Eat Your Brussel Sprouts

I mean it. Eat brussel sprouts. They are delicious, misunderstood veggies.

The secret is to cook them at a very, very high heat, helping to create a light char. It also helps to pair them with ingredients that complement their strong flavor. Think sweet, salty, and smoky. We used salty smoky bacon, warm and sweet apples, and sweet and spicy candied pecans.

We started by creating some yummy toasted, sugared pecans that we would toss with the brussel sprouts once they were ready to serve. These are very simple to make, simply melt about one tbsp of butter with one tbsp of honey or maple syrup in a skillet. Throw in a generous handful of pecans, sprinkle with about one tbsp of brown sugar, a pinch of salt and cayenne pepper, and a touch of cinnamon. Stir until the nuts are evenly coated and toast on medium heat until lightly browned and really fragrant.



To cook the sprouts - We began by cooking two strips of bacon in a skillet. When done, take the bacon out and crank the heat up on the skillet to high (we went to setting 8 out of 10 on our electric stove).

In the meantime, make sure the sprouts are well washed. Cut each sprout in half. Finely slice one large shallot. Finely chop an apple, we used about 1/2 cup of apple slices. All at once, toss the sprouts, shallots, and apples into the skillet. Season with salt, pepper, dried rosemary, and finely crushed fennel seeds. The heat should be high enough that the sprouts begin to brown in less than a minute. Make sure to shimmie the pan so that everything cooks well on all sides and nothing burns. After 2-4 minutes, put a lid on the skillet and allow the sprouts to steam for 2-3 minutes. Take off the lid and add a splash of balsamic vinegar, tossing the spouts to coat them evenly.

Serve the sprouts with the crumbled bacon and candied pecans on top.



We pretty much ate this dish as a main course, serving with whole grain bread on the side and a few slices of good cheese (I could eat cheese and bread for every meal).

I get into a weird pattern where I will make something fabulous and it's all I will want to eat for two weeks. Like these sprouts, I loved this dish so much that I'm making it for family on Tuesday. However, I think I will slice the sprouts into fine strips, kind of like what cabbage would look like in a cole slaw. This is a great trick if you want to serve sprouts to someone who claims them don't like them, it's like a disguise, you can call the dish "warm apple and bacon slaw" and no one will know!

:)

Roasted Acorn Squash with Goat Cheese and Arugula

We made this squash with risotto for dinner on one of our first nights back in Ohio, and it was FANTASTIC :)

While we were planning the wedding, we barely ever cooked together or had the time for creative experimenting in the kitchen. We mostly ate things that we could throw together quickly and easily. So on our honeymoon, I was dreaming of all of the time we'd have to REALLY cook again when we got home. I was especially excited since it would officially be fall when we got back, and since we received so many wonderful gifts for the kitchen (HELLO salad spinner)!! October is most definitely my favorite month of the year, and I was thrilled to see fall produce in the grocery store when we got home! I picked up a beautiful little acorn squash, the perfect size for two people.

We scrubbed the squash, cut in half, scooped out the seeds and stringiness, then sliced into pretty little pieces. We tossed the pieces in a bit of coconut oil, one chopped garlic clove, salt, and some of our homemade curry powder mix. We roasted in a 375 degree oven for probably 20-25 minutes. We served it over arugula with goat cheese crumblies on top. The arugula was lightly tossed in a homemade dressing, just balsamic vinegar, a little honey, a little dijon, rosemary, and olive oil.



These adorable little boxes were our wedding favors for our guests, along with a small packet of recipes we developed to use with them. The curry powder was simply cumin, coriander, ginger, cinnamon, cayenne pepper, and cardamom (no exact ratios here, we started off with an exact mix and then sort of ended up throwing things in the bowl)! But the ingredients are listed in order of what the mixture has the most of, that's for sure. I know people associate tumeric with curry, but truth be told, I'm not a huge fan. I don't really dig the flavor, or the neon yellow color. So we left it out!

I'll share more about our little spice mixes in future posts! We have a ton left over, so I'll be using them a lot :)

Carrot Cake Mini Cupcakes

Thanks, Martha Stewart! Your recipes are always a success.

I only altered this recipe a little bit. I used a bit of whole wheat flour in place of some of the all-purpose flour and I added a few more ground spices (ginger & allspice) to both the cake batter and the icing. I also used dried cranberries instead of raisins and added about 1/2 cup of finely chopped pecans. The result was a moist, hearty, yummy cupcake. My only problem - I filled the mini muffin cups a bit too full, they really overflowed in the oven and then the tops stuck together in the pan. I had to cut/peel off the overflowing cupcake tops in order to make them presentable. So now I have a baggie in the freezer of carrot cupcake shards. I will have to put them on top of vanilla ice cream or crumble them on top of my morning oatmeal, something creative.

We served these last night after dinner with my parents and JT's parents. We had a little wedding planning get-together. The clear plate these cupcakes are displayed on in the picture has a "T" on it for JT's last name, and my future last name. It was an engagement present from JT's parents! Thanks guys!

:)

KJ