my cluttered kitchen

meal plan 2/3-2/6 - better late than never?

2011-02-03T10:22:00.000-08:00

Well, the last few weeks have been... well, let's just say they've been what I would describe as "hectic". I was going full speed into a winter retreat for the 20-somethings ministry at my church, which was this last weekend. It was two days full of running around in high altitude, winter wardrobe wearing, meetings, rehearsals, giggling... you name it. Fun, mixed with work, mixed with stress.

I hit the ground running when I got home, and have been sort of on "survival mode" for the last couple of days. I'm grateful to be able to say that I'm finally getting a breather today.

Monday we're starting a weight loss challenge with a bunch of family members. Each person can do what they want to lose weight - Adam and I are doing Weight Watchers, which I'm thrilled about. I'm hoping he doesn't notice a huge difference, in that our food will hopefully be delicious enough that he won't miss pizza, beer, and indulgence as much... I guess I hope the same thing for myself!

I thought I would try to create a menu plan for these next few days, and then focus on getting ready for our 12-week challenge. There's a $50 buy-in, and 7 of us participating. $350 is pretty motivating, don't you think?

Breakfasts:

English Muffins

Oatmeal

Fruit & Yogurt

Lunches:

Leftovers

Noodles & Butter

Dinners:

Thursday

Pot Roast

Friday

Wings & Veggies

Saturday

Chicken & Dumplings (Adam's Birthday Dinner!)

Sunday

Game Day! Party food.

this week

2011-01-16T11:04:00.000-08:00

I'm cleaning out the pantry, freezer, and fridge. I've ignored the bloated contents of these areas for far too long. I've also spent more than my fair share this month. So, I'm using what I already have to make my meals this week. Well... almost everything. I still want to get a few things, like onions, milk, butter... stuff like that.

Isn't it amazing what happens when you actually take time to investigate the black hole of your pantry? I mean, I realized just how much I had in there that I just hadn't used yet. For example, I have plenty of beef broth, consumme, and french onion soup. That's just screaming for a good roast with some potatoes and carrots. I also have a bag of frozen tilapia filets. I think I should bread them and fry them up this week. We haven't had fish in a long time!

So, I've plopped these other ingredients into a recipe finder to come up with ideas for my other meals this week.

Monday

Carnitas

Tuesday

Pork Chops & Horseradish Sauce *NEW*

Wednesday

Chicken & Black Bean Taco Salad

Thursday

Meatloaf with Mashed Potatoes & Steamed Broccoli

Friday

Pot Roast with Homemade Rolls

Saturday

Out!!

Sunday

Fish & Chips

meal plan 12/12 - 12/18

2010-12-12T08:22:00.000-08:00

Sunday - party!
Monday - party!
Tuesday - White Chicken Chili
Wednesday - Balsamic Chicken w/ Mushrooms
Thursday - Meatloaf
Friday - Carnitas
Saturday - Chicken Parmesan

meal plan 12/5 - 12/11

2010-12-06T15:37:00.000-08:00

Sunday - late lunch, we ate brownies for dinner!

Monday - Meatloaf & Sauteed Spinach

Tuesday - Roasted Chicken & Veggies

Wednesday - Ham, Au Gratin Potatoes (for lifegroup)

Thursday - Chicken "Philly" Calzones

Friday - Fried Tilapia w/ Ratatouille

Saturday - Grilled Cheese Sandwiches & Soup

pesto chicken

2010-12-01T07:00:00.000-08:00

Made this for dinner last night and paired it with noodles & cheesy garlic white sauce. It was... amazing. And so simple! So fast! My kind of recipe.

Pesto Chicken
Ingredients:
4 chicken breasts (I took two thick breasts and cut them in half - like butterflying, only all the way!)
2 tbsp pesto
4-8 slices prosciutto (I happened to have some, but you could use bacon as well, I'm sure)

Directions:
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Lightly grease a glass baking pan. Trim chicken breasts and pat completely dry. Spread pesto on both sides of each breast. Take 1 slice of prosciutto (or bacon!) and wrap chicken - use more if necessary.

