Dinner Archives - Page 13 of 15

5 Main Course Salads for Post-Holiday Healthy Eating

While holiday eating is about indulgence, Thanksgiving dinner isn’t the only meal you’ll be eating this week, we hope. In your moments of free time between pie ingestion, you might give some thought to lighter meals, meals that won’t sit quite as heavy as turkey and stuffing, meals after which you might be able to take a walk or play a sport.

We’re talking here about salads. But these are not bare little side salads dressed with a drizzle vinegar and nothing else. We may be eating a bit more thoughtfully before and after a holiday meal, but we’re still eating!

So, let lettuce (or kale) be your base, and from there, let’s build out delicious, satisfying salads that nonetheless keep it light. Here are five favorites:

Kale Caesar Salad

Kale: trendy, as well as delicious, nutritious, and more filling than you’d expect. This salad really hits it out of the park with toppings like hazelnuts and soft-boiled eggs.

Roasted Carrot Salad with Candied Almonds, Fresh Figs, and Ricotta Salata

This one basically provides a formula for making sandwiches good. In other words, if you put in fruit, candied nuts, and cheese, we will always eat our greens.

Chopped Napa Cabbage Salad

Mild, sweet Napa cabbage is an incredible base for this salad that boldly pairs Asian pears with sweet potatoes and walnuts with blue cheese and ginger. Yum!

Snow Pea & Sweet Potato

This guy relies less on lettuce than a giant and delicious hodgepodge of vegetables. Because everything gets doused in homemade pesto, you can also throw in any Thanksgiving leftovers, if that’s your jam.

Chipotle Steak Salad

Chipotle is one of those ingredients that makes everything ten times better. Steak does that too. Together, they make this salad ridiculously good.

Mac ‘n Cheese, 4 Ways

Mac ‘n cheese: comfort food. On cold nights in fall and winter, a mac ‘n cheese craving is never far off.

If you’ve never strayed far from the blue box and the orange powder version of mac, you may be surprised by how simple the dish is to make at home. While a bowl of pasta, cheese, and creamy sauce will never fully count as health food, homemade mac doesn’t need to be a crazy indulgence either. We tweak ours with vegetables, interesting cheeses, and whole wheat pastas.

Nine times out of ten, the base for this creamy, comforting dish is a white sauce, or béchamel sauce, made from butter, flour, and low-fat milk. It is the most common of the five French “mother sauces.” Sauces derived from mother sauces by adding cheese or other ingredients are often called “daughter sauces.” Here are four delicious versions of those daughters in different iterations of mac ‘n cheese:

**Mac ‘n Cheese, 4 Ways**

Cauliflower Mac ‘n Cheese
This is what you get when you replace the pasta with vegetables completely. As in, crazily enough, there is no macaroni in this casserole dish. Before it bakes, the cauliflower should still be slightly crunchy, and the sauce just a little too thin. The magic really happens in the oven, when the sauce thickens, the cauliflower finishes cooking, and the crumbs become that irresistible, crunchy golden topping.
Get the recipe!

Butternut Mac ‘n Cheese
Here, whole wheat penne replaces the traditional little elbows, and the sauce is complemented by cubes of sweet, seasonal butternut squash. Since mac ‘n cheese can be somewhat uniform, texturally, we improve the mouthfeel factor by topping with crispy breadcrumbs, something you’ll notice we do quite often.
Get the recipe!

Cheesy Broccoli Rotini Casserole
Fall is broccoli season and the perfect time to make this tasty iteration, which uses whole grain rotini pasta, Danish Gouda cheese, and a crispy crumb topping. We highly recommend it as a way to enjoy broccoli. We couldn’t resist digging right in, but letting the casserole sit for a few minutes after baking helps it set to the perfect consistency.
Get the recipe!

Whole Wheat Spaghetti with Ricotta and Zucchini
This dish uses a slightly different preparation. Instead of thickening milk with flour, as in a béchamel, here we pour ricotta and cream into a saucepan and cook them down until they’re a saucy consistency. Toss that with nutritious whole wheat pasta and chunks of sautéed zucchini, and you’ve created a heartwarming, satisfying dinner in almost no time.
Get the recipe!

