Friday, March 12, 2010

Fantastic Chicken Burritos!

Quick, simple, tasty, healthy, and fresh! What more can you ask for? This would be great with beef, pork, fish, or grilled veggies as well ^_^

You will need:
  • flour or corn tortillas, heated over the stove top to soften them up
  • meat, shredded or chopped . . . I did enough for 2 people, 5 small chicken drummers
  • guacamole
  • cheese
  • dob of sour cream
  • great additions: rice, beans, veggies
If want to mix it up, these can be made using a fried or baked corn tortilla to make a tostada; you can also make tacos. 

    Step 1, boil chicken. I seasoned my water with Louisiana chicken wing seasoning


    Step 2, shred or chop your chicken (without the skin)


    Step 3, assemble with your amazing additions . . . I made guacamole to go with, so good!


    It looks a little pathetic rolled up, but then you bite into it and . . .


    Mmmmm, hello gorgeous. So.Tasty.

    Monday, March 8, 2010

    Worn to Work 3/08

    Phew.  Monday is over with! It's so difficult to start another week, especially after a very long and eventful weekend! I have no clue what I'm making for dinner tonight, hopefully something good so I can finally put up a new recipe =) Hubby is playing Bioshock 2 right now, it's such a creepy game. Maybe he'll beat it soon so we can watch a movie. I hope everyone had a more interesting day than mine, I was yawning constantly wishing I was home watching Rachael Ray!

    top, bag, belt & shoes: Target, jeans: H&M, sweater: Aeropostale, long sweater: Tulle, necklace: F21

    I'm really awesome at being a bum as of late. Right now I'm in my pj's and bath robe because I just washed off the icky kid germs. I'm thinking wine and maybe a nice healthy dinner of veggies! Please please please no more frozen pizza!! Have a great night!

    Sunday, March 7, 2010

    Monkey Bread

    This is a simple and delicious treat also known as "pull apart bread." I love this stuff! When my husband and I placed the order for our wedding cake we got a free loaf of monkey bread. It was a small bakery in Point Loma and they wanted to thank us. Ummmmmmm thank you very much for the amazing bread and a cake! I haven't had this since then, so I thought it was time I made some. You can do different versions of this dish. A great way is to chop up walnuts and raisins and layer those in about halfway between the dough and over the top.  I didn't feel like chopping nuts, and I don't have any raisins so I just made the bread plain.

    You will need:
    • Three or four 7.5 ounce cans Albertson's brand (or any other) of home style buttermilk biscuits
    • 1 teaspoon cinnamon
    • 1/2 cup granulated sugar (I use the raw organic cane sugar, it's a little more grainy)
    • 3/4 cup packed brown sugar
    • 1/3 cup butter (or margarine), melted
    If you're using 2 large cans or the Pillsbury cans (16.3 ounces) then you can bump up the brown sugar to 1 cup and the butter to 3/4 but it all depends on the shape of the pan you're using. Generally you would want to use a bundt cake pan, since I don't have one I used a little disposable loaf pan that I got from my neighbor. I thought it would work well since the bread would still be close together and the sugary butter mixture would still be able to cover everything as it cooked. Unfortunately my cake pan would only hold three of the cans, and I probably could have gotten away with two since the bread rises.

    To start off, preheat your oven to 350 F and open up your cans and quarter your individual biscuits. In a bowl (or Ziploc freezer bag, I was out) combine your cinnamon and granulated sugar. If you're using the bag you can just add in all your dough and shake it up, but since I was using a bowl I did mine in small batches filling the pan. 


    Melt your butter and add the brown sugar, stir and cover the bread mixture with the sticky yummy goodness. I kind of poked at the mixture to get it to flow down into the cracks before I popped it in the oven. 


    Bake at 350 for about 30 minutes, or until golden brown and fully cooked through the center. When cool flip over onto a plate, pull apart to eat and enjoy!

    You can see I made too much of the butter and sugar mixture because I was only using three cans and my cake pan was tiny. What I should have done was add a little of the mixture about halfway into piling in the dough, that would have been smart though . . . Also, I do recommend using a bundt pan because I had to flip this over and keep cooking it after the full half hour because it was still doughy and raw in the middle =/


    Flipped onto the plate:



    After my little monkeys had a bite =)

    Sunday Brunch

    Good morning! Or uh, I guess it's afternoon now. Hard to tell when there's no sunshine! I just had to do a quick post about biscuits and share my absolute joy with you guys! Growing up, the best part about the weekends was breakfast. Every once in a while, and especially on Easter morning my mom would make Pillsbury Sweet Orange Rolls. I would die to get my hands on some really miss eating those, but unfortunately they have trans fat in them . . . just like every other Pillsbury roll, biscuit, cookie, or pizza crust. It makes me sad, because I also loved biscuits and gravy when I was younger. While my husband was wandering the aisles in search of what type of corn dogs he wanted to buy (don't even get me started on that) I stood patiently in the butter/cookies/biscuit section, reading labels. I rolled all the cans over so the ingredient label was facing me, and up and down the aisle all I could read was "partially hydrogenated soybean oil." My heart sank. I wanted biscuits so badly, but I don't want to make them myself. I'm not a baker. I don't enjoy it. I just wanted to eat some flippen biscuits. Well, I just about jumped for joy when I finally saw these babies:


    There is no trans fat. I repeat, NO trans fat!!!! I couldn't be happier, I can have store bought biscuits again! The homestyle and the buttermilk of the Albertsons brand biscuits are the only ones in the whole damn aisle that didn't have that horrible man made manufactured artery clogging obesity causing fat. Here's what I made with the can of buttermilk . . .



