Honey-Apple Brie Bites

Source: Pampered Chef

These are pretty much the fanciest, most sophisticated thing I feel like I have ever made. They were easy to make and didn't take very long (the dicing of the apples took the longest) and everyone loved them. 

HONEY-APPLE BRIE BITES

1 lemon

1 c toasted walnuts

2 medium red baking apples (such as Jonathan)

¼ c honey

1 - 4” round (8 oz) Brie cheese w/ rind

2 pkg prepared mini phyllo shells (30 shells total)  (you can find these in the freezer section)

Preheat oven to 400F. Zest lemon using a microplane grater to measure 1 tsp zest. (Or, conversely, zest until there's nothing left to zest. My approach to lemon zest is similar to that of garlic: the more the better.)

Coarsely chop walnuts using Food Chopper. Finely dice apple. 

Combine zest, walnuts, apple, and honey in mixing bowl. (Note: if you feel like it's a little bit dry or not mixing as well as you'd like, and/or if you ended up with extra zest and a lot of apple and slightly more than a cup of walnuts because you figured you may as well just finish up the bag, and now you need to compensate with the honey too, just squirt some more honey into the mix. You'll have to eyeball this, I'm not sure how much extra I added.)

Cut Brie into thirty 1/2” cubes. (You will not use your whole wheel.) Arrange phyllo cups on large sheet pan. (You can fit all 30 onto one pan provided the pan is large enough and you're okay with breaking ranks and not having everything in even rows.) Place one Brie cube into each cup. Using small scoop, top Brie with a level scoop of apple mixture. (You know what happens when you try and use a scoop? Stuff falls everywhere. I ended up having to use my hands. It kind of felt like I was making little sculptures. I'm not sure what they mean by "level" but if your phyllo cups were anything like my phyllo cups, once you put the Brie in them, that takes up quite a bit of room, since they're not all even on the bottom, so your mixture will have to go around and on top of the little cube, and there will be nothing level about them. And you know what? That's okay.) (Note: I ended up with a lot of extra apple mixture - I probably could have gotten another 15count box of phyllo cups and filled those as well. I don't know if it was because of the size of my apples or my lack of accurate measuring, but... oh well. Who doesn't like having extra?) (Despite all of my commentary, these are actually quite easy to make.)

Bake 6-8 minutes or until cheese is melted. (I went 7.)

Verdict: Deeeeeeeelish.

Leftover quality: they all got eaten. This question is unanswerable.

Chili Lime Meatballs

They're not real photogenic, but damn, they're tasty

Source: Pampered Chef

I made these for a bridal show I did tonight and it was totally unnerving because we did the food prep before the show instead of a demo during the show, and we were just throwing things together and not much measuring was being done and I'd never made these before and I was really worried about how they were going to turn out. As it was, they turned out very well, and they're super easy, even if you're not 100% following the directions.

CHILI LIME MEATBALLS

Glaze

½ c teriyaki baste and glaze (we weren't sure what this was, exactly, so we just used a generic teriyaki sauce and it seemed to work okay)

2 tbs lime juice

2 tsp Thai red curry paste

2 garlic cloves, pressed (as per my usual motto, more garlic = better, so I used 4)

Meatballs

1 lb lean ground beef

¼ cup plain dried bread crumbs

1 egg

2 tbs Asian Seasoning Mix (this is a Pampered Chef item, but see below for a substitution that they helpfully provided)

2 tsp Thai red curry paste

2 green onions, sliced

Whisk together baste and glaze (or dump in your sauce, whichever), lime juice, curry paste, and garlic in a small bowl. Set aside.

Combine beef, bread crumbs, egg, seasoning mix, and curry paste in large bowl; mix well. (Note: if you're at a loss on how to do this, as I was, since it didn't seem to want to stir very well, just use your hands and knead that stuff together. It worked really well.)

Using small scoop, form beef mixture into 40 meatballs. (Here is where the recipe went slightly awry, because I think I was using a medium-sized scoop, and there is no way I got 40 meatballs. I actually gave up about halfway and just started shaping them with my hands anyway.) (The idea behind using the scoop is to make them uniform in size so they cook consistently)

Place meatballs in 12" skillet. Cook over medium-high heat 8-10 minutes or until browned, turning frequently. Remove skillet from heat. (I found that timing this endeavor was pointless and you really just have to eyeball them and poke at random samples to make sure they're not still pink in the middle. Again, mine were probably much larger than they were supposed to be.)

Pour glaze into skillet; stir meatballs to coat. Place meatballs onto serving platter and top with green onions.

This step wasn't mentioned, but next: sit back and let the compliments roll in. Everyone loved these.

To substitute the Asian Seasoning Mix, add 2 tsp grated fresh gingerroot, ¾ tsp salt, 1 pressed garlic clove and ¼ tsp ground cayenne pepper. 

Verdict: quite tasty, though I would like to try this again sometime when I'm not so rushed and can properly measure out ingredients and make the meatballs the right size. 

Leftover quality: Unknown. There were no leftovers to be had. 

Mango Confetti Salsa

Source: Pampered Chef

Weight Watchers Points+ Values: I didn't calculate, but I would assume it would be zero, given the ingredients.

MANGO CONFETTI SALSA

1 large mango (we used 2)

½ small jicama (we used the whole thing)

1/3 orange bell pepper (again, the whole thing)

1/3 red bell pepper (who has time to measure? throw the whole thing in!)

1 jalapeno pepper, stemmed (I guess we used this too, all of it)

1/3 small red onion (I believe all of this went in as well)

1 tbs fresh lime juice (we used... 2? Maybe 3? Look, there wasn't a lot of measuring going on)

¼ tsp salt 

½ tsp Chili Lime Rub (This is recommended as it is the official P-Chef rub, but we found a Mango Lime Rub at the local grocery store and it was perfect)

Cut/core the mango. Don't peel it.

Peel the jicama. (Pronounced "hick-a-muh" for those of you who are unfamiliar with Spanish. I'd never heard of this before but it's popular on the Weight Watcher circuit. Just... look for a sign, you'll find it. It looks kind of odd. I wasn't the one gathering ingredients so I still have no idea where this is located, but it's somewhere in the produce section.) 

Chop everything into little pieces. 

Throw the little pieces into a food processor.

Process!

Dump back into a bowl, add the lime juice and salt, and stir. Then throw some rub on there. I honestly didn't measure any of it, I just went by taste and had it right on the first try.

Eat! (Don't forget to buy some tortilla chips, that is helpful to the process).

Verdict: Holy yum, Batman! This was Delicious. Capital D. It does make quite a bit, especially if you use the entirety of your fruits/veggies (and why wouldn't you?), but if you're having a gathering of sorts, it should be the right amount.

Leftover Quality: Undetermined, as it was all left at the party in question. I'm sure it would be good though.