Deli-Wrapped Cheese for Christmas!

I, myself, have a sweet tooth; whereas, my husband has more of a 'meat' tooth. So naturally, when I told him my plans to wrap deli meat around cheese as a Christmas treat, he was over the moon! To be honest, I was half expecting cartoon hearts to start pulsing from his eyes.

Well friends, there were no hearts, but there sure was a lot of praise. In fact, I count myself lucky that I was able to photograph the finished product! I left the kitchen for a little while to test how well the wrapped cheese would set (just to ensure your 'ribbons' wouldn't start falling off 10 minutes after setting them in front of guests), only to return to a chopping board covered with empty toothpicks - I seriously have no idea when he even got into the kitchen?! In any case, there were a few remaining and I was able to successfully test their ability to stay intact at room temperature and in the fridge.

I may be a tad biased here, but I think these are most definitely the cutest, easiest (while looking most complicated), treat you can whip up this holiday season! A definite for your hor d'oeuvres table for sure ;)

Warning: Cheesy, deli meat presents, may turn your loved ones into sneaky food-stealing ninjas.

Old School 'Mario' Kraft Dinner

At the risk of losing all legitimacy I’ve established to date, I bring to you this amazing ‘recipe’ – Old School ‘Mario’ Kraft Dinner, a.k.a. my vice!  Now, before you ream me out for posting a ‘recipe’ for a pre-packaged product with all kinds of preservatives and hard-to-pronounce ingredients (this coming on the heels of my granola bar post about trying to avoid these types of things), I can’t help myself. This is my crack! I could seriously eat Kraft Dinner every day for the rest of my life and never grow sick of it. If I know it’s in the house, it doesn’t stand a chance!

I’m probably revealing too much about myself at the moment, but I don’t possess the control to put the spoon down! Every box of Kraft Dinner is a shameful gorge-fest. A straight-out-of-the-pot, using my ‘kraft dinner spoon’ (yes I have a special spoon), eat ‘til it’s gone type meal, that sends me into a world of shame/happiness – don’t judge and don’t dare ask me to share.

Now, this ‘recipe’ is for the old school Kraft Dinner I remember from childhood. Any true Kraft Dinner connoisseur recognizes the merits of each variety of KD, and likely holds one of them as a favourite. Original is nothing but a tasty time, and I LOVE me some spirals, I even enjoyed the KD spaghetti they tested out for a while, but for me, nothing compares to the taste of the character Kraft Dinner!

To be honest, I’m not sure why they gave up on the stuff? Maybe it was a cost thing, maybe for some bizarre reason it wasn’t a big seller? Or maybe they just stopped selling it where I live? Either way, it’s something I think they should seriously consider bringing back! But until then, for those of you out there longing to chinch yourself full of cheesy-character-pasta-goodness, this recipe is for you!  

Tacos!

Who doesn't love a good taco... or 2... or 3?! They're super yum, quick to fix and fun to build! Me mudz, a.k.a. me mudder, a.k.a. my Mom, was visiting a while ago and she happens to be a big taco fan. Since I had all the ingredients on hand to make homemade tacos, I whipped out the recipe book and cracked to it! Not only are these simple to make (just as few steps as the boxed variety) they're made in your kitchen so they're mystery ingredient and preservative-free! Well... everything but the taco shells, but you can't have it all, all the time! ;)

Anywho, this delicious recipe hails from The Joy of Cooking cookbook. My mom has been known to be picky about her tacos (just ask taco and his other brother taco...), but she really enjoyed this version. Definitely something I'll be having again very soon!

Turkey Casserole

Last week we had a couple of friends over to help us eat a turkey that's been chillin in our freezer since Christmas. It was a delicious, local, free-range 20 pounder prepared just right - very tender and juicy. With that said, there's only so much turkey 4 people can pack away in one sitting, so after offloading about a quarter of the turkey to our friends as a souvenir, we packed the rest away in the fridge. That's when the turkey meals started: turkey sandwiches, turkey tetrazzini, and turkey casserole when finally, the turkey found it's way back home in the freezer (occupying much less space this time.)

Turkey Casserole just happens to be one of my favourite post-turkey-dinner meals. Not only is it super easy to make and involve very little prep, it's also great at getting rid of leftovers.