Dinner Club - Mediterranean Theme

The girls on the block were at it again, this time it was Mediterranean night at Teresa's house!

Look how beautiful the table was set.  That's Teresa in the picture.  Hi Teresa!

I loved these plates, so pretty.



The picture above is borrowed from Ward Street Bistro because I had a "moment" and totally forgot to take pictures of the main course, which was called Tajine.  The official meal of Morocco.  It was wonderful! Thank you Teresa for hosting, and for making such a beautiful dish for us.

Hi Shannon!  She made this yummy Corn with Feta Cheese and Mint, she also made this wonderful dip that had cream cheese, tomatoes, calamata olives, basil - maybe some other things.  I'll get the recipe for you.

Hi Lisa!  She's with Teresa in this picture.  She made this delicious appetizer of baguette, cheese, tomato and topped with Basil.  YUM!





Introducing, Anjanette! She made this wonderful Cucumber Salad!  It was super yummy, thanks Anjanette!

Heeeeere's Melissa!  She made these Greek style pinwheels and a Greek Salad.  So good! Thank you Melissa!

I made two dishes, Mediterranean Couscous and Lemon Cookies.  I'll be posting those recipes separately.

I will try to gather the recipes for the pictures that were shown here and get them added to the blog; just in case you want to do your own Mediterranean themed dinner.

Thanks to Teresa, Shannon, Lisa, Anjanette and Melissa for hanging out with us for the night and sharing your amazing recipes!

Banana Bread - Two Ways

So, here's the dilemma I always face when making banana bread.  Walnuts, or no walnuts.  I'm not a huge walnut fan; my husband loves them.  It's not that I don't like them at all, I like them plain but I'm not a huge fan of them in baked goods or candy.  Strange, I know.  So, when making banana bread at the hubbies request this last time I decided to double the recipe, put walnuts in his loaf and peanut butter chips in mine. It worked, we were both happy.

I used a recipe that I found here and substituted 1/2 cup walnuts in one, and 1/2 cup peanut butter chips in the other.

To make them more easily identifiable I put whole walnuts on the top of my hubbies.

Nothing on top of mine. Although, about half way through the loaf I decided to step up the peanut butter factor by adding some of this. It's good.  Really really good.

What you'll need for 1 loaf:

1/2 cup butter, melted
1 cup white sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup sour cream
1/2 cup chopped walnuts OR peanut butter chips
2 medium bananas, sliced

1.Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9x5 inch loaf pan.


2.In a large bowl, stir together the melted butter and sugar. Add the eggs and vanilla, mix well. Combine the flour, baking soda and salt, stir into the butter mixture until smooth. Finally, fold in the sour cream, walnuts and bananas. Spread evenly into the prepared pan.

3.Bake at 350 degrees for 60 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the loaf comes out clean. Cool loaf in the pan for 10 minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool completely.

Salmon with Creamy Dill Sauce

Finally, a healthy recipe!  I knew I had it in me, somewhere...anyhoo, I love salmon and I just happened to have some at home that I needed to use so it was perfect timing finding this recipe.

What's great about this is that there isn't very much that you would need to run out and buy.  Maybe the lemons - but the rest I'll bet you have right within reach.

I loved this recipe.  It was easy, healthy, tasty, and believe me when I say I could use the Creamy Dill Sauce for sandwiches for the rest of my life!  I love this stuff!

Get a couple good sized pieces of salmon and lay it down on a lightly sprayed piece of tin foil. 

Sprinkle the salmon with Lemon Pepper and Onion Salt.

Place the onion circles and lemons on top...

Top with some pieces of butter.

Fold the tin foil around the salmon to make a tight little packet.  Put the packet on a rimmed sheet like a jelly roll pan.

While the salmon cooks; mix up the Dill Sauce.  Sour Cream, Mayo, Dill, Minced Onion, Horseradish, Lemon Juice, Garlic Salt and Pepper to taste.

Once the Salmon has cooked for 20 minutes inside the packet, open it up and put it under the broiler for another 8 - 10 minutes until the fish flakes.

Serve the fish with the dill sauce and enjoy. 

Did I mention how much I love the dill sauce?

I found the recipe here. The information below was taken directly from the Taste of Home website.

Ingredients
1 salmon fillet (about 2 pounds)
1 to 1-1/2 teaspoons lemon-pepper seasoning
1 teaspoon onion salt
1 small onion, sliced and separated into rings
6 lemon slices
1/4 cup butter


DILL SAUCE:
1/3 cup sour cream
1/3 cup mayonnaise
1 tablespoon finely chopped onion
1 teaspoon lemon juice
1 teaspoon prepared horseradish
3/4 teaspoon dill weed
1/4 teaspoon garlic salt
Pepper to taste

Directions

Line a 15-in. x 10-in. x 1-in. baking pan with heavy-duty foil; grease lightly. Place salmon skin side down on foil. Sprinkle with lemon-pepper and onion salt. Top with onion and lemon. Dot with butter. Fold foil around salmon; seal tightly,

Bake at 350° for 20 minutes. Open foil. Broil 4-6 in. from the heat for 8-12 minutes or until the fish flakes easily with a fork.

Combine the sauce ingredients until smooth. Serve with salmon.

White Chocolate Peanut Butter

This is one of those recipes that I tagged a couple of months ago to make and just got around to it. I have to tell you, making this recipe has inspired me to make other kinds of butters too.  It was super easy, super fast, and super delicious!  I have been spreading it on some Banana and Peanut Butter Chip Bread that I made and will post about soon.  Great combination!

A good place to start is with peanuts, sort of vital to peanut butter.

