13-7: Falafel

13-7: Falafel

I do enjoy getting falafel when I go out to a Middle-Eastern restaurant. It’s much easier to cook them when you have a deep fryer. In the past, I have pan-fried some falafel, but it tastes the best when it is crispy and fried. Since we happened to be borrowing a deep-fryer, I made 13-7: Falafel.

I didn’t have any pita on hand, so I served the balls with a spicy dipping sauce instead of in the traditional pita pocket.


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6-25: Salmon-Filled Chicken Breasts

6-25: Salmon-Filled Chicken Breasts

I’ve been saving some lox in the freezer from a past brunch for this recipe, 6-25: Salmon-Filled Chicken Breasts. There’s not a lot of salmon recipes in Simply Delicious (despite salmon’s popularity in the 1980s & 90s), and this may be one of the only smoked salmon ones that I have in my collection for this book.

Definitely not the first time Simply Delicious has given a recipe for stuffed chicken breasts–see 6-4: Easy Stuffed Chicken Breasts for another take on the same idea. However, if you like smoked salmon like I do, you may have some extra laying around–here’s a use for it. 🐟


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5-9: Swiss Cheese and Crouton Omelette

5-9: Swiss Cheese and Crouton Omelette

An old proverb states, “If you’re going to make an omelette, you’re going to have to break a few eggs.” 5-9: Swiss Cheese and Crouton Omelette is another Simply Delicious recipe where I had a reading comprehension fail and had to get creative to fix it. I didn’t notice that I was making up two individual omelettes and accidentally tried to make a giant omelette all at once which didn’t go well. 🍳

As the card states, it would be great for our next brunch. We had this dish on a night where we had breakfast for dinner. I made bacon to make it feel more breakfast-y. 🌇


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15-1: Lemon Mousse

15-1: Lemon Mousse

It took more than two years, but I’ve finally ventured into the last untouched dessert category – Group 15: Cold Desserts – with 15-1: Lemon Mousse. I’ve experimented with mousse before, both within this project and in my own cooking (here’s one of my desserts from my restaurant days), but I’ve never made this version. It’s simple, refreshing, and a good summer dessert. 🍋

This recipe is for lemon, but you could probably substitute orange, lime, or something else citrusy that’s similar if you want to get creative/different with it. This freezes/holds well, so you can make it even further in advance of the night before if you want. ❄


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11-14: Tempura

11-14: Tempura

This recipe, 11-14: Tempura tastes great, but the amount of prep is so arduous that I would rather pay a chef at a restaurant to make it for me.

Mixed tempura is my favorite starter dish whenever Jamie and I go out to a sushi restaurant. 🍣


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13-2: Onion Tart

13-2: Onion Tart

It’s hard to think of things to write about something you cooked awhile ago–a moment of honesty while I get my gears turning here. 13-2: Onion Tart is a great vegetarian (with a modification or two) option that satisfies everyone for any meal of the day. It’s not super exciting (which explains my inability to think of anything particularly interesting to say about it), but it’s definitely a pretty good fallback option if you’re in need of an easy, crowd-pleasing, inoffensive, yet impressive recipe.

Simply Delicious notes that this recipe is French and that this version comes from the Alsace region of the country. I found a few other takes on that version scattered around the Internet, but give or take some bacon and Gruyère cheese, they’re all relatively similar to this one. 🍷


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17-27: Nut Cookies

17-27: Nut Cookies

17-27: Nut Cookies are tremendous. My mother certainly never baked cookies like this. She is into the traditional chocolate chip variety only. 🍪

This was my first time baking with rye flour, which we had left over from when Jamie made 17-37: Holiday Cookies. 🌰


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11-25: Best Ever Sole Au Gratin

11-25: Best Ever Sole Au Gratin

This recipe is already setting high expectations with the title 11-25: Best Ever Sole Au Gratin, and I’m not here to completely dash those hopes. This is a pretty decent fish recipe, as those go (I’m usually wary of home-cooked fish recipes), but it’s nothing spectacular, despite Simply Delicious’ assertions. 🐟

This one gets fancy with the piping bag and tips for the potatoes. I still haven’t replaced my piping/pastry bag set-up since it all failed during the making of 17-52: Apricot Macaroons for the holidays last year (2015). Since I’ve yet to replace it, I’ll have to get creative again.


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13-5: Onion Focaccia

13-5: Onion Focaccia

Jamie made this dish previously, without documenting the process, and I really enjoyed the bread. I took a shot at making this dish to practice using yeast to make a dough.

My final dish was not circular like a pizza, it was easier to flatten the dough into a square like a flatbread.


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6-43: Cheesy Chicken Cutlets

6-43: Cheesy Chicken Cutlets

Here’s yet another boneless/skinless chicken breast recipe born of the health-conscious 1980s. We ate a LOT of chicken breast when I was growing up, so I’m surprised my mom never busted 6-43: Cheesy Chicken Cutlets out for yet another version.

I’m sorry, but it’s ALWAYS seemed just a bit morbid to dip chicken in egg. I realize it’s often a big part of one of my favorite things (fried chicken), but it still always nags.  I’ll leave it there–you do the math if you want to. 🐣


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