Dinner Ideas: Craving Pasta

We start thinking about dinner immediately after breakfast. That means, more often than not, we spend the rest of the day craving pasta. Is that a crime? Definitely not! The Italian staple offers the most delicious base for your weeknight creations, offering a base for whatever sauce or topping you can dream up. Some of our favorites? Fresh Fettucelle with Wild Mushroom Bolognese, Trofie Pasta with Golden Garlic & Heirloom Tomatoes, and Cheesy Broccoli Rotini Casserole are some of our favorites. If you’re as in love with fresh pasta, al dente penne, and freeform lasagna as we are you’ll find plenty of dinner inspiration over at our Weeknight Pasta Pinboard!

Saag Paneer at Home

Defining what makes a meal a good vegetarian main course is no easy task. Once you take the meat and potatoes off the plate, the format of dinner acquires a new freedom that we love.

Of course, we’re a little late to the party. Indian cooks mastered the art of vegetarian cooking long ago. Their recipes are a rich source of inspiration for us, since they produce dishes that are at once hearty, healthy, and flavorful, vegetarian food where you’d never think to miss the meat.

A good place to start is with Saag Paneer, which also goes by the name Palak Paneer. Unforgettable for its flavorful combination of freshly ground spices and silken spinach, you may have found that restaurant version of the dish are epically creamy–too rich for more than a few bites. At home, you have a change to balance the spicy-rich seesaw. We use fresh paneer cheese, which we crisp up in a pan. Towards the end, we finish with dollops of creamy yogurt, which add both tanginess and the appealing creaminess of dairy. One of our tricks for optimizing this dish is chopping the spinach after we’ve sautéed it. That helps the spinach really coat each morsel of cheese, helping you get a perfect bite each time: part crispy cheese, partly spicy, creamy spinach. You can get the full recipe over on our recipe card.

We’re happy to be participating in Food Network’s Fall Fest, a weekly blog tour of all the incredible produce we’ll be enjoying this season. This week, the topic is spinach! You can see the other bloggers’ delicious spinach creations by following the links below.

The Heritage Cook: Fresh Spinach with Maple Vinegar Vinaigrette
Blue Apron Blog: Saag Paneer at Home
Weelicious: Spinach Cake Muffins
Virtually Homemade: Creamy Spinach and Chicken Casserole
Haute Apple Pie: Parmesan Spinach, Broccoli and Chicken Bake
Red or Green: Spinach-Walnut Pesto on Bruschetta with Fried Egg
Napa Farmhouse 1885: Spinach with Sausage, Peppers and Tomatoes
The Sensitive Epicure: Spanakopita Minus the -Opita
Taste With The Eyes: Spinach and Chickpeas in a Bengali Mustard Sauce
Domesticate Me: Warm Spinach Salad with Bacon Vinaigrette and a Fried Egg
In Jennie’s Kitchen: Crispy Spinach Latkes
Devour: How to Make Spinach Gnocchi
Dishin & Dishes: Pear, Walnut and Blue Cheese Salad with Arugula and Baby Spinach
FN Dish: Eat Your Spinach Sides

Roadside Noodles with Bell Pepper, Tomato & Broccoli Rabe

When we brainstorm dinners you can make in 35 minutes or so, our thoughts often turn to the stir fry. In this traditional form of quick cooking, flavor develops as ingredients take a quick turn being cooked in a hot pan. Just like the inhabitants of Thailand, Vietnam, and parts of China, we could eat some sort of stir fry for practically every meal. The flavor variations are infinite, from shrimp fried rice to curry noodles with pork. Yet it’s our latest creation, these Roadside Noodles with Bell Pepper, Tomato & Broccoli Rabe, that we want to tell you about today.

As with many stir fries, here we start with the aromatics, sautéing ginger, garlic, and lemongrass first. Not long after, we add onion and stir fry that with a freshly slivered red pepper (which, awesomely, is in season right now and therefore boasting extraordinary flavor). From there, we add as many vegetables as we can pack in, like tomatoes and broccoli rabe, and we finish off with some herbs, too.

We call them roadside noodles because they’re quite similar to the noodles that you’ll find served from a roadside stand almost anywhere in Southeast Asia.

