
Fresh Picnic Ham Two Ways: Cuban Style & BBQ
As a family we can eat a ton of food in one night and leftovers normally disappear as after school/work snacks, but there is at least one hunk of meat too large us: the fresh ham. The fresh ham or picnic ham is one of the cheapest cuts in your grocery store and it’s...

Black Beans – Frijoles Negros
I live in south Florida and growing up here you eat a lot of black beans, some good, some bad and some are great. The great ones nearly always come from smaller Cuban restaurants cooking the food they grew up on, and they are awesome. I have tried for years to get...

Mini Dulce de Leche Cheesecakes
I am not a baker; I have neither the patience nor the exacting standards to be a good baker. I am a cook; I like a pinch of this and a dash of that. Thus desert can be a challenge. In most cases I am quick to delegate the responsibility to a guest, my mother in-law...

Smoked Cornish Game Hens with Blonde BBQ Sauce
My oldest stepdaughter is not quite the adventurous eater that the rest of us are but for her birthday I wanted to make a fun and kind of fancy dinner she would like. I found cute little Cornish Game Hens in 4 packs and Costco and decided that these mini extra tasty...

Grilled Shrimp with Minty Orzo Salad and Tzatziki
Christmas is over and we have all been very naughty around here eating lots of cookies, cakes and cheese. I don’t even want to know the average daily calorie intake of the members of this household; it might make me take up starvation as a hobby. Just kidding I love...

Roasted Chicken Thighs with Mushrooms and Root Vegetables
Tis the season of heavy eating! Thanksgiving dinner, holiday parties, and cookie exchanges it’s time to lighten up. This simple diner of chicken thighs and vegetables is the result of a quick trip to Whole Foods looking for inspiration for the defrosted chicken that...

Holiday Spoon Rolls
With the holidays in full swing I wanted to share the dinner rolls that I have been making for family events lately. They are an amalgamation of my grandma’s classic yeast spoon roll and the Southern Living dinner rolls I found online. I also add some whole wheat...

Brie and Bacon Spinach Dip
So this is the best homemade spinach dip ever. It’s hot and gooey, rich and cheesy, salty and creamy. Basically it is everything that spinach dip should be. My version evolved out of Emeril Lagasse’s recipe for spinach dip on the food network website, I took a few...

Cilantro Dijon Salmon
This is a simple, simple dish. The instructions could read mix up sauce, grill salmon, then eat; but that would not be a very fun blog post. So I will tell you about this recipe’s inspiration. It started from a watching this strange daytime show The Chew that has...

Pork Roast Stuffed with Spinach and Gorgonzola
Pork Roast Stuffed with Spinach and Gorgonzola I love a nice pork roast, it’s tasty, versatile, and cheap. Don’t confuse the affordable roast with the pricey and also tasty little tenderloins. I like especially to butterfly the roasts and fill them with all kinds of...