All posts filed under: Mains

Chicken Strips with Honey Mustard Sauce

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For my final recipe in my #BackToSchool series, I made a wonderful homemade version of a childhood classic… Chicken Strips with Honey Mustard Sauce. You could say I saved the best recipe for last! Now I know we have all had frozen chicken strips before. There are varying qualities that are on the market, but I guarantee that this homemade version will blow all of them right out of the water! Not only are they made with natural, whole ingredients, they are baked and not fried. Honestly just by looking at them (and smelling and tasting them) you can’t notice a difference! I have made a lot of chicken strips in my day, and I have experimented with many marinades, breadings, and cooking methods. This recipe combines all of my knowledge from YEARS of making chicken strips, and I am willing to give up all of my secrets to you! Secret #1: Breadcrumbs My first secret is the breadcrumbs and this is actually the most critical part of the chicken strip in my opinion. I …

Beef & Broccoli Stir Fry

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I am back again with another recipe in my #BackToSchool series! For my fourth installment, I have a quick and easy stir fry recipe that you will love–Beef & Broccoli Stir Fry! I’m serious…you will make this over and over again! I am such a huge fan of broccoli. It’s fantastic it steamed, raw, in soup, baked…you name it! I really love it in this classic Asian stir fry since the broccoli florets really help cling onto and absorb the delicious steak marinade that I make from scratch. My Secret Ingredient to Tender Beef This marinade is what makes this recipe so good. Plus, I add a not-so-secret ingredient in it that makes the beef super tender, light, and fluffy–just like at Chinese restaurants. The secret to getting the beef (or any meat for that matter) to get that texture is….wait for it…baking soda. I know, I couldn’t believe it either until I tried it! The baking soda acts to tenderize the beef and give it that light and airy texture. For that reason, this enables …

Garlic Butter Salmon

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I am back again with another great recipe for my #BackToSchool series. If you are returning to school, or are just trying to get back into your work routine, then these recipes will really help you out! They are quick, simple and can be enjoyed by both adults and children. For today’s recipe, I have come up with a super simple Garlic Butter Salmon. This salmon filet is baked in a parchment paper package in the oven to keep it juicy and succulent. The addition of a homemade garlic butter makes this recipe extra delicious and adds lots of moisture to the salmon as it cooks. All Wrapped Up This Garlic Butter Salmon is very easy to make. Simply combine butter, garlic, salt, pepper and lemon juice in a bowl and mix everything until combined. Spread the butter mixture evenly over the salmon filet and wrap everything up in a nice parchment paper package. Once the salmon is all wrapped up, just bake it in the oven for 20 minutes or so! You barely have …

Penne alla Rosé

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Today, I am kicking off my #BackToSchool series on my blog! This time of the year can be super busy, and after a long day, the last thing you want to do is make dinner. Lucky for you, I have come up with a week’s worth of recipes to get you back into your school (or work) routine. These meals are all very quick, healthy, and taste delicious! For my first recipe, I have made a delicious Penne alla Rosé. Now this sounds fancy, but this is essentially just pasta with a creamy tomato sauce. A few simple additions make this pasta incredibly delicious, and the best part is that this whole recipe can be made in just 15 minutes! I know…I can’t believe it either! How to Pull Off this Recipe in 15 Minutes… This Penne alla Rosé recipe requires a bit of multi-tasking, but I can hardly call it that since you don’t have to do too much work when boiling pasta. Once your pasta is in the pot and boiling, you can …

Simple Grilled Clams

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While clams are abundant year-round on the west coast, I particularly love to enjoy them in the summertime. They make the perfect light (yet satisfying) summer meal, especially when they are combined with fresh summer flavours and eaten outdoors on a patio or at the beach. This year, I decided to experiment with cooking clams. I typically steam-cook clams in a large pot on the stove, but realistically, I can do that any time of year. However, I can only grill my food for a few months before the rain starts up; so naturally, I opted for experimenting with grilling clams. After a few tries of experimenting with various ingredients and flavour combinations, I came back to keeping it simple, and that’s how my recipe for Simple Grilled Clams came to be! Direct or Indirect, that is the Question I had seen a few recipes where the clams were grilled directly on the metal grates of a grill. While I thought this would be great, I found that the tasty clam juices easily fall into …

