Lemon & Raspberry Mini-Tarts

I am a dirty rotten cheater for posting this. Lemon curd from a jar? Pssshaw, clearly I am a terrible mad scientist. Go ahead and tell me how bad I am for posting this. What's that you say? Sorry, I can't understand you, because you just stuffed five of these delicious little tarts I made into your mouth. Why don't I get you a coffee to wash those down with, and then we can sit down and I'll tell you how to make them.

Preheat oven to 425.

You will need a mini muffin tin, as well as:

-1 ready-made pie crust (box usually contains 2 crusts for the top & bottom of the pie)
-1 jar lemon curd
-24 delicious raspberries.

Using a cookie cutter slightly bigger than the muffin holes in your mini muffin tin, cut out 24 circles.  Press pie crust circles into muffin tin, and bake for 10 minutes or until done (golden).

When cool, spoon in lemon curd, and top each mini-tart with a raspberry.

See what I mean? Too easy to post. But aren't they pretty?

Lemon Chicken Penne with Braising Greens

At first glance, this dish doesn't seem very mad science-y. Come on, chicken and pasta? The reason I am posting this is to make you all use your noodles (pun intended) whenever you think you don't have enough in your pantry to cook a kickass meal.
I thought I had no food in the house and was about to go waste 20 bucks at Saturn Cafe when I remembered the braising greens I had just bought at the farmers market. I didn't really know what to do with them and had bought them simply because they contained something called "dinosaur kale". I'll admit I didn't and still don't know what "braising" means, but to me it sounded like quickly stir-fried or something along those lines. I remembered then I had a bag of frozen thighs in the freezer I bought for a (failed) teriyaki chicken attempt. The best idea seemed to be to throw it all on top of penne pasta and see what happened. I loved the outcome and hope you will too!

2 cups dry penne pasta
2 chicken thighs
1 1/2 cup braising greens (or just use kale)
juice of 1/2 lemon
1 tsp. dried marjoram
1 tsp. salt
black or lemon pepper

boil a pot of salted water and add the penne. While it's cooking, heat a skillet with a little oil and add the chicken. squeeze the lemon juice onto the chicken during the last 5 minutes of cooking. once the chicken is cooked add the braising greens, pepper, marjoram, and salt to the skillet. Cook for only about a minute and a half longer; you want the greens to be a little crunchy. serve on top of penne with a drizzle of olvie oil and parmesan cheese.

serves 2

Orange Devil Curry

This demonic curry will send you to hell and back! Well, not exactly. It didn't come out as spicy as I expected, but it was still absolutely delicious!
For those of you who don't know, I'm a hopeless curry addict. That's not going to change any time soon, so I decided to make a curry dish with an "orange" theme, meaning using as much orange-colored food as possible! The stars of the show are yams, butternut squash, and kumquats (you know, those sour little orange citrus things)! You can get kumquats at the health food store, or if you're me, off a bush in grandpa's garden when you were little.
This is unlike any curry I've ever made. It's like a summer vacation spot where sweet, spicy, and tart all hang out on the beach and become best friends! DIETERS BEWARE: you'll be back for seconds before you can say "How many Weight Watchers points is this?"

1 can Coconut milk
1 tsp. Chinese Five Spice powder
1 tsp. Curry powder
1 tsp. Garlic powder
1 dried California chili pepper, stem removed.
1 small Garnet yam, peeled
1 cup cubed Butternut Squash
1/2 cup whole Kumquats
3 green onions
1/4 Cup Macadamia nuts
Any kind of long pasta or noodle (I used spaghetti)


Heat the Coconut milk and spices in a frying pan. Tear the chili into pieces, add to the mixture and stir.
Cut the yam into quarter-inch cubes and add to the pan.
Cut the Kumquats into circles, squeeze over the pan to release the juice, and add to the mixture.
Cover the pan, turn down the heat and simmer for 10 minutes.
Add the squash, stir and cover again, stirring occasionally, for about 40 minutes.
Meanwhile, cook the pasta, crush the Macadamia nuts, and slice the green onions.



Serve the curry on top of the pasta, sprinkled with green onions and macadamia nuts