Why A New Recipe Each Week?

Ok so I sort of explained my reasoning in my new years post, however I neglected to tell you another reason.  I love cooking and I LOVE cookbooks.  I think I am generally a good cook...I mean I don't cook anything super fancy but who wants that for dinner every night anyway?
I would like you to take a look at just SOME of the sauces we keep in our fridge that Adam pulls out with almost every meal we eat...

the only reason we only have 5 sauces now is because I limit the amount I will keep in the refrigerator at a given time.  Adam is a sauce lover...and puts some sort of sauce on just about everything (I exaggerate a little but not too much).  He even put sauce on the buffalo chicken sandwich that already was soaking in buffalo sauce and topped with ranch dressing.  My goal is to make a meal that is sooooooo good on its own that it needs no help with sauce.  Adam says it has nothing to do with how my food tastes he just likes sauces...and yes he puts several sauces on his plate and mixes and matches on the hunt for the perfect combination.  Does anyone else cook for a sauce lover?  Whats their favorite recipe?

National Margarita Day!

Did you know last Wednesday was National Margarita day?  Well I heard it on the news and instantly changed our meal plans for dinner and took Zack on his first trip to the ABC store...milestone?...no?
I decided to save the baked chicken and roasted potato's for a night that didn't have such and exciting drink.  I even went to the grocery store without coupons and picked up some green tomato's (do you see where I am going with this?) and corn on the cob.  I have wanted to make fried green tomato's FOREVER but I don't like to cook fried food at home...fried food is a treat for when you eat out...let someone else deal with the fry smell and the dirty grease.  Since I was already frying tomato's, I fried my homemade chicken tenders...I usually bake them so I guess my fried chicken can count as a new recipe also.  Why chicken tenders and not chicken legs?  I have an issue with meat on the bone...how I survived in China I will never know.
Anyway the fried tomato's were AWESOME (and totally worth the lingering fry smell).
Oh and the corn on the cob...I roasted them with chili powder and made the dip I found on pinterest.  It is a HONEY CHILI BUTTER...need I say more?
And the inspiration...

the plan was to make a Jalapeno Margarita recipe found here...but I realized that it is really expensive to buy the alcohol separate so I ended up buying the pre made...I figured it would be worth it if I drank on a regular basis...and after the AMAZING nights sleep I got that night I think I may have to be an alcoholic beverage at night kind of girl.

and the biscuits...Pillsbury...if you read the first page of Paula Deen's book that is sitting on my shelf she says don't bother making from scratch.  She put her stamp of approval on Pillsbury's and that is good enough for me!

Green and White Lightening Chicken Chili {Updated With Recipe}

This week I made what Rachael Ray called White Lightening Green Chicken...or something like that (I mean I am comfy on the couch and the book is all the way on the shelf).

It was pretty good.  Rachael wanted me to cube the chicken and watch it on the stove...

I threw all the ingredients (unmeasured because RR and I feel the same way about measuring) in the crock put and shredded the chicken.  Since I used the crock pot it obviously took more than 30 min...but the crock pot did all the hard work so I was OK with that. 
It was pretty awesome and left two more dinners for each of us!
Per Request...the Recipe:
2 Tbl veggie oil (I didn't use since I threw it in crock pot)
6 boneless skinless chicken breast cut into bite sized pieces (Didn't cut either)
salt and pepper
1 med. yellow onion
5 garlic cloves finely chopped
1 jalapeno pepper seeded and chopped (I used 4 and left seeds in...we like it spicy)
2 Tbl ground cumin
1 Tbl ground coriander
1 cup mild or hot tomatillo salsa (we used hot...and I just threw in the whole jar)
4 cups chicken stock or broth (this made it more like soup you could use less)
1 handful fresh cilantro
1 handful fresh parsley
shredded Monterrey or Pepper Jack cheese
Corn Chips

Rachael wants you to cook the chicken chunks in a pot then add the jalapeno, garlic and dried herbs cook for a little while and add the salsa cook for a little then add the chicken stock (adding the fresh herbs right before taking off the stove).  Top with corn chips and cheese.
I threw frozen chicken and everything else (except fresh herbs cheese and chips) in the crock pot cooked it on high for 5 hours shredded the chicken and cooked it on low for an hour. 

Super Food

Usually when you hear super food you may think something like avocado...full of healthy stuff.  Our super food was the meal we had before the Super Bowl.  And if I don't get to cooking another new recipe this is my new recipe of the week.
Buffalo Chicken Sandwiches and Sweet Potato Fries!
I cooked all day...

