First off, these are called burgers.. but they are NOTHING like a burger. They are closer to a patty. And have NO meat. Quinoa is an excellent source of protein as well as black beans. SO, these two together are protein packed and also great as a side for breakfast. They are so quick and pretty tasty.

What you will need:
1 cup of cooked/cooled quinoa  (its fine if its not entirely cooled- but if its too hot it could cook the egg)
2 cans of black beans
various colors of peppers ( I used 6 small colored peppers)
1 tablespoon of crushed garlic
Salt
Pepper
2-3 eggs
3 stalks of chopped green onion
3/4 cups of dried breadcrumbs (I ran out but used crackers pulsed in the food processor)
EVOO
*optional: cheese, avocado, your favorite salsa... the possibilities are endless!

**This is enough for 4 adults and possibly a few kiddies... if you are making this for 2-def  cut everything in 1/2. You can always make this amount, form the patties, use wax paper to store and freeze them in quality tupperware. And defrost when you need them. :)

**You can def get creative and use any veggie in the patties that processes well. Zucchini, carrots, peppers, mushrooms... it's up to what you like or as is the case in my home, whatever I seem to have on hand.


Drain and rinse your black beans- put them through a food processor to break them down- not to a complete puree, leave them a course chop.

Food process your peppers, green onions and garlic.

Adding everything to one large bowl

In a large bowl toss in beans, pepper/green onion/garlic mixture, breadcrumbs, cooked quinoa. Beat eggs and add to the bowl now mixing all the ingredients. Add a 1/2 tablespoon of salt and as much cracked pepper as your palate prefers.
(optional flavor trick- I have a go to green salsa from Trader Joe's I sometimes use in this mixture to bump up the flavor, as well as add it to the finished product as garnish/flavor... your palate will determine your preference.)

Everything mixed

In a large saucepan liberally coat the pan with EVOO on medium heat. Form patties no bigger than the palm of your hand. Place them in the medium heat and cover for 4-5 minutes then flip. Watch the heat... the quinoa can burn if your heat is too high- and you def want to cook this for that time b/c of the raw egg.

Finished product w/out cheese or salsa.

When you have browned both sides serve with veggies/salad of your choice. Garnish with your favorite cheese, avocado, and salsa.

 Bueno Provecho!

Quinoa is an amazing grain to add to your diet. It is VERY high in protein and is the best choice when it comes to grains you want to choose for your pantry, even over brown rice. It also doesn't leave you feeling heavy like rice or pasta does. It's a wonderful blank canvas that you can add so many things to.  A quick tip, I bought a bag at a local grocery store and it set me back close to $11. I went to Big Lots and they had the same bag for $3... so, if you find someone who says its too expensive to eat well, tell them they need to do their HW. Nothing of value comes easy... that includes taking control of your health!
With all that said :) here's an EASY and fresh salad I think is perfect for all year around. This recipe yielded approx. 4 medium sized servings. But I was using leftover chicken and made too much quinoa, so I suggest doubling everything except the quinoa.

1/2 cup of Quinoa (it doubles once cooked)
*optional- I season the water with a pinch of Chicken Bouillon

2tsp EVOO
TJ's Green Salsa
1 avocado
2 cups chopped or shredded chicken (I had 1/2 of a SMALL store roasted chicken, and used that)
1 green onion sprig
6-7sprigs of fresh cilantro chopped
1 1/2 cups (or more depending on your palate, we like to add more veggies) chopped veggies
  *I purchased a mixed bag of veggies that included purple onion, green/red peppers

OPTIONAL- I used a jalapeño for heat.. if you have a lighter palate omit it.
Also, I keep jars of Trader Joe's green Salsa on hand, it is incredibly fresh and a good way to add a lot of flavor in a cost effective way. I HIGHLY suggest keeping a bottle on hand. You can always use what you need and freeze small amounts in baggies/tupperware if you aren't a salsa family. This one is fairly mild in flavor.
Salt/Pepper to taste

Cooking Quinoa is fairly simple. The bag usually gives you cooking directions but if you happen to buy it in larger quantity at markets who sell it by the barrel... it's a 2:1 ratio.
So, boil 1 CUP of water (add bouillon if you have it, if not no biggie), add 1/2 cup quinoa cover it with a lid and leave it to simmer for 12 mins. DO NOT OPEN IT! Until 12 mins are up...

