Winstead Wandering

Prone to Wander

Mexican Street Corn Salad

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With sweet and smoky charred corn, cool sour cream and citrus, and the perfect notes of spice, this Mexican Street Corn Salad will be a year-round hit at your house!

With sweet and smoky charred corn, cool sour cream and citrus, and the perfect notes of spice, this Mexican Street Corn Salad will be a year-round hit at your house!

I first made this Mexican Street Corn Salad a few months ago for guests. The adults and the teenagers all raved about it, and not in a just-being-polite kind of way, either. In fact, at least a couple of them went back for seconds and thirds. I made it recently for a church potluck and, again, the salad got rave reviews.

With sweet and smoky charred corn, cool sour cream and citrus, and the perfect notes of spice, this Mexican Street Corn Salad will be a year-round hit at your house!

It’s not hard to see why this recipe is such a hit. With the sweet and smoky notes of charred corn, the hit of spice from chipotle chili pepper and jalapeños, and the cooling notes of sour cream and citrus, you’ve got a perfect summer salad that will transition right into fall. Sure, grilled corn is typically a summer staple, but the beauty of this recipe is that you capture all the favorite flavors of Mexican street corn without leaving your kitchen.

With sweet and smoky charred corn, cool sour cream and citrus, and the perfect notes of spice, this Mexican Street Corn Salad will be a year-round hit at your house!

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Toasted Peperoncini and Tomato Pesto Pita

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Need a last-minute appetizer or a quick lunch? Toasted Peperoncini and Tomato Pesto Pita, with two kinds of pesto, plump tomatoes, and the unexpected brightness of peperoncini, is the perfect easy recipe.

 Need a last-minute appetizer or a quick lunch? Toasted Peperoncini and Tomato Pesto Pita, with two kinds of pesto, plump tomatoes, and the unexpected brightness of peperoncini, is the perfect easy recipe.

One of the first vegetables I remember falling in love with is peperoncini. There were other veggies I ate, of course, but I don’t remember the first time I tried them. Peperoncini, though, I first tried on my sandwich at a popular sub shop. I immediately loved the mildly spicy flavor and the hearty crunch.

Now, I don’t order a sub sandwich without them. In addition, I always have a jar of Mezzetta peperoncini in my refrigerator. I love to eat them on salads, in omelets, and on these Toasted Peperoncini and Tomato Pesto Pita. Basically, I’m constantly looking for new ways to eat them. I even have a recipe that uses the liquid from the jar because I’m not about to waste even one little bit. Don’t worry, that won’t be a problem now that you have this recipe on hand.

Need another reason to love Mezzetta? They’re currently offering a sweepstakes with Chef’d to give away 52 meal kits! Plus, all entrants get a 10% off coupon.

 Need a last-minute appetizer or a quick lunch? Toasted Peperoncini and Tomato Pesto Pita, with two kinds of pesto, plump tomatoes, and the unexpected brightness of peperoncini, is the perfect easy recipe.

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Overcoming Your Menu Planning Fears

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Whatever your reasons for avoiding meal planning, it’s time to give it a shot. Read on to learn all about overcoming your menu planning fears.

Whatever your reasons for avoiding meal planning, it's time to give it a shot. Read on to learn all about overcoming your menu planning fears.

Y’all I am so excited to be guest posting for my friend Angela at Setting My Intention. She asked me to write about menu planning- a topic I love– so I put some thought into what I wanted to say and, before I knew it, this post came pouring out:

I received a lot of comments when I wrote about how to make once-a-month menu planning work for you. Many were from people who loved the concept, either because they practice once-a-month menu planning or because they’d like to. There were a bunch of comments, though, from far more skeptical readers. A lot of them said things like, “Menu planning for an entire month? I can’t even manage to plan for a week.”

That got me thinking. As someone who has menu planned in one form or another for many years, I can’t quite imagine what it would be like not to do it. Even during phases when I don’t get a month at a time planned, I still plan by the week. Knowing what we’ll be having for supper each night is one less thing to worry about, and it’s something I highly recommend to pretty much everyone.

So why isn’t everyone doing it? Of course menu planning isn’t right for every person, but I don’t think that’s what’s holding people back. If I had to guess, I’d say what’s holding them back is various fears. Fears that, in my opinion, are largely unfounded.

Head over to Setting My Intention to read the rest!

 For more menu planning tips, check out my crazy popular post about how to make once-a-month menu planning work for you.Whatever your reasons for avoiding meal planning, it's time to give it a shot. Read on to learn all about overcoming your menu planning fears.

