While Whit is in the clouds in Costa Rica and Jeremy is recovering from a bachelorette party…what is Misty doing?  Misty is cooking for JewHungry!!  The last time I was a guest blogger it was February and there were right at 400 hits on the site.  Now, five months later there are 2,816 and counting!  I hope everyone who is visiting enjoys this easy and delicious meal!

Sundays are usually a little crazy around here, while we try to do our best to just hang out and “be” on Shabbat, that means that Sundays are NUTS and is never-ending loads of laundry, yard work, grocery shopping and all those other fun domestic things to do.  So, during the kids nap time, I start getting ready for dinner.  This week I prepared a Heart of Palm Salad, Spinach Quiche with Pine Nuts and Apple Pie for dessert.  While it seems like a lot of work, simple things like the cut canned hearts of palm, bagged greens and frozen pie crust really cut down on prep time!

*PS- please forgive me if the format gets all crazy here…I have no clue what I’m doing 🙂  Thanks!  Misty Lacefield

Hearts of Palm Salad

What:

1 cup mixed baby greens

1 (14 0z) can hearts of palm salad, cut, drained

1/2 cup diced red onion

1/2 cup sliced radishes

1 ripe avocado, pitted, peeled and cubed

1 blood orange, cut into segments (or 1/2 cup canned mandarin oranges)

2 tablespoons balsamic vinaigrette dressing

Sea Salt and ground black Pepper

How?

Toss greens, hearts of palm, onion, radishes, avocado and orange segments in a bowl with vinaigrette.  Season with salt & pepper.  Drizzle with additional vinaigrette, if desired.  *I couldn’t find a blood orange on my quick trip out and I HATE mandarin oranges so I skipped the orange all together but it was still a delicious salad and EASY!!!!

Spinach Quiche with Pine Nuts

What?

1 frozen 9-inch ready-made whole wheat pie crust

1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil

2 large cloves garlic, sliced

6 cups (I used 1 bag of organic baby spinach leaves) washed and dried

1 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper

1 teaspoon dried sage or 1 tablespoon fresh sage, chopped

1/2 cup pine nuts, toasted

1 cup mozzarella cheese, grated

1/4 cup Parmesan cheese, grated

1 cup milk

2 large eggs

1 large red potato, steamed until firm-tender, sliced 1/4 inch thick

How?

Preheat the oven to 350.  Remove pie crust from freezer and thaw for ten minutes. * While your waiting, go ahead and toast your pine nuts and steam your potato so they will be ready. *  Prick the bottom of the crust with a fork and bake for 10 minutes or until lightly browned.  Remove crust from oven and let cool.

Heat olive oil in a medium saute pan.  Add garlic, spinach, salt, pepper and sage.  Cook, stirring constantly, for about 1 minute, or until the spinach is just wilted.  Stir in pine nuts.

In a small bowl, mix mozzarella and parmesan cheeses.  In another bowl, whisk milk and eggs together.

Sprinkle 1/4 cup of the cheese mixture on the pie crust.  Top with half of the spinach mixture.  Place potato slices on top of spinach.  Add half remaining cheese mixture and then remaining spinach mixture.  Top with remaining cheese.

Place the pie pan on a baking sheet.  Carefully pour in milk mixture.  Bake for 45 to 50 minutes, until a knife inserted into the center comes out clean.  Cool slightly before cutting.

Swedish Apple Pie

What?

How?

Fill pie pan 2/3 full of peeled, sliced apples. Sprinkle with 1 tablespoon sugar and cover apples with cinnamon. In small bowl, combine butter, 1 cup sugar, flour, egg, nuts and salt. Pour over the apples. Bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes, or until golden brown.  *This pie was SO easy, I actually made it spontaneously just b/c I had an extra pie shell- it was delicious and not too sweet b/c of the Gala apples.*