Arlene has come up with some pretty creative recipes over the years, but “pierogi taco salad” from this 2003 episode might have been one of her wilder ideas. We’re not sure if she invented this dish herself, or if it was shared by a friend. All we know is, the idea doesn’t sound so crazy when you think about it. Combine the cheesy potato interior of pierogis with Mexican-seasoned ground beef, spicy salsa, and lots of cheese, and it sounds pretty good!
This episode is all about fresh and exciting ideas for salads, and even if you don’t try the pierogi one, these two other delicious choices, shrimp and avocado salad and bow tie pasta salad. Enjoy!
Shrimp and Avocado Salad
Combining the tropical flavors of shrimp, avocado, and fresh fruit, this salad is tangy, sweet, and delicious.
Ingredients
- 1 fully-ripened avocado, halved, pitted, peeled, and sliced into thin pieces
- 3 cups chopped salad greens
- 1-2 mangoes, peeled, pitted, and cubed (about 2 cups)
- 1 1/3 cup seedless red grapes, halved
- 1/2 cup bottled orange-flavored salad dressing* divided
- 1 pound cooked shrimp, peeled and de-veined
- 1 lime, cut into wedges (for garnish)
Instructions
- In a large bowl, toss the greens, mango and grapes with half of the salad dressing. Arrange the avocado and shrimp on top and drizzle with the remaining dressing. Serve with lime wedges. Makes 4 servings. Enjoy!
- *If you can't find orange-flavored dressing, French or any other sweet dressing can work.
Pierogi Taco Salad
Cheesy, potato-y, spicy, and hearty, this salad sound odd but tastes incredible.
Ingredients
- 1/2 pound ground beef (8 oz)
- 1 box frozen potato and cheddar pierogies (12 oz)
- 1 package low-sodium taco seasoning (1.25 oz)
- 1 bag mixed salad greens (about 10 oz)
- 1 cup grated Monterey Jack cheese
- 1 cup salsa
- 1 cup diced ripe avocado
Instructions
- In a large skillet, over medium-high heat, place beef; cook and stir until meat loses its pink color, about 3 minutes. Add frozen pierogies. Cook and stir until partially thawed, about 5 minutes. Sprinkle with taco seasoning; add 3/4 cup water.
- Cook and stir until flavors are blended and pierogies are heated through, about 5 minutes. Meanwhile, arrange salad greens on a platter. Top with pierogi and meat mixture, cheese, salsa, and avocado. Makes 4 servings. Enjoy!
Mediterranean Bow Tie Pasta Salad
This salad is like a trip to Italy in a bowl.
Ingredients
- 1 pound farfalle (bow tie) or other medium-sized pasta
- 1/4 cup olive oil
- 1 pinch salt
- 12 ounces marinated artichoke hearts, drained
- 2 ounces sun-dried tomatoes
- 12 ounces ricotta cheese
- 1/2 pound smoked mozzarella cheese, diced
- 1/4 pound pitted black olives, sliced
- 1 medium red onion, diced finely
- 1/2 cup Italian parsley, minced
- 1/2 cup olive oil
- 3 Tbsp balsamic vinegar
- 1 Tbsp sugar
- salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
- Cook pasta to package directions. Drain and run under cold water. Pat dry with paper towel and place in bowl large enough to hold all ingredients.
- Toss with 1/4 cup olive oil and pinch of salt. In a small saucepan, bring artichokes to a boil, lower heat and simmer for 3 minutes. Drain and add to pasta. Place sun-dried tomatoes in a heat-proof bowl and cover with boiling water. Let stand 5 minutes to soften and then drain.
- Mince tomatoes and stir into pasta. Stir in ricotta, mozzarella, olives, red onion and parsley. In a small cup stir olive oil, vinegar and sugar. Pour over salad and toss. Add salt and pepper to taste. Cover and place in refrigerator to chill. Makes 10 to 12 servings. Enjoy!
