Recipe Review: Teriyaki Salmon and No-Bake Cookie Dough Bites

You may recall that one of my New Year's Resolutions was to cook one new recipe each week. Pinterest has been one of my favorite resources for new recipes over the past year, with some turning out better than others.  Last night I decided to try not one, but two new items, and thought it would be fun to provide a bit of a review on how the recipes/meals turned out!

Photo Credit: Damn Delicious

First up, Teriyaki Salmon with Sriracha Cream Sauce from Damn Delicious. I've had this one pinned in my Food Board for quite some time now and finally decided last night to give it a try.

This recipe was really easy to follow, especially with the step by step photo instructions listed on the website. I also had the majority of the ingredients already in my cabinet/fridge so only had to purchase a handful of items including the sweetened condensed milk, green onions, and cornstarch -- I couldn't believe I didn't have any on hand! Oh, and of course the salmon.

I made the marinade first and it smelled amazing while it was simmering! I will definitely keep this teriyaki recipe on hand for other dishes! I love that it was so simple too -- no more bottled teriyaki sauce for me!

After marinating the salmon for close to an hour, I finally started cooking dinner. We opted to go with brown rice for a healthier option, and to also add some zucchini for a veggie to make a more complete meal.  For the zucchini, I thinly sliced them and put them into a pan with some of the teriyaki marinade from the fish to give it a nice flavor and complement the meal. We had some large pieces of fish and it took exactly 20 mins at 400 degrees for them to cook, just like the recipe said, and they were cooked perfectly!

The Sriracha Cream sauce was also super easy to whip up, and added a really nice flavor pairing to the fish! Everything went together quite nicely.  You can see how our version turned out -- need to work on my drizzling skills and get some white plates for better photos!


Overall, we loved this dish and will definitely keep it on hand for the future.  I will also try some different versions of the teriyaki marinade as well -- maybe even thicken it up a bit more for grilling.




After dinner, we were in need of a dessert! One of the more popular food pins I've found recently are no-bake cookie dough bites.  It seems every blog has a version of them and I've been waiting for one that looked super easy and didn't require a ton of ingredients.  This version from Lauren Conrad's site finally sold me to give them a try.  For this recipe I had to buy most of the ingredients including the cashews, oats, agave syrup, and mini chocolate chips.  But, the good news is I now have these items on hand to make more batches next time!

Photo Credit: Lauren Conrad

This recipe said it would make one dozen dough bites, and from the photo it was hard to tell how large they actually would be.  You only use 1 cup of dry ingredients to make them though between the cashews and oats, which made me a bit skeptical that I would get a full dozen.  The recipe is ridiculously easy, although I did run into a bit of a problem when mixing the dough in my food processor.  I have a larger processor, which seemed a bit too big for the small amount.  I think it would work better if I doubled the recipe in the future.


Once the dough was ready, I started rolling the dough bites.  I ended up making 6 of them, all about 1" in diameter, so not very large at all. I wouldn't want to make them much smaller. Dave tasted one before I told him what it was made out of it. He liked it, but wasn't quite sure of the flavor.  I used raw unsalted, un-roasted cashews since it wasn't specified in the recipe.  Once I told him what was in it, he suggested that in the future we try it with the salted and/or roasted to add a bit of salt to complement the sweet with the agave and maple syrup.

You can see how our version turned out -- looks almost identical to the original! This is a recipe that will take a bit more fine tuning to really get the right flavor combination, but it definitely has potential, and I love that it's a bit of a "healthier" option to cookies!  These were perfect little sweet treats to enjoy after dinner while we continued our Big Love marathon.  Almost done with Season 2! Definitely a successful (and tasty) evening of new recipes!