Mini Leek and Goat Cheese Quiches

I think I've mentioned that I can't bake to save my life.  That's the other sisters' area of expertise (not her only area of expertise.  She never ceases to amaze in the kitchen!).  The thought of making the pastry for a quiche horrifies me.  Easy solution? Mini phyllo cups.  Even I, the most incompetent baker I've ever met, can handle this.


The result? Mini quiches with sauteed leeks, goat cheese, and ...you guessed it... yogurt!


These little guys are delicious.  Easy to make and packed with a ton of flavor.  Make them for brunch, lunch or appetizers: these will impress any crowd!

Ingredients:
1) 8 sheets of defrosted phyllo pastry
2) Olive oil or olive oil spray
3) 6 eggs
4) 1 leek, thinly sliced
5) 1 tbsp goat cheese
6) 1/3 cup non-fat yogurt
7) S & P


Directions:
1) Preheat oven to 375.
2) Place one sheet of phyllo pastry on a cutting board.  Lightly brush with olive oil/olive oil spray.
3) Place another sheet on top. Repeat step on until you have stacked 4 pieces of phyllo.
4) Cut into squares (12 per sheet). 
5) Repeat with remaining 4 slices of phyllo pastry.
6) Place each small square into a muffin tin you have prepared lightly with olive oil.
7) Bake for 5 - 7 minutes until tops are JUST starting to turn brown.
8) In a pan, sautee the leeks in olive oil until golden brown. Let cool.
9) Whisk together goat cheese, eggs, yogurt, leeks and salt and pepper.  
         *You don't want to add too much yogurt here because the tanginess may
          overtake the other delicious ingredients.  Just enough to make it creamy!
10) Pour mixture into phyllo cups.  Bake at 375 - 400 for 15 minutes until tops are lightly golden.


Serve with crispy baked proscuitto, a fruit salad and these Mini-Hashbrown Stacks and you have a delicious sunday morning ahead of you!

Sunday Brunch: Mini-Hashbrown Stacks

I hosted brunch on Sunday and these were a huge hit.  They were crispy on the top and edges and moist on inside.  Top them off with a dollop of lemon chive and yogurt sauce.  


I served these with Mini Leek and Goat Cheese Quiches, my [healthier] alternative to bacon: crispy baked proscuitto (laid flat and baked at 400 for 10 minutes) and fruit salad.  What a delicious way to end the weekend!

Ingredients:
1) 2 potatoes, sliced very thin
2) Olive oil for brushing the muffin tin and each layer of tomatoe
3) Salt and Pepper


Sauce:
1) 1/2 cup of yogurt
2) 1 tbs chopped chives
3) Zest of half a lemon


Directions:
1) Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
2) Put olive oil in a bowl.  Brush the muffin tin with olive oil.
3) Put a slice of potato in each muffin tin.  Brush top of potato with oil.
4) Repeat, until you have put down 6-7 potatoes slices.
5) Brush top potato slices with oil.  S& P each potato stack.
6) Bake for 40-45 minutes.
7) Let cool for a few minutes.  Remove potato stacks from tin and top with a dollop of yogurt lemon chive sauce.


This was enough for 8 stacks.  Make lots, because everyone will be asking for seconds!

Healthy Crab Cakes with Spicy Chipotle Yogurt Sauce

I know you don't believe me.  Healthy crab cakes? It seems impossible with all the mayo, bread crumbs and deep frying.  But it is soo possible - and soo delicious!!



Lesson learned: cut the @#$% and let the delicious fresh crab speak for itself. These crunchy golden cakes are just made with good wholesome ingredients - and broiled, not fried!

There isn't one ingredient in these that isn't good for you.  I substituted the mayo for non-fat greek yogurt.  I substituted the bread crumbs for a mix of gluten-free breadcrumbs and quinoa flakes.  Finally, instead of frying them, I discovered you can get the same crispiness without all the oil by broiling them. 


Ingredients:
For the crab cakes:
1) 1/2 pound of fresh crab 
2) 1 tbsp non-fat greek yogurt
3) 1/2 jalapeno, diced
4) 1 tsp lemon zest
5) 1 tsp dijon mustard
6) 1 egg, with yolk and white whisked together
7) 1/2 cup glutten-free bread crumbs
8) 1/2 cup quinoa flakes
9) S & P
10) Drizzle of olive oil


For the sauce:
1) 1 cup non-fat greek yogurt
2) 2 tbsp chipotle seasoning


Directions:
1) Mix together first 6 ingredients for the crab cakes.  Add S & P, 1/4 cup of the bread crumbs and 1/4 cup of the quinoa flakes.
2) Roll the crab cake mixture into small balls (I used tbsp per ball).  Place on a baking tray.
3) Refrigerate crab cakes for an hour or more.
4) When refrigerated, remove crab cakes and prepare a bowl with the remaining quinoa flakes and bread crumbs mixed together. 
5) Roll crab cakes in the bread crumb mixture.  If it is not sticking, you can whisk together another egg, roll in the egg and then the bread crumb mixture.
6) Drizzle crab cakes with olive oil.
7) Broil on high for no more than 5 minutes (this depends on the strength of your broiler and be very careful not to burn them - check constantly!)
8) Mix together sauce ingredients and serve.


Enjoy eating these delicious crab cakes with no guilt! 

