new ideas...for me, anyway

Hi friends.  Wanted to share with you all some food things this week that may be old news to some of you, but they were a revelation to me.

1) add feta to rice pilaf to spruce it up (my friend Kristi, aka my roommate, taught me this the other night and it's so easy and delicious.  I don't know why I've never done it before.  She used a quick cooking rice pilaf mix and it was DELISH.)

2) along the rice train, add feta (or blue cheese or goat cheese...mmm!) to hot orzo with some fresh herbs for ANOTHER way to dress up orzo/rice.  The best part?  You don't have to re-heat it the next day because orzo is great cold.  Add a squeeze of lemon and a drizzle of olive oil for a little boost for next-day leftovers.

3) nutella hot chocolate.  yes. I'm serious.  I have had 2 previous attempts at making hot chocolate here at the Mayo/Kurzen household (some of our best friends are staying with us for a couple months) and both attempts were not well received by the others.  So, I read on Pinterest (Naturally.  Can I have an independent thought anymore?) about stirring a big tablespoon of nutella into hot milk to make this delightful creation and DELIGHTFUL IT WAS.  oh my goodness it was sensational.  And easy. And better than any powder mix you can buy.

Ok, I'm sure most of you have been adding cheese to rice and thought to stir nutella into hot milk for a long time now, but for me, these were just incredible new bits of food knowledge.  Hope you try these things if you haven't before!