Easy Eggs Bennedict - Budget Cooking

 

It's possible! You may find you like it so much that going out for breakfast at a restaurant is not as appealing anymore because you can make this meal in about 15 minutes and you save yourself a few dollars too!

I have tried making my own hollandaise sauce, however it's much more time consuming. I came across a seasoning sauce mix packet made by Knorr. I'll be honest I was not sure if I would like it. It's not bad! However it needed to be made more tasty. Just a couple extra additives to this sauce makes a restaurant quality sauce!

 

Poached eggs: I have a special pan that makes poaching eggs easy, however if you don't have this pan you can still make poached eggs. I was watching Brunch with Bobby Flay and he had some great tips on making pouched eggs, click on the link for video (see brunch with bobby flay).

Fresh lemon juice is the key!It livens the sauce, so please use fresh squeezed lemon.

 

What you will need:

1 packet Knorr Hollandaise sauce mix

1 cup milk

3 TBSP butter

1 TBSP fresh squeezed lemon juice

pinch of smoked paprika

pinch of onion powder

pinch of dried parsley OR pinch of fresh minced parsley

8 Canadian bacon slices

2 sourdough English muffins, split in half.

4 eggs

 

Start off by make hollandaise sauce according to packet direction. When combining contents of the packet, milk and butter also add fresh squeezed lemon juice, pepper, onion powder, and smoked paprika. Then whisk until sauce thickens. Turn on low and cover with lid to keep warm

Prep the english muffins, split in half and spread butter on each half. Pre heat a pan, once hot turn temperature to a level 3. Place english muffin butter side down into pan. Place a heavy pan on top of muffins and let cook until brown. It's important to this on a low heat that way you don't burn english muffins. Once cooked, place on plates.

Next make poached eggs and heat up Canadian bacon.

If using poaching pan. Fill pan with a little water and bring to a medium simmer. Once water is at a simmer place dab of butter in each egg poacher. Then crack eggs and place one into each egg holder. Cover with lid and let steam for about 3 minuets or until cooked to your preference.

In the mean time while eggs are poaching in pan, heat Canadian bacon by placing in a preheated pan. Once warm transfer to foil and cover.

Next assembly: Place 2 slices of bacon on english muffin on each half, next egg and top off with hollandaise sauce.

Serve and enjoy!

 

 

Frozen Turkey Patties - Make from scratch and freeze

I have a tendency to buy pounds of ground beef, chicken or turkey when i can, especially if its on sale. Then i end up throwing in the freezer...Of course once its time to cook some burgers I have this HUGE frozen clump of meat i need to wait to defrost. So what do i end up doing instead? Going back to the store and buying fresh meat bc I don't want to wait around to defrost my meat! I start feeling like i'm throwing money out the window. So I decided I will start making my own burger patties ahead of time and just freeze. Its much CHEAPER to make my own.

The one thing however is frozen turkey or chicken patties are not enjoyable to eat. They usually are dry and  don't have much flavor. So I decided I JUST need to make my own! I was at trader joes and they had 1lb of ground turkey for $2.99 pkg. So I bought 1lb bc that's a good deal i thought. I had just made beef patties and I wanted to make turkey patties now from scratch for better flavor.

One thing about turkey or chicken is it can be dry bc the patties have been handled to much causing a compact patty. So my biggest tip is DO NOT over mash the ground turkey.

This is not an exact recipe, so the quantities can be adjusted to your taste.

~What you will need~

Raw Fresh Ground Turkey - 1lb makes 4 patties

Lemon Zest - 2 lemons

Garlic Cloves- 6-8 cloves depending on how much garlic you like.

Fresh Parsley and Fresh Thyme

Olive oil or another healthy oil you like. I use Grapeseed oil, but you can use vegetable or canola oil.

Salt and Pepper

Next you want to get your herb paste prepped. Rinse off a large handful or parsley and a small handful of fresh thyme. Remove thyme leaves from twigs, you don't want to use the large twigs from the brown part of thyme. Next take garlic cloves and smash then peel. Zest two lemons. (my pictures do not show the large handful, this was a smaller pile that I added to...save yourself time and do a bigger pile)

Pile together parsley, thyme, garlic, lemon zest and 1 teaspoon of sea salt and chop very fine all together until you get a "paste" like texture. Set aside. 

Next get a large biscuit cutter (size 4 inches)

Take a small handful of turkey and place into bottom of biscuit cutter and fill half way up, gently pressing down to spread out evenly. Next season with pepper and sea salt. Then take a teaspoon of herb paste and rub it onto ground turkey.

Then get another small handful of turkey and place over herb filling, turkey filling should fill to the top of cutter. Gently press down to even out. Add another teaspoon of herb paste and season with pepper only, for top layer. Then add teaspoon of oil over patty.

Transfer patty to a cookie sheet that has been lined with foil or plastic wrap.

Continue to follow this process until all your patties are made, again about 4 patties per 1lb of turkey.

Once all your patties are formed and transferred to cookie sheet, place into freezer. Let freeze for 2+ hours, i suggest at least 6 hours. Then take each patty and individually wrapped in foil. Then place into a ziplock freezer bag. Then place back into freezer. Once your are ready to cook just place on BBQ or into a hot pan while frozen.

Easy Peasy, really!

