Friday, March 27, 2009

Ectasy Delight Chicken and 'Pookie' pasta

So aptly named by tonight's guinea pigs. :) I love my guinea pigs... really I do. and apparently this gets the approval of the resident people food hating cat Poe.



So for ecstasy delight chicken here's what you'll need. (this was one of those last minute throw things together meals so bare with me)

  • Some variant of General Tsao's sauce
  • Some Variant of Sesame Garlic sauce
  • Balsamic Vinaigrette
  • and Lime Juice you know the kind that comes out of a green plastic lime :)
  • Oh yeah... and chicken, chicken is useful to make chicken.

Now here's what you do.

  • Take your chicken and defrost it (my recipes have been easy lately,and it makes me feel lazy so yeah, i might use 'filler' steps)
  • Mix all the sauces, dressings, and juices in a bowl.
  • Place chicken in some sort of pan one with sides of course
  • Pour mixture over chicken and place in an oven preheated to 355 for 45 minutes to an hour.
there you go...

hmmm still seems pretty short and sweet to me :(

for the 'pookie' pasta (so named for a phrase from the csi plaing in the background) you'll need:

  • Pasta! (i used a tomato spinach tri color pasta.)
  • Milk
  • Flour and Butter
  • Basil, bay leaves, thyme, lemon pepper, and parsley (all my spices are dried and chopped so... use your best judgment)
  • chicken stock
what to do:

  • prepare your pasta
  • make a melt your butter and whisk it with the flour to make a roux, when then stir in the milk to make the base of your sauce.
  • toss in your spices (i eyeballed... i always do i'm so sorry but i probably used about 1/2 tablespoon of each, maybe 1 tablespoon of lemon pepper)
  • Mix the sauce with your drained pasta and if you need to thin the sauce out more use a bit of chicken stock.
plate and enjoy... YUM!

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Best ever Mashed Taters

In my humble opinion that is.

You'll need roughly 2-3 pounds o' taters (I make large quantities) Yukon Golds or something like that works best I suppose.
An 8 oz block of cream cheese, softened
some sour cream
salt
pepper
and butter
oh and a pound of hickory smoked bacon, or whatever bacon your little clogged arteries desire ;)

So, I'm gonna be straight with you all. This is not a 'healthy' recipe i'm pretty sure i felt my heart slow down after eating these delicious spuds, and i even used Light cream cheese and fat free sour cream! ;)

But that's ok, because once in a while, you just oughta let yourself be naughty with a potatoe.

So we're gonna start like you do with EVERY mashed tater recipe i've ever heard and we're going to wash the spuds. Well you are anyways.

After that you have a choice, you can be EVIL and skin the spuds or you can be a beautiful person who let's them stay clothed ;) Me i eat my with their skins.

Cut your potatoes into consistent pieces, usually i just cut mine into eights or fourths depending on the general size of my potatoes. Then i pile all those pieces into a pan, fill it with water until the little guys are JUST covered, sprinkle in some kosher salt and let them boil. While you wait you can... make your entre I guess... or sit and watch the pot even if they do say it won't boil.

When your potatoes are fork tender, I always thought that was a funny way to say "when you can easily stab the potatoe," Drain them of their water and return to the pot (if you use a strainer like I do. I'm still not quite capable enough to strain them straight in the pot. Some people are... those people can come over and strain my potatoes for me next time :) please?

Once you have your delectable little dudes back in the pot mash them up a bit with your mashing tool and add in the entire block of cream cheese, then mash that all together and add in a few dollops of sour cream, salt pepper and butter to taste, and if you desire a bit of milk to help thin it out into a smoother mash.

Now I just remembered what you could be doing while the pot boils! Frying your bacon ^_^ i just took my pound of bacon (pre sliced) and cut them into small little bits. tossed them in a pan and cooked them until they were crispy.

In the end toss the Bacon in, mix it well and enjoy these freaking awesome spuds!

Wednesday, February 4, 2009

I have no ideas as to what to call this one.

So I'm open to suggestions, anyone who's out there... :)

"Untitled" Chicken

I pretty much threw this together and it turned out great :)

you'll need:

Boneless Skinless chicken breasts (however many people are eating make that many ;) )
Vegetable oil (I ran outta olive oil >_> but it tasted good >_<;;)
Italian seasonings, ground pepper, kosher salt
Balsamic Vinaigrette
Crumbs (or smashed ships) of the new Spicy Sweet Doritos

Simply take your chicken breast, brush on some of the oil and vinaigrette, sprinkle with salt pepper and seasonings, and then covered with the crushed Doritos.

Place in a preheated 375 oven and cook for 45 minutes.

Monday, January 26, 2009

Forgot a Recipe!!!

I was looking trying to figure out why my recipe list didn't match up with my 1001 list... and I remembered I forgot to post two of my recipes!!! oh noes!

Both are dealing with Pork Tenderloin though (YUMMY)

First up we have a Roast Tenderloin with Scalloped Taters

For the roast you'll need:

1 lb pork tenderloin
2 tbsp Balsamic vinaigrette dressing
1 tbsp honey

mix the vinaigrette dressing with the honey and then glaze the tenderloin baking in a 425 degree oven for 30-40 minutes. That's all pretty simple hmm? I added other spices into mine, like lemon pepper and kosher salt and all sorta stuffs... but the basic bits are there.

Now for the Scalloped Taters I used a cheap poor mans recipe.

