Pillsbury 3 Ingredient Bubble Bake

I'm sick and that means something simple needed to happen for dinner tonight. This was my grocery shopping day today, so I was able to grab the ingredients for this easy recipe. Pillsbury 3 Ingredient Chicken and Broccoli Bubble Bake is a great recipe to keep on hand for those times when quick is what you need. I cooked my chicken in a little evoo with minced garlic, oregano, salt, and pepper. The things I did differently were to thaw the broccoli and cheese sauce in the skillet with the chicken so none of the sauce is left in the package. During the last 5 minutes of cooking I sprinkled on shredded cheese. Two thumbs up! You could easily modify this recipe by swapping what you put on top of the biscuits. Pizza sauce and pepperoni would be good. Thin sliced steak, peppers, onions, and alfredo sauce is another winner...

Crunchy Chicken Wrap

This is a fast food homemade kinda post and one of those recipes where I can't really tell you what to use cause it's so customizable. The technique is what you have to get down. You layer the ingredients starting with cheese and ending with cheese. I put the greek yogurt side of the tostada down and put the cheese (which acts as glue) on top. You can substitute sour cream for greek yogurt if you have it. I just had greek yogurt leftover from making some greek pitas a few nights before. You want to make sure that this is completely wrapped in tortilla, so if when you're done folding you have a whole just trim a little of the excess tortilla off one side to cover it up. You want to keep all the goodness wrapped inside! If you don't have a George Foreman or panini press you can make these in the skillet seam side down then flip when browned. My mom had the idea of using Doritos as the crunch instead of the tostada and I think I will try that for lunch!

Cornbread Chicken Casserole

Tonight I threw together a pretty delicious dinner from what I had on hand. I made a chicken and veggie filling (like a pot pie filling), topped it with cornbread batter, sprinkled on Parmesan cheese, and baked on 425* for 20-30min. I wanted the cornbread batter cooked all the way through and browned on top, so I cooked it covered for 20min and another 10min uncovered.

3 cooked chicken breast, chopped or shredded
1lb veggies
1 1/2cu sauce
2 boxes Jiffy cornbread

1. Preheat oven to 425*. Mix chicken, veggies, and sauce together and place into 9x13 baking pan.

2. Prepare cornbread as directed on back of box and spread over top.

3. Cover with foil and begin to bake.

Crock Pot Chicken Broth

As a working mom I rely on easy to prepare meals to get nutritious food into my kids without having to hit the drive-thru every night. One of my favorite things to do is cook well seasoned boneless, skinless chicken breast in the crock pot. I buy a large pack at Walmart (usually 8-10 breast), place them all into the crock with plenty of seasoning, and fill it to the top with water. The chicken is cooked and incredibly moist which is important when you're going to be further cooking it in other recipes. I'm also left with this wonderful broth to use as a soup base or in recipes later. Doing my chicken this way allows me to make 4-5 different meals from that one pack of chicken.

Crock Pot Curry

Today I decided to take a flavor trip to Asia with a crock pot curry. I used chicken thighs because they were the cheapest meat and the deep flavor of dark meat is great in a curry. This will be served over brown and jasmine rice cooking in my small crock pot. I also got some naan bread which is kind of like a pita without the pocket.

8 boneless skinless chicken thighs
6 small red potatoes, cut into eigths
1/2 bag frozen California blend veggies
6oz sliced okra
1 jar curry sauce

1. Layer potatoes, okra, and frozen veggies in crock pot. Add half the jar of sauce.

2. Place chicken on top, pour over rest of sauce, and allow to cook for 6-8hrs.

Mmm, enchiladas!

Stay tuned for the recipe for this delicious dinner!

Chicken Bacon Ranch Casserole

This meal combines  two of my favorite meats chicken and bacon. Frozen veggies, a cream sauce, and canned biscuits round this out for a delicious casserole sure to please the whole family! The biscuits on top and bottom are crunchy, but those that are touching the chicken stay doughy like dumplings.

3 chicken breast, diced
6 slices cooked bacon, crumbled
2cu cheese sauce
1/2cu ranch
16oz bag frozen mixed veggies
2 cans refrigerated biscuits
1/2cu shredded cheese

1. Preheat oven to 375*. Sauté chicken in a pan until cooked through, about 15min. Put chicken and next 4 ingredients in a large bowl. Mix well. 

2. Open one can of biscuits and press to cover bottom of baking pan. Spread chicken mixture over biscuits. Tear the other can of biscuits into pieces and cover the top of the casserole. 

 3. Sprinkle with cheese and place into oven. Bake for about 15 minutes until the top biscuits are browned and its bubbling. Cool for 5 minutes before serving.

