Vietnamese Summer Roll Salad

When I came across the idea of a Vietnamese summer roll salad on Tasty Kitchen I immediately knew that I would have to try it! Vietnamese summer rolls, goi cuon, consist of meat, vegetables, rice noodles and fresh herbs that are rolled up in rice paper and served at room temperate, without deep frying, accompanied by a dipping sauce. I like to make my summer rolls with shrimp along with plenty of fresh vegetables like cucumber, peppers, carrots, lettuce, bean sprouts, etc and fresh herbs like basil, mint and cilantro and since they are served at room temperature or even cool, it makes them a truly amazing treat on hot summer days. Vietnamese summer rolls are usually served with a dipping sauce the most common of which are a fish sauce based nuoc cham or a Vietnamese style spicy peanut and hoisin sauce. As you can see these summer rolls are practically already just salads wrapped up in rice paper so it is pretty easy to transform the rolls into a salad and to change the dipping sauce into a dressing and I did just that for this salad!

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Crispy Baked Avocado Fries

Up next in my series of baked vegetable 'fries' is avocado fries and given my obsession with avocados I really cannot believe that it has taken me this long to get around to trying them out as fries! Like the other vegetables fries these avocado fries are super simple to make, you pretty much just need to slice up the avocados, dredge them in flour, dip them in egg and panko and then bake them until nice and golden brown and crispy and good! In total they take less than a half an hour to make so you can easily make them whenever you have a craving for fries or avocados! You might be a little surprised to learn that avocados work really well when cooked or baked and they are especially nice in these fries coated with the crispy panko bread crumbs! I served the baked avocado fries with chipotle ranch and basil ranch sauces for dipping.

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Asparagus, Baby Artichoke, Pesto and Goat Cheese Quiche with Quinoa Crust

I don't know what it is about spring and asparagus but at this time of year I always seem to think about asparagus quiches which I never tire of and I always love experimenting with. This year was no different and I wanted to try something a little different, a quinoa crust instead of the more standard all butter pie crust. Up until recently my favourite crust for quiches has been a brown rice pie crust and I figured that quinoa should work equally as well as a pie crust. The quinoa pie crust is pretty easy to make and all you need to do is cook some quinoa, mix in an egg and some cheese as binders and pre-bake the crust until golden brown before continuing with your quiche recipe as normal. For this quiche I had to go with the asparagus which had been on my mind, along with baby artichokes and I flavoured the quiche with a healthy dose of fresh homemade basil pesto and some creamy and tangy goat cheese. This asparagus, baby artichoke, pesto and goat cheese quiche may take a bit of time to make but it is well worth it and it definitely makes for one impressively tasty weekend breakfast or brunch! With the quinoa crust and the use of milk rather than heavy cream you can enjoy this healthy quiche with little or no regret!

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Carne Asada Tacos

Speaking of grilling, after making the carne asada a few weeks ago I have been obsessing about it and I just had to make it again. The carne asada is flank steak that is marinated in a tasty Mexican style mojo with orange juice, lime juice, garlic, jalapeno and cilantro and then grilled until a perfect medium rare, or well done if you prefer. I used the last batch of carne asada that I made in a carne asada salad but I had been dreaming of carne asada tacos ever since. I hardly need an excuse to grill some steak so the carne asada tacos quickly made it to my meal plan! I kept things nice and easy to let the grilled steak shine and used a homemade pico de gallo along with some dice avocado and crumbled cotija to complete the tacos. It is always wondeerful to see such simple ingredients come together to make something so fantastically good! What a great way to enjoy some steak and to get outside and to use the grill!

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Spring Quinoa Bibimbap with Asparagus, Fiddleheads, Fava Bean and Ramps

This past weekend the farmers market was full of new fresh local produce including ramp (aka wild leeks), fiddleheads, favabeans and asparagus. I had left some slots open in my meal plan this week to pick up some of the new arrivals to make a dish or two but now that there was so much selection I just could not decide what to get! In the end I decided to get a bit of everything and I was already thinking about what to use them all in on my walk home. Bibimbap is a Korean 'mixed rice' dish where vegetables and meats are served over rice and then all mixed up before eating and it seemed like a great way to enjoy all of springs bounty! Although bibimbap is normally made with rice, I like to make it with quinoa both for the extra nutritional value and because of the great texture that quinoa has. This dish is really easy to make though if you are starting from scratch rather than using leftovers it can take a bit of time to cook all of the vegetables but it is well worth it. Most of the vegetables are steamed or blanched and then optionally sauteed in a bit of oil along with the ramps. This spring bibimbap is finished with a fried egg with a runny yolks and a spicy gochujang sauce.

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Buffalo Chicken Burgers

With the warmer weather here I have been thinking about grilling more and burgers definitely come to mind! When I went over all of my burger recipes I noticed a glaring omission; where were the buffalo chicken burgers? I am a huge fan of all things buffalo chicken and it is always a treat to grill up some buffalo chicken burgers in the summer. I like to start my buffalo chicken burgers off by grinding some boneless and skinless chicken in the food processor to which I add some buffalo chicken flavours including carrots, celery, onions and blue cheese in addition to the buffalo hot sauce. In general I like to avoid fillers like egg and breadcrumbs in burgers which means that the patties are a little more delicate but as long as you flip them gently they still hold together quite well. Once the patties are assembled all that is left is to grill them until cooked and slightly charred before serving them up in a bun with your favourite condiments. For buffalo chicken burgers I like to keep the condiments simple and my faourite topping is a blue cheese slaw whether it be a cabbage slaw or as in this case a broccoli slaw. These tasty buffalo chicken burgers are all set to impress at your barbecues this summer!

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Avocado and Goat Cheese Alfredo Pasta

Not too long ago a reader asked me if I had ever combined avocado and goat cheese in a pasta dish, which I had not, but since I am a huge fan of both ingredients I was immediately intrigued. I have used avocado and goat cheese in a lot of recipes together but mostly where other ingredients were the star of the show with the avocado and goat cheese there as backup and it was about time to let them shine together. I already had plans for dinner that night but I had both avocado and goat cheese on hand so I threw them into the salad that I was having with the meal and that only confirmed that the two ingredients are indeed truly magical together!

I had avocado and goat cheese pasta on my mind for the next few days as I ruminated various pasta recipes and in the end I decided to go with a simple alfredo style pasta. An alfredo pasta is a pasta with a sauce made from butter and parmesan to which I like to add cream and I figured that that would be a great base to melt the goat cheese into. On the avocado side of things I knew that I would have to add some lime juice to brighten things up and from there it seemed only natural to continue with the theme and add some cilantro and jalapeño pepper. (At this point I was thinking that this was almost like a guacamole and goat cheese pasta!) I did not want to cook the avocado too long so I pureed it in a food processor and mixed it into the goat cheese sauce and heated it just until it was warm before tossing it with the pasta. This avocado and goat cheese pasta is super easy to make and all things said and done this recipe takes less than 20 minutes to make so it is definitely doable on a busy weeknight.

I had some pretty high hopes for this goat cheese and avocado pasta and they were easily exceeded! The creamy avocado and tangy goat cheese is an amazing combination and it goes fabulously well in this pasta!

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