Sweet Pepper Tuna Cucumbers

I do best with a protein-rich diet when I'm trying to lose weight and I wanted to incorporate a generous dose of veggies, so I threw this together for lunch. It's certainly nice to look at, and it shares some qualities with a really good canape recipe given to me by my friend Melissa.

Sweet Pepper Tuna Cucumbers
2 mini sweet peppers, sliced

1 very large cucumber, sliced
1 small can of Tuna, drained
1 1/2 T low fat cream cheese, softened
1 rounded t capers
1/2 t minced onion
1/2 t chili powder
1/4 t garlic powder
1/4 t pepper

In a bowl, mix together the drained tuna and softened cream cheese, add capers and onion, then add in all the spices and mix until thoroughly blended. Drop the blended mixture onto cucumber slices, place one slice of sweet pepper on top, then garnish with more chili powder for extra flavor and color if desired. Chill in the fridge until cold, then serve.

Ratings from the Experts*: My hubby's not a big tuna fan, so I took the burden upon myself to eat every last one of these as I sat here writing this post. What a burden it was... I kid, I kid! I give this a solid 9/10 for the fact that it's a tiny bit salty but I think that could be remedied by simply washing the capers and rubbing them off before adding to the mix. But the mix itself was a good blend. The chili powder really gave it a nice flavor and brought it all together.

Chicken Satay

Satay is one of those gold standard dishes that I tend to judge a restaurant by. I've had some realy horrible Chicken Satay that more closely resembled leather on a stick than actual food (usually found at chinese buffets), and I've had some that still makes my mouth water just thinking about it (such as Sakura's Satay- which I had in Paris last year- shown below).

For me, this recipe falls closer on the scale to Sakura's and a bit more even towards the authentic than even Sakura's, which is not a bad thing at all. I must mention that I gleaned this recipe from yet another cookbook find this past weekend. It's called Street Food, by Clare Ferguson. It's a collection of street food recipes from every corner of the world. I was thoroughly impressed by the gorgeous pictures and rich, varied recipes I found... and I got the book for only three bucks!

I didn't really have any issues with ingredients for the recipe thanks to a trip to the Asian market in OKC this past weekend (other than not having fresh lemongrass stalk or tamarind paste), so I think my dish came out pretty close to the book's. I did lack tamarind paste, so I just left it out of the peanut sauce and added a little bit of peanut butter for some consistency, then when my mixture was still too thin, I brought the sauce to a boil, added about a teaspoon of corn starch, and the problem was solved.

Chicken Satays
1 lb. boneless chicken breast
2 T peanut oil
2 T distilled white malt vinegar (I substituted apple cider vinegar for GF purposes)

-Spice paste-
3 garlic cloves, chopped
4 shallots or 1/2 small onion, chopped
1 T coriander sees, crushed
1/2 stalk lemongrass, finely chopped (I didn't have this, but I did have a Thai spice mix with some in it, so I added 1 t. of that mix)
1 t. ground turmeric
2 small, fresh hot red chilies, finely chopped (optional in my opinion)

-Satay sauce-
1 t. fish sauce, toasted on a piece of foil for 1 minute
1 t. tamarind paste (sold in jars- but I didn't have any, so I added some natural peanut butter instead mainly for consistency)
1 oz. macadamia nuts or peanuts, chopped,
1 T brown sugar
1/2 stalk lemongrass, finely sliced (again, same substitution of spice mix here)
4 shallots or 1/2 small onion, chopped
2 small, fresh hot red chilies, finely chopped (optional in my opinion)
1/2 c canned coconut milk

Cut the chicken breasts into thin ribbons about 1 inch wide, then put pieces into a medium bowl. Chop the spice paste ingredients, mixing them all together in a food processor until it becomes a paste-like consistency (if you need to, add 1 T of water to help the consistency). Heat the oil in a skillet, add the spice paste, and saute until aromatic. Let it cool, stir in the vinegar, then add to the chicken. Marinate for about 20 minutes or up to 2 hours. Meanwhile, soak 8 wooden satay sticks in water.

To make the satay sauce, put the fish sauces in a food processor, add the tamarind paste (or peanut butter in my case), nuts, sugar, lemongrass, shallots or onions, and chilies. Heat the coconut milk in a small saucepan to near boiling point, then add to the processor and puree briefly to form a sauce. Preheat your broiler or light your grill until very hot.

Push the meat onto the sticks, threading it on in waves- then grill or broil or cook for about 3 minutes each side until done. Serve with the satay sauce.

Ratings from the Experts*: Hubby gave this (even lacking some ingredients) a solid 10. Better than 95% of the other chicken satay I've had, I gave it a 9, simply for the fact that it was a tiny bit dry for what I prefer, compared to the satay in Paris which is the best experience I've had.

Tuna Rolls

I found this gorgeous new recipe in a book I picked up this past weekend at a half price bookstore during a sale... for a whopping $2!!! Not only are the pictures in this book absolutely fantastic-make-you-salivate-esque, the recipes are inventive and different. It's called Everyday Tapas : A collection of essential recipes, and appears to be put together by Paragon Books with no particular author. Thumbing through it briefly I saw at least half a dozen recipes that I wanted to try immediately, which was enough for me to decide the $2 price tag was totally worth it. This recipe was one of those that popped out at me. I love bell peppers and go through several of them every week... so I'm almost always stocked with some, and I have (or had) about 8 cans of tuna sitting in on my cabinet shelf that I'd been contemplating how to use for the past couple of weeks. As is usual for me, I had to adapt a tiny tiny bit to account for some missing ingredients as well as personal taste. (And yes... that gorgeous photo above really is mine. This dish was so pretty that it was not hard to photograph at all!

