bacon and egg salad, for sandwiches

I'm tired, and craving comfort food. Egg salad sandwiches and baked kale chips were what I wanted. Fast! Cheap! Easy! My favorite things. You all know I love deviled eggs, egg salad is just deviled eggs all chopped up and on a sandwich. Especially if you use a lot of mustard and paprika like me. Oh, and added bonus, I chopped up some bacon and added it in. Bacon and eggs are bff, everyone knows that!

Bacon and egg salad
makes about 4 sandwiches


8 eggs, hard boiled
3 slices bacon, cooked and crumbled
1/4 c sweet hot mustard
1/4 c mayonnaise
2 T finely, finely chopped onion
1/2 t hot sauce
salt and pepper
1 t paprika

Peel the eggs, and cut them up into little tiny pieces. If you have an egg slicer, this is a useful tool. Put the eggs in a bowl, and add all the other ingredients. Stir well, and taste. You might want more mustard, or hot sauce, or more mayo. Serve on lightly toasted gf bread, or on crackers, or eat with a fork.

Oh and that bacon grease leftover from cooking the bacon? Toss some kale in a tablespoon of it and make the best kale chips ever. I promise.

Steak with warm tomato and artichoke salad

Not my best photo, I know. But bear with me. This took about 15-20 minutes from start to finish, and was just what I wanted on a home alone night (while Alex is working late). Followed by a piece of this tres leches cake (really? You haven't made it yet? Do it! It keeps really well in the fridge and is oh so good), I'm in for a good evening of lying on the couch.

Steak with warm tomato and artichoke salad
The salad should maybe be called warm tomato and artichoke and gooey mozzarella and steak juice salad, but whatever. 


a piece of flank steak (mine was about 1 lb, and no I didn't eat it all)
salt and pepper
1 T olive oil or coconut oil*
a few big handfuls of cherry tomatoes (we grew ours!)
a few artichoke hearts, drained from whatever liquid they were in
a few basil leaves
a little handful of mozzarella balls, I like the little ones

Leave your steak out for a while so it comes to room temperature. Sprinkle with salt and pepper, and heat up the oil in a pan over medium-high heat until shimmery but not smoking. Cook the meat for about 3-5 minutes on each side (depending on how thick your meat is). While the meat is cooking, slice the tomatoes in half and cut the artichokes into strips. When the meat is cooked to your liking, remove it from the pan to a plate and let rest while you finish the salad. If you're not sure if your meat is done, take a sharp thin knife and cut a little tiny hole in the thickest part of the meat to see if it's cooked enough for you.

While the meat rests, toss the tomatoes, artichokes, and basil into the hot pan. Let cook on medium-high for 30-45 seconds, then toss in the pan and cook without stirring for another 30-45 seconds. Pour the salad into a bowl and toss in the mozzarella balls, which will start to melt. Slice up the meat, and serve!

*I've been cooking in coconut oil because it's healthy and full of good fats, but you don't have to. However, if you are curious about coconut oil and thinking Ew won't that make my steak taste like coconut? The answer is no. I cook almost all the meat I eat in coconut oil and Alex hasn't noticed, unless he comes in the kitchen when I'm heating up the pan with the oil - when you can smell the oil. But the taste isn't there.

Sprout salad

While you probably can't tell, I'm trying to eat healthier. I got a big pack of sprouts from Wholefoods yesterday, and whipped up a quick dressing and had a delicious salad. A healthy one. If you want to be even healthier, use 1 T flaxseed oil in place of one of the tablespoons of olive oil.

Sprout salad

1 clove garlic, mashed

1 t mustard

1 t cider vinegar

1 t wine

3 T olive oil

salt and pepper

3 c various sprouts (lentil, sunflower, bean, etc)

Mix together the garlic, mustard, vinegar, and wine in a small bowl. Beat in the oil with a fork or small whisk, a little bit at a time until the dressing is smooth. Taste for salt and pepper, and pour over your sprouts and mix together.

Caesar salad with parmesan chicken 'croutons'

I haven't had a Caesar salad in...I don't even know how long. I've been craving it. I forgot I was out of gluten-free bread, so I made parmesan chicken 'croutons'. Really, they're just little chicken nuggets with lots of parmesan cheese. This is delicious. Seriously.

Caesar salad with parmesan chicken 'croutons'

1 lb chicken thighs, skinned, boned, and cut into small cubes

1 c parmesan cheese

1 c bread crumbs

1 egg

1/2 c milk

salt and pepper

oil for frying chicken

2 romaine hearts

caesar dressing (I used this recipe and it was awesome)

Sprinkle the chicken thigh pieces with salt and pepper. Combine the cheese and bread crumbs, then beat the egg and milk together. Dip the chicken pieces in the egg, then the cheese-crumb mixture. Heat the oil and fry the chicken pieces until they're cooked. Chop up the romaine hearts and put them in a big salad bowl, then toss with the dressing. Top with the crispy chicken, and serve. Serves 4.

