Flan

Something to sweeten your day - main ingredients - eggs, condensed milk, evaporated milk, regular milk and sugar! Before anything else set to pre-heat your oven to 375F

Prepare the mix - In a blender add eggs, vanilla (home made!), milk, condensed and evaporated milk.

Prepare the caramelized sugar then pour into a Pyrex pan ready for the oven!

Vanilla Extract

Yes, this is the real deal - no artificial flavors! Also this is a long process - 6 months to get your first extract so be patient. Essential ingredients:

Slice open the vanilla beans - we found ours at the Hawaii Vanilla Company on the Big Island.
Inside are thousands of tiny seeds and you will instantly smell the familiar vanilla flavor. Add to a bottle, pour in the vodka and then your wait begins for about 6mths!

Shake the bottle every few months and you will see the color darken. After about 6 months pour out 1/3 of the bottle. Refill with vodka and we were told it is supposed to last for years! (Empty out 1/3 every 6mths).

Add to a variety of recipes, eg: Flan. More will come soon.

Lasagna - spinach, mushrooms

First cook the lasagna for about 15mins in hot water. Then wash our with cold water. Also start to pre-heat your oven to 400F.

Simultaneously you can prepare the onion, mushroom, spinach and pasta sauce (marinara) mix and cook it.

Start layering! In a baking corning ware spary some pam/non-stick spray/oil. Layer the lasanga, the mix, ricotta cheeese. Top off with a layer of marinara sauce and grated cheese (mozzarella/blend).
Bake for 15-20mins and serve!