After 12 minutes, I realized I needed to let it sit for a few minutes b/c I added a little too much water.

Meanwhile add EVOO in a large saucepan and chopped veggies, cilantro, jalapeño, generous pinch of salt/pepper and sauté until onion starts to look translucent, about 5 min on medium heat. Add chicken and heat through for about 2 mins. Add 1/2 cup of TJ's green salsa, and stir.

Ready to saute

Quinoa should be cooked, use a spoon/fork to fluff up and pour it into a large bowl. Add chicken-veggie mixture and mix through. CAUTION do NOT over mix it, or it will look like mush, it will taste fine but no one wants to look at mush right?!
Taste it, if it needs salt or pepper add it a pinch at a time. And continue to taste until it reaches your liking. I like to add more fresh cilantro ( I'm obsessed w/ cilantro) and a bit more TJ's salsa. If you feel it needs a bit of EVOO to soften it up, that works too, just watch your hand.

Salad ready to eat! All it needs is avocado :)

Serve salad with slices of avocado and voila!

To bump up the health factor I serve this with a spinach salad.. I have previously made this salad with zucchini, carrots... different veggies. You really can't go wrong- any veggie you choose... with the exception of asparagus.

My friend Jamie made this soup for us a while back, and I wasn't sure I would like it because it has garbanzo beans, and I'm not much of a garbanzo bean kind of person. BUT, it is such a great blend of flavors that I happily filled my tummy to the brim with this soup and didn't even mind the fact that it didn't have the usual cream the soup calls for. In fact, I dare to say this version is my favorite... Jamie, you win!
All games aside, Jamie is an amazing cook, and I can't wait to blog his version of white lasagna which we were invited to try last night and it BLEW me away.. I woke up counting down the minutes until leftovers for lunch..ahh I digress, with that said here's the Katie version of  the new and improved payanx version of zuppa toscana.

1 medium onion chopped
1 bay leaf
3 Hot Italian Sausages (usually they come in 1lb. pkg I used 1/2 and froze the remainder, also if you aren't a spicy kind of person just opt for a mild spice)
2  chopped/minced garlic
Pinch of salt and pepper
1 tablespoon EVOO
1 32oz carton of chicken stock
1 15oz can of garbanzo beans rinsed
6 roughly chopped fingerling potatoes OR 1 large russet diced with skin ON ( chopped about the size of a large grape)
3-4 cups of washed/roughly chopped kale: I buy the prepackaged Trader Joe's Kale.. save yourself the time! You use 1/2 the bag.

In a large stock pot on medium heat sautee EVOO, onion, garlic, salt, pepper, bay leaf. Let onion get slightly transulcent, add spicy sausage and use the spoon to break apart the sausage. When sausage has cooked, add chopped potatoes, chicken broth and garbanzos. Let this come to a boil allowing the potatoes to fully cook. Turn heat to LOW and add chopped kale, cover with a lid and let the steam soften the kale, mix it a few times over so the kale can get covered in broth. Simmer on low until you are ready to serve.
Before you serve it make sure to DISCARD the BAY LEAF.

Simmering and ready to be devoured!

I have to thank my awesome neighbor Terry for letting us use their pizza stone. I'm convinced I need one now! :) So in case you haven't noticed my neighbors are simply amazing people I'm lucky enough to call friends. Terry always lets me borrow random kitchen utensils and what not. He often makes dinner for him and his fiancé Jen, and if Marc is out of town on business, will bring me over dinner, or coffee, or dessert.... how blessed are Marc and I?!?! Anyway he's an awesome friend!
I told him what I had planned to make for dinner and he said "do you want to borrow our pizza stone?!" YESSSSSSS I dooooo!! :)

I bought everything from Trader Joe's (am I getting commission yet on how much I endorse them!?!) pre-made, down to the dough, their garlic & herb dough is amaze amaze amaze. Anyway the assembly is pretty easy once you have the ingredients, I'd have to highly encourage buying fresh yummy ingredients... that makes all the difference.