Panko Crusted Salmon Fillet with pesto mayo

I made Panko Crusted Salmon last night. It was super tasty! I can't recall what I was watching, some show on the Food Network. The epi was about a sandwich lathered with a pesto mayo. I keep buying French Bread to make the sandwich, however we would end up eating the bread with other things before we ever made the sandwich. Or I would forget to buy the pesto when I bought the bread...yes, I forget to bring a list. Even when I bring a list I don't look at it all the time. I actually remembered to buy the pesto this time, but ate the bread alone....so I decided to make the pesto mayo and would use it on salmon.

Bread Crumbs: I highly recommend panko bread crumbs. I love the light crispy texture more then regular bread crumbs.

Pesto: I prefer to buy the premade because it's cost effective. I enjoy whatelse but Trader Joes prepared pesto. You can make your own pesto if you do desire!.

Mayo: Please don't use miracle whip! Unless u think it's the best stuff on earth! I prefer my Best Foods (or known as Helmans on the East Coast). I actaully really like Dukes which I found at the Dollar store....it's a popular brand I found when living in Florida, I really like it.

Seafood: Great money saving tip. Walmart has a great frozen food section that carries  Salmon, Tilapia, Shrimp & Scallops. The small bags run $5 (unless you live in Alaska or Hawaii you will pay more.) for four fillets. You can have 4 small servings or two large servings. Fish is individually frozen so it's great! But use whatever salmon you like!

You could even adapt this recipe and instead of salmon try shrimp, or a white fish.

Smoked Paprika: Love this stuff!! If you don't have the smoked version, no need to add the non smoked plain paprika. Smoked gives a nice flavor, non smoked is more of a coloring effect then for flavor.

2 tBs mayo
2 tSp pesto
4 Salmon Fillets
1 cup of panko bread crumbs
2 tBs grated parmesan cheese
Dash of salt to your tasting
Pepper
1/4 tSp Smoked Paprika
2 or 3 tBs Canola Oil for frying

Lemon Sauce (scroll to bottom)
3 lemons
2 tBs butter

In a bowl combine mayo & pesto, mix well. Lightly season fish with a little smoked paprika, salt & pepper. Then rub pesto mayo onto fish. I got my Little Cupcake involved in this process. I gave her a food brush and let her lather it up. I don't suggest allowing a young child to do this with their hands, only becasue the fish is raw and they might try to eat whats off their hand. Just watch the little ones.

In a separate plate combine panko bread crumbs, parmesan cheese, smoked paprika, dash of pepper & salt

Heat your pan on high until smokey then turn to a medium temperature then add the oil and let heat up until it starts crackling.

Place fish into bread crumbs and coat both sides of fish. Then place into hot oil pan.

Let fish cook for 3 min, check bottom to make sure there is gold brown color. Once ready, flip and cook for another 3 min on the other side. Then place fish on a cooling rack with paper towels underneath to catch any oil. Finish the rest of fish. You may keep fish warm in a warm oven if you have a few fillets to finish. Depending on pan size you should be able to cook 2 fillets at a time.

Also note if your Salmon is on the thicker side you may need to continue to cook for an additional 2 min. If your fish gets brown before the fish is cooked in the middle and you are worried it may burn. Either turn down temperature of  burner to a medium low OR place fish on a cooling rack then place cookie sheet underneath (this will allow air to circulate and not get bottom mushy). Place fish in a preheated oven on 350 for 15 min to allow fish to finish cooking. I personally prefer my fish medium rare, fish is a little opaque in the middle. So cook longer if it's not to your liking.

Serve with your favorite vegetable or salad and with rice for a complete meal. My Little Cupcake likes this version because of the crispy coating.

There are two types, breaded and nonbreaded 

Lemon Sauce
I like a lemon butter finishing sauce. I did not make with this meal because I thought I had lemons but I was wrong.

Still using the same pan you cooked your fish in, dump oil out and any left behind bread crumbs. Place burner on a medium low temperature. Simply squeeze juice from 2 or 3 lemons (you want about 1/3 cup). Place 2 tBs of butter in pan and let melt, then add lemon and let simmer for 2 minutes. Taste to see if you want more butter flavor. If so add 1 tBs of butter to sauce. Let cook for 1 min. You can drizzle onto your fish, or place on the side.



Note: I did make two versions of salmon using the pesto mayo. One was breaded the other was left unbreaded. For unbreaded version follow all the steps, but do not coat fish in bread crumbs and only add 1tBs of oil to pan. 

Non-Breaded Fish

Money savings tip: Make your own olive oil?

What?? That's what I said when I saw a video post from Americas Test Kitchen. It's very complicated....okay, no it's not!! If it was I probably wouldn't do it. Click on this link for ATK video Americas Test Kitchen

Simply just combine  3 parts canola oil & 1 part extra virgin olive oil together and you have your own olive oil. You have both the taste of extra virgin olive oil with the high heat ability of canola oil. Now you don't need to buy 3 separate oils, just buy two and recycle a unused extra virgin olive oil bottle. I call that a money savings tip!

I did not have a funnel, so I made my own. On Pinterest I saw a great idea to use a plastic bottle! So I cut the plastic water bottle in half, and used the top portion as my funnel.

I had about 2/3 cups of Extra Virgin Olive Oil left in my glass bottle. So I measured out 1 & 1/4 cup of canola oil and combined to the EVOO bottle. Not hard! Now I have "olive oil"!

Make your own funnel, use a plastic bottle

Cut plastic bottle in half

you have a funnel!

Cross out the "extra virgin" on your bottle