5 More Mother’s Day Brunch Ideas

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So we went to Trader Joe’s last night and found a few more great ideas for Mother’s Day Brunch. There are so many great items on the shelves, that we just kept turning the corners and saying “what about …. “ again and again. We hope this next list will continue to help you think of a great meal for your Mom, or any brunch really.

1. Eggs in a bun

We saw this cute idea on the internet last fall, and WOW it really stood out for me as super cute! You take a dinner roll or a larger bun (we used Trader Joe’s Brioche buns), cut the top off, and add an egg (or two, depending on the size of the bun). Sprinkle with cheese, green onions, salt and pepper- anything you like and bake in a 350 degree oven until the eggs are cooked. Ours took about 30 minutes.

2. Stuffed French Toast

Stuffed French toast is much easier to make than it sounds. In fact, you can “stuff” the bread the night before and then just dip in the batter in the AM and cook. We like to take two pieces of bread and spread one side with cream cheese and the other with jam, and stick them together. Then in the morning, dip them in the egg batter (eggs, milk, sugar and vanilla) and cook like normal.

3. Baked French Toast

Can you tell that we love French Toast?? This idea is more like a breakfast bread pudding. Trader Joe’s has wonderful different kinds of breads that would be super in this dish -think of brioche or another rich eggy bread. One time we used that Italian Holiday bread Panetone- WOW! Ok you take eggs, milk, sugar and vanilla (just like regular French toast) but you pour this into a baking dish. (4 eggs and 2 cups of milk for a 8×8 pan) Then cube up some bread (stale is great) and soak it into the milk and egg mixture.  Bake in a 350 oven for 3-45 minutes until puffy and fully cooked. Add cinnamon and sugar to the top if you like before baking.

4. Egg in Toast

Who does not like an egg in toast? Simply cut a circle (or use a heart cookie cutter) into a piece of bread and toast it in a pan in butter. When hot, crack an egg into the center of the bread and let cook for a minute before flipping over to cook the other side.  When you use the heart shaped cutter this becomes a great Valentine’s breakfast item as well- and you also have a little heart shaped piece of toast to go along.

5. Oatmeal

Oatmeal does sound a bit plain for breakfast, but there are many ways you can jazz it up for a special Mother’s day brunch. You can top it with yogurt, fresh fruit, frozen mixed berries or even sour cream and brown sugar. We love oatmeal with bananas, fresh blueberries and toasted pecan pieces. Or try a spoonful of jam and top with crunchy granola cereal.

Bonus:

Can you tell we thought of another one, AFTER we wrote the post title? What about Bagels, cream cheese and lox (smoked salmon)?  Trader Joe’s sells a number of different kinds of bagels as well as a few different kinds of smoked salmon or lox. Add a little bit of lettuce, some sliced tomatoes, sliced red onions and capers and you have a fantastic  tasty brunch item.

There are many wonderful ways to celebrate your Mom on Mother’s Day. We hope you find one that works for you.

How to make Crepes

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Trader Joe's Buttermilk Pancake Mix

Trader Joe's Buttermilk Pancake Mix

Trade Joe’s makes it easy to enjoy crepes

Here is a super easy way to make crepes. We usually enjoy crepes for special occasion breakfasts but they are also great for lunch, dinner or dessert as well. Sometimes crepes are filled with sweet fillings (think here about filling a crepe with jam, yogurt or fruit fillings) and other times they are savory ( here what about chicken chunks and steamed broccoli with mushroom sauce or diced ham with a cheese sauce). Either way you fill them, we think they are pretty cool and that everyone will just love them

Now if you have never made crepes before, they might seem a bit strange. Basically you are making pancakes, but instead of thick and fluffy pancakes, you will be thinning down the batter (with either milk or water) with the goal of making a runny batter that will spread out to cover the bottom of your pan. We like smaller crepes, so we like to use a small-ish pan; like those little 8 inch pans that you might cook a couple of fried eggs in.

We like to use Trader Joe’s Buttermilk Pancake & All Purpose Baking Mix to make our crepes as everything is pre-measured and ready right out of the box.

For the best results, the batter must “rest” for a few minutes after you mixed it up. So let it sit in the bowl for a few minutes while you clean up, or go have a coffee 🙂

What you need (about 10 crepes):

  • 1Cup Trader Joe’s Buttermilk Pancake Mix
  • 1 Egg
  • 1Cup Water (+ more to make batter thin)
  • Oil for cooking
  • Filling Ingredients of your choice

1. Mix Egg and 1Cup of water together in a bowl. Add 1 Cup Trader Joe’s Buttermilk Pancake Mix and whisk together until smooth. Check the batter; it should be thin. Add more water if needed to get the right thickness. Let the batter rest for 15 minutes before you start to cook

2. Heat your pan on medium heat until hot. Wipe the hot pan with a paper towel dipped in cooking oil so that the crepes don’t stick. Add about ¼ cup of the crepe batter to the pan and swirl around. You want to coat the bottom of the pan with a thin layer batter, without having a lot leftover.

3. Cook the crepe unit the top side is dry, but try not to let the bottom brown. Watch your heat and adjust as necessary.

4. When each crepe is done we usually stack them together on a plate until all the crepes are ready, then you can fill them all at once. OR you can wait until the crepes cool, wrap the plate in plastic and chill until you need them.