You'll need:
Potatoes (I'd say I had roughly 3 lbs) sliced thin thin thin... I broke out my brand new Mandolin for this recipe (Thank you thank you thank you Mom!)
kraft styled sliced cheese (you can use whatever brand suits you best)
Flour
Pepper
Salt

all your gonna do is arrange a layer of potato slices on the bottom of a baking dish, dust the layer with flour salt and pepper and then top with a few slices of cheese (I used to or three slices usually) and repeat the process until all materials are used up. then pop the entire thing into a pre heated oven (375) for 30 -40 minutes.

the last recipe i learned was Pork Medallion Alfredo:

you'll need:

1lb Pork Tenderloin sliced into 1/2 inch thick slices
1/2 cup cream cheese spread (herb and garlic flavored is recommended)
1/3 cup less sodium chicken broth
1/4 cup balsamic vinaigrette dressing
1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese (yeah that little green tube of goodness)
1 tbsp Lemon juice (i substituted lime juice)
2 tbsp basil (fresh or dried) chopped
Also egg noodles cooked to your satisfaction, enough to feed four (these are four person recipes)

Spray a large nonstick skillet with cooking spray and place it over medium high heat. add meat and cook 2 minutes each side or just until pork begins to brown

Add cream cheese broth balsamic dressing, lemon (lime) juice, and Parmesan cheese and stir until mixture is smooth, cream cheese is melted, and meat is cooked thoroughly.

Sprinkle with basil and toss with egg noodles before serving.

ENJOY :)

Sunday, January 25, 2009

Sweet Citrus Chicken

Pretty damn easy recipe if ya ask me :)

But somewhere i lost an entire unopened box of brown sugar... so i had to break the old box apart for this :( i am saddened and maddened by this fact.

you'll need:
1 lb boneless skinless chicken breasts (This equated to three breasts for me tonight)
1/2 cup Orange Juice
1/4 cupped tightly packed brown sugar
1 cup of hot water
2 tbsp melted butter
1 package of chicken stuffing.

Pre Heat your oven to 400 :)

Now the recipe calls for one to flatten the chicken out by pounding it until it's about a 1/4 inch thick. While i might have gained from this after finding i had no new box of brown sugar... I didn't do this and the chicken tastes fine

Stir the cup of hot water into the stuffing mix until it is just moistened...

Mix the butter sugar and oj together and place the chicken in a baking dish, pouring the oj mix over it.

Top with the stuffing and pop it in the oven for 30 minutes if you flattened the chicken, or about 45 if you didn't.

enjoy... i'm off to go vent some brown sugar loss induced anger XD

Friday, January 23, 2009

SUSHI!

Candy Sushi that is...


No recipe list here just pictures of the lovely result Miss Ashley and I came out with :)



ricecrispy "rice", gummy worm "innards", Swedish "fish", fruit roll up / fruit by the foot 'Nori', and Hazelnut Kahlua 'Soy Sauce'


The Ramune is all natural real-ness though



YUM YUM!

Wednesday, January 14, 2009

Cauliflower Soup

Original Recipe found Via The Pioneer Woman... and I followed her instructions pretty much to the letter... But I guess I'll retype it all anyways >_>

What you'll need to make this Scrumptious bunch oh soupy bliss:

1 stick of butter (divided in half)
1/2 an onion finely diced
1 carrot finely diced
1 celery stalk (or two celery 'hearts') finely diced
1-2 heads of cauliflower chopped roughly(I used two because I'm greedy and I know I'd want lots of little white bites of heaven in my bowl ;) )
2 tbsp fresh (or dried) chopped parsley
2 quarts chicken broth or stock (I used 1 quarts stock and one quarts water because I oopsed when I was at the market >_>)
2 cups milk (whatever percentage you desire)
6 tbsp Flour
1 cup half and half
2-4 tsp salt
1 cup of sour cream

If you don't know how to slice and dice... i can't help you really, But thanks to my lovely assistant and wonderful friend Ashley, my chopping went three times faster than normal!

For the onion: I use the planks sticks and cubes approach usually, not today but it still worked out. if you cut the onion parallel to the cutting surface (or into planks) and then perpendicular (i.e. sticks) and then you just chop straight down (into cubes) you have a finely diced onion! VOI LA!

For the celery: cut each stalk in half and then just dice it into smaller pieces

For carrots: I find cutting the carot in half and each half into half etc until their fairly thin and then chopping is the easiest way for me :)

for the Cauliflower: wash the florets and lop off that stem, and then just whack at it until it's a good size for your tastes. (But be careful, I had little cauliflower escapeess all over my floor by the time I finished and had to sweep... I'm a messy knife user lol)

In a Large Stock pot or Dutch Oven:

Take half that stick of butter and toss it in the pot... Or slide, or place or what have you... and let it melt down. add your onions into the pot (don't toss these i'm sure it'd lead to a mess) and let them cook until they start to turn brown. Add the carrots and celery and allow to cook a few more minutes, roughly 3-5. Finally add in the cauliflower and parsley, stir to coat, cover and cook for 15 minutes.

After 15 minutes pour in your stock (and water if you went my route) bring to a boil and then reduce heat allowing to simmer covered.

IN a MEDIUM sauce pan:

Melt the other half stick of butter. Whisk milk and flour together and then continously whisking slowly add into the saucepan with the melted butter. let simmer a few moments and then take off the heat, adding the half and half in.

Add the cream mixture into the soup, stir, cover and let simmer for 15 - 20 minutes. Add any salt or pepper to taste.

Now to enjoy the soup, place a nice dollop of sour cream in your bowl and ladle one or two spoons of soup into the bowl, stir to mix before adding in however much else soup you feel like enjoying.

EAT AND BE HAPPY!

yum (pictures when i find batteries... again. if there's any left.