What you will need:
1 package Trader Joe's garlic & herb pizza dough
1 package of shredded mozzarella cheese
1 jar of pizza sauce
1 firm large tomato on the vine (or any tomato you wish to use)
1 package of FRESH basil
flour- its needed for dough... and for the pizza stone.
**optional: shredded fresh parmesan cheese, I had some on hand and figured I'd use it.. who doesn't love extra cheese

Before oven..

So I left the oven on 400 (as called for on the dough) and placed stone in for 15 minutes.
As a heads up, the dough needs to sit on a surface sprinkled with flour for about 20 mins before you use it... if you don't it's no biggie, but when it's cold it is tougher to work with, rather than when it's been sitting at room temp. I rolled out the dough to the best circle I could possibly make.  Then took about 10-15 leaves of basil and sliced them, also sliced the tomato in fairly thin slices. Then I took the stone out, sprinkled a bit of flour on it and placed the dough on it, poured sauce on evenly, sprinkled cheese, sprinkled generously the chopped basil, placed tomatoes around the pizza to cover all basil, and sprinkled some fresh parmesan on top and into the oven for about 15 minutes or until the dough was golden brown.

After oven... YUM!

I paired this with a spinach salad... it was delicious!! There were NO leftovers... :(

So my neighbor Fulya makes this amazing spinach salad.. truly it changed my mind about spinach salad. She's from Turkey and has shared quite a few things she's made with us. So,after having her salad I tried to make it at home.. because as sweet as she is I'm sure she wouldn't appreciate me asking her to make salad every week.  It's not as good as hers.. but its as close as I can get.. and it's the only way I can eat spinach salad now!

Spinach Salad:
3 or 4 cups of spinach (I buy it pre-washed/cleaned/trimmed)
1/2 teaspoon of dried DILL weed
2 1/2 tablespoons of EVOO.. I bought a flavored EVOO at a EVOO bar and can't go back to plain for this salad- Roasted Onion & Cilantro EVOO... amaaaaazing
pinch of salad/pepper to taste
3 tablespoons of feta cheese
1 green onion "chive" chopped (about 1 tablespoon)
1/2 cup diced english cucumber (if you have plain old cucumber that works too)
**optional: olives, now I personally don't like olives but if you bought some really great high quality ones I'm sure it would be delish!

So assembly is quite easy. Place spinach in glass bowl, pour EVOO in, dash of salt pepper, dill, feta, diced cucumber and green onion (I didn't have any today, taste fine w/out but I love it when I do) and toss a few times.

It's super fresh and so healthy! Salad is obviously easy, but just thought I'd share this delicious salad I adapted from a wonderful friend.

Kale can be intimidating, but it is packed full of some great vitamins and does wonders for your body. It's super easy, and so good for you! We had quite a bit of Kale left over from the zuppa toscana a few nights ago, so this was lunch today :) besides... who isn't sick of turkey by now?!?! Kale is a tougher salad, and I almost dare to say it's an acquired taste, but give it a chance :)

I didn't take pictures of all my ingredients, like a dummy however my quick tip is that I DID buy a prepackaged mix of sorpressata and assiago cheese from Trader Joe's.. so easy. But I'm sure you could buy a few slices of each from the deli counter at your local market.
 Here's what you will need:

3 or 4 cups of Kale ( I bought pre-washed/cut from Trader Joe's)
1 lemon
1/2 cup of EVOO (this can change depending on how much dressing you prefer)
salt/ pepper to taste
8 cherry tomatoes slice in 1/2 or 1/4
3/4 cup chopped english cucumber (you can always use regular cucumber)
1/2 or 3/4 cup garbanzo beans (up to your preference)
6 slices of sorpressata chopped (you can literally use any italian meat, salami, pepperoni....)
2 or 3 slices of assiago cheese torn apart (you can literally use any sharp italian cheese, peccorino.. parmesan..I would NOT recommend nor use mozzarella for this salad)

