Top o' the mornin' to ya! St. Patty's Day is upon us!

Having a St. Patrick's day celebration?!  Let me help you prepare with some great recipes!

In preparation of the festivities, I have decided to start the baking a day or so early.  So on tonight's agenda are pistachio cupcakes.  This is super simple recipe that will put some green on your table!

You'll need:

• A box of yellow cake mix
• 1 box of pistachio pudding mix
• 1/3 cup of oil
• 1 cup of water
• 4 eggs
• 1/2 teaspoon of Almond extract
• Confectioner's sugar (for sprinkling)



Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.  Line your cupcake pan with your cupcake liners.  In mixing bowl, combine all the ingredients with the exception of the sugar.  Beat with a hand mixer for about 2 minutes.  Fill your cupcake liners 3/4 of the way up and place in the oven.  Cook in the oven 15-20 minutes, until you can stick a toothpick in the middle and have it come out clean!  Let cool.  Sprinkle with sugar before serving!

It's greener in person.  It isn't easy being greeeeeen.

Tomorrow night, I will prep the Corned Beef and Cabbage dinner to go into the slow cooker.  I don't really use too many measurements for the infamous 'boiled dinner'.  So you'll have to bare with me.

I picked up:

• 5lb corned beef which includes a spice packet
• a small bag of white potatoes
• a small bag of onions
• a bag of baby carrots (because I'm too lazy to peel and cut the carrots) and
• a head of cabbage (roughly two pounds)

First things first, spray your crock pot with cooking spray. 

Getting ready to slowww cook.

Trim the fat off the corn beef.  This is by far the worst part.  You know I hate trimming the fat off.  Cut the potatoes in quarters, and line the bottom of the crock pot.  Then slice a couple of medium sized onions and sprinkle over the potatoes like cheese on a pizza!  Then, add as many carrots as your heart desires.  Rest the corn beef on top of the vegetables, add 1.5 cups of water, and the spice packet.  Cook 8 hours on low. 

Cut the cabbage into quarters.  Add the cabbage after the 8 hours of cooking, and cook another hour on low.  I love making this dish every St Patty's Day!  Everything will come out so juicy and tender.

Lastly, I will be serving some sausage, peppers, and onions in a Guinness sauce.  I based this recipe off my friend Erich's delicious looking sausage, pepper and onion dish he served on Superbowl Sunday.



Ingredients:


• Your favorite sausage.  I'm making about 2.5 lbs worth of beef kielbasa.
• 2 red bell peppers
• 2 medium onions
• 1 tablespoon butter

• 1 teaspoon olive oil
• 1 tablespoon minced garlic
• Salt and Pepper for tasting 
• 1 bottle of Guinness



Slice the sausage, red peppers, and onions.  In a pan, heat the olive oil and butter, and add the onions.  Saute in the pan for about 5 minutes.  Add the garlic, salt and pepper, saute for a minute, and add the red peppers, saute another 3 minutes or so.  Take the peppers and onions and put them into the crock pot (not the same crock pot with the corned beef though, a separate crock pot!). 



Add the slices sausage to the hot pan and saute for about 3 minutes just long enough to a get a nice sear on the outside.  Then add the the sausage to the crock pot.  Add the bottle o' Guinness and cook on low for 3 hours. 



So you've got your appetizer, entree, and dessert...now all you're missing is your green beer!  Make sure you pick up some green food coloring to get in the mood this St. Patty's day!  I plan to start the day with a black and blueeee, which I could make a black and green!

Happy Saint Patrick's Day to those of you who are Irish, and for those of you who aren't but like to celebrate all the same!  Slainte!

Third times a charm!

I recently purchased some 'gourmet' tomato and mozzarella chicken sausage, and I thought I bet this would taste really good over some pasta with olive oil, garlic, sliced tomatoes and fresh mozzarella.  And I was right, it was fantastic.

I cut up three sausage links, and sauteed them in a pan with garlic (a heaping teaspoon of the minced variety...I really love garlic) and a little olive oil.  Cook the whole grain pasta according to the package.  And while those two things were going on the stove, I sliced some tomatoes and cut up some fresh motz.  Once the pasta was cooked I tossed it with a little olive oil, salt and pepper.  Added the sauteed sausage, tomatoes and motz to complete the dish.

Later in the week, I thought that dish I made the other night was really good, but I have some extra veggies I need to use before they go bad.  So, I started with the same base as the meal mentioned above except I used two sausage links instead of three and added broccoli and yellow squash.  I sauteed the broccoli and squash in the same pan with the sausage.  I ran out of fresh motz, so I used some grated motz I had in the fridge.  Another great dish with a good serving of veggies!

A few days after the second meal listed, I remembered I had bought spinach to throw into a pasta dish as some point.  I know what you're thinking, wow, that is a lot of pasta for one family to eat in such a short amount of time.  Well, James and I had been running to get in shape for the Janis Bresnahan 5K Run for Education which took place this past weekend, so I thought it didn't hurt that we were getting our share of carbs.  So I took the second dish from above, and merely added chopped spinach to it.  This time I had very little grated motz left, so I garnished it with grated Parmesan.    

All in all, we found all three meals to be very delicious.  However, the more veggies you can add to a dish the better.  They are filling, have tons of vitamins and nutrients, and are low in calories.  You really can't go wrong.  And since the veggies fill you up quicker, there's leftovers for lunch the next day!

As for pasta, it's okay to enjoy pasta multiple times a week if you are smart about it.  I try to buy whole grain pasta, and I pay close attention to portion sizes.   Measure your pasta before boiling it.  And if you can some exercise in after dinner that helps too!  Maybe you didn't run this weekend's 5K, doesn't mean you can't start training now for next year's event!

Does apple sausage count as a fruit and a protein?

The Red Sox have finally won a couple of games, and what better way to celebrate the start of Spring with some sausages.  It's too bad ballpark type foods are so fattening because they sure make for quick and easy dinners, which I love since the last thing I want to do is spend a lot of time cooking after working all day.  Plus, I'm usually starving by the time I get home.

I picked up some apple and chicken sausage from the grocery store.  I decided to save on some calories and avoid putting them in a roll.  So I sliced the sausage and sizzled them in a pan with red and green peppers and sliced onions.  I was a little nervous the sweetness of the apple in the sausage wouldn't go well with peppers and onions, but it actually tasted fine.

Since we were going for a run tonight, I thought we needed some carbs to go with this meal.  I made some toasted almond Near East rice.  I always stock up on a variety of Near East rice when its on sale, otherwise it can be kind of pricey.

So again, nothing glamorous about this meal, but it was quick and easy, and hit the spot.  Good fuel for our run tonight....