One of my favorite apps for my android phone and tablet is BigOven. (BigOven is also available for iPhone, iPad, and Windows Phones and on any computer through their website)  I have been using this site for well over a year now and it has saved dinner several times now.  BigOven is a pretty straight forward website.  It has a very simple design that makes reading on a mobile device much easier.  When I first started using this app it was purely for the “use up leftover” feature.  In fact this is still my favorite feature.  However since this time they have expanded the program.

“Use up leftovers” is the most unique part of this app.  After clicking this option users are directed to a clean, basic page.  On this page simply select three items that you have on hand or that you would like to use in a recipe. A list of all of the recipes on the site that include those three ingredients will be given.  Not all combinations have recipes but the majority do.  I also find this helpful if I’m at the farmer’s market and I am considering purchasing an item.  I know what I have at home but BigOven helps me find recipe ideas or even just to feel out if the ingredients will go together.

BigOven has added some new features like video, a great resource for those cooks who are more visually oriented.  There’s also a community section that has many different groups that you can join based on your likes.  Like many traditional recipe sites the front page lists categories of recipes for browsing as well as recipes that have recently rated high.

If you are someone who likes to keep all your recipes in one place BigOven can help with that too.  When you’re browsing it lets you save your favorite recipes which are then filed in the “my kitchen” area of the website.  Other categories in this area are;

• Try Soon
• Recipes I’ve made
• Recipes I’ve posted
• Post a recipe
• Grocery List
• Kitchen Stream (a neat little tool that shows you what other people are cooking/eating!)

Not all of these functions are available in the free version of BigOven.  If you opt for the $15.99 year Pro Membership you can select recipes, and the ingredients are then transferred directly to the shopping list.  The Pro version also includes nutritional information and the ability to post recipes privately.

Overall this is a really good application for home cooks.  I do wish that they offered the grocery list function as a part of the free membership but understand why they don’t.  Even if you only use this app for the “use up leftovers” capability you won’t be disappointed.

The Ingredients:

• 1 tsp cumin
• 1 tsp curry
• 1 tbsp paprika
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 3 tsp salt
• 1 tsp pepper
• 1/4 cup chicken stock
• 2 pounds of low fat hamburger meat
• 1 cup red peppers
• 1 cup chopped cilantro
• 10 romaine leaves
• 1 lime

Instructions:

1. Heat up oil in a pan and put spices in. Add beef and use a fork to blend spices and cut up meat. Add broth. Cook about 20 mins.
2. Toss beef with lime, red pepper and cilantro.
3. Spoon beef into lettuce cups and serve right away.

If you want to add some yum , you can layer in avocado slices. I wouldn’t serve this to guest but on a week day these feel a bit different and lighter. Enjoy and I hope this helps you with any resolutions to eat a bit healthier in 2011!

I did this recipe as part of the #SabrosoSaturday blog hop hosted by @MsLatina. Check out all the great recipes!

The batter is pound cake like and very tasty! These do not require any real skill to decorate so perfect for the cupcake novice! I use soy in all my recipes to bake as it’s lighter and I like the taste. We also have milk allergies in the house so no dairy at my house and we don’t miss it.

This recipe produces approximately 24 cupcakes.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups of flour
• 1 & 1/2 cups sugar
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup melted earth balance/butter
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 cup milk ( I use soy)
• 5 eggs

Instructions: Cupcakes

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Combine the dry ingredients in a bowl.
3. Mix eggs, vanilla, butter and milk, gradually adding in the dry ingredients.
4. Put batter into baking cups, bake for 14/15 minutes or until done.

While the cupcakes cool,  start on the frosting.

1. Mix 5 cups of powdered sugar, 1/2 cup melted butter , 1/4 tsp salt, 1 tbs vanilla and 1/2 cup milk.
2. You may have to play around with adding more sugar or milk to get non-grainy frosting with the right consistency for spreading.
3. Frost the cupcakes and sprinkle with powdered sugar and red candy sugar, then add a mini-candy cane.

Bring to a party and watch them go fast!

I did this recipe as part of the #SabrosoSaturday blog hop hosted by @MsLatina. Check out all the great recipes!

