Nicole, Author at Life's Tidbits

01Feb 2012

Recipe: Tabbouleh

My friend and I go to Skewers a lot and I LOVE, love, love their lighter side menu options. I was having friends over for dinner and craving middle eastern / mediterranean food. So this dinner menu was inspired by my lovely girly dinners at Skewers.

My dinner party menu consisted of chicken, tabbouleh, hummus, tzatziki and pita bread. I’ve already blogged about my hummus recipe, check it out and then come back to this recipe.

The tabbouleh is a little more time intensive then the hummus, but it is super easy to make. So without further ado here is how I make the tabbouleh.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup bulgur
1 1/4 cups boiling water
1 bunch chopped parsley
1 medium tomato diced tomatoes
1/2 medium onion chopped
2-3 tablespoons of roughly chopped mint leaves
1/2 lemon juiced
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1 tablespoon olive oil

Soak the bulgur in boiling water, cover and let it stand for about 2 hours. Drain the excess water using a colander and then squeeze out any remaining water from bulghur using your hands or paper towel. (I am a bad blogger and forgot to take a picture. Sorry!)

Dice the tomato and onion. Place them in a bowl.

Chop the curley parsley and mint.

Mix the bulgur, tomatoes, onion, parsley and mint in a bowl. Add lemon juice, olive oil, salt and pepper and mix well.

Your tabbouleh is complete!!

Serve immediately or chill in refrigerator for 2 hours before serving. I prefer to have it chill in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes so all the flavors can develop.

Coming up next for our middle eastern inspired meal is the tzatziki sauce and then the chicken.

Happy Cooking!

30Jan 2012

V-day gift ideas for your man

by Nicole ⋅ 1 Comment

I don’t know about the rest of you, but my man is HARD to buy for. He tends to purchase the things he wants/needs on his own. Anything else he wants is technology related and seriously buying computer gadgets or as he says “nerd books” isn’t that much fun for me. Annnnddd clearly getting him a gift is all about me, right?!?! Hahaha.

Personally I am not a huge fan of giving (or receiving) big gifts on valentines days. All I really want is a card and some roses, which is totally reasonable if you ask me. :) Valentines day is the perfect time to buy something fun for your plus one. Here are a couple of my favorites present ideas …

Collar Stays

I got the husband collar stays from red envelope for Christmas and all I can say is they were a BIG hit. Kind of fun and flirty and oh so perfect for a holiday based around being in love.

Steampunk Cufflinks

The hubby gave these to his groomsmen at our wedding as bridal party gifts. Everyone loved them and I’m convinced they would also make a fabulous vday gift. There are a number of cufflink designs looks sold on Etsy.

Photo Credit: Korie Lynn Photography

Cordless Helicopter

Given to my husband by his parents for Christmas. Unfortunately I can’t take credit for this gift idea. He definitively enjoys playing with the helicopter, but Sophi (the dog) keeps him from doing so more often than not. Sophi barks at the moving object and then immediately runs for cover … it is pretty hilarious!

And some additional ideas:

BBQ set
Tools (like a cordless drill)
Ipod dock/speaker
Whiskey set
Blazer
Boat Shoes
Valet
Beer mug(s) with initials or name engraved

Happy Gift Giving and Happy Valentines Day (soon)!!

xoxoxo

23Jan 2012

Recipe: Garlic Hummus

by Nicole ⋅ Leave a Comment

My friend invited us over for Sunday football and was already planning on making all the classic football foods. After sitting on the couch debating on what I should bring, I decided on hummus. It is healthy, yummy and I can snack on it for the whole game without getting sick of it. :)

I took a number of different recipes from online and came up with this yummolicious hummus!! It is a prefect party item, appetizer or food to bring to a football viewing.

Here’s how the hummus comes out and it takes less than 15 minutes to make!

Ingredients:

2-3 garlic cloves
2 cans chickpeas, drained, liquid reserved (save a couple of chickpeas for garnishing)
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/3 cup tahini (sesame paste)
2 lemons squeezed
2 tablespoons liquid from the chickpeas
Olive Oil

Put all the ingredients in the food processor (except the olive oil). Start processing and slowly add 1-2 tablespoons of olive oil at a time. Unfortunately when I made the hummus this afternoon I eye balled the olive oil until it looked/tasted right. If you’ve purchased hummus from the store or ordered it at dinner you will have no problem with assessing if you’ve added enough olive oil.

Once it is done place it in a bowl and refrigerate for 15 minutes or more. The hummus can be served chilled or at room temperature. It tastes great with pita bread, carrots, chips or really any vegetable.

Add a little paprika and the chickpeas you reserved as a garnish. You can also add a little extra olive oil on top if desired.

Happy Cooking!!

