Ready, Set, Weekend with Simply Beautiful Eating

I have to be honest. I really have trouble coming up with lunch dishes lately. On occasion, there are days where I will just open the fridge and eat what falls out. This folks was one of those days. The first thing I spotted was some leftover Foccacia bread which I had made the night before to accompany our pasta.

Ever make this bread from scratch? It’s the same concept as making pizza dough and but even easier. OR even easier than making the dough from scratch is buying a ready made pizza dough and following the steps to make the Foccacia. Or wait. Even easier than all of that is buying a foccacia bread at the market. I like option 3 best but it really is fun to make it yourself.

I had a few pieces hanging around, some suspect goat cheese, frozen sweet peas and when I moved over the peas I found some edamame.

All good ingredients to slap on top of this bread right?

Before I get to the recipe I wanted to tell you about the brunch I made for my son this past weekend. Yep. The baby turned 25. A quarter of a century old. OH to be 25 again. He was such a cutie as a baby and his brothers were pretty darn sweet too. These are my three musketeers who look a bit different now. I can’t with these guys….I just cannot.

My eldest son is turning 30 in May, the second eldest will be 28 in March and the little guy just turned 25 last week.

The whole family joined in on the celebration and it was great success. So where are the pictures from this brunch? There were NONE. It was the first time no one took out a camera. I have no clue why. My only guess was ….everyone was so hungry they didn’t want to do anything but EAT. And eat they did. At one point I was the only one in the kitchen and there was complete silence coming from the dining room. I thought they left but they actually had their mouths too full to speak.

The sign of a good meal is silence and forks moving around.

Here was the menu:

Berry Mimosas Pan Fried Cajun Shrimp Cheese Noodle Kugel Spinach Salad with Strawberries, Pecans and Poppyseed Dressing (thank you Daniella) Cold Soba Noodles with fresh vegetables and snap peas (thank you Mandy) Egg Salad Tuna Salad Smoked Salmon (lox) Cream Cheese Assorted bagels Chocolate Chip Banana Bread Cinnamon Walnut Coffee Cake Chocolate Babka Fruit and Berry Cheesecake (thank you Cruz) Mixed Berries

Um.

I have to tell you. I made enough to feed an army and there was hardly any leftovers. I love leftovers ya know why?

Because today’s leftovers are tomorrow’s lunch.

FOCCACIA WITH GOAT CHEESE, AVOCADO, SWEET PEAS & EDAMAME

One Recipe Foccacia -Click Here or feel free to use store bought

-1 avocado, smashed -¼ cup each steamed sweet peas and edamame -¼ cup of shredded red cabbage if desired -¼ cup crumbled goat cheese -extra virgin olive oil -salt and pepper to taste

1) Toast a few pieces of foccacia that have been been shmeared with olive oil 2) Layer avocado, sweet peas, edamame, red cabbage and crumbled goat cheese 3) Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Serve warm