Tuna Salad Melt with Hearty Wheat Bread

Bread puts a smile on my face. Tasty bread puts a bigger smile on my face. Healthy tasty bread is an added bonus. Thanks to the Tastemaker program from Foodbuzz, I received a delicious loaf of bread to sample once again from Nature's Pride. It was good timing too as I had just finished the last bit of bread I had around the house. No bread in my house is a sad day. This time it was a loaf of their Hearty Wheat with Flax.

Let's just say that Nature's Pride Hasn't disappointed me yet. :) Of course with any bread the first thing that comes to my mind is a good ol' sandwich. This one is a nice tuna salad melt. It's got your typical tuna salad mixes like a tiny bit of may and sweet relish. This version has that with a little tropical twist of pineapple with some paprika, extra virgin olive oil and crushed cracker to give it a little crunch. Topped with some delicious slices of cheese and my all too favorite fruit...the avocado. Yes, the avocado is a fruit, if you didn't know. It's just treated and tastes like it's a vegetable. That's your fun food fact for the day. Put all that between two delicious slices of the Hearty Wheat bread and cooked it up like a grilled cheese sammy in ol' Georgie. This was my solution to an easy-peasy "I-don't-know-what-to-eat" kind of lunch.  

Makes 2 sandwiches.

Tuna Salad Melt

1 5oz can tuna (in oil)
1 tsp mayo
1 tsp paprika
1 Tbsp sweet relish
1/8 c crushed crackers (saltine)
1/8 c pineapple tidbits (with juice)
pinch of salt and pepper

4 sliced bread (Nature' Pride Hearty Wheat with Flax Seed)
Dijon mustard
2-4 slices mozzarella
butter
1 small ripe avocado sliced


To make the tuna salad portion, Drain most but not all the oil from the can. Mix in the mayo, paprika, sweet relish, cracker, pineapple, salt and pepper. Mix together well, then set aside.

Note: if you have tuna in water, drain the water and add a tbsp of extra virgin olive oil.

Preheat your skillet on medium heat.

Assemble the sandwich, lightly butter one side of each slice of bread. Then lightly spread some dijon mustard on the opposite sides of each slice of bread. Place half the tuna on the dijon mustard side, followed by some avocado slices and a couple slices of mozzarella. Top with the other slice of bread. dijon side in.

Place the sandwich on the skillet and heat until toasted. Roughly 5 minutes. Place something heavy like a place with a canned good over the sandwich to help flatten the sandwich and help melt the cheese. Repeat the same process for the other side.

Serve warm.

Production Eats No. 42

Issue Number 42.  Worked 2 days on the show The Event. I haven't really seen the show, so I can't really tell you much of what it's about.

Day 1

Top left clockwise: Baked potato, white fish with red onion feta salsa, stuffed pasta, slice of french bread, rice with mushrooms, veggies.

I like the salsa for the fish. Red onion and feta was a good mix. I wish there was sour cream for the baked potato. That's usually the only way I can eat it, but ti was still good with a nice pat of butter. 

Salad with honey mustard dressing and a nice chunk of fresh baked chocolate cake.

Moist delicious chocolaty cake. What's not to love about that? I devoured all the other stuff on my plate so that I can get to dessert. Yes, I was that eager for the cake. 

Day 2

Top left closkcwise: Thick slice of caramelized sweet potato. Battered fish with tartar sauce, salad with some mushroom cripy noodles with honey mustard dressing, corn, a little rice, cous cous (center)

I was overly excited to see the sweet potato. Not too often I've seen caramelized versions of it on set. i should have gotten two. The fish was pretty good, too. It did make me think of fish and chips all of the sudden. The only thing missing was the malt vinegar and the chips. Hehe...

On the dessert bowl for this day were some pineapple chunks and a nice slice of crumb cake. 

The cake part almost had a consistency of pound cake. Ooo...that's one thing I have to make. 

Production Eats No. 41

This past week I worked on the show The Middle once again. It was a sort of long day being outside the whole time getting burnt by the bright sun. Portion of my arms, legs and face managed to get a bit of a tan. I guess I'm partially ready for summer. Ha! Now on to the lunch. The catering on the show is pretty tasty the previous time I was there. It was no surprise that it was tasty once again this time.

Top left clockwise: Pineapple slices, dinner roll, some veggies, Salad with mushrooms, fettucini with white sauce, grilled salmon.

I really liked the salmon. The crust had a nice crisp to it that I put into my little dinner roll to make a sandwich. The salad portion was some cesaer, I absent-mindedly topped it with a ladle of some vinaigrette. There was also a beef and chicken selection for those who wanted. 

Dessert consisted of a fresh chocolate chip cookie and a nice chunky brownie. There was some rice crispy treats and some nice fresh warm peach cobbler. As tempting as it was, I had to restrain myself from over stuffing my already full stomach. 

B + B turns 2!!

Yup...that's right! B + B has turned 2 this past week. I actually didn't realize it until a couple days ago when I glanced at my calendar. Wow... Crazy!!! I figured I'd take a look down memory lane and revisit one of the first recipes I ever posted here. It was a crazy whim of an idea to randomly start a food blog and here we are today.

