real food for the adventurous spirit
Craving something sweet and delicious, but also light and springy to munch on? Check out the homegrown tomato’s latest guest post on NOW STREAMING for a simple chocolate covered everything technique and recipe!
Have a fun and safe day everyone! Enjoy 🙂
In a moment of great ambition, I volunteered to make pies for my family’s Easter celebration. Baking does not come naturally to me, so I felt a lot of pressure to get these pies right, since there was going to be a crowd of about 20 people. I decided on one strawberry rhubarb and one apple pie. I also decided to buy pre-made crust, and that I was not going to post about this adventure. However, a few things happened and that all changed. First, I found out there is no rhubarb to be found anywhere this time of year. So, with the strawberries already in my cart I decided to try a mixed berry pie. Second, the pies came out great! So here we are 🙂
Mixed Berry Pie
adapted from Epicurious
2 store bought pie crusts (I used the Whole Food’s brand frozen ones, made from only a few whole ingredients)
1-16oz container of strawberries, hulled and halved
1/2 pint fresh blueberries
1/2 pint fresh raspberries
1/2 cup packed brown sugar (dark or light)
1/2 cup white sugar
1/4 cup cornstarch
1tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp salt
1 egg yolk (for glaze)
Preheat over to 400 degrees F. Combine all ingredients except egg yolk in a bowl, and stir until fruit is nice and coated. Line a pie dish with one crust, and fill with fruit mixture. It should be piled nice and high, since the filling will cook down quite a bit. Carefully cover pie with the second crust. Seal by crimping the edges together with a fork nice and tightly. Cut a few slits in the top for vents.
To make the glaze, beat one egg yolk, 1 tsp of water and 1/4 tsp white sugar together. Brush over the top crust.
Bake for 20 minutes at 400F, then reduce temperature to 350F and bake for an additional hour to 1 hour and 25 minutes until golden brown.
Remove from over and cool completely before slicing. Enjoy!
Confession: It’s not always easy being clean. Keeping the meal repertoire interesting and tasty enough to stay on track is hard to do sometimes. My motivation and creativity come in waves. Recently, simplicity has been my ingredient of choice. So, the other night I started with one idea, chicken sausage. Recently I’ve been playing around with taking sausage out of the casing, making it much more versatile. I actually googled “chicken sausage lettuce wraps” to see what ideas I could steal, but there wasn’t much to be found. I had cooked quinoa and a lemon in the fridge, naturally challenging me to incorporate them as well. So, I thought, let’s see if we can’t make chicken sausage lettuce wraps a thing.
Chicken Sausage Lettuce Wraps
Makes 3-4 servings
Ingredients:
6 plain chicken sausages, casings removed
1 head bib lettuce
1 granny smith apple, diced
1 cup cooked quinoa
handfull fresh parsley, chopped (I actually pulled mind out of the freezer)
1 tbsp lemon juice
sea salt and pepper to taste
In a hot pan, add the sausage and break it up into small pieces as it begins to cook. Saute on medium heat until completely cooked through, about 10 minutes. Add in the quinoa and cook an additional 2-3 minutes, until everything is heated through.
Remove from heat. Toss sausage mixture in a large mixing bowl with parsley, lemon juice and the diced apple.
Carefully pull off each lettuce leaf, and fill them with a spoonful of the mixture. Serve like tacos. This also makes great leftovers, just pack filling and lettuce separately.
Enjoy!
the homegrown tomato 