...OK well the crock pot did the work for me.  I spent all of 2 min throwing frozen chicken, pouring a bottle of wing sauce and dumping in a packet of ranch dressing mix into the crock pot as I ran out the door for church.
Don't you love the Crock Pot?
I did have to shred the chicken so that took maybe another 5 min.  I'll take it.
The sweet potato fries took about 45 min. including cook time.

football jammies in honor of the super bowl

"hmmm...I wonder if mommy will let me try one of these"

I toasted the bread for about 5 min.

Check out the recipes:
Sweet Potato Fries
Buffalo Chicken Sandwich

This meal was a total winner!

Zack ate the fries and had a bit of garlic bread with his mac and cheese and steamed carrots.

yeah, he is sticking his tongue out at me

Meatballs????

My new recipe of the week is special for my little man.  I got this book for Christmas:

and now that Z is eating real people food (but would live off of bananas and graham crackers if it was up to him) I decided to make him some meals that I could freeze and serve him so I am not looking into the fridge everyday wondering what I can give him.
I LOVE meatballs (being Norwegian I have been trained to make the best meatballs EVER), and I can make them bite sized so I figured this would be a great start for my "cooking for children" days.  The recipe called for her "green puree" (sweet peas, broccoli and spinach).  The whole idea of this cook book is to sneak veggies and other healthy ingredients into your children's food.  I originally wanted Jessica Seinfeld's book but I saw a review of several mothers who cooked and compared recipes from both books.  They liked the food and their children liked the food of both but they said the "Sneaky" cookbook was easier (um.....I'll take the easy one). 

Zack's well balanced meal: steamed carrots, garlic bread and meatballs

It looked awful (I should say I used breadcrumbs instead of wheat germ...I couldn't find wheat germ in the store).  The meatballs ha a green tint to them.  Once I cooked them they looked much better, but they kind of fell apart (next time I might roll them in flour before I cook).  None of this matters because Zack loved it!

I should mention that he won't eat food that blends into his high chair tray...even if he likes it so meatballs were something I knew he would try

He liked it so much he didn't care I was taking pictures of him!

I tried a bite but I think knowing what the green puree looked like and seeing the green meat might have swayed my opinion.  I gave a bite to Adam without telling him what was in it and his comment was "what...it tastes like ground beef".  You are supposed to serve the meatballs with sauce on spaghetti...but I am not ready for that mess yet.

By the way don't judge me for letting my baby stay in pj's all day...or that I took him to the grocery store like this (what am I supposed to do when I need to get to the store and Z takes an extra long nap...and on a side note why can't he take the extra long nap when I need to get things done at home).

Chinese New Year Dinner

It's ironic that while I lived in China for 18 months I did everything I could to not eat Chinese food, and now in my first month of new recipes 2 meals have been Chinese. 
I had to do something special to celebrate the year of the dragon.  So I pulled out my Chinese food cookbook and made egg rolls, crab rangoon, hot and sour soup and garlic beef and broccoli.

I love that every Chinese recipe requires green onion...it really makes things easier.  

I broke my own rule and bought special ingredients for the meal.  Thankfully these are ingredients I will use in other Chinese food recipes.  I am also really excited that I was able to find bamboo shoots without any issues (I figured it would be a hard to find item...but they had it in a special display and on sale...SCORE).

I did most of the prep (innards for rangoon and spring rolls and made the soup) during Zack's naps.  When he woke up he played with my Tupperware while I finished up.  I heated the soup, wrapped the rolls, baked the rangoon and sauteed the beef after Adam got home to distract little man.

 My rolls may not look like they do in the book (notice the first one I wrapped was exploding).  But they sure did taste good.

Yumm....I hardly ever make appetizers!

 I think I was most impressed with the hot and sour soup...doesn't it look like the soup you would get at PF Changs?  It was my first time cooking with tofu and it tasted AMAZING!  What makes homemade Chinese food better than going out...I left out the mushrooms and added extra chili oil to make it more our taste.

 All in all...a great meal.  However the book said to saute the beef for 12 min...I took it off the stove after 6 and it was still overcooked.  This is why you have to do what you know is right.  Next time I will listen to my gut and not even cook the meat that long...it's tricky though because you do want the broccoli to be soft.

I love this cookbook.  It's great because it uses ingredients even found in my own little grocery store.

Gumbo and Brunch

Last weekend was CRAZY...and a crazy weekend always leads to an off week for me.  Plus we had several play dates (which are AMAZING), a couple library story times, and several meals with friends scheduled for this week.  Long story short...not much time to cook let alone eat a meal together at home.  I used this week as an opportunity to cheat a little bit on my resolution.
****SIDE NOTE****I use New Years as a way to start something...knowing full well it won't continue but it will get me started, which is the most difficult part of any goal.  Just because I miss a week...or two...or, as I suspect, many more, doesn't mean I will stop all together.
I used a mix I bought at the Junior League's Shopping Spree this past fall.

