My Favourite Isolation Recipes
Did you guys know that yeast is basically impossible to find right now at the grocery stores, because everyone is learning to bake their own bread? I think that’s kind of great.
There are also a ton of memes floating around joking about how one of the toughest things some people have to do during isolation is figure out what to do with all of the banana bread they’ve been baking. While this unprecedented situation we are in is no joke, I DO think it’s great that some people are taking the extra time that they have and using it in the kitchen.
Now, don’t get me wrong. A lot of us are out there wondering just what the heck is happening to all of this supposed “extra time” that we have, and feeling guilty about it. While I was still teaching, I often wondered just where my day went. Between balancing taking care of a toddler and trying to figure out distance learning, the days often flew by, leaving me feeling like I had accomplished nothing. However, there were days when I would get a sudden rush of motivation and whip up one of my favourite recipes. Today, I’m going to share them with you!
Leah Garrad-Cole’s Individual Baked “Lasagnas”
Leah is the author of It All Begins with Food, and also the brains behind Love Child Organics. I loved this recipe while Little Miss was in daycare, because I could bake the “lasagnas” individually and pop a few into her lunch kit. I alter the ingredients a little bit to suit what we usually have in the fridge, and normally include:
1 cup cooked pasta (usually a kid-friendly one like PC Organics whole-grain bowties)
I cup cooked broccoli
1/4 tsp salt
1 cup pasta sauce (we make our own and always have it on hand)
1 tbsp chia seeds
1/2 cup ground beef and pork (or you can use navy beans like in the original vegetarian recipe)
1/2 cup finely chopped baby spinach leaves
1 1/2-2 cups shredded cheese - mozzarella or havarti or really anything we have on hand
Preheat the oven to 375, combine all ingredients, and plop them into a greased mini muffin tin. Bake for about 20 minutes and then let them sit for 5-10 minutes before removing from the pan. I usually make a HUGE batch of these and freeze a bunch of them. They are so simple and such a nice quick lunch to grab for a kiddo (or for yourself, let’s be honest).
Chrissy Teigen’s Skillet Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Blondies
Ask anyone who knows me well, and they will tell you that I’m probably one of the world’s worst bakers. I think it all started when I tried to make chocolate chip cookies when I was about 10 years old and used a tablespoon of salt instead of a teaspoon. It was all downhill from there. More recently, I completely mangled a chocolate birthday cake for my mom’s 60th Birthday (who knew ICING A CAKE could be so traumatizing?) and flat-out undercooked my daughter’s 1st birthday cake (I had to be saved by my best friend delivering a last-minute Dairy Queen cake to my door or risk giving everyone at the party food poisoning). I just do not have bakers’ instincts. Plus, I don’t particularly enjoy having a bunch of baking lying around waiting for me to eat.
HOWEVER.
Chrissy Teigen is my FAVOURITE cookbook author, EVER, because she makes me feel like an amazing cook. Her recipes are DIVINE and SIMPLE and I highly, highly recommend both of her cookbooks: Cravings and Cravings: Hungry For More. Her no-fuss approach to cooking is the reason I decided to try out one of her dessert recipes. And, you guys … not only did I not mess it up, but it was actually really good. And, more importantly, Instagram-worthy. #winning.
Good Morning American outlines the recipe, with videos, here.
Jamie Oliver’s Southern Fried Chicken
Ok, I can’t take any credit for this one, guys.
As you may or may not know, my husband is an AMAZING cook. Those instincts that I mentioned lacking? He has ‘em all. I’m the type of person who can only succeed with a recipe two inches from her nose, following every instruction to a tee, googling things like “can I substitute spelt flour for all-purpose flour?” and generally doubting myself in the kitchen. My husband, however, is a really skilled cook. He’s the kind of person who watches cooking shows for fun, and remembers everything they talk about, and then applies it to when he cooks. He looks at a recipe once and can duplicate it over and over again without ever re-visitng it, has a world of knowledge about best practices, and confidently changes up recipes based on taste or what he has available.
And it’s ALWAYS good.
So it was no surprise that he absolutely nailed this fried chicken recipe a few weeks ago. Guys, it was basically one of the best things I’ve ever eaten. EVER.
I’m not even going to try to explain how he made it. I’ll warn you that it’s involved. The recipe includes things like brine and buttermilk and 12-hour marinading. No thanks. Not for me. But if you’re up for a challenge and want to try one of the best dang chicken you’ve ever had, check out the recipe here. It’s from his cookbook, Jamie’s Comfort Food. Personally, my favourite Jamie cookbook is 5 Ingredients, because the recipes are SUPER straightforward and I have yet to mess one up.
To each his or her own!
What have been your favourite go-to recipes over isolation? Or just in general? I’d love to hear about them!
Bon appetit!