I made enough soup for two as this is more of grown-up meal. This is a super fast soup which is relatively healthy.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups left over turkey
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1 tbsp curry powder
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• 2 cardamons
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp pepper
• 1/2 onion – don’t bother to chop
• 1 cup frozen peas and carrots
• 5 cups of water

Instructions:

1. Brown the onion in the oil
2. Add turkey and all the spices. Coat the turkey in the spices and brown a bit.
3. Add water
4. Add potato
5. Add Peas and carrots
6. Cook at until boil and then simmer for about 20 mins. (potatoes are firm but you can put a knife thru them)
7. Serve immediately with extra pepper on top

This soup is not a dish I would serve to guest but for a fast home cooked soup it does the trick. Enjoy and maybe add a piece of that left over pumpkin pie for dessert.

I did this recipe as part of the #SabrosoSaturday blog hop hosted by @MsLatina. Check out all the great recipes!

So what is Yuca? Yuca is a rather ugly looking root that Caribbeans just love and other folks are confused about. I really see no point in using fresh yuca so go for the frozen.

On Thanksgiving, I like to make yuca that has a bit of visual pop so I use olives and lots of onions to give my yuca a “pick me” look :

Ingredients:

• 2 pound bag of Yuca
• 3 tbsp lime juice
• 1 cup olive oil
• 1 tbsp Adobo
• 5 garlic cloves chopped
• 4 medium onions chopped fine
• 30 small green olives chopped
• 4 bay leaves

Instructions:
Yuca

1. Boil yuca in salted water about 25 minutes (until you can put a knife through one)
2. Important to asustar (scare) the yuca so it does not get mushy! So drain and run cold water over your Yuca.
3. Put the cooked yuca in a serving dish

The Sauce:

1. Saute onions in olive oil until brown
2. Add the garlic, olives, bay leaves and Adobo (a spice mix available in the Hispanic section of supermarket)
3. Add lime juice
4. Add salt and pepper to taste
5. Pour over the Yuca

Yuca can look and taste bland so make sure your onions get brown and you use olive oil to add some needed color and sabor to your yuca. Adding olives is not traditional but adds a nice flavor. If you have leftovers, drain off the sauce, chop up your yuca into cubes size and fry. Leftover yuca makes great home fries!

Check out the Tiki Tiki Blog’s great Thanksgiving recipe round up:  El Mish Mash that is Our Thanksgiving

What’s your favorite Thanksgiving dish? And what kind of left over magic do you do?

Happy Thanksgiving!

Don’t Be A Shopping Statistic

The annual “Black Friday” post-Thanksgiving shopping rush lost some of its luster two years ago when a customer was trampled to death, and bricks and mortar retailers are being advised again to take precautions.

Iphone App developers have been working to spare you from the crowd while enlarging your bargain target area. But make a self and product assessment before you take the plunge.  What do you really want, and how many hoops are you willing to jump through to get it?  Lifehacker has a good list of  resources for checking whats out there before you look around.

To the phones!

Black Friday [brace yourself, the names will get repetitive] seems one of the best out there. It  has an easy to find and use search function.  You would think that would be standard, but you would be mistaken. 

Black Friday also has social network tools which make it easy to hook up Twitter and Facebook to the app’s finds and pump them out to the greater universe.

Black Friday Wish demonstrates the need to start out with a goal.   The store search is largely limited to standard big box stores, but if you find what you want the app makes it painless to spread the word via Twitter and Facebook.  But the stand alone “Tell A Friend” function is email only.  No scans of deal ads.

Black Friday 2010 -  the name alone makes the competition seem so yesterday!

The app’s  ”Top Deals” are varied and include Groupon offerings, and its  compilation of store ads is fairly vast and easy to access, if a little eye-straining. 

But there’s no snappy means of sharing the love via social networks.

TGI-Black Friday has a very detailed category list ["Blank Media," anyone?], and while it has no Twitter or Facebook capabilities the app allows easy emailing of your search finds.  It has a vast list of shops but below that a puzzling ghost list of stores with no deals. Look upon the greyed-out Apple store and be sad [Dollar General is there too for contrast].  

Black Friday Ads does best at that, providing scads of scans of store ads and promotions. 

The app has some trouble keeping up though.  A number of stores listed in its list of most recent ads lead to dead ends.    

No Twitter, Facebook or even email functions.

BlackFriday.fm opens with a news page, which might give you ideas about where to target. 

