Category Archives: Damn Good Dinners

Cornbread Stuffing with Sausage

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Two posts in one week?! Well it is the week of eating so, we wanted to bring you as many tasty recipes as possible to get ready for the big day.

So technically this is dressing and not stuffing because my future father in law will probably be stuffing the bird with aromatics but let’s be real, whatever you call this dish is just semantics. IT’S FREAKING TASTY, is all that matters. This dish reminds me of my mom (& uncle). Mom and I both adore when there is sausage in stuffing or dressing. We are also big fans of cornbread, so this is a family favorite. My uncle typically made his stuffing with white bread but one year to mix it up he did cornbread and it was epic. So in reverence to my late uncle and his impeccable cooking skills I am going to attempt to replicate his yummy side for my future in laws.

  • 1 lb. sausage (I did it with chorizo to give it a spicy flair)
  • 1 onion, diced
  • 1 tbsp. of fresh sage
  • 1 tbsp. of fresh rosemary
  • ½ tbsp. of fresh thyme
  • 2 cloves smashed/minced garlic
  • 2 cups or 3-4 celery stalks, diced
  • 1 stick butter
  • 2 cups of chicken or turkey broth
  • 1 can cream of chicken soup
  • S&P to taste
  • 1 family size pan of cornbread (So think like 2 jiffy boxes worth, made in advance & don’t use the sweet/honey cornbread)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Crumble the cornbread into a large bowl and set aside while you brown the meat. Drain the fat before adding sausage to cornbread bowl. Sauté the onions, celery, garlic, and butter until semi-translucent. In another bowl whisk together the broth, cream of chicken soup, herbs, and s&p. Pour into cornbread, sausage, and veggie mixture and stir together gently.

Spray a 2 quart baking dish with cooking spray or grease with butter and spoon mixture into pan. Bake uncovered for 25-35 minutes or until browned & heated through.

Happy Eating, XO.

Grilled Romaine with Tahini Dressing

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Guys, I wish I could say we were busy whipping up a million new recipes for you which is why we haven’t posted the entire month of July. But actually, it’s a little more exciting. One of our very own got engaged! Congrats, Sonia! So, as you can imagine, we’ve had some other things on our brains. But, we’re ready to jump back into it. We missed you guys!

With all that’s going on now, we’re going to keep it super simple. Like toss-it-all-in-a-processor simple. We’re well into grilling season and I’m not gonna lie – there’s only so many ways you can grill chopped veggies before they get boring. I mean, we love you spicy veggies, but we need a change. Enter: grilled romaine. But not just plain romaine, romaine with tahini dressing. Not only does the romaine give you a smokey taste, but the tahini gives it an extra nutty and savory kick.

  • 2 cups tahini
  • 1/2 cup of olive oil (or extra oil from the tahini)
  • 1 garlic clove, minced
  • Juice of 1 lemon
  • 1 bunch romaine lettuce
  • 2 tbsps capers

In a food processor (or by hand), toss in the tahini, garlic, and lemon juice. Pulse all of the ingredients together until smooth and creamy. If you notice it’s getting too thick, add in more oil and a slight bit of water. It should have the consistency of a creamy dressing when you’re done.

For the romaine, clean and separate the leaves. Grease the grill and bring to medium heat. Place the leaves on the grill (over a tiny flame is a-ok), and let them crisp for 2-3 minutes. Just the edges of the leaves should brown.

When serving, pour the tahini dressing over the romaine and top with capers.

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Happy Eating, XO.

Saucy

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I’m so sick of the typical red sauce in pasta dishes. Legit I get acidity these days from eating too many tomato based sauces so I figured I would try and mix it up in case anyone else out there is just as over it as me. I wanted to do an alfredo like sauce but hopefully keep it figure friendly as well. Luckily there are so many skinny variations out there in the world wide web and I found this yummy cauliflower based one! I legit roast cauliflower on the reg and even make the Indian sabzi version of it all the time so now thatI can utilize it in one more way is #winning in itself. Anyway, next carb craving try this sauce over marinara and don’t tell me if your pasta doesn’t sing!