In a glass bowl squeeze lemon, begin mixing and slowly add EVOO mixing to create a dressing.. it should look creamy when it's done. Add a pinch of salt/pepper and mix.
 In another bowl toss in Kale, tomatoes, cucumber, garbanzo beans, chopped sorpressata (about size of thumbnail), tear apart cheese into salad (also size of thumbnail).
Add dressing and mix well, add a quick pinch of salt and pepper, taste a piece of kale.. you can choose to add more EVOO, salt, pepper depending on your palate.


Provecho!

My sister is NOT a cook, she would quickly agree. However, she does make an excellent meatloaf. Since she's gone for another 9 months, asking her to make dinner is a little out of the question. So, in her honor I attempted to make her famous meatloaf (which by the way she has no way of making a recipe because she "eyeballs it") and added the things she does... this time measuring in hopes that it could be replicated. It's pretty simple, the veggie chopping is time consuming, but I think a food processor would help. I used a chop-it once, but I hate the noise, and the mess of cleaning it up.... to each their own :)
It's veggie because we try to chop up as many veggies/color into it to punch up the health factor.. it is meatloaf after all... and to make it a little more exciting than a plain old chunk of beef. If, as you are chopping you think, "this is too many veggies" don't worry, it's not. If you don't want to add a bunch of bell pepper you can add whatever you have on hand, and I'm sure it would come out just as great.

What you will need:

1lb of ground beef
various colors of bell pepper (if you only have one just use that.. no sense it making it difficult, also I use about 1/2 of each bell pepper giving you approx. 1/2 cup of EACH: red, green, orange)
1/3 cup chopped onion
1 small carrot chopped
1 celery stalk chopped
1-2 jalapeños chopped (this depends on your heat-o-meter, if the jalapeño has brown/tan striations on the outside, chances are its on the spicy side... no striations generally means it's not very spicy- test it's hotness by cutting it open and licking it, if your tongue stays zinged ya know it's hot)
1/3 cup bread crumbs
1 egg beaten
2 tablespoons Worcestershire Sauce
3 tablespoons BBQ sauce
3 tablespoons of ketchup
3/4 tablespoon Lawry's meat seasoning (or any meat seasoning you have on hand)
 1 package of bacon (you won't use it all, it depends on the size of your loaf)
1/3 cup chopped pepper jack cheese chopped into small cubes.

Preheat your oven to 375

In a large mixing bowl add beef, meat seasoning, beaten egg, bread crumbs, ALL chopped veggies (bell peppers, carrot, celery, jalapeño, onion), worcestershire sauce, bbq sauce, ketchup. Mix so that everything is evenly spread out, just don't over work the meat to mix, or it will turn out tough.

I used a large baking dish (13x9), lined it with foil for easy clean up, placed meat in and then "sprinkled" cubes on top of the loaf-pushing cheese in with my palm, a few squirts of ketchup and then placed uncooked bacon on top, covering the loaf, and for good measure added a bit of ketchup again.

Cover with foil and into the oven for 40 mins. Then uncover it, turn up head to 425 for bacon to brown/until the loaf has cooked through. I highly recommend doing a "thinner" loaf. I made mine about an inch and a half thick. Only because cook time is faster.  :)


Pair it with some mashed potatoes and you've got yourself a fantastic meal... well if you like meatloaf. :)

A friend made this soup and posted a picture, after deciding this week all the sickies in my house would be fed soups to recoup, this one seemed perfect to add to the mix. I didn't realize she had posted her recipe up until after I searched online for one, but they all seem to be about the same. One of the best things about THIS soup is that it literally requires NO spices. And tastes incredible. I know, it sounds impossible, but believe it.