Bake until juices from the chicken are clear and the prosciutto is crispy - about 25 minutes.

Enjoy!

meal plan 11/28-12/4

2010-11-28T19:56:00.000-08:00

This turned out (unexpectedly, I might add) to be a no-shopping week. I use a coupon website to track sales, and this week was a "no list week" according to the site this morning. It wouldn't have been a huge problem, except that I threw out my ads on Wednesday, and the ad wasn't available online. So, I scrambled to see what I had in my pantry, freezer, and fridge and came up with the following menu. Hurray for no shopping!

Sunday - Sweet & Spicy Turkey Sandwiches (can't get enough of these!)
Monday - Turkey Pot Pie
Tuesday - fried chicken breasts with baked squash
Wednesday - pasta salad
Thursday - Meatballs & Rice
Friday - Chicken Pesto Skillet
Saturday - Dirty Rice

something different turkey sandwich

2010-11-27T14:02:00.000-08:00

Looking for something a little different to do with your leftovers? I found the following recipe on allrecipes.com using the ingredient search - my ingredient being turkey. I wanted to find something different to do with my leftovers besides making a Thanksgiving replica plate and zapping it for 2 minutes in the microwave.

Sweet & Spicy Turkey Sandwich
Ingredients:
2 slices of bread - your choice
butter, softened
leftover turkey
1 slice pepper jack cheese
cranberry or other jelly

Directions:
Butter each slice of bread on one side. Place on slice, buttered side down, on a small skillet on medium heat. Arrange turkey evenly over the slice. Layer with pepper jack cheese. I spread the cranberry jelly on the other side of the next slice of bread and topped off the sandwich and grilled it on the skillet. Allow bread to toast, then flip and toast the other side, until the cheese melts. Enjoy!

The original recipe called for strawberry preserves and has you serving it on the side. I'm sure it would be tasty either way, but I happened to have quite a bit of cranberry jelly leftover from Thanksgiving, so I went ahead and used that instead and spread it right on the sandwich. Yum!!

Meal Plan 9/27/10

2010-09-27T13:27:00.000-07:00

Well, Adam and I celebrated our anniversary by eating out at RigaTony's - we had our first date there... although that's been a subject for debate over the years.

Anyways, it was delicious. It ended on a slightly sour note, however, as we unexpectedly launched into talking about money. Oh joy. Money. Again.

It was a conversation which was characterized by the usual frustration, tension, occasional emotional outburst, and mutual feeling of being misunderstood and not listened to. We're still learning all about conflict/resolution. :) Anyways, the reason I'm even sharing this is because we ended it well! Yay us! Or yay God for intervening!

We were able to discuss our food budget, and actually came to some sort of understanding. We've done that in the past, but I realized that I needed to change a few things I was doing. For example, I have a habit of having "Oh NOOOOO!!!!!!!" weeks. Those weeks tend to go something like this:
Monday - I work for 10 hours, and then have no energy to cook. I also forget to throw things in the crock pot in the morning before I leave... soooo pizza.
Tuesday - I used to say that was an automatic eat-out night, so I wouldn't plan to cook. Soooo... pizza.
Wednesday - Lifegroup night. I feed the group. I've been making spaghetti. Adam informed me last night that he was hoping I could find another cheap, easy meal to prepare, since spaghetti's getting a little old.
Thursday - Again, I teach late in the afternoon when most people prepare meals, so it either needs to be a quick 30 minute meal, or a crock pot meal. I forget. Soooo... fast food.
Friday - I can usually cook, but I've been bad about meal planning and shopping, so I end up spending...

And the vicious cycle continues. So, while he approves my general shopping practices now, he has a hard time with the fact that I haven't actually followed through with them. I tend to have really good weeks where I plan, shop, cook, and all is well. Then things fall apart. And, I have no system for these weeks.

