All of the Yums: Recent Recipes

You guys. . .winter is seriously no joke. I am so itchy for warmth and being able to be outside for longer than five minutes without my eyes watering from the wind and cold. I am so ready for skin and lips that aren't chapped and hair that isn't static-y. 

I know I complain a lot about winter, but I really wasn't made for it. Jon and I both agree that if we could guarantee jobs in a warmer climate, we'd bounce. Thankfully, we love Pittsburgh and we have a lot of fun here, so it's not all bad - but I definitely feel like a grumpier, more blah version of myself through the grayest season of the year.

That having been said, we've been eating really, really well. As a lover of food (I may or may not have said out loud earlier today, "Food makes me so fucking happy"), a good meal can absolutely boost my mood. I am not one who eats to live - like, only putting in 'x' amount of proteins to fuel me or whatever. If you can do that, great, all the power to you. For me, it's more like I live to eat. I plan my meals out so that I always have something to look forward to and I love trying to balance pairings or meals throughout the week. 

Let's start with what we had for Superbowl Sunday. I will not comment on the game itself because it is absolutely a sore subject for me - but the food, oh, the food. We ate like champs.

Spread of champions.

Best cheese and cracker assortment ever. Aldi for the win.

I'm getting hungry for it all over again. . .

So, now that I'm all but drooling, let's talk details. My cousin (who is newly engaged!!!) Kaitlin made a significant portion of the above amazingness including assembling the baller cheese platter, shredded chicken (frozen chicken breast, salsa and hot sauce, I think) and my favorite, Mexi-Corn Dip (I don't even know what's in it and I don't think I want to know but I could legitimately gobble up the entire tupperware container of it). 

One of my contributions - cold, fresh veggie pizza. Swoonies. It took everything in me not to gobble it up the minute it was assembled.

My contributions were super simple but super great staples for these types of get togethers. For the Fresh Veggie Pizza, I essentially followed this recipe from Pillsbury's website: the only thing I would say I did super differently was that I unrolled the crescent roll dough and then mushed it all together with my hands so it joined together to form a base. I think the recipe wants you to just place the triangles near each other, but I just reformed the entire damn thing. Warning: this shit smells fabulous. 

Another of my contributions: slow cooker sweet and sour meatballs.

These Slow Cooker Sweet-and-Sour Meatballs are another easy appetizer that can fit with almost any theme or assortment of food. You can use freezer or homemade meatballs (for this particular batch, I used freezer meatballs) and then it's just a jar of grape jelly and a jar of chili sauce. The. End. Seriously, guys, that's it. It takes about an hour and a half to cook completely - until the jelly is melted and the sauce is soupier than it is thick. We were all eating, like, five at a time. 

In terms of real dinners, we've been trying to eat lighter items like chicken and pineapple and slow cooker quinoa chili. We've been doing well but on Sunday we just decided to say forget it. Therefore, I present to you this piece of freakin' art. . .

Yes, that is a piece of steak wrapped in bacon with a sweet potato in the foreground and a fresh salad in the bowl in the background. This was one of those meals that was so good that I ate it slowly because I didn't want it to be gone, you know? 

There isn't so much a recipe for this as there is a preference for cooking it, if that makes sense. For the steaks, I put down some plastic wrap over a part of my counter to season the steak. I kept it pretty simple with cracked salt and pepper and an Italian seasoning blend. I then wrapped the steak with the bacon and placed it into a cast-iron skillet that had melted butter and garlic waiting for it. I seared the meats on each side (note: I do not have metal tongs so I had to use two forks and kind of finagle it to stay together - I imagine it would be easier with metal tongs, the bacon kind of came unwrapped a few times as it cooked) and then stuck the whole damn thing in the oven. Jon likes his steak still mooing so he removed his after about ten minutes in the oven. As you can see from the above picture, I like my steak crispy crispy crispy.

#HeavenInASkillet

This was a perfect Sunday dinner - hearty and fresh(ish - I mean, the steak was from Whole Foods!), which made for a great way to end and start a week.

There have been other less inventive/more routine meals lately but these yums were the ones worth sharing. What have you been eating lately? Anything new or out of your comfort zone? What's getting you through winter?