Potato Crust Sausage Quiche

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With a unique and crunchy potato crust, this sausage quiche is easy enough for a weeknight meal and fancy enough to impress just about anyone.

With a unique and crunchy potato crust, this sausage quiche is easy enough for a weeknight meal and fancy enough to impress just about anyone.

For the longest time, I assumed quiches were way too fancy for my taste and for my cooking abilities. One day I realized they’re mostly just a really big omelette, minus the complicated flipping part. They’ve been a staple at our table ever since.

Like a lot of the “breakfast” recipes I share, we usually enjoy this sausage quiche for supper. It’s super easy to make, especially when I use shredded hash browns and sausage from the freezer (I typically cook a pound of sausage at a time and freeze the half I don’t use). The cook time is longer than most dinner recipes I make, but the hands-on time is minimal.

With a unique and crunchy potato crust, this sausage quiche is easy enough for a weeknight meal and fancy enough to impress just about anyone.

One of my favorite things about this recipe is that it’s totally customizable to the tastes of the people you’re feeding. My husband doesn’t care for most vegetables, so it’s easy for me to include veggies only on my half. Of course, you could leave out the veggies entirely, or skip the sausage and double up on the vegetables.

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Tips for Getting Dinner on the Table (When You Don’t Feel Like Cooking)

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Let’s be real. Sometimes, despite your best intentions, evening rolls around and you just can’t imagine how you’re going to feed your family. Don’t worry, I’ve got you covered with these tips for getting dinner on the table (when you don’t feel like cooking).

Let's be real. Sometimes, despite your best intentions, evening rolls around and you just can't imagine how you're going to feed your family. Don't worry, I've got you covered with these tips for getting dinner on the table (when you don't feel like cooking).

We’ve all been there: you have a crazy day and nothing seems to go right. When you get home, all you want is to put your feet up. The last thing you want is little people demanding to be fed. Despite how crappy of a day you have, though, it seems they want to eat on a regular basis. Like, daily.

Even the most seasoned home cooks have days when they don’t feel like cooking. Unfortunately, though, scrapping regularly scheduled dinner plans usually results in resorting to pricey takeout or unhealthy fast food. Don’t get me wrong, I love to eat out as much as the next person, but as a parent, I need more of a Plan B than just the number for pizza delivery.

Tips for Getting Dinner on the Table

Have Go-To Ingredients on Hand

Your family probably has a few favorites meals that can be pulled together quickly. For us, that would be sausage and tortellini or chicken tacos. One way to avoid ditching your dinner plans in favor of takeout is make sure you’re never without the ingredients to make a couple quick meals.

If your family loves grilled sandwiches, keep your fridge stocked with deli meat and your favorite bread. If you love homemade pizza, keep a roll of pop-open pizza dough and a jar of sauce. Whatever you can throw together quickly to satisfy your family is what you should make sure you don’t run out of.

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Sausage and Tortellini

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Meet your family’s new favorite easy weeknight meal: this sausage and tortellini isn’t just mouthwatering, it’s also a super easy one-pot meal.

Meet your family's new favorite easy weeknight meal: this sausage and tortellini isn't just mouthwatering, it's also a super easy one-pot meal.

Does your family have a meal that’s always available as a backup? A recipe that you make sure to keep all the ingredients on hand for? If you’re a fan of easy weeknight meals, you’ll want to add this one to your arsenal.

If you open our refrigerator and don’t find a package of tortellini and a hunk of sausage, it’s probably because I made this meal in the last few days. There are several reasons why we eat this sausage and tortellini a couple times a month, with the main reason being that it’s just so good.

Beyond the fact that we love the hearty sausage and the rich tortellini, I also like that this meal is quick. It comes together quickly, in about 20 minutes. It’s made all in one pot and the pasta isn’t boiled separately, it’s just tossed in with the other ingredients and simmered there.

A supper that’s quick to prepare, only requires one pot, and brings together smoky sausage, garlic, and cheese-filled tortellini? I’m not sure what else you could ask for.

Meet your family's new favorite easy weeknight meal: this sausage and tortellini isn't just mouthwatering, it's also a super easy one-pot meal.

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Cooking Tips for People Who Don’t Like to Cook

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Cooking tips for people who don’t like to cook: tips, tricks, and advice for people who want to eat, but would rather be anywhere but in the kitchen.

Cooking tips for people who don't like to cook: tips, tricks, and advice for people who want to eat, but would rather be anywhere but in the kitchen.