Variations:

You can add some flavors to the batter depending on how you want to serve the crepes. For example if they are going to be filled with something sweet (like for breakfast or dessert) you could add some lemon peel or vanilla extract to the batter. If they will be filled with something savory, you could try some garlic powder or black pepper in the batter.

Once the crepes are made, the fillings are almost limitless. We ate crepes at a restaurant one time that served chocolate and banana crepes with whipped cream! Delish! What about using Nutella -WOW!

We were thinking about making a video showing the different steps to making crepes. Please let us know if you would like to see a video here explaining the whole crepe deal in more details.

5 Mother’s Day Brunch Ideas

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Mother’s Day Brunch is one of my favorite meals. Now, I am not a mother, but I enjoy planning and plotting different ideas to make for my Mother for her brunch. Trader Joe’s has a lot of wonderful products that you can use to make your Mother’s Day Brunch special. Beyond food, there are flowers, drinks and especially champagne -eeks!

This year I have been checking out different items each time I go to Trader Joe’s to get some ideas. I thought I would share some of these ideas with you, to try and help you generate some ideas of your own. (Maybe I will have to cook a few ahead of time, just to make sure they are good, right?)

1. Pancakes
Yes, we love making Pancakes for Mother’s Day Brunch. I feel like they are a great celebration food and they can be plain, or jazzed up with a few extra additions. We like to use Trader Joe’s Buttermilk Pancake & All Purpose Baking Mix to keep it easy. We like to use Trader Joe’s Pure Maple syrup to top our pancakes. Another great idea is to “melt” Mom’s favorite jam and use that as syrup on the pancakes.

2. Crepes
OK… getting a bit tricky here, but Crepes for Mother’s Day Brunch are wonderful, elegant and just plain fun.  Again we use the Trader Joe’s Buttermilk Pancake & All Purpose Baking Mix as a base (keep it kinda easy)  for making the crepes. We use 1cup of the Baking Mix, 1 cup of water, 1 egg and whisk this all together. Add more water if needed to make a THIN batter. You can fill the crepes with a number of goodies. We like rubbing them with soft butter and sprinkling with a cinnamon-sugar mixture OR filling with a spoonful of Trader Joe’s Sour Cream and a spoonful of Jam.

3. Hash
Yep, a scary confession but my mother loves hash for breakfast. So for her, Trader Joe’s Roast Beef Hash is the perfect item for her. This package is ready to heat-and-eat and serve along with fried eggs. This is my Mother’s idea of a perfect Mother’s Day Brunch

4. Garden Scrambled Eggs
What about scrambled eggs? We like to make Garden Scrambled eggs with diced tomatoes, sliced green onions, mushrooms, ham, bacon, leftover veggies or cheese (use any or all of these suggestions). Serve with some crisp toast.

5. Mexican  Fiesta Brunch idea
Well, with Cinco de Mayo only a few days before Mother’s day, perhaps your Mother would like to continue the Mexican food theme? Serve up some fried eggs with some Sonoran Caviar (See Recipe here), and sour cream- OR make scrambled eggs and add green chilies and cheese. Either could be served with some warm tortillas on the side.

So enjoy these 5 Mother’s Day Brunch ideas. We hope they spark some creativity in you.  Drop us a note and tell us what you served for Mother’s Day this year.

How to Cook Raw Shrimp

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or the SUPER EASY way to cook raw shrimp

We get this question a lot from friends. It seems like many people struggle and stress about cooking raw shrimp. They always tell us a horror story about overcooked and rubbery shrimp with hardly any flavor- YUCK!

Well, we have a solution to your shrimp cooking troubles:  Introducing the easiest way ever to cook raw shrimp.

This method is a combination of quick cooking and quick chilling (if you are going to eat the shrimp cold like in a shrimp cocktail) to prevent the shrimp from overcooking.

If you are using frozen shrimp (like Trader Joe’s frozen raw shrimp) make sure to thaw them before cooking. This is easily done by placing the shrimp in a plastic zip top bag, removing the air, and submerging the bag in a bowl of lukewarm water for about 20 or so minutes. We place another  bowl on top of the shrimp to keep them under the water while we are thawing. Check the water every 5-7 minutes and add warm water when necessary.

What you need:

  • 1# of raw shrimp (we like Trader Joe’s frozen raw shrimp) thawed if they are frozen
  • 1 lemon cut in slices

How to:

1. Fill a 4 quart or larger pan with water and bring to a full rolling boil.

2. Add the lemon slices and the thawed raw shrimp.  Stir a couple of times

3. Turn the stove off, cover the pan and leave to cook for 4-5 minutes. Now if you have super small shrimp, check them after 3-4 minutes of cooking- If you have very large shrimp, check them after 5 minutes they may need another minute or so.  Shrimp are fully cooked when they are a solid “white” in the center.

4. Drain and the shrimp are ready to eat.

If you are going to serve the shrimp cold, place the hot cooked shrimp into a bowl of ice water, and stir for a couple of minutes, adding more ice if needed until the shrimp are cold to the touch. Refrigerate until you are ready to use them.

Variations:

  • “Old bay” type seasoning
  • Trader Joe’s Taco seasoning
  • Garlic
  • Onions
  • Lemons and limes slices

You can add any of these items to the boiling water or to the  shrimp once they are cooked.

We hope you enjoyed this easy way to cook raw shrimp. Now you will be able to cook and add shrimp quickly and easily to many meals. We like to eat shrimp in tacos, with pasta and tossed on a salad.

What is your favorite way to eat shrimp?