Today, I am sharing two recipes, created from ingredients in my recent delivery from Home Chef, a fresh food delivery service that provides a wide variety of seasonal recipes, right at your doorstep. These Holiday Morning Biscuits (with three tasty toppings), and this Raspberry Chia Seed Smoothie would be perfect for breakfast or any meal of the day.
As I was preparing these foods, I thought about who the idea person would be that could really benefit from this subscription box. I thought it would be a super fun date night activity. Or, perhaps you want to send this to someone who is just learning to cook, just moved into their first place, or would be perfect for someone loves to cook but either dislikes shopping for groceries, or doesn't have the time to plan out a special meal. There are lots of foods available that are great for restricted diets, too.
Home Chef was founded on the idea of creating a delightful home cooking experience. From Black Peppered Salmon to Cinnamon Sugar Pork chops, Home Chef provides a variety of meals that everyone can enjoy. While creating your account, you set up your taste profile and Home Chef provides great meal recommendations each week! Meal planning has never been easier or more delicious. You select your own menu from around 10+ different selections each week. The photos are all so pretty, and the recipes and ingredients are all detailed very well. Great emphasis is put onto explaining which recipes are good for restricted diets, vegetarian options, seafood, food allergy issues, and more.
This beautiful box arrived safely on my doorstep pretty early one morning. I was so excited, and could not wait to open it and see all of my ingredients inside. The box was a bit heavy, but this was due to the foam padding and ice packs inside. These ice packs stayed cold for days and days - in fact, they're still practically frozen solid.
Upon opening the box, I found some colorful, full-page recipe cards, my recipe binder, and pre-portioned ingredients for the meals I ordered.
There were lots os ingredients in this part of my order. I first preheated the oven to 425, and mixed the biscuit mix with the Asiago shredded cheese and 3/4 C. water. These tasted amazing right out of the oven and this was actually my first time making biscuits from a mix (or ever besides the refrigerated ones).
Holiday mornings are for pajamas, hot coffee or cocoa, and relaxing with your loved ones. And your loved ones will love you even more when these biscuits roll out of the kitchen, baked with care and Asiago cheese. What's more, you'll be giving them the option of three delicious toppings: warm apple-cinnamon butter, rich cherry butter, and delightful onion jam. Give yourself a memorable holiday morning with low stress and maximum flavor.
I also used my 1/4 C measuring cup to portion out my dough, and sprayed a bit of non-stick cooking spray into it so the. dough would not stick to the cup. This worked extremely well and ensured my biscuits were all uniform. I rolled the biscuits further, and made little mounds. How cute!
Then, it was time to prepare my three toppings - the onion jam, apple cinnamon spread, and the cherry butter. I started with the cherry butter, which was super easy - simply mix the butter packets and the cherry jam they provide. I actually used my silicone-coated whisk attachment for my hand mixer, and it worked WAY better than mixing/incorporating by hand.
For the second topping, I simply heated the applesauce and cinnamon for about 15 minutes, stirring occasionally.
Lastly, the spread/topping with the most steps was the onion jam. You basically slice up the provided onions into strips, sauté them with a teeny tiny bit of oil, then once they are softened, add in the sugar and the balsamic vinegar. It wound up tasting sweet, and the smell was incredible. I was able to make these three toppings in approximately the same amount of time as the biscuits took to bake.
In The Box:
- 1 Granny Smith Apple
- 5 oz. Frozen Raspberries
- 1 tsp. Chia Seeds
- 4 fl. oz. Apple Juice
- 2 oz. Honey
- 5⅓ oz. Plain Greek Yogurt
Instructions:
1.) Thoroughly rinse produce and pat dry. Prepare the apple by cutting it into small pieces. This green apple was really tasty!
2.) Blend smoothie. Place all ingredients into blender, reserving a few raspberries and chia seeds for garnish, and blend with two cups of ice until smooth. Decide how sweet you want the smoothie by first adding only part of one honey packet, then increasing the amount if you want more. I used hardly any honey and it tasted great.
3.) Drink up! I poured the smoothie into three small jars, but feel free to use one large glass or jar. I garnished the top with chia seeds, and everything looked and tasted great!
This was the easiest and least messy smoothie I have ever made. With the pre-portioned ingredients all in one place, it made prep work and clean up super easy. Cut the apple into pieces, and toss ice + all ingredients into blender. It worked great.
Since Home Chef has lots of amazing, Chef-Created recipes for you to make at home, it was so easy to follow their instructions. You can definitely tell, after tasting the meals you prepare, that a lot of thought goes into each recipe that is made available to you. I had such a great time learning about all of the ingredients, and then following the two-sided recipe card, which contains large, colorful images of each and every step.
The chef who created the smoothie recipe, Chef Justin Paruszkiewicz says, "A good rule of thumb for blending smoothies is to add liquids to the blender first, followed by soft foods, and saving harder foods like apples and ice cubes for last. For best texture results, keep frozen fruit in the freezer just up until you make the smoothie.
Did you know…
Chia seeds aren't only super nutritious, but they also help thicken the smoothie. Allow smoothies to sit for a minute or two before drinking to activate their magical thickening power".
