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Spice Rubbed Pork Loin

Dave and Sarah Eickelberg — July 18, 2012 — 1 Comment

[This is Part 5 in our Catering series. To view previous posts, click here.]

The final component of the party menu is Spice Rubbed Pork Loin. This pork is where it’s at! It’s juicy, tender and spicy. The combination of cumin and paprika gives it a warm smokey flavor without being too hot. If you prefer a little more kick, just up the amount of crushed red pepper you add to the rub. For the party, we roasted the pork loins and put them into a roaster on the lowest setting just to keep the meat warm. We wanted to keep the heat nice and low so the meat didn’t continue to cook. We found a great roasted salsa verde at Costco that went beautifully with the sliced pork, saving us time and money! This shaved a good (valuable) hour off our prep time. But, really, any salsa verde would work great.

(photo courtesy of The Wedding Format)

In Meat and Poultry, Recipes

How To Grill Perfect Chicken Breasts

Dave — July 13, 2012 — 1 Comment

There are many things in life that I (Dave) am awful at doing. Here are just a few of them:

Dancing
Cartwheels
Math, specifically math that involves fractions

However, there are also some things in life that I am great at doing. One of those things is grilling chicken breast. I don’t want to brag here, but I will. I have yet to eat a grilled chicken breast that tastes as good as mine. I really can’t take all the credit though. Much of my success comes from my grillfriend:

The Charbroil Infrared Grill takes all of the guess work out of grilling. There are no hot spots and cold spots…just consistent perfection. Today, I am sharing my grilling secrets with the world so that you too can enjoy perfectly grilled chicken breasts.

In Awesome Tips, Meat and Poultry, Recipes

Quinoa Stuffed Poblano Peppers

Dave and Sarah Eickelberg — July 11, 2012 — Leave a comment

[This is Part 4 in our Catering series. To view previous posts, click here.]

Sorry it’s taken us so long (too long!) to get the rest of this series posted. We have said it before, but our lives are a little jam packed! The kiddos have been in full action these days! Over the last month we’ve had vacation bible school, T-Ball, playdates, birthday parties, and Father’s day festivities. Not to mention the usual time we like to carve out for friends, church and TV! Yes…we protect our TV time. Our current TV addiction is Breaking Bad. We are hooked.

Anyways, on to the food..peppers. Quinoa stuffed poblano peppers to be exact. We started with fresh, off the truck poblano peppers from a local Mexican grocery store. Dave had to wait until the very last minute to get these babies. The truck didn’t get there with the peppers until the morning of the party, so he was waiting at the front door when the store opened at 10:00 AM. Cutting it close! Once all 60 peppers were cleaned and halved we filled them with a warm quinoa salad. We’ve posted a very similar version of this before…it’s one of our favorite ways to use quinoa. It was extra awesome and satisfying when it was stuffed into the peppers, roasted, and drizzled with salsa verde.

(photo courtesy of The Wedding Format)

In Recipes, Side Dish

Mexican Chopped Salad with Cilantro Lime Vinaigrette

Dave and Sarah Eickelberg — May 22, 2012 — 3 Comments

[This is Part 3 in our Catering series. To view previous posts, click here.]

Last Fall, I (Dave) went to a conference for work at Disneyland Hotel (rough…I know). The food that the hotel served was so incredibly good. It was better than any catered food I had ever had before. One of the meals they served was a Mexican-style meal, and it helped to inspire the food we served for the party. They served a salad with jicama in it, and that was my first time ever eating jicama. If you have not had it before, it is a cool and crunchy root vegetable with a mild taste. We added some jicama to the salad we served and it was the mystery ingredient of the night. We had about 10 people ask us what the “crunchy white stuff” was in the salad.

The jicama, along with the other ingredients, made for a pretty amazing salad! It was crisp with bright and fresh flavors and was the perfect salad for a Mexican-style meal.

(photo courtesy of The Wedding Format)

In Recipes, Salad

Cinnamon Brownie Pie

Dave and Sarah Eickelberg — May 16, 2012 — 4 Comments

[This is Part 2 in our Catering series. To view previous posts, click here.]

(Photo courtesy of The Wedding Format)

Even though dessert was the last course we served for the night, we wanted it to be the first recipe that we shared with you. It was a definite crowd pleaser at the party! We had so many people asking us for the recipe! At first we were a little embarrassed to admit that we used a box mix for the brownies. But the more we thought about it, the more comfortable we became with it. The reason we picked a Ghirardelli mix was because we checked the ingredient list and it was everything we would use if we made brownies from scratch. And when we knew were making 18 pies, we figured we’d take all the help we could get!