Transcript
- Well, hello and welcome to At Home today. We’re so glad that you dropped by. Nice for family to get together and friends, always glad to have you visiting. We wanna welcome a brand new station in Punta Gorda, Florida, who’s just joined the At Home network and it’s WRXY-TV 49. We’re so glad that you’re watching us now. And thanks to Ken Griffith, he got us on the station. We appreciate it so much. You folks, I hope you’re gonna enjoy the show. It’s a very special welcome from our heart to yours today. We’re glad you’re with us. Well, you know, I recently have been talking to a girl who went through some really deep, rough waters in her life. And when I would talk to her, when I would email her, God just kept giving me one phrase over and over and over. And He would say, “Tell her that I love her.” You know what, those simple little words carry such power. “Just tell her that I love her.” Who could ever reject God’s love? I don’t know how you could. How could anybody reject love from anyone? That bond of love. That feeling of love towards someone who has wronged you, towards someone who maybe is not as nice as they should be. Just to love them anyway is what God’s love is all about. And His love is far-reaching. It will reach out there and pull people toward you that will never ever come toward you any other way. You say, “Well, how do I do that, Arlene?” Well, when you’re fighting for a parking place, let the other guy have it. You know, you say, “Well, how’s that God’s love?” Well, you’d be surprised ’cause Paul is notorious for, “That’s my parking place.” So when he gets into the parking place, and then he made somebody angry, inevitably we bang into them at the store. In the store, oh, and then he’s embarrassed. So now when he gives up the parking place and we see that person who really, we had the right to it, but Paul’s given it up, we’ll see them in the store and that person is thankful to us, and sometimes opens the door. Simple little case in point, but it works. So today I want you to think, “Who can I reach out to with God’s love and who can I let them know that I love them not with my own natural love, but with the love that God puts in my heart for them,” Think about it. Is it the delivery guy? Is it the mailman who may be is vicious with your dog? Think about that. Okay. Think about God’s love. Well, today we’re doing salads. All kinds of salads. And we’re using avocados, mangoes. It’s gonna be good. Stay with us. Here’s today’s At Home hint. We’ll be right back. Here’s today’s At Home Hint: “The darker the leaves of spinach, the better and the more nutritious. Be sure they are crisp and do not have yellow spots.” If you’ve got a helpful hint that you’d like to share with us, we want to hear from you. Send your hint to At Home Hints, Cornerstone Television Wall, Pennsylvania, 15148-1499. The first salad we’re doing today is called a Mediterranean salad. It’s got a pasta, some sun-dried tomatoes, olives, smoked mozzarella, different than a regular mozzarella, ricotta cheese, artichokes. This is a great salad. What we’ve done is taken a one pound package of the little bow tie pasta, okay? We cooked it according to directions, and then we run it under cold water. And then we patted it dry because it needs to be dry. It needs to be cold because this is a cold salad, all right. Now we’re just gonna take a little bit of olive oil and put that over ’cause we want all of those bow ties to be separate. We don’t want them to stick together. And that oil will just give them a nice like-coating. And you wanna use a good olive oil. Don’t use cheap. Don’t use something that you think, “Oh, this is gonna leave a terrible taste,” because it will. I’d rather buy a little bit of good stuff than a lot of cheap, not tasteful stuff. All right. Okay. We have that covered. Now, what we’ve done, we took two jars of marinaded artichokes. You know, there’s this little square jars and you wanna get the ones that have the seasoning in it. Don’t buy the cans of just water-packed artichokes ’cause you’ll miss out on a lot of the flavor. We put them in this pan and we’ve just boiled them for about three minutes. Now we’re going to drain ’cause we don’t want all of that oil in this because we already have some other oil there. And we just let those drain for a little bit in our colander. It doesn’t matter if you don’t get it all off. It’s okay ’cause that little bit of flavor is gonna help. Add that to our salad, like so. And we’ve also… we’re using sun-dried tomatoes that come in a jar like this. We got these of course at McGinnis Sisters. And we’re gonna use a couple of ounces. These are packed in pure olive oil with herbs. And that’s what we have here. They’re dried, but once you add boiling water and we just let this sit