19Jan 2012

Ways to Use Your Engagement Photos

by Nicole ⋅ Leave a Comment

We got engaged in October and by the time we found our photographer, signed the contract and thought about scheduling our e-session it was FRRRREEZING outside. After giving it some thought we decided to wait until April to do our engagement photos.

A larger number of people use their e-pics on their save the dates (STDs). Since our save the dates went out priority to even booking the photographer we were going to have to find other ways to use the pictures. When we received our ~120 engagement photos I started wondering what we were going to do with all these pictures.

We did the typical print a few and put them up around the house as well as place a few favorites on the wedding website. But it just didn’t feel like enough and I started to think there just HAD to be more we could do with all these cutsie pictures.

I found five fun ways to take advantage our engagement pictures!

All of the engagement photos were taken by Korie Lynn Photography

1. Guest Book

Part of our photography package included a guest book. The hubby and I chose our favorite pictures and then our photographer designed and printed the book for us. If it isn’t included in your photo package it’s a super easy DIY project. Photobooks can be created on Shutterfly, MyPublisher, SnapFish, Blur and the list of places goes on and on.

Check out our book:

Photo Credit: Korie Lynn Photography

2. Framed Collage

We had a frame with pictures we weren’t loving anymore. We printed our top 9 photos and voila …

3. Table numbers!

I had serious issues trying to decide what to do about table numbers. I thought about naming each table a Washington Monument, wine bottles, luminaria with numbers and gosh probably a dozen other things.

In the end we picked our favorite engagement pictures added numbers with Photoshop … printed the pictures and purchased some plastic picture frames. It was a super easy DIY and pretty cheap too if you ask me.

Looks pretty … right?!

Photo Credit: Korie Lynn Photography

4. Thank you cards

These were a HUGE hit with our friends and family. We chose two different pictures and used Photoshop to add “Thank you” to the images. I ordered them from Shutterfly, however like the guest book there are a ton of places you can order customized photo thank you cards.

5. Custom Stamps for the wedding invitation

I wish I could take all the credit for this idea, but my mom really pushed me to follow through on this idea. I had toyed with buying custom stamps for the invitations, however I wasn’t sure if it was worth the extra money. In the end I decided it would be fun and I ordered the custom stamps from Zazzle.com. The stamps come in three different sizes so you have your choice of how big you want the stamp to be.

Tip: Make sure to take the invitation to the post office prior to buying the custom stamps so you know what postage rate you will need to purchase.

Photo Credit: Korie Lynn Photography

So there are my engagement picture tidbits. How have you (or your friends) used engagement pictures?

Happy Planning and DIY!

09Jan 2012

Recipe: Turkey Chili

by Nicole ⋅ Leave a Comment

Brrrrr it’s cold out there and today was the first snow fall of the year!!!

Cold weather = chili night at our house and to be specific turkey chili! My husband swears he’s going to be made of turkey, because of how many turkey based meals I make. LOL. He cracks me up.

Now I’m not saying by any means that I don’t like beef, but in things like chili using turkey or beef doesn’t make a difference to me. Turkey is lower in fat so I often use it instead of beef. You can totally use beef if that’s your preference with this recipe. Either way it will taste great … in my humble opinion. :)

**This recipe was updated on November 4, 2014**

Ingredients:

1.25 pounds ground turkey
1 can chili beans in medium spicy sauce (not drained)
1 can dark red kidney beans (drained)
1 can fire roasted diced tomatoes (with juice)
1 can tomato paste
1 large onion (chopped)
1 red bell peppers (seeded & chopped)
⅓ jalapeno pepper (seeded & minced – use less if you don’t like things spicy)
4-6 cloves or 1 tablespoon garlic (minced)
½ cup beer (or substitute in water)
2 tablespoons chili powder
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
½ tablespoon dried oregano
1 teaspoons ground cumin
1 teaspoons hot sauce
1 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon ground black pepper
⅛ teaspoon cayenne pepper (or less to taste)
½ teaspoon paprika

Chop the red pepper and drop it into a big enough pot to hold all of chili. I like to add a little vegetable oil to make the veges soften quicker. Then chop your jalapeno, garlic and onion and drop those in as well. Saute until they are tender.

In a pan over medium-high heat ground turkey. Break into small pieces and cook until browned. Drain off any excess fat.

Once the vegetables are cooked add the turkey (or beef) to the big pot. Next, add in Worcestershire sauce, hot sauce, and beer (I usually use water and to me it tastes the same). Then add chili beans (with the sauce), kidney beans, fire roasted tomatoes and tomato paste.

Season with chili powder, oregano, cumin, salt, pepper, cayenne pepper, and paprika. Mix well. Cover and simmer for 1/2 hour stirring occasionally.

Makes 6 servings. If you have left overs it makes for a fabulous lunch the next day or later in the week!