Featured Friday: Trader Joe’s
Happy Friday Everyone! Just like that with a blink of an eye we are officially at the last Featured Friday of the year and we truly can’t believe how quickly this year has wrapped up. As the year is coming to a close we can’t help but feel an overwhelming sense of appreciation and joy for all of the support, blessings, and overall achievements that this year has brought OnBrand and our business. We are so excited for the projects and plans that we have for the incoming year and we cant wait to show you all fun that we have planned. We will still be doing our Featured Friday’s for the new year so please continue to send us all of your businesses and brands to be highlighted on our blog. This weeks Featured Friday is a little bit different than the previous weeks, so lets jump into it.
Usually for our Friday segments we try to choose local businesses or businesses with diverse backgrounds like being woman owned; but for this week we decided to do something a little bit different and highlight a business that is very near and dear to our hearts. With the holiday season around the corner and being in the thick of a second quarantine a lot of millennials and people in general will be spending the holidays at home with roommates or significant others this season. I wanted this blog to help people hold some sense of normalcy when celebrating at home by creating a 3-Course Millennial Holiday Dinner from Trader Joe’s. All the ingredients we used to make each meal came 100% from Trader Joe’s and we were able to get all of the ingredients for under $100 for the courses and leftovers. To be totally honest we are not the most experienced cooks either so if we can throw a meal like this together, I have full confidence that you will not have any troubles. All of these items can defiantly be customized to dietary restrictions or can be bought at any other grocery store for your convenience. Time to get into the Appetizer hour.
Course one: Hors d’oeuvres
I hate to admit it but one of my favorite Christmas traditions growing up was arriving at my Grandmothers house on Christmas Eve and walking into the most beautiful arrangement of charcuterie boards. My family are the masters of putting together an awesome cocktail hour, so I decided to do my family justice and create my own charcuterie board at home. Trader Joe’s is an amazing place to build boards because they have so many different artisanal items that pair really well together. First, I start in the cheese isle and build my boards around my main cheeses, usually 3 to 5. I decided to do a cranberry goat cheese that looked beautiful with the red coloring, a pepper jack, and a triple cream Brie that was to die for. Next, I will add protein in small folds around the cheese and I found a great variety pack with meat like Salami, for $6! My personal favorite item on any board are the dips so I made sure to get a sweet and spicy jam, artichoke dip, and (literally the best ever) bruschetta. To spice up any board you can put small detail touches to bring out the color, so I added candid walnuts, chocolate, rosemary, and cranberries. Lastly, you HAVE to make sure you have amazing carb options so we had a baguette and crackers. Overall, I feel like this was a perfect first course and honestly this is a great option for a full meal as well, you can totally add or subtract items depending on your preferences and hunger level. Paired with a great glass of Stella Rosa we had a perfect appetizer hour.
Course Two: Dinner
As we continued to snack on our board we decided to start making dinner. We were looking for a variation of surf and turf, so when we saw stuffed salmon pinwheels next to filet mignon we knew it was a sign that we are about to make the best dinner ever. We decided to pair our entree with veggie sides, so I picked up asparagus since its usually my go-to but I also weirdly felt the sweet potatoes calling my name so I picked a few of those up as well. First, I would start by preparing all of the food. We marinated our steak with a spoon full of smoked paprika, garlic powder, salt, pepper, ground cumin, and brown sugar. For the sweet potatoes initially place a pot of water on the stove to boil, peel and cut the sweet potatoes into small chunks and throw them into the water to boil for 15 minutes. For the the asparagus cut the gross ends off and cut them in half, place them in a pot with two inches of water with a lid to also steam. Once everything has been prepared you can start actually cooking the food. We placed the steaks on a grill in the backyard, but you can also do it on a stove top if you don’t have a grill option, and we grilled the steaks for 5 minutes on each side to get that perfect medium rare center. While your grilling your steaks place the salmon pinwheels on a cooking sheet with some salt, pepper, butter, and garlic in the oven for 16 minutes at 375 degrees. As those two things are about to finish, strain out the sweet potatoes and mash them with a spoon full of butter, salt, pepper, 1/4 cup of milk, and brown sugar. Lastly, we strung out the asparagus and put butter, garlic, lemon, salt, and pepper on top and they were good to go. After everything was finished we seasoned everything a little more to taste and holy cow it was so so good! All of the items worked very well together and honestly the whole meal tasted so gourmet. All in all, from start to finish it took about an hour to cook the meal and it was so extremely worth it. It felt great being able to have such a special meal at home with a loved one, and it felt even more significant because we were able to cook it together.
Course 3: Dessert
We defiantly had to wait for a minute before we were ready for dessert since dinner was so amazing and filling. We knew we would be pretty lazy after making dinner so we decided to buy a few small different dessert options and put them out on a dessert tray. We picked up lemon bars, macaroons, and frozen cheesecake cones. It honestly took 5 minutes to put the dessert together but it still looked very festive and aesthetic. All of the treats worked really well together but all definitely had a different and unique palette taste. We leisurely snacked on our dessert tier while we sipped on our eggnog martinis and I literally don’t think the meals could have gone any better.
Overall, I had such an amazing time putting together these meals, and hopefully you can find these meals just as yummy and can find some holiday enjoyment in putting together your Christmas meal. I know the holidays will feel different this year, but you can still make the holiday the best you can, and when does a fantastic meal with a glass of your favorite drink not make anything better. If you try any of these items or recipes at home we would love to see how your getting down for the holidays so please send your photos to our Instagram!
There you have it folks, officially the last segment of the year. It’s really crazy because at the beginning of this whole idea we really had no idea what was going to come out of this journey, but in just the 3-4 months that we have been running this blog, I truly feel like this has been one of the most rewarding things I have ever done. To be able to connect with people, readers, businesses, brands, and different experiences has completely changed my life. So I will forever thank all of our readers, but truly everyone’s support has meant so much to us, and this project is our favorite thing that happened in 2020. I hope everyone has such a magical and safe holiday season and we will see you after the New Year.
OnBrand