Grilled tomato, feta and ramp salad

I spent this past weekend in Amherst, Massachusetts, visiting my mother and accomplishing a ton of wedding stuff (countdown less than 1 month!!). There is always good food at my mom's house, and this weekend was no exception. Her boyfriend went out when we were cooking dinner and foraged some ramps. If you don't know about ramps, they're delicious, related to garlic. I love garlic. I love little cherry or grape tomatoes when they're cooked, the sweetness just comes out and if they're whole they pop in your mouth and are so good. Especially when paired with a ton of garlic. I know I wrote about roasting them a month ago, but grilling them gives them a little bit of a smokey flavor, which pairs perfectly with the creamy feta and bite of the garlic and ramps. 

Grilled tomato, feta and ramp salad

This can also be done in the oven if you aren't grilling

2 pints of cherry or grape tomatoes, rinsed

a small bunch of ramps, about 5 or 6

a few cloves of garlic, pressed/minced

1 T olive oil

one small onion

1/4 c crumbled feta

salt and pepper

1 T balsamic vinegar

Mince the white part of the ramps, then combine with the garlic and olive oil. Toss in the tomatoes, then stick them all on skewers. Slice an onion, then toss in the rest of the oil-garlic mix. Skewer the onion, then toss the ramp leaves in any oil leftover. Bring the whole mess out to the grill. Grill the onions first, as they need the longest amount of time to cook. When they're starting to soften and char, add the tomatoes. Grill them, turning once, until slightly charred and softened. Grill the leaves very quickly, just until wilted. Take the tomatoes and onions off the skewers into a bowl, and add the feta, which will soften a bit with the warm vegetables. Roughly chop the ramp leaves and add them, then sprinkle with salt and pepper, and drizzle balsamic over. Toss, and serve immediately while still warm, or chill and serve later. You might want to double the recipe, because everyone I've served it to wants seconds. 

100th post: falafel party

So this is my 100th post. I started this blog a while ago, it sucked until pretty recently, and now I have 100 posts. Thats a lot. Thanks everyone!

I got my new camera from my dad (Christmas present) on Wednesday. It's awesome. I'm writing this post as the software is downloading/being installed, let's hope it doesn't take too long because I wanted to write this post while my dinner is cooking. I went to New York for my days off this week, Wed and came home on Friday. I saw my dad, ate a great meal at Barbuto in the West Village, then hung out with my sister, went to the Met (my favorite place), saw some friends play a show at the Knitting Factory, then overslept, bought some books, then came home to my sweet boyfriend cooking me lamb for dinner.However, before I left for New York, I made falafel. I've never made falafel, I haven't had it since I went gluten-free since everywhere I've been has put flour in it, or fried it with the breaded foods. At work we've been making a lot of wraps with them, and I wanted to make my own. So I went home, looked up some stuff, and dove in. I had a can of chickpeas, and some tahini in the fridge, that was pretty much all I needed. Once I started, I decided I should make some stuff to go with the falafel.

I made Kate's GF Wrap bread, lemon-tahini sauce, spicy cucumber salad, and served it with roasted red peppers and thin sliced cucumbers. It was so good. And cheap, and easy, and awesome. Falafel (recipe from epicurious.com)
1 can chickpeas
1/2 onion, rough chopped
2 T parsley
1 t salt
1/2-1 t hot sauce (I love chili-garlic sauce)
4 cloves garlic
1 t cumin
1 t baking powder
4-6 T chickpea flour

Process the onion, garlic, parsley and salt in the food processor until pretty fine. Drain the chickpeas, dump them in with the hot sauce and cumin. Process until the chickpeas are pretty finely ground, or to your taste. Some people like chunky chickpeas in their falafel. I don't really. Sprinkle the baking powder and chickpea flour on top, process again just until it comes together. Use more or less chickpea flour if necessary. If you don't have chickpea flour, any flour of your choice would be good I'm sure. Stick the mixture in the fridge for a few hours. Once its totally chilled, roll into little balls and fry two to four minutes on each side until crispy and delicious smelling.

Tahini sauce
1/2 c tahini
juice of 1 lemon
1/3 c yogurt
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 t (or more) garlic oil
1/4 t cumin
1/4 t chili powder

Mix everything together, let sit for a bit to meld flavors. Or serve right away.

Spicy Cucumber Salad
1/2 large cucumber, or more, cut up into small pieces
2 shallots, chopped
3 cloves of garlic, minced
a big splash of your favorite vinegar, I used rice
A big splash of olive or garlic oil
Chili flakes, to taste
A splash of chili oil

Mix everything together, let chill out for a while to let the flavors blend.