Obviously, no one could tell they were from a box! They were super rich and decadent with a little warmth from the cinnamon. The real whipped cream took it over the top! We heard that at one table each person took their first bite as they got to the table and exclaimed to themselves, “Whoa!..” We’ll take that as a complement!

It was hard to break this recipe down much more than this. Sorry that it still makes 3 pies, serving 18 people. The good thing about these pies is that they are frozen so you can just keep a couple on hand to pull out later for a last minute dessert.

In Dessert, Recipes

No Bake Lemon Cheesecake

Dave and Sarah Eickelberg — May 15, 2012 — 6 Comments

When I (Sarah) was growing up, Jello No Bake Cheesecake was a popular dessert at our house. In 4th grade we had to write a list of our favorite things. Lets just say cheesecake appeared on there about …oh four times. Shame!

The thing is, I don’t think I had real cheesecake until I was in high school. This means I was listing Jello No Bake Cheesecake 4 times with various toppings! I loved the stuff! I remember one time in particular that we are camping and my cousin brought a no bake cheesecake in a 9 x 13 topped with blueberry pie filling. It obviously left an impression on me, since I remember that to this day! Let’s bring this back around to last week when I was on Pinterest and was completely delighted by a stunning picture of a square piece of cheesecake topped with fresh blueberries!! I was reminded of my childhood love and knew I needed to recreate this beloved dessert of mine ASAP!

I love this dessert because you don’t have to bake the filling. I admit that I am no good at making traditional cheesecake. It never turns out the way I see it in my dreams. It’s usually cracked and dry and disappointing. But, I have no shame in saying that I could knock your socks off with this cheesecake! The filling is fluffy and tangy with the perfect amount of lemon to brighten it up. I love the blackberries on top for a change. (Especially since blueberries cost twice as much. Yikes!) Give it a try soon. It’s the perfect spring dessert!

In Dessert, Recipes

Pasta Salad with Tomatoes and Corn

Dave and Sarah Eickelberg — May 14, 2012 — Leave a comment

We needed a light and healthy side to go with our grilled chicken breast and honey mustard sauce for our Mother’s Day lunch. After scouring the pantry and freezer for some staples, this pasta salad came together in a snap. The combo of corn and tomatoes screams summer, which we are definitely ready for! We are all for making our own salad dressings, but sometimes it’s so nice to just open and pour! Brianna’s French Vinaigrette was perfect on this salad. It was bold enough to hold up the to flavor of the whole wheat pasta but not over power the other ingredients.

In Pasta, Recipes, Salad

Fruit Pizza

Dave and Sarah Eickelberg — April 25, 2012 — Leave a comment

Last weekend, we were getting together with our friends and we were in charge of dessert. We wanted something with fresh fruit that would be quick and easy to make. That’s when we remembered an old favorite of ours, Fruit Pizza.

We used to make this all the time during a first few years of marriage, but we had kind of forgotten about it. That won’t happen again! We remembered how much we love it and our kids love it too, especially Marley. Seriously, who could resist all this?!

In Dessert, Recipes

White Chicken Chili

Dave and Sarah Eickelberg — February 23, 2012 — 4 Comments

In our first year of marriage we invited three couples over to our little apartment for dinner. This was one of our first times ever entertaining guests for dinner so we wanted to make a really good meal. We decided to try our hand at a White Chicken Chili recipe that Dave’s mom passed down to him. We read the recipe and saw that it served 4-6 people. Since we were feeding 8 people, we figured we should double the recipe. Sure, we may end up with some leftovers, but you can’t run out of food when serving guests, right?!

Oh man…I wish we had a picture of this! Every single burner on our stove had a pot on it and each pot was COMPLETELY full of soup. It was so ridiculous. We learned that night that this recipe serves 4-6 Eickelbergs (we can eat a lot of food). This recipe actually serves about 8 normal servings!

In Recipes, Soup

Tortellini Soup

Dave and Sarah Eickelberg — February 15, 2012 — 5 Comments

Last week we caught you up on the dinners we had in our last days at our old house, Turkey Fried Quinoa and Mac and Cheese. This week it’s time to catch up on the dinners we’ve had since moving to our new house. We didn’t want these beauties to slip through the cracks! First up…Tortellini Soup. We posted pictures of this hearty soup in 1 Cup Awesome Weekend, and promised the recipe would follow. We’re keeping our promise, and you’ll be glad we did! You have to make this as soon as possible! It’s fresh, healthy and super flavorful. Combining marinara and chicken stock makes the perfect tomato based soup. And it is so simple since it’s already seasoned so well! This, paired with all the tender crisp veggies, is a knockout. It has just enough tortellini and parmesan cheese to make feel indulgent. Are you hungry yet?!

In Recipes, Soup

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