for about five minutes, that rehydrates them so they get plumped up again. So we’re gonna drain those same way just like we did with the artichokes. And these we have to chop up. So, that’s just a couple of ounces. Just gonna put them on our platter here, our chopping board, and just give them a quick chop. Like so. Just want the little bits of that to go through the salad. This has an unusual, wonderful taste. You know these sun-dried tomatoes have really come into their own the last few years. For a while, people had them didn’t know really what to do with them, but, I love it when people get new ingredients because then it sparks their creativity. And pretty soon, you find a lot of recipes with sun-dried tomatoes. Okay. Now we’re just gonna put that into our salad. And this you would wanna make… ’cause this needs to chill. So you’d wanna make this ahead of time. By that I mean, if you’re going to serve it today, I would even make it the night before or early in the morning ’cause it’s better when it’s cold and thoroughly cold. All right. Now, we have some other things to put in. We’re gonna do red onion. That’s too much, don’t put it all in. It’s a medium red onion. Let me talk about this. This is mozzarella, but smoked mozzarella, which thoroughly gives it a different flavor. And you see how it’s brown? That’s the smoked part. This is about a half a pound in cubes. Okay. That’s… Can you see the color, is gorgeous? Whoa, I’m already ready for this. This is a fresh parsley, Italian parsley chopped fine. Put that in. Black olives sliced to your liking. If you don’t like them, don’t put that in. And, ricotta cheese. Oh! I’d better get a clean one for that one. Okay. A couple of ounces or as much as you want. Me, I like that flavor. So we’re gonna put about that much. I’m sorry. We’re supposed to put 12 ounces. 12 ounces, yeah. This is a 15-ounce container, so you would leave about three ounces left in the container. So we’re going to even more. We don’t wanna cheat anybody. Right Mike?
- [Mike] Absolutely
- Okay. Now we’re gonna mix this well, then I’m gonna make a dressing that goes on top. Oh! Where do you see this one? So good. So delicious. And again, like I said, this really needs to chill. You can see this makes a lot. This will feed about 10 or 12 people by the time we get it all put together. And, I like the bow ties ’cause that’s kind of something different. Could use shells. Any other kinds of pasta but I think the bow ties work really nice with this. Now, we have a half a cup of olive oil plus one tablespoon, and we’re gonna put a tablespoon of sugar. We’re gonna put salt and pepper. Okay. And we’re going to use balsamic vinegar, about three tablespoons. More or less to taste really? So that’s one, two and three. There we go. And I’m just gonna whisk this up. We’re going to pour it over the salad. That’s the dressing. Really? Oh, I can’t wait to taste this one. You’re going to love it. So think about… this would be great for picnics or just a nice dinner you’re taking somewhere or whatever, whenever the need arises that you need is a different kind of a heartier salad than just a lettuce salad. This would be the one. So we mix this up, put it in the fridge. When we come back, we have some more salads for you. Stay with us. Our second salad is called shrimp and fruit salad. And we have about three cups of mixed greens. And that could be any kind that you really, really like. To that, we’re gonna add some seedless red grapes. They’ve been cut in half. About a cup and a third. Okay. And, we have a mango. If you haven’t used that, buy one, and it has to be good and ripe, a little bit soft to the touch, and we’re gonna put that in there. Now, the next thing you need is bottled orange flavored dressing. And that would be this. You can make one fine, but this is just easier. And we’re just gonna put some of this over top just to make sure that the greens get seasoned like that. I’m gonna mix this up. Okay. And then, what you would do with this next would be you’d plate that on your four dinner plates or salad plates. Okay. Then, as you… I’ll show you with one. Then you’re going to… Okay. Put that on there. Put your greens on some mango. Make sure each person gets a little flavor of that mango ’cause that’s nice. Next, you’re gonna put your shrimp around the top. About a pound of shrimp, nicely cleaned, just like so. You know, just give a little dimension. Put all the shrimp on one side because what we’re gonna do on the other side is avocado. Now, if you haven’t had an avocado, you’re gonna want to try it because I didn’t touch them for years ’cause I was a little bit leery of them. Best way is you cut them just like this in half, then you’ll take it and twist it. Just like that. Then you got to get this big seed