The taste carousel of Pinterest

I don't know about you, but I love Pinterest. I find myself on it at least once a day browsing craft ideas, new work out options, and looking at recipes (my personal favorite). My problem? There are so many recipes to browse through that end up on my board and the majority of them just sitting there with their tantalizing photos and they never get made.

A lot of the reason for that is that I don't want to take the time to make a recipe that is going to take up my precious time, money, and efforts without much of an idea if it will be good or not. On web sites like Food Network's or allrecipes there are reviews from users to give you an idea of the recipes success. On Pinterest you end up with the pick and pray method. The ingredients themselves may sound good but that doesn't mean that the end product will be anything to shout about.

We have all run across recipes like that, I'm sure. One you drool over and finally decide to make only to discover that the end product is better off in the pig pin than in your family's mouths.

So, what does that mean to you, reader, looking at this blog? Well, I am going to be taking recipes that I exclusively find on Pinterest, make them, rate them, and give an overall review. While I myself have pinned things from Alton Brown and some of the other wonderful hosts that you find on cable TV, their recipes will not be finding their way to this blog. These will be honest reviews done by a home cook and fed to my family (or not, depending on my own taste tests during cooking). And, while I will try to pick recipes that I see popping up frequently on the Food & Drink feed, there may be some that you haven't seen on there before.

I hope you enjoy, and feel free to be amused by any of the Pinterest failures that I may come across. I know I will be.

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The recipe I'd like to start this off with is actually one of my favorites. Start on a high note, right? It is a black-eyed pea salad that has popped up in my feed many times and I've actually made on several occasions, as well.

Now, I would like to point out that I may not be making these recipes exactly as they appear on their respective sites. For instance, I myself am not particularly fond of chunks of tomatoes which this recipe calls for. But, that is part of the fun of a recipe. Start with a base and alter it how it works for. Whether it be exchanging one disliked ingredient for another that you do like or just exchanging, say, parsley for cilantro because that is what you happen to have in the fridge. Like I said, it is aimed at the home cook and I don't know about you but I neither have the time nor inclination to go running to the grocery store for one ingredient when another will do just fine, thank you very much.

Now, anyway, black-eyed pea salad.

Gorgeous, isn't it? I adore this recipe. I use it as a stand alone salad and it also works well as a salsa for tacos or nachos! Multi-purpose recipe, how great is that? 

Black-Eyed Pea Salad

INGREDIENTS

2 cans black-eyed peas, drained and rinsed
1 large tomato, diced
1/2 large red onion, diced
1 small or 1/2 large red, yellow, or orange bell pepper, diced
1 jalapeno, diced
4 green onions, sliced
1/3 cup cilantro, chopped
1/4 cup rice wine vinegar (unseasoned)
2 Tbsp. canola oil
1/2 tsp. organic cane sugar
salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste

DIRECTIONS

1. Toss to combine black-eyed peas, tomato, red onion, pepper, jalapeno, and green onion in a large bowl.

2. In a small bowl, dissolve sugar in vinegar. Whisk in oil. Season with salt and pepper.

3. Pour dressing over bean mixture. Toss to coat. Stir in cilantro and season to taste with salt and pepper. Refrigerate until ready to serve (the longer it sits the better the flavor will be).

Serves 8.

The above is the recipe exactly as it appears on the website (which you can view here). 

I will say that I do make one small change to this recipe. I typically despise raw tomatoes, which the recipe calls for, so I exchange the one tomato for another red bell pepper. I also completely leave out the sugar because I don't find a lot of joy in sweet foods. 

But, that is part of my love of this recipe! You can change things out so easily to make it something you love! Don't have black-eyed peas? No problem! Use that can of navy beans you have sitting around or even the black beans. I do not, however, recommend kidney beans for this. They just don't work. 

You will see in the directions that the longer this recipe sits, the better it will be. This I absolutely agree with. The salad itself takes less than 10 minutes to chop and toss together but popping it in the fridge and letting it sit overnight is well worth the wait. The flavors meld so nicely and it really works well. Don't worry about that jalapeno, as long as you remove the seeds there is barely any heat. I've even used a pablano in this recipe without the heat being bad at all.  Just make sure to remove the seeds if you want to keep the heat under control. 

This recipe is quick, easy, and versatile. Ingredients are easily interchangeable and the total cost remains low (and let us all admit right now that cost is a majorly important factor in what we cook). I've made this multiple times over the last two years and readily recommend it. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

(Photo credit to the website in which this recipe was taken)