The sun made a small appearance over the weekend. It was very much needed, however just as quickly as it came, it went. We're back to cold temperatures and high winds. I suppose I can handle the cold having lived here in Michigan all my life, but those winds were something else. They managed to pull our gazebo out of the ground which led to Noah lecturing the winds. I kid you not; my son started to point his lecture towards the windows and talk about how bad that was; this gave me a good laugh. Comfort food is the way to go today with this cold weather. You know those meals that make you want to wrap yourself in a blanket on the couch and binge watch Netflix. Or so I hear, lately with these two wild things it's hard to find the time to sit on the couch and watch something other than Disney Junior. God forbid I change the channel because they'll come out of hiding and exclaim, "hey I was watching that!" Interesting little one...you weren't even in the living room but alright. I also find that I have to be careful about what I watch anyway, because kids tend to act like they're not paying attention and then repeat what they hear on TV. So the entire summer I spent trying to drill the ABC's into my child's head will go out the window, but the minute there is a swear word they whip around and save it in that little head of theirs. Anyone else experiencing this currently? I also find that Penny is at a stage where she will follow me wherever I go. And when I say wherever, you know what that means. I'm sure plenty of you have had your child cry outside of the bathroom door just so that they can prop a stool in front of you, stare at you with those big ol' eyes and ask, "what doing mom?" Hmm, just trying to discover the meaning of life Penny.
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| This is what happens when I tell Noah I need to take a picture. |
Anyhow, enough about the current happenings of my life. You're more interested in the recipe at hand. I wanted a dish that was going to be easy to prepare. Noah was dying to get me to play Pokemon cards with him and so the meal needed to be easy. I started by turning on my instant pot and setting it to sear/brown. I roughly chopped up some mushrooms. Toss one tablespoon of oil and let it heat up. Toss your pork with salt and pepper and sear your pork for about 5 minutes. Add your mushrooms and cook for another 3 minutes. Add your spaghetti sauce and a cup and a half of water. You could also substitute the water for beef broth.
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| Penny’s helpful hands. |
Unfortunately, I did not have any in the house and did not feel up to lugging the kids to the store for one ingredient. Next, toss in your uncooked noodles and cook for 15 minutes. Let the pressure release naturally and then toss in about 1/2 a cup of sour cream. Another ingredient I didn't have on hand, but I did have crema (Mexican sour cream), so I used that. Just like that, you have dinner ready, and you didn't have to use too many bowls/pots/pans. If you do not have an instant pot, you can cook your pork in a saute pan until done and boil your pasta as directed on the packaging. Toss your sauce in the pan with the pork and let the flavors marinate for about 10 minutes. Add your pasta and sour cream, and it's complete. Since I wanted to create a pasta dish, I figured I'd try to lighten dinner up a little by whipping together a salad. Super simple, use 1/2 cup of olive oil, salt, pepper, Italian seasoning, and the juice/zest of one lemon. Toss with your greens (I went with an already packaged Dole mix) and sprinkle some Parmesan cheese on top.
Now let us move on to the real MVP of this meal, dessert. Please feel free to buy an already packaged whipped cream at the store. I was trying to be adventurous and heard making whipped cream from scratch was pretty easy. After doing so, I would agree. I'd even suggest trying to whip this up one weekend if you want to add something homemade to an already packaged dessert. Since I have two kids who don't know the meaning of patience and who always want to help, I went with a box mix of brownies. You could pick up an angel cake at the grocery store or substitute the brownie mix for lemon cake/yellow cake/any cake mix. Cook the brownies per package instructions. For the whipped cream you want to place your mixing bowl and whisk attachment in the fridge for at least 10 minutes. The carton of heavy cream I picked up has the instructions on the side as well. Next, take two cups of heavy cream and mix on medium speed until soft peaks form. Add one tablespoon of vanilla extract and three tablespoons of powdered sugar. Beat on medium-high until stiff peaks form. Now grab your bakers hat because after this success you'll feel like you're ready to compete on a baking show!
Next, you will work on layers. Cut your cooked and cooled brownies into squares. The first layer will be whipped cream. Next, add your fruit. I chose strawberries and blackberries — another layer of whipped cream topped with granola. Any granola works well; I HIGHLY recommend if you are in the Holland area to stop at Deboer's and grab a bag of their black currant granola. It is amazing. Crunchy and not too sweet, I wondered where this granola had been all my life. I have other plans on using the rest of the granola, but for this parfait, I wanted to add a layer of crunch to the decadent and softer textures. Add your pieces of brownies next and top with whipped cream. Lastly, add a sprinkle of granola and top with more fruit if you want to get fancy place another small piece of brownie at the top so that everyone knows what to expect in the parfait. My kids had a blast helping me put this dessert together. You can only imagine how much fun it was eating it. We were so entranced with all the different flavors that I forgot to take a picture of this rare moment of silence in my house. Feel free to comment and tag me on Instagram if you create any of these meals! As always, I'm open to any ideas and suggestions for my next meal.
With love,
Carolina
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