Well, I didn't have a system for these weeks. That is, not until LAST NIGHT! (*queue celebration music)

I think my plan is to make sure that I freeze at least one meal a week. That way, I'll have an arsenal of meals to pull out of the freezer when I have an "off" week, or an especially busy week.

I'm sure a lot of you are saying "uh... duh, Jenn" by now. But, it takes me awhile. Not only am I slow when it comes to these types of things, but I also had a baby, and my brain doesn't work anymore.

So, my meal plan for this week is as follows:
Monday - Beef stew (freezer meal) w/ Crusty Bread
Tuesday - Chicken Marsala w/ Steamed Green Beans (fancy shmancy meal that takes 30 minutes)
Wednesday - we're going out... yay for planned "eating out" nights!
Thursday - Orange Chicken (TJ's favorite) w/ Rice. (I picked this meal because not only do I teach until 6pm, but I also have a rehearsal that night at 6:30... so this meal falls under the category of "super easy, and maybe not as cheap as it should be)
Friday - Whole Chicken w/ Potatoes (I'm poaching two chickens, making chicken broth, and then shredding the meat off of one chicken for chicken salad and chicken & rice soup over the weekend... I'll finish the other chicken by roasting it for a few minutes and pressure cooking the potatoes. Yum!)
Saturday - Chicken Salad for lunch, Chicken & Rice soup for dinner
Sunday - date night!!

meal plan 9/10/10

2010-09-09T16:19:00.001-07:00

Shock of the century! I'm blogging about food again. A few things are making my meal planning a bit more complicated than normal; however! I shall press on! My parents are staying with us for a bit, so their meal needs/wants are now a contributing factor to my shopping, and it definitely makes for an interesting meal planning session. :)

My mom is on a special diet at the moment, and I'm on Weight Watchers. Adam and my dad have no restrictions, so... yeah. I also have to plan on breakfast and lunch for my dad and I, and full meal planning for the weekends. Craziness!

Here's my meal plan for this week, starting tomorrow:

Friday - Grilled Chicken (rubbed w/ Dill Butter) & Asparagus

Saturday - Grilled Tilapia (seasoned w/ lemon & pepper) & Salad

Sunday - Stuffed Green Peppers w/ Ground Turkey

Monday - Buffalo Chicken Sandwiches

Tuesday - Chicken Curry & Couscous (sauce from TJ's)

Wednesday - Spaghetti

Thursday - leftovers

My lunches will mainly be Caprese Salads, and my breakfasts are my main course! I make some kind of egg dish with veggies - either a scramble or a frittata. I also have oatmeal w/ sliced almonds, and yogurt w/ fruit or a piece of toast.

So, there it is.

I'm already trying to work on my meal plan for next week, and I'll be posting that, as well as a recipe or two in the next few days. Meal plans, anyone?

ugh! and Chicken Soup/Chili Recipe

2010-08-15T20:22:00.000-07:00

Today has been one of those days - one of those days where you start to contemplate the important things. For example... I was trying to add up what I had spent over the last three days, and it wasn't pretty. So, then I started to think about how easily I lose track of what I spend, and how to remedy that. I also started thinking about budgeting, and numbers, and responsibility, and "fasting" from eating out, buying new things... The train of thought grew to mammoth proportions. Anyways... in all of these thoughts tumbling 'round in my head, one of them had to do with dinner tomorrow evening. I made a meal plan, but I couldn't find it. I could only remember that...

Oh... wait... I just remembered what I was going to make tomorrow. Hurray!!

Anyways, I couldn't remember for awhile, so I came to my blog and was browsing all of my half-finished posts to see if I could recover my plan, and realized that I had neglected this forever. I really do want to get back into the swing of things, so the plan is to start posting recipes & meal plans again, but pictures may not appear for awhile. It's really hard trying to take care of my family, time- & money-wise, work, as well as everything else!! Learning to take great food photos isn't high on the priority list. However, I may just start posting my crappy ones. We'll see.

