Tomato and Avacado Pico de Gallo

I LOVE pico de gallo.  More than salsa.  In fact, I'd prefer it to salsa.  I just love the fresh ingredients and chunky vegis.  Mmmmm, I'm drooling a little bit here.  When I made my "cafe rio" salads the other night, I had a problem - I forgot to add the ingredients for my pico de gallo recipe to my shopping list last week!  BAH!  Grrrr... So, I had to compromise.  I had an avacado and a tomato.  That's it.  Okay, I can work with it.  So, this is what I came up with and LOVED it!

Tomato and Avacado Pico de Gallo

Ingredients:
1 avacado, cubed
2 roma tomatoes, seeded and cubed
1/2 tsp. lime juice
1 tsp. white vinegar
1 tsp. onion powder
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 bunch fresh cilantro, chopped

Directions:
1. Combine all ingredients in a medium bowl.
2. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for a minimum of one hour.

Cheese and Garlic Salad

Here's another Russian recipe for you!  Another one of my favorites.  This is absoloutely wonderful served on fresh, sliced tomatoes or rye bread.  You can adjust the garlic to your liking.

Cheese and Garlic Salad

Ingredients:
3 large carrots, finely grated
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 cups shredded sharp cheddar cheese
Mayonnaise

Directions:
1. Place carrots, garlic, and cheddar cheese in a medium bowl.  Add mayonnaise just until moistened.

Creamy Tomatillo Salad Dressing

Welcome to my new recipe blog! I came up with the name as I was cooking like a M-A-N-I-A-C yesterday. Where did I get it? I'm always teasing my husband that he only married me for my cooking (since he loves it so much). :)

To celebrate the new blog, I'm posting two recipes for the Cafe Rio grilled chicken salad. Here are two recipes: the salad dressing is an update, the pico de gallo is new (and SO yummy on the salad!).

Creamy Tomatillo Salad Dressing

Ingredients:
16 oz. bottle of buttermilk ranch dressing
4 tomatillos, peeled
1/4 bunch cilantro, washed and dried
1 tsp. garlic powder
1/8 tsp. cayenne pepper
2 tsp. green Tabasco sauce
1 lime, juiced

Directions:
1. Pour ranch dressing into large bowl of food processor. Add remaining ingredients. Process until mixture is smooth.
2. Pour into a container and refrigerate for at least 2 hours.
3. Pour over salad when ready to eat.

Makes 2 cups salad dressing

Cilantro Rice

Does anyone else love Cafe Rio? This is one of my favorite places to eat, I can never get enough of their chicken salad and I usually end up hurting myself because I eat too much of it in one sitting. Anyway, the only thing I don't like about it is the price. It costs us so much money to go and eat there! So, once again, I went on a mission to find a recipe that matched the salad dressing and rice. It was practically dead on! I didn't make the shredded chicken, but I grilled one chicken breast, which I marinated in equal parts lime juice, soy sauce, and olive oil. Next time though, I want to try the shredded chicken. This is definitely a recipe that I am going to be making at least once every two weeks if not once a week. Mmmmmmmmmmmm...........

Cilantro Rice

Ingredients:
2 cups chicken broth
1/2 tsp. garlic powder
1/4 bunch cilantro
1 (4 oz.) can green chiles
1 tsp. lime juice
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 Tbs. butter
1 cup rice

Directions:
1. Blend cilantro, green chiles, and lime juice in food processor.
2. Add all ingredients to a medium saucepan and bring to a boil. Change to low heat, cover, and simmer for 30 minutes.

Buffalo Chicken Salad

If any of you like buffalo wings or Chili's Boneless Buffalo Chicken Salad, we have our own little take on it. This is one of our family favorites. Wednesday night is salad night at our house. I usually make a nice big dinner salad for all of us, sometimes with a nice piece of toast. This one is easy, fast, and uses little energy. It is also a little healthier than Chili's version because I use spinach instetad of lettuce. And instead of heating the chicken in the oven, I use our little toaster oven (about 7-10 minutes cooking time). Serve while the chicken is still warm. This meal serves 3 and cost me $3 per person.

Cat's Boneless Buffalo Chicken Salad

Ingredients:
1 bag leaf spinach, washed and drained
1 avacado, diced
1 tomato, seeded and diced
1 can corn, drained
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
12 pieces Tyson's Anytizers Boneless Buffalo Wings, cooked and each piece cut into fourths
1 cup Nana's Tortilla Strips (you can find these in the deli isle)
1/2 cup ranch dressing

Directions:
1. Layer salad in order of ingredients.

Taco Salad

Tonight we had one of our favorite salads - taco salad in a tortilla shell. You can pick and choose what you like on your salads, but here's what we usually have:

Taco Salad

Ingredients:
1 can refried beans
1 can pinto beans, drained and rinsed
1/2 lb. ground beef, browned (I like to season mine with chili powder and season salt)
Lettuce, chopped
1 tomato, seeded and diced
Shredded cheddar cheese
Sour cream
Salsa
Tortillas

Directions:
1. To make tortilla shells, fill medium saucepan 1/2 full with cooking oil and heat over medium high heat.
2. Remove both ends of the pinto bean can, remove label, wash and dry well.
3. Once the oil is heated, place one tortilla on the top of the saucepan and press the can (using tongs) into the center, pressing the tortilla down into the oil. Allow the tortilla to cook for a few minutes with the can still in the center, then remove can. Continute to turn the tortilla in the hot oil until it holds its form. Remove from the oil and place upside down on paper towels. Allow to cool for a few minutes and serve warm.

Summer Salad

One of my favorite things to eat in the summer are fruit salads. They're cool, healthy, and taste GREAT! Growing up, I was exposed to a plethera of fruit salads - granted most of them are varities of Jello, go figure - and so I thought I'd share one of my favorites. It's very easy to make. The key to this salad though is to make sure that everything is WELL DRAINED! If you do not, then you'll have a soggy salad. Not sure what the rest of you would call this, but our family calls it...

Frog Eye Salad

Ingredients:
1 cup uncooked acini de pepe pasta
1 20 oz. can crushed pineapple
1 20 oz. can chunk pineapple
1 cup sugar
2 Tbs. cornstarch
1 beaten egg yolk
2 tsp. lemon juice
1 15 oz. can apricot halves
1 15 oz. can mandarin oranges
3 medium bananas

Directions:
1. Cook pasta in medium saucepan for 7-8 minutes, or until tender. Drain well and place in large bowl. Drain both cans of pineapple and reserve juice for sauce. Set pineapple aside.
2. Combine sugar and cornstarch in medium saucepan. Add pineapple juice and whisk until sugar/cornstarch is dissolved. Cook over medium heat until thick and clear. Pour half the mixture in with the egg yolk and then pour back into saucepan. Cook for 1 minute and then remove from heat. Add lemon juice. Whisk well and pour into bowl with pasta. Allow pasta and sauce to chill overnight (sauce will thicken, so do not worry about adding more cornstarch!).
3. Drain apricots and oranges VERY well. Dice apricots. Combine with pineapple and add to pasta/sauce mixture. Chill until ready to serve. Right before serving, slice bananas into salad (if you do it right before, you'll keep the bananas from going brown).