Using your food processor, chop them up until they look a little like this.

Drizzle in some oil and vanilla until it gets creamy.

Melt some white chocolate and add it in.

Blend until it's well mixed.

Now, try not to eat it all in one sitting.

Find the recipe here

Chocolate Nutella Cookies

Nutella. Cookies. I don't see anyway these two things together could possibly be bad.  I was right, they're awesome!  The thing I loved most about these cookies are their texture, I'm really into chewy cookies and these fit the bill.  The chocolate flavor comes from Nutella of course but also from unsweetened cocoa powder so they don't take exactly like Nutella, but chocolaty non-the-less.

These cookies are easy to make and perfect for a picnic for barbecue since there aren't chocolate chips to get all melty.  I dig these.

Found the recipe here

Frozen Cherry Mojitos

When I saw this recipe on another blog I knew instantly I'd be making, and soon. With temperatures around here in the mid to upper 90's already I can't think of anything more satisfying than a frozen drink.  Cherries happen to be one of may favorites so that didn't hurt either.

I didn't have much time to whip this up but I plan to make them again very soon so I'll freeze the glasses ahead of time, and make the simple syrup in advance so it can cool properly.  I loved this drink, my friends loved it too.  I have a sweet tooth (in case you haven't noticed) so I thought it was perfect just as is, but if you don't like your drinks overly sweet, just add the simple syrup a little at a time until you reach your desired sweetness level.

Add the sugar and water to a small pot, zest three limes and then juice them and add to the sugar water. 

Bring the mixture to a boil, then simmer for 5 minutes.

Let cool until room temperature.

Rum!

Frozen cherries...

Ice, mint, simple syrup - Now blend the heck out of it.

You should go make this, you'll be happy you did.

I found this recipe here

1 pound bag frozen pitted cherries
3 cups crushed ice, plus extra to serve if desired
1/2 cup packed fresh mint leaves
1 cup white rum
Lime Simple Syrup, recipe follows
Lime wedges and fresh cherries, for garnish

Place the frozen cherries, ice, mint, rum, and lime simple syrup in a blender. Blend until smooth.
Pour the mixture into chilled glasses and top with crushed ice. Garnish with lime wedges and cherries.


Simple Syrup

1 cup sugar
1 cup water
3 limes, juiced and zested

In a small saucepan, combine the sugar, water, lime juice, and lime zest over medium heat. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, and simmer for about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the sugar has dissolved. Remove the pan from the heat and allow the syrup to cool to room temperature minutes before using. If making in advance, store in a sealed container within the refrigerator.

Red Velvet Crepe Cakes

Pardon the photo above, this was my Memorial Day block party dessert. Huge "Wow" factor going on here. This recipe makes two cakes and it it somewhat labor intensive but the look on people's face when they see it is priceless. This is a very rich cake (hello, every layer has frosting) and the texture is obviously different then a regular cake; not so much light and fluffy but more like dense and sweet.

This recipe was found in a "Taste of Home" magazine I received and I thought it would be fun to try.  I'm glad I did. It's not difficult to put together; but pull up a chair in front of your stove top because you're going to be there for a while. 

Begin with a boxed Red Velvet cake mix, and add more flower, eggs, egg yolks, butter, milk and vanilla.

Use a 1/4 Cup measuring cup and pour the mixture onto a hot, lightly greased 8 inch skillet.  Pick the skillet up and move the mixture around so it's circular and thin. 

Let this side cook until the tops start to look dry.

Flip over and let cook for another 15-30 seconds.  Re-grease the pan as needed.  I think I re-greased about every third or fourth crepe.

Add to a cooling rack.  I had two cooling racks and by the time the 3rd crepe was done the crepe on the first cooling wrack was ready to be moved to wax paper.

Get two cake plates ready.  When they are all cooked and cooled, put one crepe on each plate with about a Tbsp of frosting.  Frost each layer to within about 1/2 inch from the edge.  Continue stacking and frosting until they are all used.  Frost the entire cake and decorate as desired. 

I should tell you, I had some problems with the crepe's breaking off from the edges and mixing in with the frosting - hence the red sprinkles you see above.

You can find the recipe here.

Here's the recap:

Ingredients


1 package (18-1/4 ounces) red velvet cake mix
2-3/4 cups whole milk
1 cup all-purpose flour
3 eggs
3 egg yolks
1/4 cup butter, melted
3 teaspoons vanilla extract

FROSTING:

5 packages (3 ounces each) cream cheese, softened
1-1/4 cups butter, softened
1/2 teaspoon salt
12 cups confectioners' sugar
5 teaspoons vanilla extract
Fresh blueberries

Directions

•In a large bowl, combine the cake mix, milk, flour, eggs, egg yolks,
butter and vanilla; beat on low speed for 30 seconds. Beat on medium
for 2 minutes.

•Heat a lightly greased 8-in. nonstick skillet over medium heat; pour
1/4 cup batter into center of skillet. Lift and tilt pan to coat
bottom evenly. Cook until top appears dry; turn and cook 15-20
seconds longer. Remove to a wire rack. Repeat with remaining batter,
greasing skillet as needed. When cool, stack crepes with waxed paper
or paper towels in between.

•For frosting, in a large bowl, beat the cream cheese, butter and salt
until fluffy. Add confectioners' sugar and vanilla; beat until
smooth.

•To assemble two crepe cakes, place one crepe on each of two cake
plates. Spread each with one rounded tablespoon frosting to within
1/2 in. of edges. Repeat layers until all crepes are used. Spread
remaining frosting over tops and sides of crepe cakes. Garnish with
blueberries. Yield: 2 crepe cakes (8 servings each).