The app has an electronic-heavy category list, and for individual items it lets you see how many views each item has had, giving you a rough notion of how likely something might be to sell out.  You can email item pages, but not via Facebook or Twitter.

If you decide to get out and actually brave the crowds you needn’t go unarmed. With the  pic2shop app you point your iPhone camera [any iPhone, not just 4G] at a barcode and the app gives you on the fly cost comparisons so you can buy or walk.

I used it on a children’s book and got useful information : 

But the eBay copy had better be signed by the author.

Where do you go to find deals?

To get in the “fried zone” state, it really doesn’t matter what you fry. I had chicken in the frig so I went for Chicharrones de Pollo (Fried Chicken Latin style).

Here are my most important frying tips:

• Make it hot: Frying requires heat
• Use plenty of oil: Embrace that you are not making a low fat dish
• Consider olive oil: Gives a great flavor
• Fry it to hell: Frying is not a thing of moderation so go for the crisp
• Pay attention: You don’t want to burn your food or yourself. No tweets, calls, etc while you fry!

The key difference between Chicharrones de Pollo and regular fried Chicken is that you use spices versus flour for the coating. It is spicier and relies on the Chicken skin for the crispiness.

Ingredients:

• Four Chopped up Chicken breasts with skin and bones
• 1 TBSP of Adobo ( You can get this in the Hispanic Food section, Goya has a good one)
• 1 tsp cumin
• 2 tsp garlic
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp pepper
• 1 cup olive oil

Instructions:

1. Start to heat up your oil ( I crank it to a bit short of  high)
2. Mix all spices in a bowl
3. Rub the spices on the chicken on both sides
4. Carefully with long tongs place the chicken skin down in the oil.
5. Fry it like you mean it for about 25 minutes with frequent rotations
6. Lay-out paper towels and pat off excess oil
7. Serve asap as they are best hot

I serve these with Batata Bravas and a simple salad. I hope you get into your fried zone” and enjoy!

I did this recipe as part of the #SabrosoSaturday blog hop hosted by @MsLatina. Check out the all great recipes!

I started cooking at 3pm which is way late for Boliche (Cuban pot roast). I like my pot roast to fall to pieces. My Husband prefers it a bit less falling apart so this is a personal choice. I would go for cooking for 6 hours minimum  if you like the falling apart version.

Ingredients (serves about 10):

• 5 pounds of beef (i used bottom round)
• 4 tbsps of olive oil
• 5 garlic cloves
• 4 onions
• 1 lemon
• 1 tsp cumin
• 1 tsp cayenne pepper
• 1 tsp black pepper
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• 2 tsp salt
• 2 beers
• 1/cup chicken broth

Instructions:

1. Make a marinade for the beef. Put lemon juice, 2 tbsps of olive oil , garlic cloves, herbs , salt and pepper in blender. Coat the beef with marinade and let sit overnight or at least 1 hour in a pot that you can cook in.
2. Take beef and either grill it or brown it in a new pan with 1 tbsp olive oil. I like the smokey flavor of the grill.
3. Add oil to the pan were you marinaded the beef and add the onions. Cook till very brown.
4. Add back the beef with 2 beers and 1/2 cup of broth. Cook high till it boils then lower and then cover simmer for as long as you can (6 hours is what i do). Add the extra broth if the juices run low .
5. Make sure to let sit and serve with plenty of sauce . The best part!

Enjoy with white rice and some black beans.

I did this recipe as part of the #SabrosoSaturday blog hop hosted by @MsLatina. Check out the all great recipes!

I am not sure why but the sopa magica (magic soup) works but I think it’s the combo of green plantain and garlic provide some potent relief. It’s a very tasty soup even if you aren’t sick. It is very fast and easy to make. If you feel really bad start off with just some broth and potatoes in your bowl and save the rest for when you are better.

Drink lots of fluids and rest.

Ingredients:

• 2 breast chopped up
• 2 potatoes
• 1 green plantain
• 5 garlic cloves
• 6 cups of water
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1/2 tsp garlic powder
• 1/2 tsp cumin powder
• 1 tsp salt

Instructions:

1. Brown chicken in oil with herbs and salt
2. Add the rest of the ingredients

That is all! I hope you feel better!

I did this recipe as part of the #SabrosoSaturday blog hop hosted by @MsLatina. Check out the great recipes!