  • 1 medium head of cauliflower (approx. 450g)
  • 1 large yellow onion
  • 2 cloves of garlic (ok I did 3 obvi)
  • 1 tbsp. of butter
  • 5 cups or 1.2 L of broth (chicken is what I did but vegetable is fine)
  • 3/4 cup of milk (or almond milk)
  • 1/2 tsp of salt (I added a pinch of black pep too).

Cut the onion & garlic into thin slices and sauté in butter for about 20 minutes or until caramelized. Boil the cut up cauliflower florets until tender in the broth (Save a 1/2 to 3/4 cup for the sauce) . Combine milk, broth, cauliflower, and veggies and blend until smooth. I added a tbsp. of grated pecorino romano because sauce should have cheese IMO.

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FYI makes about 3 cups of sauce.

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Tip: If sauce is too thick, loosen with broth when reheating.

Happy Eating, XO

Ain’t no Beefin’

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In the Poconos, recently my friends and I were on a wine tour doing tastings of the area vineyards and as we all know when drinking copious amounts of booze causes most people to binge eat. Luckily, there was a cook-off contest going on nearby so we stumbled over and tried all the eats the locals had made. There was a plethora of good food like sausage and peppers, mushroom risotto, etc. but this beef dish just knocked my socks off! I asked for the recipe because I wanted to recreate it for the blog, but more importantly, I wanted to try it sober to see if I even liked it (who knows when your inebriated, errythang tastes good under the influence). My God. I was NOT disappointed! It was just as yum, so I hope you enjoy this as well.

  • 2 lbs. flank steak
  • 1 cup cranberry juice
  • 1/2 crushed pineapple or puree
  • 1/4 cup honey
  • 1 cup cranberries(recipe calls for fresh but all I had was dried so do you)
  • 1/2 cup diced candied ginger
  • 1/4 cup minced garlic or 4 cloves chopped
  • 2 tsp ground ginger
  • 1/2 cup soy sauce

In a medium saucepan cook soy sauce, honey, pineapple, cranberry juice into a marinade. Add cranberries and candied ginger cook for a bit more before turning off stove to cool.

In the meantime, coat steak with the ginger and garlic, then pour cooled marinade over steak. Marinade for 1-2 hrs then remove steak from marinade and cook for 7-10 minutes on each side. Take the marinade and recook to turn into a glaze for the steak. After letting meat rest slice on grain.  Drizzle remaining cooked marinade then serve w bean sprouts and chopped cilantro.

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Happy Eating, XO

A fish so nice they named it twice

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Mahi-mahi is such a yummy fish taco fish but I don’t know how else to prepare it other than blacken it. That’s when I went on a quest to find a different, yet easy, way to prepare it. Maj other benefit of this recipe is that it’s crazy high in protein because of the nutty crust (and obvi the fish itself).

So for those of us stuck wearing strapless bridesmaid gowns, this will be a great meal for after a solid arm bandit workout! Tone baby tone, ok I digress… anyway short grocery list + 20 minutes =tasty mahi-mahi! Hope you love it as much as I do. (Ps. feel free to serve w sides and all. I dip my mahi pieces into roasted garlic aioli, pretty much eating them like chicken fingers & honey mustard.)

  • 2 6 oz. mahi-mahi fillets
  • 1/4 cup of macadamia nuts finely chopped
  • 1/4 cup of panko breadcrumbs
  • 1 egg
  • 2 tbsp. of regular milk or unsweetened coconut milk
  • olive oil & salt & pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. In the food processor chop the nuts until it’s the sam consistency as the breadcrumbs, mix the nuts & breadcrumbs. Whisk together the milk & egg. S&P the fish before coating in egg mixture and coat both sides with the nut panko mix. In a skillet with hot oil (medium to high heat) Sear the fish on both sides for about 3 minutes each before placing in oven for 10 minutes (or until firm/cooked).

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Happy Eating, XO.