out. Don’t try to wrestle with it, doesn’t work. Take the knife, hit it, twist it. It pops right out. Can’t be any easier than that. The easiest way to get this out, then, just take a spoon. And again, these avocados are the same as the mango. They have to be soft to the touch. If they’re hard and firm you’ll have to wait until they ripen in a couple of days. So you just go around the edge of it. Just like I’m doing with a spoon. And that just loosens it from the skin. And it will come right out, like so. That amazing? I love these things that God created. You know, He just knew… certainly knew what He was doing. Now, this is a beautiful avocado. Perfect for what we want because this doesn’t have any dark spots. And all we’re gonna do is just slice that in wedges, like so. And we’re gonna take the wedges and we’re gonna lay them on our salad. That pretty? Think it’s beautiful. Maybe a couple more shrimp, and then right before you would serve this you would drizzle again with just a bit of the orange. Like that. That beautiful? I get a gorgeous, gorgeous salad. Very tasty, very delicious. Okay. And the last one I’m gonna show you today, which is a real twist and real different. But I think you’re going to like it. We have some meat, about a half a pound of ground meat that were browned just for a couple of three, four minutes in our skillet. Now you want a big deep skillet because you’re gonna be adding other things to it. We also have a big platter of greens right here that you wanna get ready. And, so this meat has brown for three minutes. Look, there’s no fat in that. It’s very lean, very good. And, this is gonna cook. Then after it is cooked for about three minutes, I’m gonna introduce you to a new product, maybe you already know about it. This is called Mrs. T’s Rogies. They’re not big Pierogies. They’re little baby Rogies, all right? And you can get them… These happened to be filled with potato, jalapeno and cheddar. Hello? This salad is called Taco Salad with Pierogie. Does that mix up your mind? Why are we in Mexico and Poland at the same time? Hey, we’re United nations here right? Not hardly. Okay. So we’re gonna add this box of frozen Pierogies to our meat that’s already cooking. And these of course are frozen. Don’t thaw them first. They’re frozen and they’re gonna cook. We’re going to stir until they’ve partially thaw. And they’ll thaw pretty quickly, like so. Just, you have to use a big pan so that you can be sure that they all get heat to them. Okay. Aren’t they cute? Look how little they are. You know, Pierogie is usually pretty big. These are just like two bite sized. That’s pretty nice. All right. And remember that has jalapeno, potato and cheddar in it. And that mixed with the ground beef sounds really good. All right. While that’s cooking then, after that cooks, we’ll soon as cook for a little while, like five minutes ’cause they’re gonna get partially thawed. For time’s sake, I’m gonna proceed. You take one package of taco seasoning mix. This has all the goodies in it. It gives everything the flavor. We’re just gonna take that and sprinkle that over top, like so, and then I’m gonna add about three fourths of a cup of water because they need to finish cooking. Okay. That water will help them to cook through. Although, I’m still gonna move these around just a little bit. I’m afraid I’m gonna need a little bit of oil here because it’s very dry. Because the ground meat was so lean, which is great. Okay. Now, oh, I wish you could be here to smell this. It’s incredible. Wonderful. Now we’re gonna add the water, and it’s really gonna start cooking now. Okay. This needs to cook for about five minutes until they’re cook clear through and they’re thawed. And that seasoning has had a chance to get into every one of those little pierogies. Then what we’ll do after that’s done, on your greens, you’re going to take that pierogie and meat mixture, pour on top of the greens, okay. Then, you’re gonna put cheese. This is Monterey Jack cheese, it’s been graded. There’s a cup of salsa, that’s, we’re gonna spoon on top of the cheese, and then, on top of the salsa, diced avocado. Oh me. Oh my. Delicious all the way. We’re gonna be right back, and we’ll show you the finished product soon as that gets done. But here’s how you can get today’s recipes. We’ll be right back. Well, here we are. I hope you don’t forget to send for the recipes, by the way. But here we are. I’m just gonna put this together ’cause it’s really important for you to see this. This is what it should look like when it’s done. That Wonderful? The smell, the aroma. Oh man. Okay. Now what we do, we have our plate of greens. We’re just gonna spoon this on top of the greens, the meat, the Pierogies. Uh, that’s a taco salad with a little twang to it or punch.