Carraba's Chicken Bryan remix

For date night a week ago we went out to Carraba's to eat and my boyfriend had their chicken bryan. It was a chicken breast topped with basil, sundried tomatoes, goat cheese, and a lemon butter sauce. I got one bite of it and decided it definitely needed to be made again at home. I marinated my chicken overnight with Italian seasonings, a little oil from the sundried tomatoes, and lemon juice. This chicken starts in a skillet and finishes in the oven. Mine was served over whole wheat angel hair pasta with steamed veggies.

4 boneless skinless chicken breast
Extra virgin olive oil
Basil cut into thin strips
Sundried tomatoes in oil
Goat cheese cut into thin disk
1/2 cu butter or margarine
1tbsp flour
3tbsp lemon juice
2 garlic cloves minced

1. Preheat the oven to 425*. Put a small amount of EVOO into a skillet and cook the chicken on medium high for 10 minutes each side. You don't need to move the chicken around in the skillet. Just allow it to brown up nicely. Transfer the chicken to a baking dish.

2. Put the butter into the skillet you cooked the chicken in and melt. Add the garlic cloves and sautee for a minute before sprinkling in the flour. Allow this to cook for a minute then whisk in the lemon juice. Pour over the top of the chicken breast. Place into oven and bake for 10 minutes.

2. Layer the goat cheese and sundried tomatoes on top. Place back into the oven until the cheese is bubbly. Remove and immediately top with basil. Allow to rest for 5 minutes and serve.

Bacon Wrapped Chicken Tenders

BACON!!!! Now that I have your attention, join me for a delicious dish that features a meat which has inspired countless products that should not taste or smell like it (bacon scented bandaids anyone?). Bacon wrapped about bonless skinless chicken breast tenders are great to serve for dinner with the family or at your next party. They're also super easy to make. You can get away with just two ingredients, but I'm all about punching up flavor, so I take it a step further.

3 boneless skinless chicken breast cut into 24 pieces
8 slices of bacon cut into thirds
Brown sugar
Spicy seasoning of choice

1. Preheat oven to 425* and fit a baking sheet with a baking rack. If you don't have one, that's ok. You can still bake straight on the sheet, but you might want to drain the chicken on a paper towel before serving to remove excess bacon fat.

2. Wrap each piece of chicken in a piece of bacon. If the pieces are smaller you can just wrap it right around the piece and place into the pan loose ends down. If the chicken is longer wrap it around spiral style and place with both loose ends down. Sprinkle with seasoning if using. I left the seasoning off the pieces I was feeding my anti-spicy kids.

3. Bake in the oven for 20 minutes and flip over. Sprinkle brown sugar and more seasoning. Rotate pan and place back into oven for another 15 minutes. The bacon should be nice and crispy. Enjoy!

These are the three spicy seasonings I have in my cupboard. I used my Jim Beam Spicy Bourbon tonight.

This is how big I cut the chicken and bacon.

You can see the smaller pieces at the top have the bacon just wrapped around them. The larger pieces have the bacon going around in a spiral style.

This is what the chicken should look like after 20min when you're ready to flip. The ones in the bottom left do not have spicy seasoning on them.

Flip them over and sprinkle with brown sugar and more seasoning if using.

All done!

Chicken Cordon Bleu

Chicken cordon bleu seems like a really complicated meal, but it's actually pretty easy to make since there are three variations to it. The basic flavors of chicken, ham, and cheese with a crunchy outer layer will be there no matter how you choose to make it. In order from easiest to hardest here are the ways you can make it. First, you can just lay the ham and cheese on top of the chicken breast and carefully bread the whole thing before setting into the baking pan. Second, you can cut a slit into the chicken breast taking care not to slice all the way through and stuff the ham/cheese inside before breading. Third, you can pound the chicken breast until they are very thin (or save the hassle and start with cutlets) then lay the ham/cheese on top and roll them up before breading. In this rendition I go for the middle ground with the slit cut into the chicken breast.

4 boneless skinless chicken breast
4 slices cheese
4 slices deli ham
1 egg
1/2cu milk
bread crumbs

1. Preheat the oven to 450* and spray a baking pan. Prepare the chicken breast however you please. I cut a slit running about a half inch from each end and almost all the way through to the other side. Stuff a slice of ham and cheese into each chicken breast.

2. Beat together the egg and milk then dip each chicken breast before fully coating with bread crumbs. Place each breast into the prepared pan and spray with more cooking spray.

3. Bake on a lower rack in the oven for 20 minutes or until the edges of the breast start to brown. Rotate the pan and finish baking another 10-15 minutes until the juices from the chicken run clear and the bread crumbs are golden brown.

It's Friday!