If you’re inspired by our vegetarian stir fry situation, then it’s easy enough to follow the formula on a non-Blue Apron night. Set a pan over high heat – a skillet works just as well as a wok. Simply chop up garlic and ginger. Cook that in some oil, then add onions and any vegetables you like. Throw in cooked noodles–either rice noodles or wontons noodles, as we use here. Make a sauce by stirring together soy sauce and mirin (or sub in white wine), plus a little bit of sugar. Garnish with herbs or some peanuts. And that’s dinner!

You can get the full recipe for Roadside Noodles over in our cookbook here.

We’re happy to be participating in Food Network’s Summer Fest, a weekly blog tour of all the incredible produce we’ll be enjoying this summer. This week, the topic is peppers! You can see the other bloggers’ delicious sweet pea creations by following the links below.

The Heritage Cook: Poblano Pepper, Corn and Potato “Chowder” Salad
Dishing: Bell Peppers Chutney/ Capsicum Chutney
The Lemon Bowl: Red Pepper Salsa
Weelicious: Bell Pepper Egg Flowers
Dishin & Dishes: Chicken, Poblano, Spinach and Mushroom Quesadillas
Domesticate Me: Brown Rice Jambalaya with Shrimp, Chicken Sausage and Bell Peppers
Taste With The Eyes: Cheeseburger Bloody Mary with Cherry Peppers and Pickles
Napa Farmhouse 1885:Italian Pork Chops with Peppers and Chiles on Buttered Egg Noodles
Red or Green: Green Chile Pork Stew
Devour: Stuffed Peppers 5 Ways
Chez Us: Grilled Eggplant and Carmen Pepper Pizza
Daily*Dishin: Marinated Peppers and Shrimp New Orleans Style
FN Dish: Sensational Stuffed Peppers

A Summer Dinner: Seared Trout with Peach & Arugula Salad

Let’s talk about why sweet and savory are so good together.

In this dish, sweet peach, spicy arugula, and fragrant tarragon conspire to turn crispy trout into an extraordinary dinner. And while spicy arugula and fragrant tarragon (and fingerling potatoes! and almonds!) are good on their own, it’s the peaches here that set the dish apart.

To make a dish more tasty than usual, it helps to have its flavors hit several different notes. Two of those are sweet and savory.

We tend to think that sweet tastes below in dessert, after we’ve eaten our due savory courses. But if you think about some of the most delicious delicacies, you’ll find the two combined. Chocolate covered pretzels boast are better because they offer both sweet and savory notes. Many chefs pair melon or figs with salty prosciutto. Many Southeast Asian dishes, like these noodles, contain more sugar than you’d imagine, to balance out the sour, salty, and bitter notes that are instrumental to every dish.

So, back to the peach.

In summer, ripe peaches give off the scent of honey. Their juices are incredibly sweet, meant to drip off your chin when you take a bite. All those sugary notes provide just the complement to the other savory flavors in this dish: those rich almonds, that spicy arugula, that tangy dressing. By the time you’ve piled the salad high on top of the crispy trout, you’ll have made a meal that’s balanced, both in terms of health and flavor. Enjoy!

We’re happy to be participating in Food Network’s Summer Fest, a weekly blog tour of all the incredible produce we’ll be enjoying this summer. This week, the topic is peaches! You can see the other bloggers’ delicious creations by following the links below.

Jeanette’s Healthy Living: Peach Kiwi Salsa
Chez Us: Upside Down Peach Bourbon Cake
The Heritage Cook: Grilled Peaches with Mascarpone Filling
Virtually Homemade: Peach Cobbler Muffins
Made By Michelle: Mint Peach Popsicles
Taste With The Eyes: The BLP Sandwich (Bacon, Lettuce and Peach)
Napa Farmhouse 1885: Healthy Peach Crisp Smoothie
Red or Green: Spiced Peach Daiquiri
Feed Me Phoebe: Peach Lassi
Domesticate Me: Grilled Halibut Tacos with Peach Salsa
Weelicious: Kenya’s Peach Cake
Blue Apron Blog: Seared Trout with Peach and Arugula Salad
The Sensitive Epicure: Grilled Peaches with Greek Yogurt, Honey, Lime Zest and Vanilla
Daily*Dishin: Blackberry Cheesecake with Fresh Peach Topping
Devour: Chia Seed Pudding with Peaches
FN Dish: 5 Unsung Sides of the Summer Peach

Dinner Conversation: Farmers’ Markets Everywhere and Veggies in Your Meals

Each week, we round up posts, videos, and even playlists to entertain you while you cook, and provide conversation fodder for tonight’s Blue Apron dinner. We hope you enjoy!

