Breakfast is the most important meal of the day therefore, I never go empty in the morning. If you start your day with a protein-rich breakfast, you’ll have all the energy to last you through lunch. I wanted to switch up my breakfast today with a Spanish twist by making a big pot of beans, sauteing some fresh spinach and topping it off with a fried egg. What came out was so delicious that I’m going to have to put this in my, “go-to-recipe” files

I’m bringing back an old school soup with a twist. Tomato soup is an American classic eaten by many kids. It goes pairs very well with a grill cheese! (my grilled cheese not in photo) I changed the traditional tomato soup and added fennel to jazz it up. Fennel is a bulb grown in the ground that resembles an onion with many layers and the texture of celery but the taste is definitely not for everyone. Fennel taste like anise; just like fennel seeds you use as a spice. But when you cook and render it down, the taste gets very mild and you barely notice the anise flavor at all. It actually pairs very well with tomatoes and even roasting fennel is delicious. I topped off this soup with a dollop of creme fraishe to add some creaminess to the soup. It’s a great soup during this brutal winter we are having out east. I can’t wait for Spring, already!

Pardon the plain photo shot of this DELICIOUS loaf of Nutella Banana Bread I decided to whip up. I wish I would’ve taken a picture of it sliced because I just couldn’t wait to eat it!

I always have bananas laying around in my kitchen. I hate it when I have leftover bananas that may get a bit too ripe to enjoy so what I do is take the ripe fruit and make banana bread. I make banana bread all the time (as seen from one of my previous post), but I decided to step it up a notch by adding in Nutella! It’s a decedent hazelnut cocoa spread widely popular in Europe and now in American households. I took half my batter and scooped a HUGE spoonful of Nutella into part of the batter and swirled it into the plain banana batter. The end result was ridiculously good to say the least. I made this for my in-laws and it was devoured in 2 days!

I have plans for this batter and I will actually make a layer cake with a yummy frosting real soon. Oh yeah, it will happen…just wait and see!!!