Balsalmic Chicken and Sweet Potatoes

Man, tonight's dinner was AMAZING. I'm pretty impressed with myself. This was my first dinner where I made sure it followed the Hormone Diet detox guidelines. This was a healthy, tasty, and filling dinner.

Sorry for the crappy picture. It looked better on my phone.

This is such an easy recipe! Prep time: 10 min. Cook time: 45 min to 1 hour.
Balsamic Chicken:
- Chicken (enough for who you are feeding)
-1 can of diced tomatoes
- balsamic vinegar
- diced onion (I always keep some frozen in my fridge)
- Basil
- Oregano
- Rosemary
- Thyme
- garlic salt
- pepper

1. Put chicken breasts in a pan. Top with garlic salt and pepper. Pour some diced onion on top. (This gives it nice flavor). I always have a bag of diced onions in my freezer. I just took it out and shook it over the chicken.
2. Pour can of diced tomatoes on top of chicken. Pour balsamic vinegar on top of the tomatoes and chicken. Be generous, but don't over do it. It'll flavor the tomatoes nicely so they can be eaten as well.
3. On top of the tomatoes and vinegar, sprinkle on some basil, oregano, rosemary and thyme. It may seem like a lot of herbs, but it'll be worth it. I didn't measure it out, maybe 1 tsp of each. The flavors seep into the tomatoes and then down to the chicken It''ll look soupy in the pan, but it's ok! The chicken will be moist and have all that yummy flavor sucked up into it.
4. Cook for 45 min to 1 hour at 350 degrees or until done

This might be my new favorite potato dish!
Rosemary Sweet Potatoes:
- Olive oil
- Sweet Potatoes
- Rosemary
- Onion
- Green Onion

1. Wash and peel the sweet potatoes. Cut them up and put them in a pan. Sprinkle with olive oil and shake them around in the pan. The oil helps crisp the potatoes. Sprinkle some onion on the potatoes, just like how you did with the chicken.
2. Cut up a green onion and put it on top. I only did one sweet potato, and one green onion. It may seem like a lot of onion, but the onions and potatoes get crispy from cooking in the oil and they become almost sweet. The onion really accents the sweet potato. Top with rosemary.
3. Cook for 45 min to 1 hour at 350 degrees.

I put both the chicken and the potatoes in the oven at the same time. Serve with salad. These are 2 recipes that I am going to be making again! I got the approval from the husband, he liked them too! These certainly don't taste like "diet" food! Both were so easy to throw together and the dishes complimented each other very well!

- SamiMae

All Homemade Dinner - Chicken Zita

I loved this meal. It was as homemade as one could get. I am always so proud of the new foods I cook, and we are usually so hungry, that I forget to take a bigger picture of the dish before we dig in. I usually just remember to take a picture before I take my first bite. :) I was pretty proud of this meal. The potatoes have some yummy seasoning on it. (I'm a potato-lovin' gal from Idaho.) The bread you see, is homemade. I no longer purchase store bread. I can't remember the last time I did. It was one of the best decisions ever. I taught myself how to make bread (I cheat and use a bread machine. Still working on making it without one.). I've perfected my bread recipe. My white bread makes perfect sandwiches, garlic bread and anything else that store bought bread is used for - but it's better. There are not preservatives in it and it's fresh. Can life get better?!! 

The zita, was fun to make. I used the penne noodles and cooked them. I also cooked some frozen (no canned chicken for me!) I had mozzarella cheese on hand. Oh ya! And the spaghetti sauce I used in this was from home bottled tomatoes with spaghetti seasoning. This also had cream cheese in it. This was another hit. Trevor loved it. :) 

Again, most of this stuff is stuff I keep on hand, except the mozzarella. But I've found that I've been purchasing it more for different meals. Maybe it'll become a normal item in my kitchen. What I also love about homemade meals, is there is usually enough for leftovers for lunch the next day. It breaks up the sandwich routine which I get in. It gives variety to our lunches. And, when dinner is so good, we get it a second time for lunch. :) 

- SamiMae

Beef Enchiladas and Ramblings...

I'm all about taking a nice dish, making, but on the cheap. I feel this was kind of one of those. I made homemade beef enchiladas for the first time. (Oh, I also love trying to cook new things, on my own. :) 

This was an awesome meal, which I had so much fun making. I made home made tortillas! Yes, home made tortillas. They are generally smaller than the large plate sized ones you can purchase. The small size made these perfect portions. I cooked up some shredded beef that I had and added some spices as well as cream cheese in it to give it a creamy texture. Then I  put some beef and cheese in a tortilla and rolled it up. I have some natural enchilada sauce that I love to purchase (I stock up when it comes on sale for $1!) It was red enchilada sauce, which I hadn't tried before. I poured some in the bottom of the pan, placed my enchiladas in the pan, topped with the rest of the sauce and more cheese and olives. If I had green onions that would have been even better!

This was quickly a hit with Trevor! He's requested it twice since. What's even greater about this dish, I made it all out of my food storage. Or, I should say, my giant food stock. I can make this meal any time I want, because I keep a stock of everything! How great is that?! That's what I strive to do. Keep a stock of all very usable food and make all my meals from it. Very rarely do I pick something up from the store for a specific dish. I'm pretty proud of the work I've one. 