Cumin Lamb Skewers

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As the days get hotter, I am preparing to send BBQ season into full swing! While I love hamburgers, veggies, and chicken on the grill, I sometimes like to treat myself with something special, like these delicious Cumin Lamb Skewers. These Cumin Lamb Skewers were inspired by the delicious variety of skewers at one of my favourite barbecue restaurants in Vancouver: Happy Tree House BBQ. While the name of the restaurant may be a little crazy, the food is totally on point! They have a variety of skewers available (that come pre-BBQd) including beef, chicken, seafood, chicken skin, and lamb. Spice Up Your BBQ this Summer! Since it’s a northern Chinese restaurant, that means the food is seasoned with lots of spices to give it amazing flavour. All their skewers come with this amazing cumin and chili spice on them. It’s spicy and smoky and just makes you want to keep eating them! Since I haven’t been to Vancouver in a while, I’ve been missing them and decided to recreate them at home! I bought …

Lemon & Herb Salmon Burgers

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As you may have recently seen on my Instagram, I have collaborated with my good friend Liisa (@Essential_oil_health) to give away a few of my favourite essential oils. Not only are essential oils great for diffusing into the air and making your home smell amazing, you can actually use them in cooking (in small amounts of course)! This month, we are giving away a bottles of essential oil from DoTERRA: Lemon and Lime. We thought that these oils would be perfect for spring since they are so uplifting and refreshing, and can be used in tons of recipes, like this one for Lemon & Herb Salmon Burgers! There is not a can of salmon in sight with this recipe—it is made with fresh salmon fillet. I really prefer fresh salmon as opposed to canned salmon since it’s often less pungent and less cat food-y…if you know what I mean. I like to cook with sockeye salmon, but when it is out of season, it can be quite expensive. As an alternative, I like to cook …

Two Delicious Pizzas for National Pizza Day + Homemade Pizza Dough

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To me, nothing beats the taste of homemade pizza. Made with fresh toppings, cheese, and dough from scratch, you just can’t go wrong. And with a food this popular, you must celebrate it with it’s very own national food holiday! That’s right… it’s National Pizza Day! And I have two delicious pizza recipes to share with you: a Traditional Margherita Pizza and a fresh Spring Veggie Pizza. My Traditional Margherita Pizza – a true pizza classic! My pizza dough is much fluffier and thicker than what you may be accustomed to, but everyone always loves it! It’s more of a Roman style pizza dough that’s thicker and loaded with olive oil– kind of like a thin focaccia. It is really sturdy and holds up the toppings really well. Plus, Roman style pizza is rectangular shaped, and since those are the only pans I have, then that’s what I went for! Once you have the basic dough recipe down, you can add whatever toppings you like. For a Traditional Margherita Pizza, use some tomato sauce, mozzarella …

Soy Sauce Chicken

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Soy Sauce Chicken is a classic Chinese dish. A whole chicken is marinated and then poached in a pot full of soy sauce and various spices. Once cooked, it’s cut up into chunks and served warm or at room temperature. While this recipe is a bit challenging to make at home, it’s much cheaper than purchasing a Soy Sauce Chicken from the store– and you get to modify the spices to suit your taste! Winner, winner, chicken dinner! Am I right? Recipe Testing: 3 chickens and a jug of soy sauce later… I set out to make Soy Sauce Chicken mainly to see if I could actually make it at home. I love a culinary challenge! While I had eaten this dish numerous times (and loved it), I had never made it from scratch…so I did LOTS of research on how to make it. There are tons of variations for the preparation of this dish. Some recipes call for the chicken to be marinated for just a few hours to marinating it overnight. Some stuffed …

Herbed Turkey Breast with Roasted Apples

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The moment you have all been waiting for, it’s time to reveal the star of Thanksgiving dinner—my Herbed Turkey Breast with Roasted Apples. Honestly, does it get more autumnal than this? Turkey is a staple during Thanksgiving, and has always been a tradition to have this for Thanksgiving dinner probably for decades now. While cooking an entire turkey is fun and a bit of a culinary challenge, that is WAY too much for two people! So, for a smaller crowd, I opted to cook a turkey breast. I picked up this fantastic, locally-raised turkey breast from the butcher at Red Barn grocery store here in Victoria. I find that with basically all meats, buying local and free-range (if available) really has its benefits. Not only does the meat taste more flavourful (the way meat should taste) you also support your local farmers. A total win-win! I found this skin-on turkey breast to be incredibly rich and flavourful despite just being the turkey breast (i.e. white meat), and frankly, I didn’t miss the dark meat at …