Tuna Rolls (as adapted from Everyday Tapas)
3 bell peppers (I used yellow and orange, although the original recipe calls for red)
2 oz. olive oil (was 4 oz. - I cut this in half and didn't notice any difference)
2 T lemon juice
5 T red wine vinegar
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1 t. paprika
1 t. chili powder (called for chili flakes- which I don't have)
2 t. sugar
2 T salted capers
10 oz. tuna in water, drained

Preheat the oven to 500 degrees. Slice and deseed the peppers into thirds, coat lightly with olive oil and place on a baking sheet in the oven for 15 minutes, turning peppers frequently until the skin is blackened and blistered all over. When finished, set them aside and allow to cool.

In a separate bowl, whisk the olive oil, lemon juice, vinegar, garlic, paprika, chili powder and sugar together.

When the peppers are cool enough to handle, peel off the skins, then place in the bowl of dressing mixture, making sure all the pieces of pepper are covered and coated, then set in the fridge for 30 minutes.

Next, rinse the salt off the capers and mix with the tuna. Drain the pepper pieces, reserving the dressing. Divide the tuna mixture between the pepper pieces and roll up. Secure the roll with a toothpick. Place the tuna rolls on a large plate or serving platter, then drizzle with the remaining dressing and serve.

Makes approximately 4 servings.


Ratings from the Experts*: 9 very easily. My husband isn't a fan of tuna so it's doubtful he'll even try these, but I loved them. The only things I would change is to add a little black pepper to the mix, and perhaps cut back the olive oil even more or change it to garlic infused olive oil for a tiny bit more flavor.

Day 21: Guest Post! Nutty Salmon Asparagus Bacon Wraps

My hubby practically forced me out the door for a run and took over my blog for the night. I happily complied. So take it away, sweetie!

Sometimes the recipes I pick are chosen due to an odd mix of ingredients I find in the cupboard or freezer. Tonight it was a can of salmon and half a package of frozen asparagus. Hmm. What to make? So I found a recipe that sounded good and was easy enough to modify using ingredients on hand. Behold the

Nutty Salmon Asparagus Bacon Wraps

What you'll need:
14.75 oz can Wild Alaskan Salmon
1 T Olive oil 
2/3 c Almonds
1 t Safflower oil
1 T onion, finely diced
1 clove garlic
1 T mayonnaise
1 t. Parmesan cheese
1 t. spicy brown mustard
1 t. chives
1 t. old bay seasoning (see recipe here)
1 egg white
bunch of fresh asparagus (about a dozen stalks)
1 dozen pieces of bacon


I started by chopping the almonds in a food processor, adding some safflower oil and a dab of melted butter to make  nuts moist and gooey.  Other nuts, like pinion nuts or some pecans may be oily enough to stick together on their own, but these almonds weren't.

Next, I chopped the onion and garlic in the food processor then sauteed them in butter. When these were translucent, I mixed them with the following ingredients in a bowl: beaten egg white, almonds, mayo, cheese, mustard, old bay, and chives.

• I beat the egg whites with a hand beater until they were slightly foamy. I can't say this was an important step, but in my book, you're either using egg whites (with no yoke) for texture (so you need to beat them) or you're disagreeing with God and birds everywhere about what makes a good egg.
• It was at this point I realized I didn't have the Old Bay spice, so this step took a little longer while I mixed some up following the first recipe on this page. Also, I think this mixture may have turned out a titch too salty.

I drained the salmon and cooked it in a pan with the olive oil, breaking it apart and picking out anything that looked like a bone. Fish bones and I don't get along.  I'm not sure what the term for this is when you're working with salmon, but if it was beef I'd say I was browning it. Although the original recipe called for cooling the salmon in the fridge, I skipped that part because I don't have all day.

This mixture should have all the ingredients in it now except the asparagus and bacon, and should be firm and sticky enough to form balls, like a cookie dough. If not, chilling it for about an hour in the fridge could help.

I cut the asparagus into pieces about as long as a bacon rasher was wide, and placed them a couple of asparagus pieces on each rasher. Then I formed a ball of nutty salmon dough and put it on the asparagus, and wrapped the bacon around it adding more asparagus on the sides and top. I used about one stalk of asparagus per salmon cake, and sealed the whole thing with a toothpick.

Taking a hint from the original recipe, I used the broiler pan and lid so the bacon grease could drain off, and baked these at 375 for an undetermined amount of time - just long enough for the bacon to look crispy, probably about half an hour or less.



Ratings from the Experts*:
Jen: 8, it's a bit on the salty side
John: 7, too salty for my tastes, although a lot of seafood I've had tends to be saltier than I'd prefer. Also, I've never been a huge "wrapped in bacon" fan. It could also use more asparagus - 2 stalks per wrap. I would also be interested in trying this with pecans, I think they would bring more flavor than the almonds did. However, I'll be taking these to work...they won't spoil in the fridge.