Tag Archives: bacon

Hardcore Hobbit: Full Breakfast

Posted on August 22, 2011 | Leave a comment

This is a nice and easy hardcore hobbit to get back into the swing of things. Apparently when hobbits say full breakfast, they truly mean FULL breakfast! This makes a great meal for a busy day when you might not have time to stop for a full lunch. You certainly will not be hungry by lunch time….you might not even be done eating your full breakfast by lunch time. In the game a full breakfast includes mushroom, egg, tater, bacon, pork sausage and chives to make it epic. Yes, we got it all in there, with healthy alternatives! Want to see?

  • 2 chicken or turkey sausages ( I suggest visiting your local farmers market or butcher for some really unique flavours. The one we have here is a chicken, pineapple, curry, and cheese sausage from market on millstream)
  • 1 cup egg substitute (like egg creations, etc.)
  • 2 tbl chopped fresh chives
  • 4 slices of canadian bacon
  • Hardcore Hobbit fried mushrooms
  • potato pancakes
  • Salt and pepper to taste
  1. Prepare the sausage and canadian bacon to taste. We did ours on the bbq. Who said the grill is for lunch and dinner only?
  2. Prepare the fried mushroom and potato pancakes and plate.
  3. In a medium heated pan scramble the eggs and plate.
  4. Plate the sausage and canadian bacon and garnish with the chopped chives.

This is another one of those recipes that a nutritional calculation cannot be done for since it all depends on your sausage choices in the end. Choose wisely young hobbits and enjoy a full breakfast!

Is it just me or is that breakfast kind of smiling at us?

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Posted in Breakfast, Comfort Foods, The Hardcore Hobbit

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Hardcore Hobbit: Flounder with Bacon

Posted on August 2, 2011 | Leave a comment

Well, sure we don’t exactly need warming against the cold of Forochel this time of year but doesn’t a piece of bacon wrapped flounder just sound tasty? How about grilling that piece of bacon wrapped flounder? How about we just say BACON wrapped flounder one more time. *cough* Bacon *cough*. In LOTRO this dish is made using water, BACON (o.k. I was on a bacon kick yesterday), seasonings, and flounder. My husband and I once again collaborated on this one…after all he is the grill master around here. The water part of this recipe eluded me so we made this using frozen flounder. There, water in the ice. Actually using this fish still frozen helped us wrap it in bacon and season it without having it fall apart. If you are using fish from Forochel I’m sure it comes pre-frozen anyways.

  • 2 flounder fillets, still frozen
  • 4-6 strips bacon (I recommend 2 strips of bacon per filet)
  • 1 tsp extra virgin avocado oil
  • 1 tsp fresh rosemary, chopped
  •  1/2 tsp white pepper, freshly ground
  1. Add the bacon to a medium hot pan and cook for a minute. Just enough to partially cook the bacon.
  2. Brush the fillets with the avocado oil.
  3. Sprinkle the rosemary and white pepper on both sides.
  4. Wrap the bacon around the filet and secure each slice with a toothpick.
  5. Cook the fillets on a grill for about 10-12 minutes.
  6. Serve immediately. These are great served with some mini gem potatoes cooked in a foil packet on the grill.

Serves 2. Each serving contains (3 oz flounder piece and 2 strips bacon) 172 calories, 7.5 grams fat, 24.4 grams protein, no carbs and no fibre. Get that fibre in using a high fibre side dish and a nice veggie dish. Enjoy!