One of the first recipes I posted was for some delicious soft buttermilk biscuits. Mmmm... Nothing beats a fresh baked biscuit with some butter, jam or syrup. Maybe even all three smothered together. Yum yum! Once in a while I like to mix in some cheddar or parmesan to make them cheddar biscuits. I'm seriously craving to get back into the kitchen and whip something up. Gosh darn it...I think I will.

Happy cooking/baking/eating!!!

Makes 9 Biscuits

Buttermilk Biscuits

1 1/2 c All Purpose Flour (cake flour works too if you don't have anything else)

1/2 tsp salt

1 tbsp sugar

1 tbsp baking powder

2/3 c buttermilk

1/2 c unsalted butter (best if cold, cut into cubes)

2/3 c shredded cheddar or parmesan cheese (optional)

Preheat oven to 425°

Sift flour, salt, sugar and baking powder into a bowl. Crumble in butter and mix well until almost like a powder-thick consistency. Add buttermilk again mix thoroughly well until it is of a dough consistency. You can add more milk, if needed.

Note: mix in the optional cheese with the dry ingredients. 

Then place the dough on a well-floured flat surface and knead a few times. Cut dough into desired size and place on baking sheet. Baked in oven 10-13 min.

For those who haven't seen the teaser trailer for my short film yet. Here it is for your viewing pleasure.
Become a fan on Facebook because I sure have some exciting news coming up in the near future. Enjoy!!

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See-Food Buffet

Fat tuesday is always a day to eat whatever you want and however much you can eat. I intended to make the most of the day since the next day would be Ash Wednesday. A mark to signify the beginning of Lent.

My mom and I ventured into Kyoto Seafood Buffet on Glenoaks, Blvd in Glendale, CA. I have a love/hate thing about buffets. Depending if the place is good or not, I end up wanting to try everything. The place is nice and spacious.

We arrive just before the dinnertime rush, so we were able to get some nice seats at a booth. Brightly lit. Servers come to take your drink order and let you loose onto the buffet. It's funny I'd see people going back three, four, five times. Some carrying platefuls of crab legs and other items. That's what you get when it's "all-you-can-eat"! I went for two and half rounds. I like to try pits and pieces of what seems to interest me at the moment.

They had a nice wide selection. Chow mien, wantons, peking duck, stuffed shrimp, stuffed mussels, fish, mushrooms, sweet potato tempura. All this on plate #1.

Plate #2 consisted of a sushi variety (which are freshly made by a couple sushi chefs stationed by them) seaweed salad, Kimchi, baked stuffed mussel, cream cheese wontons. There was still another section of the place I didn't get to try like whatever was served at the grill station and the miso soup. 

Of course one can't leave a buffet without having some kind of dessert. I opted for a couple strawberries, jello, a cream puff, and a cake roll. I'm usually big on dessert, but at that point after two rounds I didn't want to push my luck.

I'd definitely come back again and try out more of the foods I didn't get a chance to try. Considering, I tend to be picky about buffets this is one worth going back for.

Kyoto Seafood Buffet
1407 W Glenoaks Blvd
Glendale, CA 91201
818.243.8168

Pizza Nachos

Pizza nachos or nacho pizza? You decide. This little recipe was a quick fix lunch. I didn't really have much around the kitchen, which means that I must make a trip to the market very very soon. Though, I did have a small handful of items in the fridge and pantry. Like cheese, pepperoni and tortilla chips. I did have a craving for nachos for the past couple days, so I figures...why not? I cooked up the pepperoni in a skillet until they were crisp. It took out the oily fat from them. Then carefully layered them onto a pit tin. Chip, cheese, pepperoni. Though, i figured that I was sort of missing one other ingredient. In pops the canned diced tomatoes. I would have like to put fresh in there, but the canned stuff was a good substitute. Put that on top as well. Pop it in the oven for a few minutes.

Voila! You get yourself a little hybrid. Satisfy two comfort foods in one. Actually I think it's a neat alternative to easting actual pizza, if you don't want to deal with the dough/bread portion. I had mine with some sriracha on the side. Next time, I'm going to try it with bacon. Nachos doesn't necessarily mean the melted tangy cheddar and jalapeno slices. Make it into what ever you feel comfortable with.

Serve 2

Pizza Nachooooooooos :-)

Tortilla Chips

1 12 oz can diced tomatoes - Drained

     or 1 beefy tomato - fine diced

pepperoni or bacon

1 1/2 c shredded mozzarella

Preheat your oven to 350˚F. 

Chop the pepperoni or back in to bits. Cook on medium heat on a skillet. Cook until the piece had browned and the fatis removed. Drain the pieces on a paper towel.

Place half of the tortilla chips in an oven safe dish or pie tin. Sprinkle half of the mozzarella then half of the pepperoni bits and half the diced tomatoes

Repeat those same layers with the left over ingredients.

Place the dish into the oven and baked for 5-10. Until cheese has melted.

Best served warm.