I love directions like..."put it all in a pot and heat"

All I did was add the sausage, chicken and can of tomato (I hate canned veggies but tomato is OK for something like this) and a bag of who knows what.  Voa La: GUMBO!

and it went really well with the leftover cornbread.

Saturday I made a recipe from my mom.  Apple Pancake Bake.

It's made mostly with egg and has thin apple slices on the top...you can use any fruit!

We ate breakfast for lunch (I intended for it to be breakfast but a lazy morning and my early nap turned it into lunch).
Sausage...Apple Pancake...Hash browns...

Adam's Plate

and Z-man's plate...I love that he eats our food!

and I never cook a breakfast without a little help from Pillsbury...

(the bottom one is cut in half because I gave Z part of a roll without the frosting)

Buttermilk Pan Fried Chicken, Jalapeno Corn Bread and Chocolate Banana Eggrolls

Today I made lots of new recipes. 

The buttermilk chicken was good...nothing special but sometimes it's nice to have just plain chicken. The cornbread was AMAZING.

The recipe called for 1 diced jalapeno...I used 3!

Adam always gives me a hard time because I never follow a recipe.  I use a recipe as a suggestion and so far (2 weeks) I have basically followed the recipes...I only substituted frying the chicken in EVOO instead of canola...and added cayenne pepper.
Our dinner was awesome...

Dessert however didn't quite work out as I planned.  Rachael Ray usually writes recipes that anyone can make...I however failed with my chocolate banana eggrolls.

The recipe said to thaw out 4 sheets fillo dough (which isn't found in the two grocery stores near my house).  I have never used fillo dough but each sheet is as thin as one ply of tissue and the package has 20 sheets rolled up.  It basically fell apart when I tried unrolling it and also when it was thawed.  Maybe I was supposed to use the whole roll (20 sheets according to the box)? 

I still tried...the banana and the chocolate were going to be a no fail wonderful dessert.  I served it with the dipping sauce on top.

It tasted good...I could call it chocolate banana bird nest.

Week 1: Kung Po Chicken

It's totally fitting that my first recipe of the year is Chinese food...well AMERICAN Chinese food.  I received this cookbook from one of Adam's coworkers in China:

The ironic thing was I couldn't make these recipes in China because I couldn't find the ingredients.  Chinese food in China is VERY different then the Chinese food we know and love...in fact when we returned to the US one of the first foods we ate was Pei Wei...I am almost embarrassed to say we eat there (well take out) almost every week on our weekly "date night in".  When I call to place the order they ask if we want "the usual" (Changs Spicy Chicken with brown rice - ADAM and Orange Peal Chicken with white rice - ME...with a side order of chili paste and spicy mustard).
Anyway...I was super excited to try my hand in some Chinese cooking after being so anti Chinese food for 18 months.
Kung Po Chicken was a favorite of ours before going to China and there was only one place that offered Kung Po in Huizhou...I knew Adam would be very excited to come home to some homemade Chinese food.

I was worried that I may not find all the ingredients I needed, I mean where do you find Chutney in a grocery store?  Rather than spend time looking for chutney for homemade plum sauce I bought a jar of already made sauce. 

This was a great recipe...I followed it almost exactly, I added more chili oil and extra chicken and garlic and of course I served it over rice.

Good ol' Chinese rice

When I make it again I will add some fresh chili's for more of a kick (it wasn't much of a "kung PO" with this chicken) and some carrots and green beans so it ends up being a full meal.  I would also make extra sauce to pour over the rice.

1/2 graham cracker + 1 cup of juice + a ball in a paper bag = just enough time to do the prep for this meal.

1 week down!

Something easy to cook without a proper kitchen...

and it just so happens to be one of my favorite meals.  THAI GREEN CURRY!

I always add three times the meat and veggies to make it a full meal.

You may remember my obsession with green curry during the month and a half of my pregnancy that I actually enjoyed food...as long as it was green curry.
While in Thailand we took a cooking class. 

Adam and I with Nom, our teacher

One of the dishes I chose to make was green curry. 

Fresh Curry Paste

Curry...with all the proper ingredients

Funny thing is I can't wait to come back to America so I can go to an oriental market to find the proper ingredients to make it from scratch like we did in Thailand, until then the curry paste I found in our new grocery store will do just fine! 

A positive to food offered in China is the vegetables are super fresh and delicious (it's a shame Chinese cooking requires these vegetables to be soaked in oil and sauces...ironic I am writing this as I write about soaking them in curry).  I can't find the usual Thai vegetables that go in curry but I have found an amazing alternative: carrots, eggplant (Adam and I have gained an unexpected appreciation to eggplant), and potato chunks. 

Mine doesn't look quite as "Thai" but I promise it was delicious!

I make the curry the night before so the vegetables have a chance to soak in the curry...plus I get to anticipate this meal all day!