Sooooo, the recipe.

I made a spin-off of a Chicken Enchilada Soup that I usually make in the winter. I didn't have all of the ingredients necessary to make my usual recipe, so I kinda made this one up. It's a great crock-pot recipe.

Ingredients:

4 chicken breasts
green taco sauce (I used about half a bottle)
1 can whole tomatoes - run through a food processor or blender until mostly smooth
3 green onions, chopped
1 bag frozen corn (or one cob... that's what I had)
cilantro, chopped fine
juice from 1 lime
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp paprika
smidge of chili powder (optional)
salt & pepper (to taste)
1 tsp chicken bouillion

How to:

Poach the chicken breasts by placing in a stock pot and fill with water until the breasts are covered by about 1 inch of water. Season the water with the cumin, paprika, chili powder, salt & pepper. Bring the water to a boil. After you have a rolling boil, turn the heat down to medium-low and simmer for 10 minutes (an occasional bubble of water coming to the surface). After 10 minutes, turn the heat off and cover the pot and allow to sit on burner for another 10 minutes.
When the chicken is done cooking, dice or shred and place in crock pot. Pour about 2 cups of the poaching liquid along with the taco sauce over the chicken. Mix in chicken bouillion and add tomatoes, corn, green onion, & lime juice. Cover and cook on high heat for 1 hour for a brothy soup. Cook on high for 4 hours for more of a chili texture. Add cilantro right before eating, and serve with sour cream and cheese as a garnish.

super fast, super delicious, super healthy!

2010-07-28T14:40:00.000-07:00

1 slice Ezekiel bread

1 tbsp Nutella

1 Strawberry, hulled & sliced very thin

Toast your slice of Ezekiel bread to desired toastiness. :)

Spread the Nutella evenly over the slice. I used an egg slicer that I got from Pampered Chef to slice my strawberry. Arrange the strawberry slices over toast - make it pretty, just for fun. Enjoy!

This is possibly one of the yummiest things I have had in a long time. It's 2 Weight Watchers points, and impossibly decadent. It's packed with protein, fiber, and nutrients. You can substitute the strawberries if you want. Imagine the chocolate covered fruit of your choice and just slice it on top. Bananas, mixed berries, even ultra thin slices of apples would be delicious. Try it! You seriously won't regret it.

New Stuff!!

2010-06-07T18:30:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone!

So, I had a baby. I haven't cooked. I have a new camera that I still haven't taken the time to learn. It's because I had a baby. He's the joy of my life right now, and also the stress!! Being a new mom is almost everything I hoped and was warned it would be.

Tonight I'm making dinner for pretty much the first time since I had him. We've been so blessed by our family and church community with meals that I haven't had to even think about grocery shopping until just today!

I made mushroom risotto and fried up some chicken "marsala style" without the 'shrooms - cause they're in the risotto. :) It tastes really good!! I can't wait for Adam to get home so we can eat it! Although, with the way things have been going, my little peanut will wake up just as I was about to eat. He likes to do that.

Pineapple!

2010-04-10T18:08:00.001-07:00

I'm at the end of my pregnancy. I'm not quite desperate, but I am definitely feeling very done. I am experimenting with inducing my own labor. Probably not the best idea ever, and it probably won't work, but the reason I'm posting about it here is because I took this momentous opportunity to a) practice food photography, b) document that I did, at one time, like pineapple, and c) put something up on my blog. (My last few cooking adventures didn't turn out so well.) :(

Ok, so here's the game plan. Eat this:

in just 2 hours.

And, from another angle:

Not really sure which picture is better. If anyone has feedback, I'd appreciate it! (P.S. These aren't edited at all... I just grabbed what I thought were the best looking out of the bunch.)

So, this is 2 whole pineapples that I've cut up. I'm supposed to eat them in less than 2 hours. I'm about 45 minutes in, and have consummed what I believe is about half this amount already. My mouth hurts. A lot.