For many people the work week is over and they're ready to enjoy the weekend. I'm going to enjoy a brew while I cook some bacon wrapped chicken tenders. Stay tuned for new blog post :-) I've got chicken cordon bleu, garlic oven fries, and tonight's dinner to post! What do you have cooking?

Drunk Pulled Pork

Meat taste better when its drunk. I mean cooked in alcohol. It imparts a depth of flavor that's hard to get with a standard marinade. Tonight for dinner I cooked a pork roast in the slow cooker with a can of Jeremiah Weed Spiked Cola. It's flavors are reminiscent of Jack and Coke with a much lower price tag. I seasoned my roast with brown sugar and a Jim Beam barbeque rub I found at Walmart. In the crock pot while I enjoyed Mother's Day! There's no real recipe here. Just put enough meat in the pot to feed your family, add a cup or two of your favorite beverage combo, and let the slow cooker do all the work...

Roasted Chicken and Veggie Pasta Salad

Super simple pasta salad that is perfect for summertime meals! I roasted the chicken with red onion, asparagus, zucchini, and yellow squash tossed with sun dried tomato vinegrette. When it came out the oven I added halved grape tomatoes and chopped black olives.

Boneless skinless chicken breast, cut into bite sized pieces
Oil based dressing
Choice of pasta
Choice of veggies

1. Preheat oven to 425*. Toss chicken and veggies with dressing on a baking sheet. Roast for 20-25min, stirring occassionaly.

2. Remove from oven and toss together on baking sheet with prepared pasta. Can be enjoyed warm or cold.

What's For Dinner? Monday 5/7

Tonight I decided to make one of the meals from my Recipes I'm Trying This Week. Well, I used the baked chicken and spinach flautas as inspiration and did my own thing. It was pretty delicious. Who knew you could make healthy Mexican food that tasted so good! This meal worked out great because I already had some shredded fajita chicken. I made that by just tossing boneless skinless chicken breast in the crock pot with red, orange, and yellow bell pepper strips and a packet of fajita seasoning mix. These flautas can be customized with whatever you have in the fridge. Steak or shrimp would be just as tasty!

2cu precooked shredded chicken
1/2 diced red onion
4cu spinach
3 cloves minced garlic
1/2cu minced cilantro
olive oil
any size flour tortillas
cheese
Favorite toppings: guacamole, salsa, sour cream, etc

1.  Preheat the oven to 450* and grease a baking sheet or pan.

2. Saute the onion, spinach, cilantro, and garlic in a large skillet over medium high heat. You want the onions to soften and start to become translucent. The spinach should wilt down considerably, so don't worry that 4cu sounds like a lot. Add in the chicken and cook for a few minutes until it heats through.

3. Cut a tortilla in half (if using burrito size tortillas) and place a couple of tablespoons of the filling along the long edge. Sprinkle on cheese and roll. Place into the pan seam side down. Continue doing this until you have used up all of the filling.

4. Spray the tops of the flautas with a light spray of oil and place into the oven. Allow to cook for about 10 minutes until the tops are brown. Flip over and let cook another 5-7 min until browned on the other side. Enjoy!

 

What's For Dinner? Sunday 5/6

Sunday night for dinner I prepared balsamic Italian chicken legs, spaghetti squash, and Pasta Roni white cheddar shells (made with lactose free milk for the lactose intolerant man of the house). This was a pretty easy meal as I just needed to thaw the chicken legs which went into the freezer marinaded already. They roasted at the same time as the spaghetti squash for a super tasty and easy meal. Even my 5 year old proclaimed that it was the best chicken ever as he ate every ounce of meat off.

Marinade
- 1/2cu balsamic vinegrette
- 2tbsp italian seasoning mix
-3 cloves minced garlic
- 6 chicken legs

Spaghetti Squash
- medium size spaghetti squash
- olive oil
- italian seasoning
- garlic salt
- spaghetti sauce or favorite topping

1. Combine all the marinade ingredients in a quart size zip top bag and add the chicken legs. Squeeze as much air out of the bag as possible. Let marinade at least 2hrs or ideally overnight. You can also do as I did and freeze the chicken with the marinade. Just take it out of the freezer and place in the fridge the night before you want to serve it.

2. Preheat oven to 425* and prepare a large baking sheet. Fit the sheet with a baking rack or crumpled foil to place the chicken onto. This allows air to circulate and the skin to crisp up on all side without the addition of oil.

3. Cut the spaghetti squash in half and scoop out the seeds. Brush the flesh with olive oil and sprinkle with seasonings.

4. Place the baking sheet with chicken and squash into the oven. Bake for 20-25 minutes. You want the squash to be soft enough to pierce with a fork and the juices from the chicken to run clear.

5. Remove the sheet from the oven and use a fork to scrape the flesh from the squash. Top with your favorite sauce or other topping. Enjoy!