Last night's pie and salad

I really needed to go to sleep last night and wasn't able to finish that last post. Waking up at 5am, no matter how early I go to bed, is not that easy. No matter how many times I do it. But, I'd much rather work early than work late. So no complaints.
I made a salad to go with the dumplings, keeping with the Asian theme. I used spinach, because that was all I had, and sauteed some mushrooms and tossed them in. I made my own dressing, based loosely off of a recipe for Japanese steakhouse dressing from the Joy. It's a lot better if you let the salad sit for a few minutes for the dressing to seep in. I think next time I'll add thinly cut carrots to the salad, maybe cucumbers too.

Asian ginger dressing
2 carrots, chopped
1 stalk celery, chopped
1/4 onion, chopped
1 1/2" ginger, peeled and chopped
2 T mirin
1 T wheat-free soy sauce
a few dashes of pepper
1 t of chili garlic sauce
2 T rice vinegar

Put everything in the food processor or blender, blend until smooth. Add salt to taste, or adjust seasonings to your liking.

crazy pie
On the fridge, we have a whiteboard where the roommates can leave each other messages. We all work different shifts and keep very different hours, so it's a good way to keep in touch. And draw funny pictures. This week I made a "dessert suggestion box" for everyone to write what they wanted me to bake this week. One roommate wrote that she wanted something along the lines of "blueberry/fruity creamy Wiggle pie" (Wiggle pie is what we call lemon meringue pie, which I make quite often). So I thought about that all day at work yesterday, and decided on a custard base-pie, with a layer of berries, then a layer of meringue. I'm not sure how I feel about the vanilla custard with meringue, but Alex said it was the best pie yet so we'll see what the two girls say.
The process was easy, I made it while the dumplings were freezing. First I made my usual pie
crust from Gluten-free Baking Classics, glazed it with an egg yolk, pricked the bottom, then baked it for 10 mins at 350. I found a simple custard pie recipe in the Joy, while that was baking I made a blueberry layer from 8 oz blueberries (frozen, cheaper), about 1/3 cup of sugar, a teaspoon of lime juice, and about 2 teaspoons of cornstarch. I heated that in a saucepan with 1 or 2 Tablespoons of water until it was thick. I spread that over the hot custard pie, then whipped up the 4 or 5 egg whites I had leftover from the custard with 1/2 cup sugar and a pinch of cream of tartar. I plopped that on top, baked the whole thing another 10 minutes until the peaks were turning golden, and cooled it. It's pretty good!

chop chop salad

It's summer. Not officially, but according to the weather. Its too hot to cook much, so I've been trying to eat things like watermelon, popsicles, and salads. Although yesterday I had a personal crisis, and the day off from work, and didn't go outside to realize how hot it was, so I baked a pie and cookies as well as cooking steak for dinner. Did I ever mention that I mastered the macaron? My God they're delicious. And gluten free on purpose! I brought them to a dinner party a few months ago, pistachio with buttercream filling, and they were a huge hit. My supervisors husband has been begging me to make them for him again. Every time I see him. "Please! Jill, when are you going to make those cookies again!"
Anyway, I've been eating the poor kids salad. The chop chop salad. Where you take everything in the fridge, maybe run out for one tomato and a head of lettuce (what do you call a honeymooners salad? Lettuce alone!!), chop it all up in a small dice, and toss it with some homemade salad dressing. If you're gluten-free, don't waste your money buying salad dressing. Even if you're not. Make your own. It's so easy. In my salad, I made a lemon-mustard-parsley dressing that was GREAT. And I'm not a huge mustard fan. Look up some salad dressings online, the formula is simple (1 part vinegar/lemon juice/acid to 3 parts oil) and additions are up to you. I always love a clove or two of garlic resting in my salad dressing for an hour or twelve to give the dressing a kick.
Salad is even better if you grow your own vegetables, which I am attempting but nothing is ready to eat except the parsley.

Chop chop salad
1 head of lettuce
1 or 2 tomatoes
1/2 bell pepper (or more, I don't love pepper so I use half)
1/2 onion
1 tiny hot pepper, or not
a good handful of parsley
1 cucumber
some basil, thyme, oregano, dill, whatever fresh herbs you have around
salt and pepper to taste
whatever other veggies you like, carrots, celery, as well as fruit, kiwi, mango, dried cranberries, go nuts.
salad dressing of choice, I like something light and fruity for summer


Chop everything into small pieces, add dressing, toss. Put in a pretty bowl and serve with the salad spoon your sister gave you and the fork your boyfriend gave you to complete the pair.

I apologize for the lack of photos. My camera is missing in the move, and my new phone doesn't have the best camera. The picture at the top is my sister writing "jill loves alex" on the sidewalk while we waited for seats at The Morning Glory Cafe, which has delicious brunch.