I know there are a lot of people out there who genuinely don’t enjoy cooking. For whatever reason, they’d prefer to spend their time doing a hundred other things before they’d willingly hang out in the kitchen. What I’ve found, though, when I discuss my love of cooking with people who don’t cook, is that this is a typical response: “I’m not good at cooking; I don’t like it.”

Those are two entirely different statements, but I’ve come to understand how related they are. It makes sense; most of us don’t enjoy things we aren’t good at. I don’t like to sit down and paint or draw, largely because I’m a horrible artist. I never enjoyed math in high school and college because, while I wasn’t horrible, I wasn’t as good at it as I was at other subjects.

So if we can remove that degree of fear from cooking, if we can make it feel accessible even for those who aren’t at home in the kitchen, we can eliminate the first half of that statement and, in doing so, eliminate the second half, too.

Cooking Tips for People Who Don’t Like to Cook

  1. Start Small

If cooking isn’t something you’re good at or comfortable with, don’t jump right into hosting a five course meal for 12 people. Find a couple easy, similar recipes and master them. Maybe you’ll start with chicken- if so, I’d recommend trying baked green chile chicken taquitos, oven-fried chimichangas, and easy weeknight chicken tacos– or maybe pasta- sausage and tortellini or baked spaghetti– is more your thing.

Look for ingredients and techniques that you’ve heard of. Seek out recipes with a short list of steps, or processes that claim to be fool-proof.

2. Read the Entire Recipe Before Getting Started

Don’t just scan the ingredients list and call it good. Read all the ingredients and their amounts and read all each step. Be sure to read the comments, too; learn from the tips and critiques of others who have already prepared that dish. If a recipe calls for ingredients or techniques you’re not familiar with, consider finding another (or see #3).

Read through the recipe again right before making it. Pay attention to how the ingredients are listed; does it call for “one onion,” or “one onion, diced”? You’ll want to make sure your ingredients are in the required state so you don’t lose time when you start cooking. If you’re uncomfortable with the fast pace that’s necessary for a lot of recipes, make sure all ingredients and tools are accessible and ready to go. Measuring out spices, digging for the colander so it’s ready to drain the pasta; these are all small things you can do to make yourself more comfortable when the cooking begins.

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baked green chile chicken taquitos

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Baked instead of fried for a healthy but satisfying crunch, these taquitos are stuffed with chicken, green salsa, sour cream, and a savory blend of spices.

Baked instead of fried for a healthy but satisfying crunch, these taquitos are stuffed with chicken, green salsa, sour cream, and a savory blend of spices.

We love these chicken taquitos. Love them.

I’ve gotten J.’s family hooked on them, too, as well as several friends. My favorite thing about these taquitos is, of course, the flavor. I love that the outside crisps up to offer the perfect crunch, but the inside is full of tender chicken and the balanced kick of green salsa and sour cream.

You could fill your taquitos with anything you have on hand. I have a friend who loves to make them with corn tortillas and left over carne asada. I once made a version with a mixture of cream cheese, shredded cheddar, and diced jalapeños; they were basically long, skinny jalapeño poppers.

I almost always have a few of these bad boys in the freezer (right now, I have 16) because they are so easy to make ahead and freeze. Go ahead and double the batch; I promise you’ll want the extras.

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seasoned oven fries

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these seasoned oven fries are so easy and so much better than the frozen kind.

 

I mentioned in a recent what i’m loving wednesday post that I am so in love with my new French fry cutter.

We don’t have fries too often, but I do make them occasionally because they’re a great crowd-pleasing side. And now, with this new French fry cutter, they’re also super easy. It perfectly cuts a potato into fries in a matter of seconds, so you can get these babies in the oven and move on to the main dish.

This seasoned oven fries recipe bakes up in about as long as it takes to throw a few turkey burgers on the grill. With minimal effort, you have a side dish that’s hands down better than anything you’d pull out of the freezer section at the grocery store.

I used several of our favorite spices and seasonings in this recipe, but it’s completely adaptable to what you prefer and what you have on hand. And if you’re feeling naughty, go ahead and take the baked fries, sprinkle them with cheese and jalapenos and bacon, and toss them back in the oven for a few more minutes.

these seasoned oven fries are so easy and so much better than the frozen kind.

seasoned oven fries

3 large baking potatoes, scrubbed and patted dry
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon Italian seasoning
1 1/2 teaspoon garlic salt
1 1/2 teaspoon onion powder
1 teaspoon chili powder
1/2 teaspoon paprika
dash of red pepper flakes (optional)

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