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Posted in Comfort Foods, Dinner, The Hardcore Hobbit

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Hardcore Hobbit: Complete Hobbit Breakfast

Posted on June 6, 2011 | 3 comments

Lotro tells us this delicious breakfast is full of potato, egg, bacon, and mushroom. Really, who could ask for more? This one came to us by accident sort of. Weekend breakfasts are my husband’s domain. Lately though he has been strapped for ideas. He told me he was in the mood for eggs though. So we talked it out and concluded that we should poach said egg and place it on a tasty potato pancake. Then he asked if I wanted bacon. To which I countered “you know…if we work in mushrooms…we have a complete hobbit breakfast!”. So, we tried it out and yes it works. Totally delicious and I would do it again. Each flavour comes through and it is indeed those ingredients in their purest form. Best of all, the egg was a perfect medium poach. My favourite kind. I love it when the egg yolk becomes this gooey buttery sauce to tie together the dish. Break the yolk first and dive in, you won’t regret it.

  • 2 medium red potatoes
  • 2 strips bacon
  • 2 large eggs
  • 4 crimini mushrooms (or mushroom of choice), sliced
  • cooking spray
  • ground pepper to taste
  1. Peel, grate and squeeze the moisture out of the potatoes. Form into two cakes and set aside.
  2. Crisp the bacon in a pan and drain off the fat. Add the mushrooms to the pan and cook until the liquids come out and get soaked up again.
  3. Pulse the mushrooms in a blender to create a tapenade  like texture (chunky, not a puree). Set aside.
  4. Place the potato pancakes in the pan. Cook until golden on one side, about 5 minutes. Flip, press down, and cook until golden. Place on your plate.
  5. Poach the eggs to desired firmness. We use an egg poacher, for the free wheeling way of making these without a poacher you would best refer to Julia Child.
  6. Spoon the mushroom tapenade on the potato pancake. Place the poached egg on top and garnish with your pieces of bacon. Serve!

Serves two. Each serving contains 275 calories, 8.4 grams fat, 37.8 grams carbs, 4.9 grams fibre, and 13 grams protein. What a pretty plate and a tasty brunch that was. Go husband!

 

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Posted in Breakfast, The Hardcore Hobbit

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Spicy Mini Sandwich

Posted on January 29, 2011 | Leave a comment

The perfect tasty treat for the hobbit on the go! There are so many wonderful ways to make variations of club sandwiches and this is one I had this week. I love these mini bagels I have found, they are boiled and baked and full of bagel goodness. One or two is all you need with a tasty side dish like baked chips or a salad. Then tada! You have been to the deli. A very good lunch indeed. Hah, and now I just realized why I am so amused by the title of this sandwich…I play a mini in LOTRO…I could see her eating this…but then I’m just a big ol’geek.

  • leaf of lettuce
  • 1 small chicken breast
  • 1 slice of bacon, cooked crispy
  • 1 tsp half the fat mayo
  • 1 mini bagel
  • 2 tbl piri piri sauce or seasoning
  1. Marinate chicken breast in the piri piri spice the night before.
  2. Slice bagel, toast, spray with butter cooking spray if desired.
  3. Pan fry or grill the chicken breast. Slice thinly after resting the meat for 5 minutes. Place 1 ounce of chicken on the bottom bagel half. Reserve the rest for future sandwiches or sharing…if you dare.
  4. Top with bacon slice broken in half. Spread mayo on the top half of the bagel, top with lettuce leaf.
  5. Assemble!

Makes one immediate serving…and ofcourse chicken for future servings. One mini sandwich is 167 calories, 6.4 grams of fat, and 1.1 grams of fibre. If you need to reduce the fat go with turkey bacon, I went with bacon because sometimes you just need to indulge. Another great version is using avocado instead of mayo. NUM! Like your sandwich extra spicy? Add some of that piri piri seasoning to your mayo.

