Birthday celebration in Nashville

This week, I decided to take a break from cooking and post pictures from our recent trip to Nashville. Brandon's birthday is April 15th and mine is April 18th and we usually try to get away from home and plan a little something to do in celebration of our birthdays. One of our favorite restaurants to go to is Maggiano's Little Italy and guess what...the closest one to us just happened to be in Nashville, TN.  We are die hard fans of Maggiano's and we will travel any distance just to get a taste. With our work schedules, we were only able to stay in Nashville for one night so we carefully planned our time together and really made the best of it! We left Oxford at 6am (and drove with the rain all the way there) and arrived to clear skies in Nashville sometime around 10am.

Brandon got Fettuccine Alfredo and I decided on the four cheese ravioli with pesto Alfredo sauce.  I hope no one was watching us because they probably would've been disgusted at how fast Brandon scarfed his food down and thought us rather odd for the huge grins we were sporting the entire meal.  To top of the meal,  Chocolate Zuccotto cake came right to our table. The cake is massive and extremely rich, but you can demolish it in minutes without thinking about what just hit your taste buds.  Layers of chocolate mousse  between chocolate cake and frosted with chocolate Ganache. Oh la la!!! We are planning a trip to St. Louis in October (for our anniversary) and just try and guess what was one of the main reasons we picked that city?  (Ok, I'll tell you- they have a Maggianos)  I can't wait!

I found a great deal on a one night's stay at the Millennium Maxwell House Hotel. Of course, the hotel had tons of music decorations and memorabilia and Brandon was pretty excited when he saw some of Bob Dylan's handwritten lyrics on display in the lobby. The hotel was conveniently located closed to downtown.

On Friday afternoon, we adventured out to the farmer's market. They had a huge selection of fresh produce and I just want to kick myself now for not getting anything and being so frugal. 

I am huge coffee fan and sucker for cute, unique coffeehouses. Well, I found Frothy Monkey and it was packed at 9am on Saturday morning. Belmont University is nearby, so the majority of customers were college aged students staring at laptops. I decided on oatmeal with fresh pineapple and granny smith apples. Along with my oatmeal, I sipped on a tasty mocha and the workers even put a pretty design in the froth. Hopefully, I'll learn to do that one day...

 The oatmeal looked so pretty once it came to the table, but I forgot to take picture.  But I did snatch a picture really quick before I devoured it.

Later on, before we left Nashville, Brandon was reminded by a good friend that Saturday was Record Store Day.  I've never seen so many people in one record store before.  It was truly an experience.  We drove all over Nashville just trying to find a record store that wasn't packed out into the streets.  Brandon did go with me to the farmers market without complaining so I was happy to be able to do something for him and watch him search for hours in old, black milk cartons for that one special record.

Thanks for taking the time read my blog and coming back week after week.  I'll cook up something yummy for you next week!

Cheese Spinach Ravioli

Cheese Spinach Ravioli

The following email was sent to me as a viewer challenge.  


"Samantha,
I have a cooking challenge for you.  As a lover of Ravioli I am wondering if you can make a healthier cheese ravioli that also tastes good.  I hope this does not require you to make your own pasta, but perhaps you could figure out some creative way around that too?  I look forward to seeing what you come up with."

I tried, viewer, to make homemade ravioli, but it was a disaster.  Just so you know, I will not give up and I'm going to try to conquer it in the next few months.  Since I wasn't able to get the ravioli working in time for this post, I had to switch to lasagna noodles kind of last minute.  Even though I was extremely disappointed, I think it turned out alright. 

8 oz lasagna noodles

 Filling

• 1 1/2 C low-fat ricotta cheese
• 3/4 c shredded mozzarella
• 1/2 c frozen chopped spinach, thawed
• 1/4 c. chopped onions
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• dash of salt and pepper

Alfredo Sauce:

• 2 C fat free milk
• 1 C chicken broth
• 3 Tbsp all-purpose flour
• 2 Tbsp Parmesan cheese
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• 1 tsp onion powder

Preheat oven to 350°F. Boil water for lasagna noodles. Cook until noodles are tender and drain.

In a small nonstick skillet, saute the chopped onions and chopped spinach.  A lot of flavors come out, that I really like, when sauteing the two.

Combine all the filling ingredients into a food processor (oh, how I love my food processor!) including the spinach and onion mixture. Process the ingredients until well blended. To start the ravioli process, you will need a sharp knife to cut through the pasta. On one sheet of lasagna, place one tablespoon of mixture per ravioli. You can fit three tablespoons of mixture on one sheet of lasagna. Next, place a new sheet of lasagna on top of your completed one. Cut into three squares. Continue process until mixture is done. Bake at 350°F for 10 minutes.

For the sauce, combine all ingredients in a saucepan and cook on medium heat. Whisk until the sauce thickens.

Lastly, take the ravioli out of oven and drizzle the Alfredo sauce on top. To add more flavor, I sprinkled reduced fat feta cheese--Brandon's favorite.

Here's his review:

Corn and feta cheese black bean burgers

Corn and feta cheese black bean burgers

• 1 15oz can black bean, drained
• 1 15 oz can corn kernels
• 1 egg
• 1/2 C onion
• 1 C Panko breadcrumbs
• 4 oz crumbled reduced fat feta cheese
• 1/4 tsp paprika
• 1/2 tsp roasted red pepper
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• a dash of salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Meanwhile, combine half a can of black beans, onion, and all the spices in a food processor. Blend until no chunks. In a mixing bowl, pour in remaining ingredients and stir in food processed ingredients. 

Start forming patties out of the mixture and arrange on a baking pan.  Refrigerate burgers for 30 minutes before baking them.  Bake for about 20 minutes.

Enjoy your burger on a wheat bun with your favorite cheese. Sweet potato fries are a great side too!  Brandon would've reviewed this but as soon as he saw burgers in the fridge (and found out they had feta cheese in it) he couldn't wait to eat them.  He showed me his famous magic trick of making them disappear before I even had time to get the camera out.  I'm pretty sure he enjoyed it, although he did say that the corn was a surprise.  I'm not sure what that means. 

I am really excited about the upcoming weekend. Brandon and I are celebrating our birthdays in Nashville and we are planning to go to our favorite restaurant (MAGGIANOS!!!).
I get way too excited about eating great food. Also, we are planning to visit a local farmer's market. I should have some extra pictures for next weeks blog.

Do you have a favorite restaurant that you would drive miles just so you could eat that one special dish?

Broccoli and Cauliflower Mac Cheese

Broccoli and Cauliflower Mac and Cheese

Serves 8

• 12 oz boxed macaroni
• 16 oz frozen package broccoli and cauliflower, thawed
• 1/4 C onion
• 2 C fat free milk
• 2 eggs
• 2 C reduced fat shredded cheddar cheese
• 4 Tbsp parmesan cheese
• 1 tsp mustard
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• 1/2 tsp crushed red pepper
• 1 tsp pepper
• 1 tsp butter

1. Preheat oven to 400F.
2. Boil water for pasta and cook until tender. Drain pasta.
3. Puree the broccoli, cauliflower, and onion. Set aside.
4. On the stove-top, combine all the ingredients along with the pasta. Stir on low until all ingredients are well blended.
5. Pour mixture into a 9 X 12 pan and cook for 30 minutes on 400F.
6. Remove pan from oven and let cool for about 5 minutes. Lastly, sprinkled your desire amount of Parmesan cheese on top of pasta.

Brandon's review:

I give this meal 7.6 smacks or maybe 7.65....okay, okay 7.66.....which if we round up then we get 7.7 smacks and seven is a holy number so this mac and cheese was righteous!