Here's what you will need:

1lb of sausage- I bought Italian SPICY ground sausage, it is on the spicier side, so if you have a sensitive  
                        palate I'd say stick to the mild.
1 32oz carton of chicken stock
1 medium onion chopped
2 cups of KALE (I bought prepackaged kale)
2 tablespoons of crushed garlic
2 or 3 large russet potatoes (chopped chunky/bite-size)
1 cup heavy cream (or whole milk, whatever is easier/you have on hand)
3-4 slices of bacon COOKED and chopped into bits.

In a large pot, brown the sausage. After it has cooked about 95% through add chopped onion and garlic, mix it in well.
Add chicken broth and bring to a boil, then add potatoes and cook on medium or until potatoes are tender.
Then add heavy cream, bacon, and kale and let it heat through for about 5 mins, or until kale has softened.

*I don't know that the bacon is entirely necessary, I would venture to skip it next time around, the spice of the sausage did enough to bump up the flavor. But it is bacon, and who doesn't love bacon.

That's it! :) Keep salt and pepper on hand if you think it requires it, I didn't have any need for any spices whatsoever.

It's a shame I haven't posted any of the amazing meals I have made for my family this summer. Food blogging, I have come to realize, is a bit more time consuming than blogging about family, or work, or whatever else there is to blog about. At any rate, we have all been sick the past week, and have been making hearty soups to help get us all feeling better. I was surfing the web and came across a cream of broccoli soup, and did what I often do, change it up to fit whats in our pantry. It was AMAZING. I wasn't sure I was going to love it but holy moly, Marc and I kept saying "this is SO good, how on earth did I not make this before?!?!!?"

What you will need:
4-5 tablespoons of butter (NOT EVOO)
12 oz. bag of broccoli
1 large onion chopped
1 carrot chopped
 2 teaspoons minced/crushed garlic
pepper to taste
1 Tablespoon Knorr chicken bouillon seasoning to taste (or salt, but bouillon adds a better flavor)
3 tablespoons of flour
32oz carton of chicken broth
1/2 cup of cream (or milk if that's easier for you)
3 Tablespoons of grated parmesan cheese (NOT powdered green bottle kind, if you don't have parmesan cheese just skip it, no use in buying it if you don't use it often, you can add shredded cheese of choice when you serve it if you so desire :)
Optional: Your choice of rice, we prefer brown rice,  or croutons,  or slice of bread....


Melt butter in a large pot, add broccoli, onion, carrot, 1tsp pepper, 2 teaspoons of minced garlic, 1 tablespoon of chicken bouillon. Sautee on med/high until onion looks translucent. About 5 mins.
Add flour cook for about a minute until the flour looks "blonde"
Add carton of stock and bring it to a boil
Simmer until the broccoli is VERY tender, pour in cream and parmesan cheese and turn off heat
Using an immersion blender OR regular blender: blending/creaming until all the broccoli has blended.
Taste: you can add more pepper/salt depending on your palate.

We love Trader Joe's microwave 3min brown rice. Added it on top after the soup was poured.

ENJOY!!

This casserole is SO easy to make and SUPER tasty! I was at a ladies breakfast a few weeks ago and one of my friends, Jamie, made it. She told us the ingredients and cooking time... and it was SO simple. I made it a few times and my husband said, "Please never make this again!" Why? Because he ate 3/4 of it!!
What's so great about it is you don't need ANY spices/salt. With the sausage and cheese it provides all the spice/salt you need, TRUST ME! It's assembled like a lasagna, super easy!

1package of lean sausage (I bought Jimmy Dean, it's about a lb.)
1 can of crescent rolls
4 or 5 beaten eggs
1 bag of shredded mozzarella  (you want to use ONLY mozzarella or else the cheese will burn and kill the dish)

Set your oven to crescent rolls baking temp, usually 375. Meanwhile, cook sausage. Once its cooked through drain/pat dry the fat. You don't have to do this but we try to eat as lean as possible even on less healthy meal choices. Roll out the crescent dough on the bottom of glass baking dish, cover with cooked sausage, pour beaten eggs over that, and top it off with shredded cheese. Place it in the oven for about 25-30 mins, or until the casserole has firmed up. If you slice it and it juices up, eggs haven't fully cooked. The cheese should brown up quite a bit. (the picture shown was 10mins before it was ready..so it browned quite a bit more)

I have to thank my sweet friend Christine for this recipe. She invited us over for dinner and made these short ribs.. I pretty much watered at the mouth the entire week after thinking about how awesome they were. She was nice enough to share her recipe and now I'm paying it forward. This tasty dinner couldn't be any easier AND the list is only 4 items.. YES I said 4!

Short Ribs (usually 2 to 3 per adult)
Meat tenderizer
BBQ sauce
1/2 cup water

I used my crock pot because when I tried making them in the oven it didn't come out so well, so turn your crock pot on LOW, I cooked them frozen from 10am to 5pm. The longer they cook the more tender they are. Pour water in the pot and place the ribs in the crock pot sprinkling each side lightly with meat tenderizer. Cover ribs with your choice of bbq sauce (I use about 3/4 cup) and let them cook! Easy no?!?!?


As sides I ventured to make some potato cakes which rocked! If you ever have leftover mashed potatoes from a previous dinner THIS is the side to make them with. I didn't have any so the process took a smidgen longer. Because this was an experiment I didn't take any pictures but when I make them again I will make a post dedicated entirely to them!

1 potato per adult (in this recipe I used 3 medium/large potatoes)
3/4cup breadcrumbs (I used an Italian breadcrumb mix and it was AMAZING)
1 beaten egg
1tsp garlic salt
pepper to taste
salt to taste
shredded cheese
optional: chives/green onion, sour cream
2tsp of butter
EVOO

Again, because I didn't have any leftover mashed potatoes I boiled some and smashed them in a mixing bowl. Make sure they have cooled down a bit before beginning to add ingredients, if not they are too hot and can cook the egg (the LAST ingredient to be added). Add garlic salt, butter, breadcrumbs, 1/2 cup of shredded cheese and mix. Taste the mixture to see if it needs salt, if you like you can add pepper as well, again this depends on your taste. If you like chives you can add them now as well. Once you have mixed it well you can ADD the beaten egg. Begin to roll balls and flatten them between your palms. In a flat plate pour some breadcrumbs so that when you flatten the potato balls you can cover them in breadcrumbs. Turn a skillet on high heat and pour EVOO into the pan until it covers the bottom. Take each potato cake and place it in the pan and fry on each side for about a minute or until it browns, you may need to turn the heat down to medium high while frying/cooking.
When you have browned both sides, you can add a sprinkle of cheese and dollop of sour cream to each cake. Of course we had green beans as well.... all the bellies around here were FULL!

Ok bloggies... I'm back! (I think) It's definitely been a while but I promise I will do my best to get some posts going, I have a camera FULL of pictures from dinners that I just haven't sat down to share with you all, but Brooke has had me on my toes to say the least. In any event, I made this a few nights ago and we all really loved it.

I found this recipe on one of the parenting sites I'm constantly perusing. It sounded like a pretty good mix - banana & chocolate. What can go wrong? NOTHING! My mom made it first and it turned out so perfectly. In fact, if you don't care for nutella, the banana bread recipe would stand by itself and be perfectly delicious.
Here is what you'll need:

1/4 cup butter, softened
3/4 cup sugar
1 1/2 cups very ripe, mashed bananas (about 3 bananas)
2 large eggs
1/3 cup plain lowfat yogurt, sour cream or buttermilk
1 tsp vanilla
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup nutella (or more to taste)
1/3 cup chopped walnuts or pecans (optional)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray a loaf pan with non-stick spray.


Mix together the sugar and butter in a bowl until they have the consistency of wet sand. 

Add the bananas, eggs, yogurt (or whichever you use) and vanilla and beat until well blended. There is no need to get all the lumps of banana out.
Add the flour, baking soda and salt and gently stir with a spatula just until combined. If you are adding nuts or other optional ingredients, throw them in just before the batter is completely blended.
(You'll notice that I used a mixer...OOPS! You definitely want to stir together with a spatula or your bread will be a bit tougher.)


