Goodwill Hunting and Waffles…..it’s what’s for dinner.

Today hubby and I had a nice relaxing, but full day.  We got up this morning and went to the gym and later in the morning I went to church where I had an activity with the ladies ministry.  When I got home Hubby and I decided to do some Goodwill hunting.  We like to scavenge the local Goodwills and Salvation Armies for interesting home and kitchen items.  I like to find dishes and Hubby seems to have a fixation with anything that is cast iron.  It is also a great way to “change up” your food pictures at a minimal cost.  You can find all kinds of intersting dishes and items to present your food on.  Here is a collage of my finds today.  My favorite find was a set of 4 glasses that will be great to serve a layered dessert in.  I got all of these items for a grand total of $20.00, considering there are 3 cast iron skillets in the find, I think it was a pretty awesome stinking steal.

When we got home I cleaned up a bit and prept the pasta dough for lunch tommorrow.  (I will be posting step-by-step photos of this)  Then we had to figure out what to make for dinner.  Yes, I could have made the pasta but it was already late and I still had to let the dough rest and roll it out, so we decided on something a little quicker.  Hubby asked if I wanted breakfast for dinner and I thought that was an excellent idea.  We got into the kitchen together and whipped up some waffles, yummy Honey Yogurt Pecan Waffles.  I found the recipe on Annie’s Eats who got it from William and Sonoma.

Honey Yogurt Pecan Waffles

 

Honey Yogurt Pecan Waffles
3 tbsp. unsalted butter
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1/4 cup old-fashioned oats (I used instant)
2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. baking soda

1/2 cup chopped pecans
1/4 tsp. ground cinnamon
1 1/4 cups milk
3/4 cup vanilla yogurt
1/3 cup honey
2 eggs
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

 

 

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees, spray baking pan with butter non-stick spray.  Spread pecans evenly on baking pan, spray with butter non-stick spray. Toast in oven for about 5 mins.  Keep and eye on them you don’t want them to burn.  Remove from oven and set aside to cool.

Melt the butter; set aside. In a large bowl, whisk together the flours, oats, pecans, baking powder, baking soda, and cinnamon. In another bowl, whisk together the milk, yogurt, honey, eggs, and vanilla until well blended. Pour the liquid ingredients over the dry ingredients and whisk until just combined. Gently fold in the melted butter.

Preheat and lightly grease a waffle iron. Pour batter into the wells of the waffle iron and bake until the waffle is golden and set. Place in an oven preheated to 200 degrees F to keep the finished waffles warm while you use the rest of the batter. Serve with maple syrup or honey and top with fresh fruit.

My First Food Joust: Honey-Orange Glazed Pork Loin Chops w/ Sauteed Acorn Squash

Honey-Orange Glazed Pork Loin Chops w/ Sauteed Acorn Squash

If you haven’t heard The Leftover Queen holds a monthly food joust, where the previous winner picks 3 ingredients and participants submit their recipes.  The recipes are voted on and the winner then gets to pick the next 3 ingredients.  This is my first joust that I decided to participate in.  The ingredients are acorn squash, sage and orange.  Being my first joust I decided to keep it simple stupid. I was very pleasantly surprised with the results.  The squash with the orange was very yummy and gave the squash a certain sweetness.

I was going to do a submission with ravioli but someone beat me to it.  Who knows maybe I will try it anyway.

 

Honey-Orange Glazed Pork Loin Chops w/ Sauteed Acorn Squash

• 4 Pork Loin Chops
• ground sage
• salt
• pepper
• butter
• 2 TBS of Honey
• 1 TBS of Orange Concentrate
• 1 large Acorn Squash
• 3 TBS of fresh sage
• olive oil
• 1 TBS of orange concentrate

1. First if anyone has an easy way of peeling an acorn squash please tell me!  Anyway, peel and dice your acorn squash, set aside.
2. Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees.  Grease pan with butter (I used my nifty new grill skillet that I won from Foodbuzz.com) . 
3. Season chops with salt, pepper and ground sage.  Bake in oven for approximately 30 minutes. 
4. Mix honey and orange concentrated (I thought of maybe adding some ground cloves but I didn’t have any, if you dare try it tell me how it worked).  Brush chops with glaze.
5. Bake in oven for approximately 30 mins.  turning half way through. 
6. Right before they are done, brush again with glaze and turn on broiler to crisp it a bit.
7. While the chops are cooking.  Take a heavy skillet and coat pan with olive oil.  Toss diced squash into the pan with orange concentrate and sage, saute.  Turn occasionally, cook until tender. 
8. I fried up some sage leaves to garnish and crumble over squash.

Yummy….simple stupid.