Veg Out – Daily Muse
5 ways to add more veggies to your everyday meals so that all that produce you bring home from the beautiful farmstands this season doesn’t go to waste. Plus, vegetables taste amazing and are good for you.

Farmers’ Markets Everywhere – Gardenista
The North Carolina, Portland, Oregon, Michigan City farmers’ markets are brimming over with produce, and Gardenista is sharing these beautiful posts helping us tour faraway markets vicariously, watching what’s in season in different parts of the country.

Pina Colada for Breakfast? – Oh My Veggies
The tropical cocktail gets a makeover as a delicious-looking breakfast shake. As a happy bonus, this coconut-and-pineapple smoothie features healthful oatmeal, making it a truly complete, yet summery, breakfast.

How Diane von Furstenberg Eats – The New Potato
Interviews with the fashion design icon and her personal chef, Jane Coxwell, about how to eat well and live better. We like this rhubarb dessert in particular–it’s light, fresh, and not too sweet after a delicious dinner.

The Summer Food Checklist – Whole Foods Market
Everything you need to know before you picnic, barbecue, or set off on a road trip, from fun ideas to the best gear to useful food safety tips. All part of your #BlueApronSummer!

Dinner Conversation: Still Grilling and the Rise of the Sandwich

Maple-Chipotle Corn on the Cob from PopSugar Food

Each week, we round up posts, videos, and even playlists to entertain you while you cook, and provide conversation fodder for tonight’s Blue Apron dinner. We hope you had a fun 4th–this list should help you continue the fun and relaxation through the weekend.

Always Grill Your Corn – PopSugar Food
With this recipe for grilled corn with maple and chipotle, you’ll eliminate the potential boredom of always putting butter and salt on this summer’s corn by adding spice, smokiness, and sweet notes.

Frozen Strawberry Limeade – Table For Two Blog
This cool, boozy drink is everything a summer cocktail should be: pink, icy, and sweet.

Really Weird Things to Throw on the Grill – Zagat
From alligator to seitan to pig’s head, these grill-able edibles are many times more creative than ribs, sausages, and chicken, in case your grill needs a taste of adventure.

The Rise of the Sandwich in America – America’s Test Kitchen
A short history of the iconic American handheld meal, the sandwich, which came to prominence during Prohibition. Before that, there were only six kinds of sandwiches available. Can you believe it?

Homemade Soda – Kinfolk
A weekend project to make this old-fashioned lavender-flavored bubbly drink that’s sure to impress any friends and family. The recipe comes with a charming video.

Summer Succotash with Cod & Pickled Grapes

Though it may seem like Sylvester the Cat from Looney Tunes invented the word succotash with his catch phrase “sufferin’ succotash,” the vegetable dish actually comes from a pre-TV place.

Way pre-TV, in fact. The Narragansett Native American word “msíckquatash,” meaning boiled corn kernels, is the origin of the dish that today describes not just corn kernels (no longer boiled), which still form the base of succotash, but these days are only the start. As the dish has grown up, from colonial American tables to our frying pans, it has come to feature seasonal vegetables that grow alongside corn in the summer, like beans, zucchini, tomatoes, onions, shallots, and herbs.

Fresh-tasting, filling succotash honestly stands up pretty well as a vegetarian main course, especially if you add protein-packed beans like edamame or fava. In this recipe though, we pair the succotash with quickly sautéed cod filets, whose rich flaky texture is wonderful with every bite of succotash. To make sure the cod gets crispy and golden, we dip it in rice flour, a light coating that ensures that the cod is completely dry when it hits the pan–that creates the crisp exterior.

The last extraordinary part of this recipe? Pickled grape slices, sweet, cool, and surprising on top of the fish filet.

You can get the full recipe for this colorful dinner over on our recipe card for Cod with Pickled Grapes and Summer Succotash. We’ll deliver all the ingredients you need to make it if you sign up by tomorrow.

We’re happy to be participating in Food Network’s Summer Fest, a weekly blog tour of all the incredible produce we’ll be enjoying this summer. This week, the topic is summer corn. You can see the other bloggers’ delicious corny creations by following the links below. (Second only to this succotash, our favorite corn dish is Mexican-style corn, or elote.)

