If you live in North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, or Georgia, then consider yourself lucky. You have access to Annie’s baked goods and I am quite envious out here in Colorado.

I discovered Annie’s Naturally Bakery last summer in an Ingles (this just cracks me up because the Spanish-speaker in me keeps wanting this store to be pronounced- inglés… the Spanish work for English. However, it is like In-Gulz…). Anyway, my sister and I went to buy food for our family reunion in NC and we were pretty amazed to find such high quality baked goods at the local supermarket.

So, I was quite happy this year when my parents picked me up from the Asheville airport with a bag full of Annie’s cookies and a loaf of slices spelt sandwich bread. Way to go mom and dad!

Annie’s cookies are perfectly delicious and border-line health food! Well, they are if you compare the ingredient list to pre-packaged cookies. These are as close to homemade as you can find outside of my very own kitchen!

And their breads are fantastic too!

Annie’s bakes breads, cookies, cakes, etc. the way baking was intended to be done. I’m already looking forward to next year’s trip to NC just for the cookies!

I love having this grilled shrimp recipe as an easy stand-by because it takes a few minutes to prepare and tastes fantastic. I followed my Best Grilled Shrimp recipe exactly except for the oil: I used peanut oil rather than olive oil in this dish because I served these shrimp with Asian-influenced side dishes.

Try my Best Grilled Shrimp… and let me know what you think.

I served this with an avocado salad and Mushrooms and Bok Choy in Black Garlic Sauce.

Enjoy.

I love peanuts. Peanut butter. Peanut butter cookies. Roasted peanuts. Spicy peanuts. There is something about the flavor of peanuts that is very appealing to me and I am so very grateful I do not suffer from peanut allergies.

That said, I don’t eat many peanuts anymore because I mostly eat almonds. Almond butter, roasted almonds, etc. So, it is always a special treat when I decide to make peanut sauce for something like peanut noodles or Gado Gado, a traditional Indonesian vegetable salad covered in peanut sauce. Yum. That always brings me back to one of my favorite places on earth: Indonesia- the inspiration for this sauce.

So, here’s your warning: This isn’t really a quick sauce to prepare. You need to follow through with a few steps, but it is well worth the time and effort, I promise.

Step 1: Thinly slice 4 cloves of garlic and fry them with 3-5 dried Thai chilies (I always go with 5) in a couple tablespoons of peanut oil until the garlic is golden and toasted and the chilies are a little puffed.

Step 2: Remove these from the heat and oil to stop them from cooking. Let them cool on some paper towels while prepping the rest of the sauce.

In my kitchen, I have a step 3: Make peanut butter. I put 2 cups of peanuts in the Vita-Mix and make fresh peanut butter in about one minute’s time. If you don’t own a Vita-Mix yet, make sure you are using real peanut butter. Basically, that means please, please, please only use peanut butter if the the ingredients read: Peanuts. Or, Peanuts and Salt.

Step 4: In a bowl or large Pyrex measuring cup, add approximately 1 cup of peanut butter. Everything in this recipe is approximate, so you can play with the flavors and add more of something or less according to your tastes.

Next, add:

• 5 TB soy sauce
• 1/2 cup honey
• juice from 2 lemons
• juice from 1/2 lime
• 1/4 cup warm water (it is easier to mix with warm water rather than cold)

I have a special attachment to my mortar and pestle because I bought it in Indonesia.

Add the garlic and chilies to your sauce and mix well.

I made a big bowl of peanut noodles with this sauce. Too bad I didn’t double the recipe and store some in the fridge for a week or so. Next time.