Cooking Up A Storm!

I've been busy, cooking!

Last week I tackled quite a few things in the kitchen, starting with making spaghetti squash for the first time, thanks to Katie from rufflesandtruffles.com. Her post on how to cook the squash, and then how to incorporate it in this amazing recipe were a huge help, so a big shout out to her for opening my eyes to this great meal!

Then, on Thanksgiving morning, I made the Cheddar Bay Biscuits and BLT Bruschetta, which is always a big hit with my family. The recipe for the bruschetta below is from allrecipes.com, but I substitute chopped frozen spinach for the lettuce, as well as add about 1/2 of a cup of chopped mozzarella cheese. I also used tofu bacon, because a few of my cousins are vegetarian, but it's so much better with real bacon!

* 8 slices bacon, crispy cooked and crumbled
* 3 Roma (plum) tomatoes, seeded and chopped
* 1 cup chopped leafy green lettuce (or 1 package of frozen chopped spinach
* 2 tablespoons chopped fresh basil leaves
* 1 clove garlic, minced
* 1/4 teaspoon salt
* 1/4 teaspoon ground pepper
* 1/3 cup olive oil
* 1 (8 ounce) French bread loaf, cut in 1/4-inch slices
* 1/3 cup favorite crumble cheese, blue cheese or feta (optional) (or add 1/2 cup of chopped mozzarella cheese)

Directions:

1. In medium bowl, stir together all topping ingredients; set aside. Brush olive oil on both sides of bread slices; place on baking sheet.

2. Bake at 400 degrees F, turning once, for 7 minutes per side or until crisp and golden brown; cool.

3. Either spoon the bruschetta onto the bread and serve on a platter, or surround the dish of bruschetta with the bread and let guests dish up their own bruschetta.

On Friday I made the garlic and rosemary turkey roast that I posted the recipe for last week, as well as sweet potato fries. We ate turkey roast for dinner Friday, Saturday and Sunday, and it was SO GOOD! Seriously. If you try this recipe, you'll thank me. The turkey is so moist that you don't even need gravy, and as the garlic soaks into the meat, it just gets better and better as leftovers!

For the sweet potato fries, I looked at a few recipes, but ended up just winging it by chopping the potatoes, dumping them in a freezer bag with olive oil, season salt, garlic powder and pepper, and then baking them for about 30 minutes, turning every 10 minutes.

And of course, I had to have a variety of dipping sauces! Sriracha and mayo, fry sauce, and caesar dressing and ketchup.

Tonight I think I'll be making spaghetti squash with a red sauce, since we have half of the squash left over from last week. I can't wait to experiment with it in different meals as a substitute for pasta!

How much cooking did you do over the Thanksgiving holiday? And good recipes to share?