Today, I accomplished quite a bit. I managed to do 7 loads of laundry, (hauled down 3 flights of stairs to the laundry mat and back up). I turned in my most difficult task for my hardest accounting class, read another 2 chapters in the Hobbit and made a fabulous dinner!
This doesn't sound like much, and I promise I'm not lazy. Being preggers does make you more tired, and normal things go a bit slower, but I'm trying to focus my attention onto getting my degree. I'm pushing 18 months worth of work into 6 months.
After spending so much time in front of the computer screen or in front of a book, I decided some time in the kitchen would do me good. I must say, I outdid myself this time. Dinner was fantastic. I spent the day periodically thinking about what I wanted to do. After searching up some ideas on Pinterest I came up with my own Alfredo chicken pasta bake. It was delicious!
I already had some Ragu Alfredo sauce from lunch. I cooked some noodles. Next I pan fryed a chicken breast. Once the noodles were done, I poured in the sauce, tore up the chicken and added it in and mixed it all together. Then I put it into a 8x8 dish. (It's small because it's only Trevor and I eating). I topped it with mozzarella cheese and bacon bits. I put it in the oven to melt the cheese for about 20 minutes.
This happened to be the main course but I had some amazing potatoes to go with it. I love marinade mixes that you can buy at the store in little packets. I have quite a stash of them. I happened to have a roasted potato mix that I hadn't used before. It turned out to be amazing! I cut up my potatoes into slices and put the mix over them and baked them for about an hour.
I also enjoy making bread. So I happened to have some of my homemade sandwich bread that I turned into garlic bread to eat. Dinner was perfect, tasty, and for the most part - pretty healthy. It was good for me to spend time in the kitchen. It has been a while since I've cooked something this big in a while. I probably spent an hour and a half in the kitchen because there was quite a bit involved, but it was worth it! What's even better, is there was enough left over for both Trevor and I to have lunch tomorrow!
Ingredient for this dinner:
- Chicken
- noodles
- Parmesan cheese
- Alfredo sauce
Optional: garlic salt, minced onion, bacon
Potatoes and seasoning
Bread with garlic salt and parsley
Side salad.
To make the Pasta:
1. Get water on stove and heating.
2. Put chicken breast on the stove and cook in pan with some oil. Be sure to keep the lid on while cooking, it splatters and is hot! I sprinkled salt and pepper on my chicken.
3. Put noodles in boiling water and cook. Noodles will probably be done before the chicken, especially if the chicken was frozen. Drain noodles and put back in pot.
3. Put Alfredo sauce in with noodles. I added some minced onion and garlic salt. Stir.
4. Once chicken is white all the way through, Shred it up and add it to the noodles.
5. Put the noodle mixture in a greased pan.
6. Sprinkle with Parmesan cheese and bacon.
7. Bake in oven for 20 minutes.
To make Potatoes:
Potatoes
Seasonings
(Usually) Oil
I like to cut my potatoes up and put oil and a mix over them. I will often do this first and get my potatoes in the oven as soon as possible because they take an hour to cook, usually. I did this and by the time I had everything else ready and the noodle mixture cooked, the potatoes were done!
What I love about this meal, is it didn't require anything crazy. I love being able to make dinner from things I already have or usually have. I also like to alter the recipes to work for whatever I have. This recipe is really easy to make to any size. If you need to feed a bigger crowd, cook more noodles and another chicken breast and put it in a bigger pan. I look for versatility in my recipes. I'm usually cooking for just 2, which most recipes are for a family. So this was particularly nice. I enjoyed my time in the kitchen. It did me good today.
Now, off to fold laundry!
- Sami
