Making Crab Rangoons at Home

Even non-fish eaters like crab rangoons and all the guest bloggers I’ve had recently got me inspired to use some wontons.

These were a fun app to make at home, and I liked that I had more control of them…which meant that there was wayyy more crab in them than in those of take-out Chinese restaurants.

Ingredients:

8 oz crabmeat (or imitation crab)
4 oz cream cheese
2 tbs mayo
3 green onions, chopped
splash soy sauce
spash of sesame oil
wonton wrappers

Directions:

Mix crab, cream cheese, mayo, green onions, and sauces together and let sit for 10 minutes.
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Preheat oven to 375 degrees
Stuff each wonton by putting about ½ tsp of filling into the center of the wonton and bringing the corners to meet in the middle. This forms a purse shape. Or put the filling in the center and bring 1 set of opposite corners to meet, forming a triangle.
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Spray lightly with nonstick spray and bake for 10 minutes.

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My triangles oozed a bit, but were much crispier. The purses were really cute and ensured evenly filled bites, but didn’t bake up as crispy. That triangular ooze of crisped crab was amazing. Not that I’d ever taste for the sake of presentation.
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Mr. J LOVES sweet and sour sauce so I bought probably the world’s largest jar at the grocery store (think 40 oz for $2.99). It isn’t quite like take-out Chinese sweet and sour, but I like it better. Want to know the first ingredient? Of course you do!

It is apricots!
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Wow. I never would have guessed. This actually has distinguishable chunks.  I lucked out with the real crab on sale. I bet imitation isn’t bad since that’s probably what the restaurants are using anyway.

Crab Rangoon Cost:

8 oz crabmeat: $6.75 (it was on sale and wasn’t imitation crabmeat)
4 oz cream cheese: $0.75
2 oz mayo: $0.30
green onions: free! (I did this, but note it really only worked once, after that the color was a lot lighter and the flavor was pretty weak)
wontons: $1.25
total: $9.05 for about 24 crab rangoons or about $0.37 per piece.

This beats my local take-out option which sells about 8 for $8.75, though, they do bring it to my door so that has to count for something.

 

Greek Stuffed Burgers

Way back when I made stuffed burgers. These were themed for Mr. J (blue cheese & bacon) but I had all sorts of plans for other fillings.
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It’s been quite awhile, but I made them again! This time I made a Greek inspired one and grilled it. Ohh my burger goodness. I filled them with feta and topped them with spinach, red onions, and cucumber. These burgers are delicious and great for something different.
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Hmmm. Sky’s the limit for burger toppings/stuffings. Maybe a cowboy caramelized onions/bbq sauce/cheddar stuffed burger will be next. Or maybe a Southwestern with Pepperjack cheese and salsa.

Chicken Cordon Bleu Made Easy

Chicken Cordon Bleu sounds tricky but my way is very simple and could easily be tweaked into anything else! (Isn’t my new serving plate awesome??)
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I don’t exactly have “knife skills”, or great butterflying technique so I cut a pocket and filled it. It is much easier than trying to roll it back up and keep the good stuff inside.

Ingredients:

2 Chicken Breasts
1 cup shredded Swiss cheese
2 slices of deli ham, sliced thick and chopped
1 egg
1 tsp Dijon mustard
½ cup panko breadcrumbs
¼ cup breadcrumbs

Directions:

Cut a pocket into the side of the chicken breast carefully not cutting through the top, bottom, or all the way through.
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Stuff it with the cheese, then the ham.
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Whisk the egg with mustard and 1 tsp water.
Combine the breadcrumbs and add salt & pepper to taste.
Dip each stuffed chicken breast into the egg mixture then into the breadcrumbs.
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Bake 30 minutes at 375 degrees.

I was really happy with these! I think I did well cutting the pockets to get almost all the way to each end so the filling was well spread out.
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I mixed up a little roux with more cheese and more mustard to put on top. It wasn’t the most perfect cheese sauce I’ve ever made but wasn’t too bad.

This would be a great meal to impress guests because you could have it pretty prepped before they even came. It isn’t even many ingredients.

I think I might see what I could to making this into a casserole. Each chicken breast is a lot of food for one person and when you add ham and cheese it’s not a light meal.

I served this with a sliced potato bake thing. It really was an excuse to use my new le creuset and I wanted to make something in it that would be appropriate for the gifter.
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I was trying to just par-boil the potatoes a bit but they went further than I planned on while the chicken was coming together. The potatoes were too soft to mandolin so I did thicker slices and topped them with butter, sour cream, and rosemary fleur de sel.

Love Mini Foods & Mini Spinach and Artichoke Dip

My office has THE BEST potluck themes. We recently did a theme for foods you can make in a muffin tin. There were no other restrictions and it might have been one of our best. We figured we love mini-food and thought it’d be a good theme for Valentine’s Day. I’m super delayed but happy to share these guys finally. My favorite techie has updated my whole computer so I was computer hopping and had files all over.

This theme would be really fun for a party or potluck because everything is really self-serve-able and because it is pretty self-contained, not everything needed silverware!
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Mini cheesecakes! 
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Mini spinach & cheese bites
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Mini strawberry shortbreads
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Mini Mac & Cheese
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Chocolate Peanut Butter Cupcakes
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Lemon Poppyseed Ebelskiver
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Mint Frosted Brownies
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Mini Lasagna Cups
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Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins
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Mini Spinach & Artichoke Dip Cups (these were mine, the recipe is below)
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Everything was so good!
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Spinach & Artichoke Dip Cups

Ingredients:

1 cup spinach, chopped
1 cup artichokes, chopped
1/2 cup Alfredo Sauce
1/2 package cream cheese
1 tsp garlic, chopped
1 cup shredded white cheddar cheese
wonton wrappers

Directions:

Assemble dip ingredients
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Mix ingredients
If serving as dip, spray and transfer to a baking dish making a thin (aka dip-able) layer.
If serving as cups, spray a muffin tin and layer dip on top of wonton wrappers.
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I think the alfredo made the mix really dip-able and not too thick. I freeze leftover spinach whenever I know I won’t get to all of it. I also threw in some frozen kale and I thought it was great. I put some basil in too. It gave a freshness and light taste.

Curry Chicken Salad fit for Dr. Seuss

Happy Birthday to Dr. Seuss! This Curry Chicken Salad was the best I could do to honor the late writer of The Butter Battle Book, the Lorax, and Sneetches as an example of ooblek or wumbus because of the zing, bam, wow, pow this has.

I expect my birthday tomorrow to have the same kind of impact! My birthday food theme might be my best yet!

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I pretty much only like sandwiches when I make one myself and eat it immediately, or if it has all sorts of crazy things on it and it gets pressed, and occasionally when a restaurant makes it. That might sound like all the sandwiches you can think of, BUT I don’t bring them to work as lunch. If I’m going to have one, it has to be packed separately and assembled and eaten immediately.

I thought of curry chicken salad because it doesn’t have to be a sandwich and it is different. It was a great use of some leftover rotisserie chicken.
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Ingredients:
2 cups, chicken breast or rotisserie chicken
2 tbs curry sauce
1 cup red seedless grapes, halved
1 tbs light mayo

Directions:
Shred chicken into bite size pieces
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Mix chicken with curry sauce, grapes, and add mayo to taste.
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Refrigerate at least 1 hour before serving.
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This made about 3 size-able servings. I had one as a sandwich and two other servings topped salads. I think the grapes are necessary to cut the spice with some sweetness. The zing makes this great.
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