Yummy Apples!!!

Last Saturday, I went up to Logan with my aunt and uncle and their kids. We went to an orchard and picked our own apples! It was a blast. It was a neat environment. There were so many trees and so many different kinds of apples. So, I ended up coming home with a big bag of apples! I had green apples and red apples. I only had so much energy and I wasn't in the mood to can, and I had just gotten my new kitchen toy - a dehydrator! So, I dehydrated all my apples instead.

In a house of only my husband and me, these sure did go fast! I did 2 batches of apples, in total 12 trays. These were super fast because I also got an "apple corer, peeler, slicer". I can't imagine what I would have done without it! So, I peeled, sliced and cored my apples then gave them a bath in citrus acid water. After 10 minutes or so, I put them on the trays, sprinkled some cinnamon on top and left them to dry and a few hours later - these bad boys. :) The small bag are all that's left of my green apples. The bigger bag are my red apples. This was super fun and easy. The second time I did it, Trevor helped! He took time off of homework to spend time in the kitchen with me. I love it when he does that. :)

These have made for a great snack. Now I know what to do next time I have apples that I know we won't be able to eat before they go bad. I'll just dehydrate them!

Alfredo Chicken Pasta Bake

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

My First Canning Project - Peaches and Pears

This week, my awesome aunt bought me a water bath for canning. So, of course I had to give it a test run. I made sure to get all my homework done (which is most important), so I could spend the time necessary to do some canning. I went to the Provo market and picked up some peaches and pears. I then went to target to pick up some jars. Then the adventure began.

About 2-3 years ago, my mom got me the Ball canning book, it has over 400 recipes in it. I found my peaches and pears recipes in there and gave it a shot. I was careful to follow all the directions and the results were perfect! All my jars sealed! It was a ton of work. I did it all by myself. I can't imagine doing a bigger batch without help. Most of the time spent was me pealing or blanching and pealing the fruit. Once that was done, relatively little time was spent doing a heat-process on the fruit before putting them in the jars. My recipes required me to heat the fruit up in a syrup before putting them in the jars. The syrup was tasty! It ended up getting all over the handles and my hands before the night was over. :) I sure enjoyed my time doing it. I was careful to not over do it, physically. It's been awesome to see the "fruits" of my labor. :) I got 6 cans out of it. 3 peaches, 3 pears. 

It's a great skill to have. I can't wait for my next project!

Before....

After!!!

- Sami

Bean Chimichangas and Spanish Rice

Monday I finally got a rice cooker! I'd been wanting one for so long and I finally got one. It's a cute little guy, perfect for just Trevor and I. Well, I wanted to break in my new kitchen toy and needed a main dish to go with my rice. So, I happened upon this recipe for bean chimichangas. YUM! Fast and easy. You can view the original recipe here. This was an excellent easy recipe. I had Trevor in the kitchen to help me and we made these in probably about 20 minutes.

Crappy picture I know, but Trevor and I had both eaten a whole chimichanga before I realized I hadn't taken a picture. I was torn. I didn't want to stop eating these for long enough to get a good picture. I know food is like an art on other blogs, but here - I'm realistic. My food doesn't often turn out pretty, but it sure does turn out tasty. Anyway, I combined our plates quickly, snapped a picture and then went back to eating. 

If you're aiming for healthy, this might not be the best meal, but it sure is good comfort food. And really, if you take out the half block of Velveeta, it's really pretty healthy. 

Ingredients: 

Tortillas

1/2 can of Rotel

1 can refried beans

1/2 brick of Velveeta. 

Egg whites. (we used 1 egg and still had plenty)

Cheese (If the Velveeta isn't enough for you :)

1-2 tbsp of veggie oil

1. Warm beans, Rotel and Velveeta in a pot. Make sure the Velveeta is all mixed in. 

2. Warm up a pan on the stove with a little bit of oil. We are going to flash fry the chimis. (This was a new technique that I hadn't tried before. Took a little getting use to, my stove is tends to be extra hot, so I burned the first two). 

3. On a tortilla, put some of the bean mixture into it. I found that it naturally wanted to go flat, like a soup on the tortilla. So this part was a slight challenge. 

4. Baste a little bit of the egg whites around the edge of the tortilla. This acts as a sealant. Then fold up the tortilla in a burrito like style.  Top and bottom, then left and right side. 

5. Flash fry these in the pan on the stove. I only left mine on there for about 30 seconds on each side. But my stove has 2 heat options. High or off. There is no medium or low. 

6. Next, move them to a pan and let them back in the oven for about 12 minutes at 350. 

How easy right! What's awesome, is we had leftover bean/Velveeta mixture. Last night we put it on top of our baked potatoes. Wow. YUM! This was an excellent dinner. It had a bit of a kick to it, so be cautious with the Rotel, it holds a lot of heat! I also made some quick Spanish rice to go with it. You can view the original recipe here.

I just put all these ingredients in the rice cooker, gave it a stir and pressed start!

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cup of long grain rice. 

1 1/2 cup chicken broth

1 can of Rotel tomatoes (I only put in a few spoonfuls and it was really spicy!)

2 tbsp of melted butter

1 tsp of cumin

Enjoy!

-SamiMae