Perks of staying at home...

One of the perks of staying at home and not working is that I get to try alot of recipes that I have been wanting to try but haven't had the opportunity to because of work or pregnancy (where I was so sick and tired that I pretty much didn't cook more than mac 'n cheese for 8 months!). My friend Suzi from my good old days at St. Mary's Academy introduced me to skinnytaste.com, which has amazing recipes that have formed the bulk of our meals for the past month or so. Our favorites so far include asparagus and poached egg with pasta (the egg makes a delicious sauce!) and black bean salad, which I served with cheese quesadilla. Both recipes are vegetarian, which is helping us move back into our goal of eating a bulk of our foods without meat. I was a vegetarian in college and being the animal freak that I am really try to avoid killing them for my food, especially when nowadays when there are so many delicious protein alternatives. Jason and I are still debating on raising Noah vegetarian or not, but that is another post...


This morning, I made the Starbucks mozzarella and tomato panini from scratch for our breakfast. Cheaper than actual Starbucks and it was so delicious. I simply took ciabatta bread, spread it with pesto, sliced up fresh tomatoes (I think Starbucks uses roasted, but my roasted tomatoes had gone nasty) and marinated mozzerella balls, and topped it with spinach. I then baked it at 350 for about 5 minutes to warm it up and finished it under the broiler. Oooo. It was a delicious way to sneak some more veggies into McSexy, too!

For Easter, I am making these from the skinnytaste site. Pina Colada cupcakes! They don't call for rum, but I think I'll sneak some in!

I am also trying to cook more from scratch and eat at home (we got into a bad habit of eating out/to-go when I was on bed rest). My parents are both phenomenal cooks, make everything from scratch, and I want to give that to same experience to Noah.