October Favorite Things: The Colors of Fall and Cider!

I love the colors of fall, the warm reds, oranges, bright yellows, and purples!  Mums are always a favorite of mine to have on the front porch, along with a few pumpkins and perhaps some pansies!  We pulled most of the old landscape in the front of our new house and have yet to put anything back in.  So, having some color on the front porch is nice, especially considering that there isn't much grass in our front yard at the moment either.  All in good time!

I also love the smell of cider simmering on the stove top during the fall!  My favorite cider recipe is very simple to make.  Just take some basic bottled apple cider that you can find at most stores (just make sure that the only ingredient is apples!) and pour some into a saucepan.  Add a cinnamon stick, a few whole cloves, and 3-4 thin slices of a naval orange.  Let is simmer on low for an hour or two, depending on how long you have.  The longer it simmers, the better it gets! Enjoy!

October Favorite Things: Favorite Recipes - Fish With Preserved Lemon Couscous

**This post is dedicated to Sarah...who provided the most amazing Artisanal Afghan Saffron!

Saffron is one of my new favorite spices to cook with...and yes, I had to look it up to see if it was even considered a spice.  Ha.  There is a recipe in The Fast Diet Cookbook that I checked out from the library on mistake.  I thought I was getting a different book.  Regardless, it was a great find and had so many recipes we liked that I ended up buying the book for myself!  One of my favorite recipes in the book is Allegra McEvedy's Bake-In-The-Bag Fish With Preserved Lemon Couscous!  Oh my! (You can click on the link above to go to the recipe...fyi...fresh coriander is another way of saying cilantro. Also, the recipe in my book does not have the yogurt sauce, which sounds fantastic to me!)

The ingredients for the couscous, minus the fish and fennel. 

 I made my own quick preserved lemons, which turned out fairly well.

  Meyer Lemons would have worked better, but they were not available at the time. 

The Saffron, of course!

The Saffron threads soaking in water. Isn't it beautiful??!!  I hated to

 remove the threads, and tried to come up with something else to use them for. :)

The finished couscous, before being put into bags with the fish and fennel! 

This is a lovely, light, and refreshing meal that I really enjoyed! I hope that you will check it out!  If you want to learn more about Saffron, click here! 

**Disclaimer: I am not familiar with The Fast Diet. I just really enjoyed some of the recipes in their cookbook. :)

October Favorite Things: Favorite Meals - Greek Chicken and Quinoa

We have several meals that we really enjoy as a family!  Tonight we had one of those meals...Greek Stuffed Chicken with Greek Quinoa and fresh hummus (made right before dinner!)! YUM!  The only thing missing was some fresh pita, naan, or laffa!  Just as a side note, the picture below was taken in the spring when we had roasted romanesco along with dinner.  I was going to take a new, better picture tonight, but by the time I remembered, everything had been devoured. Oops.

The chicken recipe is from Men's Health a few years ago.  I was still able to find the link for it, though.  Check it out here: Greek-style stuffed chicken!

Here is the fantastic hummus recipe that I used: Smooth Hummus Recipe by Inspired Taste

Seriously, with their help, I have conquered hummus.  Until I discovered this recipe, I just couldn't make it turn out right.  Now I'm dreaming of Roasted Pine Nut Hummus and other varieties! 

As for the Greek Quinoa recipe, it comes from the amazing folks over at Two Peas and Their Pod.  This Greek Quinoa Salad is one of my all time favorites!!!  

If you want to learn more about romanesco, click here! And just for the fun of it, here is a laffa recipe I might need to try: Laffa Bread! Happy eating!