dinner thrown together-success!

Tonight I played in a softball game with my coworker Sheila so I didn't have a lot of time for dinner. I was starving because I had a light lunch so I wanted to have a filling, but healthy dinner, so I threw this meal together. I guess I would call it my version of an on the run seafood scampi? Who knows, but here's what I did:

I bought a bag of frozen shrimp, scallops and calamari from Trader Joe's and the bag was almost gone, just enough for a single serving, so I put the frozen seafood in a colander and let cold water slowly run on it to defrost. While that was defrosting I diced half a shallot and added that to a saute pan with a little olive oil. Once the seafood was defrosted I added them to the saute pan to cook. When the shrimp, scallops and calamari were about halfway cooked I added a spoonful of diced garlic. I also seasoned the seafood with salt and pepper, dill, and fresh basil and when the seafood was completely cooked I added a couple splashes of white wine and a squeeze of lemon wedge and turned the heat down to let it simmer.

While all of this was going on I decided to make a different kind of starch to accompany my seafood dish. I didn't really have time to make pasta and I didn't feel like rice, so I decided to try something new, quinoa (pronounced "keen-wah") it is a similar texture to couscous and has a light, nutty flavor. It's also really good for you. I bought a box at Trader Joe's a while back and after I saw that it can cook in the microwave for 6 minutes (there is also an option for stove top preparation) I knew it was meant to be!

When the quinoa was done, I poured it in to a bowl and then mixed in the seafood and sauce and I was ready to eat! I also squeezed a little more lemon juice before I started to eat.

For a meal I prepared in about 10 minutes, I was pretty impressed. The seafood was really good and the mixture of the white wine and lemon worked really well with the seafood. And of course garlic makes EVERYTHING better. :) I also really liked the quinoa, I'm excited to make some more recipes with it, because it is a nice alternative to pasta.

Sorry no photo..no time!

tuna pasta salad

This quick meal falls into the category of: "shit, its 6:15 and we have no food at home, but we can't afford to go out, what can we make?" I had the idea of some sort of tuna salad as a few cans of tuna was really all the protein we had in our apartment. I also thought we could make some pasta with some of our tomato sauce. Erin had the brilliant idea to forget the tomato sauce and combine a tuna salad on top of some pasta.

As we boiled the pasta we started with the "tuna salad". Erin chopped a few green onions, some celery, dill pickles, and baby carrots and added it to two cans of tuna packed in water. We added a few chunks of asiago cheese and some alfalfa sprouts and then I began to season and dress the salad. I added a couple tablespoons of olive oil, juice from 1/2 of a lemon, and a healthy splash of white wine vinegar. I seasoned the salad with salt, black pepper, lemon pepper, hot paprika, and oregano. It tasted pretty good. We added this salad to 1 pound of cooked wheat pasta and finished the dish with some parmasean cheese and a little crushed red pepper. It was a delicious, quick and easy meal.

Sorry for the lack of pictures, didn't think about blogging about this meal until well after the fact and how satisfied I was for such a last minute thing. Also, I know this is just a food blog, and it will continue to just be a food blog, but I really think that you should watch this music video inspired by Barack Obama's "Yes we Can" speech from New Hampshire about a month ago. Anyone waiting for our generation's JFK or MKL, well, here you go: