Chive Substitute: Chives can be difficult to find, and somehow always unusually expensive. You can always substitute with green onions. Bacon: We always cook bacon in the oven, and seriously cannot go back to the stovetop method. If you are going to cook bacon fresh for this recipe, we highly recommend the oven method! If you are looking for a short cut, you could buy pre-cooked bacon already crumbled! Nuts in a Homemade Party Cheeseball: Are you a nut fan?...

Making your own pita bread is such a smart thing to do. Bread is always the same…mix, rise, shape, bake with maybe a few twists and turns along the way. Pita bread is simple to make, puffs up like a balloon, and like most other breads, it is best enjoyed fresh. What is the difference between naan and pita bread? Both naan and pita are what are considered flatbreads, but they are very different....

What Is Sabich? Sabich is a pita or laffa (flatbread) sandwich made with fried eggplant, boiled eggs, tahini sauce, hummus, and a tangy Israeli salad—a classic chopped salad with cucumbers, tomatoes, herbs, and lemon juice commonly served across Israel. This sandwich is a popular street food in Tel-Aviv thought to have been introduced to Israeli cuisine by immigrant Iraqi Jews. During Sabbath (also called Shabbat), Jewish people cannot participate in any cooking, so pre-boiled eggs and fried eggplant prepared ahead and kept in the fridge are the perfect ingredients to assemble in a sandwich—the pita isn’t heated—without breaking the no-work laws of Sabbath....

For Honey Soy drumsticks and bone in thighs, use this recipe. For boneless thigh and breast, use this recipe. Honey Soy Wings I’m generally a fan of any food you can eat with your hands and wings are pretty high up on my list. Add the word “sticky” and I’m all in! The key to making these really sticky in the oven without fussing with sauce reduction on the stove or cornflour slurries is to drain off the watery chicken juices partway through baking before adding the honey soy sauce....

Scan any restaurant that specializes in authentic Mexican food and you’re sure to find a machine that has this white liquid bubbling away inside. Its creaminess and cooling powers make it the ideal counterpart for the spicy salsas and chilies common to this part of the world. Horchata de arroz (rice) morphed from the orxchata, which is Spanish in origin. Many Spanish speaking countries have their own versions of a grain-based drink, Puerto Rico has one made from sesame seeds, but this version made with rice seems to be the most popular and commonly known....

The tart nature of an apricot makes it an excellent pairing for many different types of foods. You can find apricots everywhere, from pastries to savory dishes such as Persian lamb stew. Qamar al-Din is a drink made from apricot juice (or paste) consumed across the Middle East and North Africa. Qubani ka meetha is an Indian dessert made from dried apricots. If you’re looking to learn more about apricots, take a look at our most frequently asked questions below....

How to Use Prickly Pear Prickly pear juice is often used to make jam or candy, but it also works wonders in cocktails and in vinaigrettes for salads. I’ve used the juice from prickly pear to flavor cream cheese frosting for a lime flavored cupcake and have seen others boil cactus pear down with a bit of orange and lemon juice to make a sauce for fruit salads and cheesecakes....

How To Make Healthy Smoothies – Just 6 Easy Steps There are six steps or key ingredient groups to make healthy smoothies that are balanced and nutrient dense. Below you will find a graphic you can save to Pinterest that contains all the elements you need to make healthy smoothies. Refer back to this graphic for inspiration when you are looking for a healthy new smoothie idea or looking to mix up your smoothie game with some different ingredients and healthy variations....

Dull knives aren’t just a mere inconvenience. Dull knives require more physical effort in cutting, giving you less control and increasing the risk of injury. Luckily, there are many different options for sharpening your knives quickly and efficiently. Of the various knife sharpening techniques, electric knife sharpeners are an important choice to consider. Electric knife sharpeners use a motor to shave the metal off the dull parts and expose a new sharp edge....

Easy Instant Pot Cooking We love this Instant Pot butter chicken because it’s one of the easiest recipes to throw together. There’s pretty minimal prep, and if you don’t have fresh ginger on hand you could sub about a tablespoon of dried ginger. You also get to utilize the sauté function which we think adds a little extra flavor and texture to the sauce once it’s made. Once you’re done sautéing you just add the rest of the ingredients and set your Instant Pot to cook for 10 minutes on high pressure....

This easy homemade butternut squash soup has got comfort written all over it. Thanks to an electric pressure cooker, this creamy soup can be on your table in no time. Serve with some crusty bread or crispy bacon Instant pot butternut squash soup recipe I only recently started cooking with butternut squash and I questioned myself for not trying it sooner. When my daughter who is now almost 2 years turned 5 months, I promised myself that I wouldn’t feed her any food from the jar....

This recipe comes from the fabulous new Electric Pressure Cooker Cookbook from my friend Barbara Schieving over at www.PressureCookingToday.com . She sent me over a copy of her cookbook to review and I have to say: I love it! This cookbook is the best guide I’ve seen for using your electric pressure cooker. It comes with detailed instructions and tips for using any brand of electric pressure cooker and teaches you how to maximize this fabulous kitchen appliance....

This pressure cooker lentil curry is creamy, hearty and delicious. A vegetarian or vegan side perfect for a meatless Monday dinner, very comforting and filling. Serve with fluffy rice and warm naan bread. When I am too lazy to make or order Dal Makhani from a local Indian restaurant, I make myself a quick instant pot lentil curry. What’s not to love, it is quick, super creamy, comforting and delicious....

What kinds of meat do you use in a jibarito? We love pulled pork, and we love making this jibarito recipe when we have leftovers in the fridge to use up. You can also use another shredded meat you like or have on hand, and below are some recipes of ours that would be great. All of them are perfect for meal prep, so you have a yummy protein on hand that you can use in different ways during your work week....

Khadija Hemmati, an Afghan chef based in Charlottesville, VA, stopped by on a Sunday evening with two lamb shanks and an Instant Pot cradled under her arm. She taught me how to make kabuli palao, a traditional Afghan dish of tender spiced lamb served alongside rice bejeweled with almonds, pistachios, carrots, and sultanas. Each component is prepared and cooked separately, and then beautifully layered right before serving. It’s a labor of love worthy of the most important time of the year....

It’s also very easy to make! With a prep time of 15 minutes and a baking time of another 15 minutes, it’s ready fast and requires minimum effort. Whenever I bake with almond flour fathead dough, I’m amazed at how wonderfully versatile it is. This recipe is a very good example. It doesn’t taste like the real thing. But it’s very very good. When you make bread out of mozzarella, cream cheese, almond flour, an egg, and baking powder, you don’t actually expect bread....

Thankfully, according to Vietnamese cooking expert and Simply Recipes contributor Andrea Nguyen, you probably already have everything you need. “You don’t have to outfit your kitchen with unusual gadgets,” she writes in her cookbook, Vietnamese Food Any Day. So what do you need? Here’s what Andrea recommends—both basic and upgraded picks! Essential Kitchen Tools You’ll be set to start cooking Vietnamese food at home if you have most of the following items in your kitchen:...

It’s an explosion of big, BIG flavours – and it’s a really quick and easy recipe. Kung Pao Chicken Kung Pao Chicken is a Chinese takeout favourite that is mouthwateringly good and highly addictive – so it’s a good thing it’s easy to make at home so we don’t need to order takeout every time we crave it!! We love the strong flavoured sweet-sour-savoury sauce with the signature tingle of numbing heat from the Sichuan pepper!...

She loved to bake and one of her favorite things to make for us was lemon meringue pie. I still remember the magic of that whipped meringue topping that went into the oven like soft cloudy pillows and came out firm and golden brown. Taking that first bite? Cutting into the light billowy meringue, scooping up that buttery lemon filling? Sigh. Now as much as I loved my grandmother’s lemon meringue pie, she left no record of the recipe that I have found....

Unless, of course, you are “a pancakes-for-supper” kind of gal like me. There’s nothing like pancakes to help make the stresses of just living in this world feel a little bit lighter. Ricotta adds richness without making the pancakes heavy or dense, and lemon adds a perky flavor that dances in your mouth when you take the first bite. While the step of separating the eggs and beating the whites by themselves does take a little extra time, this is about quality of life, people!...