7 Layer Mexican Dip

Blogging Marathon# 53: Week 2/ Day 1

Theme: Movie Night Snacks

Dish: 7 Layer Mexican dip

My theme for this week's blogging marathon is 'Snacks for Movie Night'. Family movie nights have become rare with my husband's crazy travel schedule but we try and catch up once in a while. I'm not big on snacks, I rather eat a full meal and I'm happy. But the kids and the husband love snacks. So for the next 3 days, I'm going to share some make ahead or quick to make snacks that are great for a movie night (or for any night or party for that matter).

First up is a Mexican layer dip. It has 7 layers with gaucamole, refried beans, salsa, sour cream, shredded cheese, olives and scallions. If you are up for it, you can make some of the layers at home, or if you are like me, just buy some good quality guacamole, refried beans and salsa.

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Vegetarian Molletes - Mexican Open Face Sandwich

After all the sweet & savory bakes in April, I'm starting May with a baked Mexican open faced sandwich called Mollete. When I think of May, I think of Cinco de Mayo that is celebrated on the 5th of May. The date is observed to commemorate the Mexican army's unlikely victory over French at the battle of Puebla on May 5, 1862. So May 5th means make Mexican food and enjoy!!
I was browsing through my 'Cookshelf -- Mexican' cookbook for some recipes and found this Mollete sandwich. It is a Mexican version of open faced sandwich that is filled with refried beans and cheese, then topped with a crunchy cabbage salad.

Molletes are traditionally made with bolillos, a savory Mexican bread that is similar to a baguette but is shorter in length and has a crunchy crust and soft inside. I couldn't find bolillo in my neighborhood, so bought wholewheat crusty rolls and made the sandwiches with them.

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Veggie Nachos

Being a food blogger, one thing that I sure don't do is post recipes ahead of a specific holiday/ festival. I wish I was more planned in that aspect. Coming from apparel retail background, I've seen companies start working on a season at least 9 months in advance, ie., designers start working on Summer designs (that will be in the store some time in April) some time in September of the previous year.
In the same way, there are quite a few bloggers who start posting recipes for summer before the end of spring. While they are thinking ahead, I am usually posting recipes I made at the end of winter (!!!!!!), that is how organized and planned I am.
Well today's dish was meant for Super Bowl Sunday and of course it is a week late. I saw Rachael Ray make this on her show and the use of veggies on nachos sounded tasty and I wanted to make it for my nacho-loving son. I actually served it for lunch (!!!) along with cilantro-lime rice.

These are infact a healthier version of traditional cheese laden nachos. Most of the cheese is replaced with sauteed veggies. My son liked them quite a lot and I'm sure I'll be making these often in the future.

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Vegan Burger made with Refried Beans

Vegan MOFO Day 2: I planned to cook today's vegan lunch in 30 minutes and post it under '30 minute meals', but little did I know that my 3 week old had her own plans. I was hardly in the kitchen for 10 minutes, she started to cry and wanted to be fed and so my 30 minute meal ended up being more than an hour meal. Even though I wasn't able to make the meal under 30, but I'm sure it can done if there are no distractions.

One of my favorite things to do while on maternity leave is to watch tons of TV. Feeding time is the best time to catch up on Law & Order: SVU marathons and loads of cooking shows. One of the cooking shows I've started watching is Bal Arneson's Spice Goddess on Cooking Channel. I'm not too thrilled with her Americanized Indian accent and her over using of spices, but this Veggie Burger did catch my attention when I watched it. She used canned refried beans as the base for the burger and I thought that was a pretty genius idea.

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