2 tsp. paprika
1/4 tsp. crushed red pepper flake
1/4 tsp. cumin
1/4 tsp. kosher salt
1/4 tsp. black pepper
2 pork chops
1 tbsp. vegetable oil

Preheat oven to 350 F. Combine spices and rub on one side of pork, allowing to sit for at least 5 minutes. Meanwhile, heat oil in cast iron skillet over medium-high heat until glossy. Place pork chops spiced side down on heat and cook for 3 minutes. Meanwhile, rub unspiced side with the remaining mixture. Turn and cook on other side for 3 minutes.

Let sit for 5 minutes before serving. We had this with steamed broccoli and my mom's homemade mac & cheese (which we finished, mom, so get cookin'!) <- she loves this, and we love her!

We Got Married!

Shocking, I know. Like anyone who reads this blog didn't already know that I was getting married, or that wedding planning consumed my life (in a good way) for the past year! It was well worth it, though. I could not have been happier with the way that the ceremony and the reception went. Of course, I was high off of endorphins and happiness after getting married to my bestie, John!

Isn't he cute? He was playing poker, mind you...not contemplating his future....maybe.

I was the most hardcore wedding planning psycho bride ever (again, in a good way). My Google Reader was filled with blog upon blog of wedding planning ideas, engagement portrait sessions, cakes, favors, dresses...you name it. I probably saw wedding pictures from over 1,000 different weddings over the past year. They actually started repeating themselves on different blogs; "Oh, Simons-McCarthy wedding...stalked it last week." Needless to say, became a little obsessed with the whole wedding planning thing.

These were picked after much deliberation and wedding stalking, I mean, research.

I am SO happy with the way that everything turned out for the wedding, but I did learn that I stressed over a number of things that I ended up not even noticing over the weekend. So, here is a list of things that I learned about the wedding planning process over the past year:

1) Budgeting Is Your Friend

We knew our budget from early on a stuck pretty close to it. The Knot has a really excellent budgeting tool that was quite helpful. We also created spreadsheets for everyone involved in the planning process to keep track of how much was being spent where by whom.

2) Scheduling Is Also Your Friend

We made a "Wedding Weekend Information Packet" about a week before the wedding and emailed it out to the wedding party and families. It had schedules for the day before and day of, contact information, directions, packing lists, and a list of responsibilities for the wedding party. It was super helpful when things got crazy and I couldn't keep track of who was supposed to be where when, and (I hope) made the wedding party more confident in knowing what they were supposed to be doing!

3) Trust Your Vendors

I guess, first, I would say "Choose vendors you can trust". Our photographer and DJ were both friends from college, and I had seen both of their work before, so I knew that I could trust them. I got to know our florist, cake baker, dressmaker and reception site coordinator pretty well, and felt like I could trust them as well. The big thing here is that you just cannot control every little thing that everyone does, and it alleviates so much stress is you can just point your vendors in a general direction and then let them use their expertise to decide on the rest. I have a feel that we avoided a number of headaches by not deciding every single song that would be played or by letting the chef just choose whatever vegetable was freshest the day of the wedding.

Josh, our amazing photographer!

Jeremy, DJ extraordinaire!

4) Roll With The Punches

This, really, is not that hard. I was so happy and having so much fun that I hardly had time to notice anything that might have gone wrong! Sure, maybe my train broke and, ok, maybe I didn't get to eat...but really, it just didn't matter!

Haha...not.

 We were too busy dancing ALL NIGHT LONG to even notice anything that may or may not have gone the way I had planned. Which brings me to my next point:

5) Don't Sweat The Small Stuff

 Here is what I consider to be small stuff: favors, napkin colors, chair covers, ceremony programs, ribbons, candles, hair staying curled, anything to do with the cake, people switching seats, sparklers, rain washing off the car decorations, guest books...pretty much anything that isn't the actual act of you getting married and then celebrating!

This is, really, the only thing I thought about all night.Not cupcake liners, surprisingly.

So, I hope that this might help anyone who is going through wedding planning stress. It was such a fun year, but as soon as I got home I unsubscribed from every wedding planning blog, newsletter and website that I have been studying for the past 13 months. Am I now addicted to HGTV? Yes. But that's another post...

Partially Paleo

John and I have been inspired by my dear friend, Elliott (check out his blog here: Paleocity) Now...we are not at all Paleos, but we have taken some of the Paleo principles into our diets such as:

Loooooow carbs: We've been doing a super low carb to no carb breakfast (I've been having eggs for breakfast for the past 2 weeks), a no-carb lunch (big chicken salads), and a super low carb dinner (or no carb, if I'm feeling up to it).

High protein: So yeah, we've been replacing those carbs with a LOT of protein. I used to like to have at least 1 vegetarian meal per day, but by cutting out carbs I was getting SUPER hungry. So I load up on protein and veggies during every meal.

Low-no sugar: We both drink black coffee, and so this wasn't very hard. We aren't really sugar-nuts, but we have been more mindful of what sugar we are consuming.

High fat: John has been doing this more than I have, although I will have a slightly fatty breakfast, which has been really helping me to feel full during the day. Not so much with dinner though...as Elliott would say, I still have lipophobia.

AAAAAAND here is where we are not following the Paleo diet:

Carbs: I mean, we still eat them, just in very small portions. Mine are mostly coming from fruit and small amounts of bread/grains we'll have with a meal.

Alcohol: Look. I'm just not willing to give up drinking.

Dairy: We still have cheese if we're having a happy hour or occasionally on a salad or meat, but this has been cut back quite a bit!

Caffeine: I still drink coffee, tea, Diet Coke, etc. We have cut back to half-caf....and I've cut back to only 1 caffinated beverage per day. I think I read in Elliott's blog that water is the only thing you should be drinking. See "Alcohol" above for my feelings on that.

So, how is it working? Well, first all of, I no longer get tired after lunch like these guys:

 

Also, I'm shrinking? My weight hasn't gone down too much (though it has a little bit!), but what I've noticed most is that I'm losing inches like crazy! So, that's tight. 

It's definitely an easy lifestyle change. It's really easy to stick to...I don't feel like I need to cook something different just for myself; I can just adjust my carb to protein to vegetable portions. AND, what I love most, is I don't feel super guilty or like I blew it if I go to a party or have a fun happy hour. My body doesn't freak out, and I just get back on track the next day.

Definitely check out Elliott's blog. He has some really great insights to the Paleo lifestyle and he's just super interesting in general!

Happy Birthday, Agnes!

Today is my grandma's 89th birthday, and she is totally ballin'. She's a fierce, Lebanese woman who has a lot of opinions (and I love opinions). She taught me a lot of the Lebanese cooking that I now know, and is also an all around great cook (her blue cheese dip is redonk). She loves coffee, drinking, and is super hilarious (I always love hearing her commentary on her opinion of the other ladies at her home). Also, she's cute as a button and is super good at accessorizing. Recently, I've been feeling very blessed and honored to have her and to be able to wear the wedding dress that she made for my mom's wedding in my own! Happy birthday, Grandma! I love you!