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Posted in Lunch, Snack

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Boeuf Bourguignon

Posted on January 19, 2011 | Leave a comment

Putting the peasant back into this peasant food inspired haute cuisine dish. This is only vaguely close to the cooking processes used for this dish today. It’s easy and tasty this way though…and I don’t argue with tasty. She fights dirty. Ofcourse, the other thing that makes this dish a good idea for hungry hobbits all over the world….MUSHROOMS!! See? Tasty fights dirty bigtime. The key to make this healthier is really in the cut of your stewing beef. Try to get one that only has a bit of marbling. If you can get sirloin stewing beef then you are golden. Some butchers offer “steak ends” which are the bits they cut off those sirloin steaks to make them beautiful. These are awesome lean cuts that are perfect for this dish. The other reason I absolutely had to post a beef dish today? I was watching ‘Come Dine with me Canada’. On it was this woman who kept complaining that when she was dieting all she could eat was chicken, that is why she dislikes chicken. Sheesh. No idea what diet she was trying but I seem to be doing just fine and NOT living on just chicken. So there. It’s not a beautiful picture, as I embraced it’s peasant roots, but it sure was tasty.

  • 1 slice bacon, chopped
  • 1 pkg crimini mushrooms, sliced or puree (according to preference)
  • 8 pearl onions (I used red pearl onions for colour)
  • 3 cloves garlic, minced
  • 3 tbl cornstarch (I like my boeuf with a thick sauce, if you don’t skip this)
  • 1 tsp poultry spice
  • 1/2 chicken broth
  • 1 cup red wine
  • 2 large potatoes, cubed
  • 4 carrots, sliced
  • 2 celery stalks, sliced
  • 8 oz stewing beef
  • salt and pepper to taste
  1. Heat a pan to medium, add bacon, garlic and mushrooms. Cook until the bacon is crispy. Drain the fat and pour into a crockpot.
  2. Toss the beef in cornstarch to coat then add to the pan and brown. You just want to sear the meat here, not cook it. Pour into the crockpot.
  3. Deglaze the pan with the red wine, scraping off the browned bits from the pan. Pour into the crockpot.
  4. Add the remaining ingredients to the crockpot and allow to cook on low for 8 hours or high for 5 hours.

Makes 4 servings. Each serving contains 278 calories, 5.7 grams of fat and 3.8 grams of fibre. Very diet friendly to me. Living on chicken, heh, the very idea!

 

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Posted in Comfort Foods, Crockpot Creations, Dinner

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Potato Skins

Posted on August 3, 2010 | Leave a comment

omnomnomnom…mmmmm…*snorfle* what now? Oh yeah…we made these bad boys for a celebration we were having. Evil neighbours moved away, attention was paid, we rocked out like no one was listening on rockband, goodtimes. We felt it was a pub fare sort of night but we wanted it to have a little flair to it too. So we made these up with some goat cheese, which in my opinion is a god among cheeses…to put it mildly. They were goodly.

  • 6 small new potatoes
  • 2 slices bacon
  • 50 grams goat cheese
  • 1 green onion, chopped
  1. Prick the potatoes with a fork and arrange on a baking sheet. Bake at 450F for 50 minutes.
  2. Remove from the oven and allow to cool.
  3. Crisp the bacon over medium heat until desired crispness. Remove from pan and drain on a paper towel. Allow to cool.
  4. Crumble the bacon into a bowl. Combine with the goat cheese and green onion.
  5. Cut the potatoes in half and gently scoop out the insides of the potato, creating a cup, allow some of the potato the remain so that the skins retain their shape. Like so:
  6. Fill each skin with a half teaspoon of the goat cheese mixture. Add more if you have enough leftover.
  7. Arrange the skins on a baking sheet and place under the broiler until the cheese is bubbly and the skins begin to crisp. Sometimes a spritz of baking spray on the skins will help those stubborn skins to brown if you are having problems.
  8. Allow to cool slightly and serve!

This makes 6 servings of two skins each. Each serving contains 85 calories, 2.9 grams of fat, and 1.2 grams of fibre. They are so full of flavour and were definitely the star of the celebration that night. So easy to do! I just baked up the potatoes earlier in the day and assembled them later. Then shortly before we wanted to have them I popped them under the broiler and served! I love easy to prepare party foods.

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Posted in Comfort Foods, Craving Buster, Sidedish, Snack

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