Jeanette’s Healthy Living: Mexican Corn Salad “Esquites”
Virtually Homemade: Grilled Corn with Ancho Chili Butter and Fresh Lime
Domesticate Me: Campfire Chicken Packets with Zucchini, Corn and Cherry Tomatoes
Dishin & Dishes: Elote (Mexican Grilled Corn) Three Ways
Feed Me Phoebe: Corn on the Cob with Sriracha Lime Butter
Taste With The Eyes: Hello Summer Salad
Napa Farmhouse 1885: Fresh Corn, Roasted Tomato and Pickled Garlic Pizza with Cornmeal Crust
Red or Green?: Corn & Green Chile Corn Muffins
Made by Michelle: Roasted Corn and Black Bean Salsa
Devour: Four Grilled Corn Favorites
The Heritage Cook: Fresh Corn and Tomato Salad
The Sensitive Epicure: Cilantro Rice with Corn, Black Beans and Avocados
Pinch My Salt: Grilled Corn Guacamole
Daily*Dishin: Manchego Lime Roasted Corn
Weelicious: Corn Salsa
FN Dish: Off the Cob Salads

Dinner Conversation: July 4th

July 4th Drinks fro PopSugar Food — Fourth Fizz Drinks from PopSugarFood

Each week, we round up posts, videos, and even playlists to entertain you while you cook, and provide conversation fodder for tonight’s Blue Apron dinner. Today we’re thinking about food and drink for the 4th in order to get ready for next week’s Red, White & Blue celebrations.

What You Need To Know Before You Grill – Food52
Grilling tips that will demystify the few remaining questions about the simple summer cooking method. Read these before opening up next week’s incredible July 4th box, with meals you have the option of grilling (you can also make them indoors).

Making Ceviche – Food Republic
Ceviche is the South American version of sushi–a light, flavorful raw fish preparation perfect for those summer nights when you don’t have a Blue Apron box coming.

Toast to Red, White & Blue – PopSugar Food
Colorful ice cubes and straws make all the difference in this festive, old-fashioned cocktail perfect for outdoor toasts this Independence day.

Down with Tapas! – Washington Post
An impassioned and not unconvincing plea to chefs to stop serving so many small plates at restaurants. Diners would rather be eating full, balanced meals, you know, the kind that come in the right portion size and contain a protein, some veggies, and some starch. Sounds familiar…

#BlueApronSummer – Blue Apron
Tag your photos with #blueapronsummer to win fame, fortune, and a beautiful Staub grill pan. Follow us on instagram here.

Dinner Conversation: A Pizza Drone and Salmon Juju

Pie in the Sky – PSFK
Watch out! A pizza drone might just be hovering above you. Domino’s new “DomiCopter” aims to deliver hot pizzas faster by avoiding traffic altogether. Hmm.

Hi, Iced Coffee Season – First We Feast
Clarity comes to the brewing methods behind your cup of iced Joe in this guide that details the many ways to make a cold mug. Did you know about New Orleans style coffee? You do now.

Secret Ingredient Vegetable Sushi – YumSugar
Two surprising ingredients take homemade vegetarian sushi to the next level in this yummy-looking, beautifully rolled sushi from YumSugar.

Catching Salmon in the Wild – Hunter Angler Gardener Cook
This story captures life on the salmon circuit. Even when you can’t be out there fishing yourself, you can live vicariously through Hank Shaw’s tremendously evocative writing.

Eat More Water – Greatist
Hydrating foods help keep you feeling good all summer long without guzzling glass after glass of water.

5 Meat-Centric Mains for Father’s Day Dinner

We’re turning our minds to dishes that focus on meat, because that’s what we want to serve front and center on Father’s Day. It’s just that kind of meal.

We start with a new and delightfully simple rendition of top round steak. In it, a homemade roasted red pepper salsa serves as both a bed and a topping for the medium-rare steak.

From there, we head to chicken–Arroz Con Pollo and the Thai Chicken Burger–and end up, once again, with Father’s Day steak, this time in the form of Roast Beef. Tuck your napkin in your lap, call your dad, and let’s get cooking. Click on the links to get the full recipes.