Pour about half of your batter in your prepared loaf pan. Top with spoonfuls of Nutella. It's a little hard to spread out evenly, so you could microwave it for just a couple of seconds to get it a little soft and it would make it easier to spread over the batter. It doesn't matter too much, though, because as the bread cooks the Nutella will spread a little.


Pour the remaining batter on top and bake in the very middle of your oven for 1 hour and 10 minutes or until the top is cracked and springy to the touch. Cool in pan on a wire rack (or like we always do in my family, eat it as soon as humanly possibly).


Enjoy!!

This will be my first (hopefully not last) Christmas candy edition blog post. During the holidays I absolutely love to make cookies and candies. I'm not sure which I like more - making them or eating them. This is my recipe for an extremely simple toffee recipe - all you need is 3 ingredients.
1 stick of unsalted butter
3/4 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1-1/2 cups of chocolate chips (I prefer semi-sweet, but you can use milk chocolate if you prefer)

*I don't like nuts at all so I don't use them, but it would be very easy to put them in this recipe


Begin by melting the butter and brown sugar in a pan over medium-high heat.


Bring to a boil. Set a time for 7 minutes and maintain a rolling boil while stirring constantly for 7 minutes.


Yes, 7 minutes. Your arms will get tired and you'll look at the clock ever 10 seconds toward the end, but if you don't keep stirring it will stick to the bottom and burn quickly. There is no reversing this and you'll have to start over. Also, note that I don't use a wooden spoon because the toffee will stick to the wood and it's extremely hard to get off.
It will begin to firm up and separate, very normal. Continue this until you get to a beautiful caramely brown color. Once your 7 minutes is up pour into a butter 8x8 pan. I just rub the wrapper of the butter on the pan after I take it out. There is plenty left on the wrapper to go around.
Immediately pour your chocolate chips over the top of the toffee then cover the pan with a large cookie sheet until the chocolate chips are softened.
Once the chocolate chips are softened/melted start to spread them over the top of the toffee evenly.
Cool on the counter, then chill in the fridge until the chocolate sets up.
Once the chocolate hardens, simply crack into it with a knife and break into pieces. 
Happy Holidays and I hope you all enjoy!

Oh I love love love this recipe! (Sorry Katie - it's another seafood-ish recipe) Crab Cakes are one of my favorite foods and this is an easy version to make at home but with Salmon and the flavor is really fresh and tasty. I actually found the recipe on a package of Chicken of the Sea® Salmon. They don't print the recipe anymore on the package but luckily I have it written down.

1/4 cup finely chopped red bell pepper
1/4 cup finely chopped green onions
1/4 cup mayonnaise
1 Tablespoon freshly squeezed lemon juice
1/4 teaspoon seasoned salt
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
Dash cayenne pepper
1 (7.1-oz.) pouch Chicken of the Sea® Premium Skinless & Boneless Pink Salmon
1 large egg, beaten
1 cup seasoned breadcrumbs (or crushed Saltine crackers)
3 Tablespoons butter (or EVOO)


In bowl, combine red pepper, green onions, mayonnaise, lemon juice, seasoned salt, garlic powder and cayenne pepper. Stir in Salmon, egg and 1/3-cup breadcrumbs (mixture may be sticky). Divide and form mixture into 4 balls. Roll salmon balls in remaining breadcrumbs; flatten into cakes about 1/2-inch thick. In skillet, melt butter or EVOO over Medium heat. Fry salmon cakes 3 to 4 minutes per side or until golden brown. Makes 4 servings. Note - this is good for a lunch or light dinner for 2. If you are serving more than two or want a more substantial meal, I suggest doubling the recipe.


Serve with mixed greens and either Basmati rice or whole wheat pasta tossed with butter and fresh Parmesan. Dollop these cakes with an easy Lemon Dill and Chive Sauce. Simply combine 1/3-cup of sour cream with a pinch of lemon zest and 1-teaspoon each of fresh dill and chives. My children's sophisticated palates prefer ranch dressing to dip them in!