Butternut Squash Gyozas with Spicy Soy Dipping Sauce

I wish I could take credit for this recipe.  But I have to thank agoisfoto.com for coming up with this amazing flavor combination: sweet butternut squash, salty soy sauce combined with a kick of ginger.  I stumbled across it and I just had to make it.  And believe me they taste as good as they sound [and look]. 


In true yogurt sisters style, I made a couple moderations.  I cut the sugar content by two thirds.  The butternut squash is sweet enough that I didn't miss the extra sugar.  I also didn't add extra salt aside from the soy sauce.  Then, even though I pan fried the gyozas, I didn't need more than 2 tbsp of olive oil to get them nice and crispy.  Next time I might even try steaming them!

Ingredients:
For the Gyoza:
1) 1 pound butternut squash cut into pieces
2) 2 tbsp soy sauce
3) 1 tbsp brown sugar
4) 2 scallions, white an pale green part, thinly sliced
5) 1 tsp grated ginger
6) Wonton wrappers (I used about 25)
7) 2 tbsp olive oil


For the Sauce:
1) 1/2 cup soy sauce
2) 1/2 cup water
3) 1/4 jalapeno, minced


Directions:
1) Heat squash, sugar, soy sauce and salt until the squash is tender enough to mash.
2) Remove from heat.  Mash squash and add scallions and ginger.
3) Lay out wonton wrapper and add less than a tbsp of the squash mixture in the middle.
4) Brush edges of wonton wrapper with water.  Fold the wonton in half and seal edges.
5) Repeat with remaining mixture.
6) When finished, freeze the gyozas until firm, about 10 - 15 minutes.
7) In the meantime, mix the sauce ingredients together.
8) Heat olive oil in a pan.  When hot, add the gyozas, 10 at a time (I only made 10 and freezed the rest). 
9) Cook until one side is gold brown.  Flip and repeat.

Jerk Chicken and Gouda Cheese Quesadillas

We were in Jamaica for a family vacay a while ago and the jerk chicken there was literally "ja-maica-me-crazy." It was so good.  It turned us into jerk chicken fiends.  


We can't come close to getting the moist, salty, smokey, sweet jerk that they have perfected in Jamaica.  But it's worth a shot, right?


I had some left over jerk chicken that we had seasoned with jerk rub and barbequed.  I shredded it and put some jerk sauce on it, combined it with some gouda cheese and cilantro, threw it on a corn tortilla and made some quesadillas out of it. To quote a friend "now, that's a quesadilla!".


I can't emphasize how tasty these ingredients are together.  You're just going to gave to try it for yourself!

Ingredients:
1) 1 breast chicken, shredded
2) 2 tbsp jerk sauce
3) S & P to taste
4) 1 cup medium gouda cheese, shredded
5) 3 tbsp cilantro, chopped
6) 6 corn tortillas
7) Olive oil
8) 2 tomatoes, diced
9) 2 garlic cloves, minced
10) Juice of 1/2 a lime


Directions:
1) Mix chicken, jerk sauce, and salt and pepper together.
2) Mix tomatoes, garlic, lime juice, 1 tbsp cilantro, salt and pepper together [the tomato salsa].
3) Heat olive oil in pan.
4) Create quesadilla with 1/3 of jerk, 1/3 of gouda and 1/3 of cilantro on a tortilla. Top with another tortilla.
5) Place in pan and sautee until bottom is browned.  Flip.
6) Repeat to create two more quesadillas.
7) Slice quesadillas in quarters and serve with tomato salsa.

Burrata cheese with tomato salsa

This is an easy and delicious way to start off any dinner party.  Just pick up some burrata cheese, throw together this easy tomato salsa, serve with crackers and enjoy! 

Ingredients:
1) Burrata cheese (you can substitute with buffalo mozzarella)
2) 3 tomatoes, cubes
3) 3 sprigs of rosemary
4) 4 unpeeled cloves of garlic
5) Olive oil
6) Salt and pepper
7) Crackers


Directions
1) Preheat oven to 425.
2) Place tomatoes in baking sheet, drizzle with olive oil and place rosemary sprigs and garlic cloves on top. Roast for 35-40 minutes.
3) Remove from oven, discard rosemary sprigs, remove garlic closes from peel, and roughly chop tomatoes and garlic together.  Add salt and pepper to taste.
4) Serve over burrata cheese with crackers.

Chipotle Chicken and Slaw Bites

These little bites have it all.  They are a healthy.  They are delicious - full of crunchy fresh slaw and flavorful spicy creamy chicken.  They cost under ten dollars to throw together.   Oh and did I mention they are easy and quick to make?

I guess there are other reasons that these are my go to appetizers for parties, aside from the fact that they taste soo good, they are the hit of any party.  They sound so simple to make, it's hard to describe the amount of flavor these guys are packing.

So, after much ado I introduce ... Creamy chipotle yogurt chicken and cilantro cabbage slaw in Tostitos scoop cups:

Ingredients:

1) 1 chicken breast, cooked and shredded

2) 1 cup plain yogurt

3) 2 tbsp chipotle seasoning

4) Juice of 1 lime

5) 1/4 of head of cabbage, sliced into small pieces.

6) 2 tbsp cilantro

7) Salt and pepper to taste

8) Tostitos scoop cups [you can buy them baked now!]

Directions

1) Mix together chicken, yogurt, chipotle seasoning, juice of half a lime and pinch of salt.

2) In another bowl, mix together cabbage, cilantro, remaining lime juice and salt and pepper.

3) Immediately before serving, put chicken and slaw mixes into the scoops cup.

Enjoy the scoops and the rave reviews!