- [Mike] Punch
- There you go, Mike. You’re right. But I can see this… I can taste this with my eyes for it ever gets to my lips, because the flavors and the smell it’s appropriate, I think it makes a good match. All right. Now on top of that, we lost some of our lettuce. We’ll put that back on. On top on that, now, we’re gonna do our salsa. This is, you know, if you make homemade salsa, use it by all means. It’s easy to make, simple to do the key to that is having good, fresh cilantro. You have to do that. Okay. We’re spooning that over the top. Just kind of random and let it run down. That’s okay. Just make sure it goes all over the place like that. Now, we’re gonna do our cheese and this is Monterey Jack. If you like really hot, just go for the hot pepper cheese or whatever you like, whatever is your pleasure, like that. Yum, yum. And then, last but not least, this kind of an avocado day here, we’re just gonna sprinkle our avocado, chopped avocado, all over the top of it. That’s truly makes it Mexican. We’re just trying to have a discussion about avocado, something that you learned to acquire a taste for. At first, you might not like it but, as you start to eat it, you’ll find out it was really quite tasty. Put on some salads. And remember, when you purchase them, they should give a little bit to the touch. There should be a little give and not hard like a rock. It’s hard like a rock, it’s not ready. Look at this. Just beautiful. I tell you, I think it’s one of the nicest salad you’re ever gonna find. And it’s so easy to do. You saw I didn’t take long to put it together. He can also add a little bit of sour cream on there if you wanted to. Just use your imagination. You know, make it what do you think your family would like. Let’s take a recap here. This is our shrimp and fruit plate. That pretty? We just added, of course, the sliced avocado, This a little bunch of grapes. There’s our shrimp. And we serve it with just a wedge of lime juice because at the table then each person, whoops, will take their lime and just squeeze it over the platter like that. And you have a wonderful salad, very refreshing. Nice piece of bread or a roll or something like that, that’s great for luncheon ’cause you have your protein with your shrimp, and your vegetables and fruit all-in-one. Then, our Mediterranean salad. Oh boy, look at that. Put it on a nice, big festive platter like this one. And that’s a great accompaniment to any time. I don’t care if it’s summertime, wintertime, or anytime that you’re hungry for a really hearty salad, this is great. You can put maybe a pork chop with that or something and that would be, that’s your whole meal. It’s got everything in it. Well, I hope that you’ve enjoyed today’s program. We always enjoy coming into your home. And I certainly hope that you’re going to send for the recipes. Remember, you can go to our website and you can subscribe with a credit card. Now, some of you have been subscribing through the mail and forgetting to tell us your email address. We can’t get in touch with you if you don’t give us the full information. So please, go there, www.ctvn.org, and hit the button for At Home and it will walk you through the steps to subscribe. Or you can get the recipes like you always do through snail mail as they call it. However you do it, we hope that you will send for them because you don’t get just today’s salad recipes, you get the whole month’s worth. And there’s a lot of good shows here. A lot of good recipes. A lot of good food ideas for your family and your friends. Again, may I recap from the beginning. Let somebody know that you love them today. And love them with the love of God. And if there’s somebody who used to know God and walked with Him and they don’t any longer, just tell them, “God loves you.” He really does. We love you. So be sure to join us the next time, here At Home, it wouldn’t be the same without you. We’ll see you then.
- [Narrator] Food provided by McGinnis Sisters, special food stores in Brentwood and Monroeville. Tastes the world.
- [Man] Cornerstone Television wishes to thank all our faithful viewers whose consistent prayers and financial support have made this program possible.
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