    The cans are 50 cents each regular price, if they ever go on sale I might buy more than two. I'm planning on making monkey bread with the other can, just a small little one, later on. Stay tuned for that recipe, hopefully it turns out! =D

    Saturday, March 6, 2010

    Rain Rain Go Away

    Sorry for the indoor pictures, it was raining like crazy earlier! Today was very eventful. Movie + breakfast, followed by gift wrapping for the grandparents and then visiting for a while, then visiting the hubby's family and then home for dinner. We watched The Informant today, which was pretty entertaining even though we had the plot figured out from the very beginning. Despite the rain I was still pretty girly, although now I'm sitting here in hideous maroon lounge pants because Bella peed on my black yoga pants. I tried to be nice and cuddle her, and she pees on me. Lucky lucky.

    top: F21, skirt: Shade, cardi & tights: Old Navy, booties & belt & bag: Target, necklace: vintage


    I want pretty outdoorsy pictures *sigh* these will have to do. Have a lovely Sunday everyone! I cant believe I start work for 2 full weeks Monday, this is going to be interesting. These kids might drive me crazy . . . I'll keep you posted.

    Thank you to Rosa for the blog award!! ♥  

    Thursday, March 4, 2010

    Someone's Ears Are Ringing!

    I've always been a bit of a sucker whenever it comes to kitchen gadgets. I needed a dehydrator last summer because I was so set on making my own dried banana chips, which I've done exactly one time =/ When I saw the Vitamix at the fair I just had to have it, and although I've been juicing more lately I haven't used it enough to justify the $300 splurge. What I do use daily are knives, who doesn't? I get jealous watching Foot Network and seeing the expensive awesometacular knives the chefs use. Granted, I am no chef but my Ikea knife sometimes has trouble chopping an onion. I've never thought of splurging on one item, but when it's something I use every day maybe it's better I stop being so cheap.

    Oddly enough, I was contacted by CSN Stores about reviewing a product of theirs. CSN Stores sell everything from bookshelves, to shoes, to children's bunk beds, and even barstools. Hopefully within the next few weeks I'll receive a chefs knife to review. I'm talking a real knife, not something you get from Walmart and never sharpen and pop into the dishwasher when you're done with it. It has a German steel blade and hand-crafted pakka wood handle. I honestly might spend more time drooling over it than using it, but that's okay too ;-)

    Wednesday, March 3, 2010

    BBQ Baked Tofu, Cous Cous, and Steamed Artichoke

    I *love* this recipe! It's incredibly simple to pull together, everything cooks at just about the same time but with enough time in between to prep and it's healthy! GASP! Healthy? I know, about time. Grab a few pots and dishes and lets get cooking!

    You will need:
    • 1/3 cup ketchup
    • 1/6 cup water
    • 2 tablespoons brown sugar
    • 1/2 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
    • 4 teaspoons minced garlic
    • 1 teaspoon yellow mustard
    • 1 1/2 teaspoons smoked paprika (will give it a smokey, cooked for hours kind of flavor)
    • 1 teaspoon Bragg's Liquid Amino's (optional)
    • 1/2 teaspoon onion powder
    • 1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
    • black pepper to taste
    • 1 package of extra firm tofu
    • optional: cous cous and artichoke for a side, or whatever you would like
    Preheat your oven to 425F. Mix all of your ingredients together and stir continually over low heat for 5-10 minutes, or until thickened. I sliced my tofu into 10 equal strips, lightly brushed one side with the sauce, put the tofu into a pan sauce side down, and smothered the top with the remaining sauce. Reserve a tiny bit of sauce, halfway through cooking take the tofu out of the oven and brush with the remaining sauce and continue to cook until firm. Bake at 425 degrees for about 30 minutes, or until firm. If you've never made cous cous, it's incredibly simple. I boiled 1 cup of water, added 1 cup of cous cous, knob of butter, a splash of lemon juice and parsley then you stir it and cover for about 5 minutes. The cous cous absorbs the water and become very dry. You can also add a splash of cream or milk to make it nice and creamy. I've done this recipe before, so I'm going to post the same pictures. Maybe that seems odd, but it was 6 months ago and I don't know if anyone even read it! So, here is what your final product should look like:

    (artichoke was from tonight, the pictures of the tofu are from a previous post)




    I cannot say how delicious this is, and how simple! If you're not a tofu lover you might want to give this a shot, I think you'll be surprised by the flavor. Maybe I'm just partial to my homemade BBQ sauce though ;-)