I'll make sure to let you know if it worked. :)

kinda crazy!

2010-04-01T21:06:00.001-07:00

Two posts in one day? I'm a little insane. But Adam asked if I was going to post about tonight's dinner, and I thought I would, although there are no pictures.

It was another interesting experience. I made Indian cuisine for the first time ever. I made basmati rice (which I love, and I make often), Naan, and Chicken Tikka Masala. It was delicious, but super spicey. I also fudged on the recipe a little because I was lacking some ingredients.

I simply cooked the rice in my rice cooker. If you don't have one, you don't know what you're missing. It's essential to me, especially when cooking for our weekly college Bible study.

The Naan was a simple bread dough that you prepare like normal - letting it rise for 1 hour, punch down dough, then break off golfball sized lumps and let rise for another 30 minutes. Then you roll them out flat and cook them on the grill. I made 5 simply gorgeous pieces on the grill before I got a little impatient, turned the grill up higher and ended up with three very burnt disks of dough, and a flaming grill. I froze the rest of the dough for later and prayed that none of my smoke alarms would go off! (Seriously, what is my deal with burning bread? Burning everything?? I need help.)

The Masala was made with Tandoori Chicken. I don't have a tandoor (I don't know many that do....), so I just marinated a bunch of chicken thighs and then grilled them. They were so, so good. They looked all beautiful and charred on the outside and were super tender and delicious. The Masala sauce was the tricky part. I didn't have any heavy cream or plain tomato sauce like the recipe called for, so I ended up using regular milk and a little yogurt for thickness, and then 8 ounces of plain spaghetti sauce. :) It worked! I think using the original ingredients called for next time will take care of the "authenticity" factor that seemed to be missing from this attempt. Other than starting the fire on the grill and my spaghetti sauce creation, it was an amazing dinner. And, it probably wasn't bad that it was spicy... I heard that spicy foods bring on labor. :)

Recipes!!!

Indian Naan
submitted by user Mic on allrecipes.com

1 package dry active yeast
1 cup warm water
1/4 cup sugar
3 T milk
1 egg, beaten
2 t salt
4 1/2 cups flour
olive oil
2 t garlic, minced
1/4 cup butter, melted

Dissolve yeast in warm water and let sit for 10 minutes (until frothy).
Stir in sugar, milk, egg, salt, and enough flour to make a soft dough (about 3 1/2 cups for me)
Turn on your favorite song, then knead the dough until the song ends on a lightly floured surface... (doesn't everyone else do that?)
Place dough in a greased bowl, cover with plastic wrap or a damp towel, and let rise until doubled in size (about 1 hour)
Punch down the dough.
Now is the time to knead in the garlic, if you choose. I did, and it was fabulous.
Pinch off small lumps (a little larger than the size of golf balls), roll into balls, and place on a sheet (I lined my cookie sheet with aluminum foil).
Cover with a towel, and let rise until double in size (about 30 minutes)
Heat grill to high heat (about 500-600 degrees on my grill)
At grill side, roll a dough ball out flat into either a circle or a triangle shape. Lightly oil grill, and place dough on the grill. Grill for about 2-3 minutes, until puffy and lightly browned.
Butter the uncooked side, and flip with tongs. Butter the cooked side. Grill for another 2-3 minutes.

You can do several at a time, just be careful with your grill. I'm not a huge griller, so I have challenges... to say the least.

Tandoori Chicken
submitted by user Simmi Gupta on allrecipes.com (with my changes)

2 lbs. chicken (I used boneless, skinless thighs, but you can use chicken breasts), cut into pieces
1 t salt
1 lemon, juiced (or use lemon pepper, like me - I used about 1 T of lemon pepper seasoning)
1 1/4 cups plain yogurt
1/2 onion, finely chopped (or... be lazy like me and use onion powder... about 1 t)
1 clove garlic, minced (again, lazy me used 1 t garlic powder instead)
1 t grated fresh ginger root (ahem... 1/4 t dried ginger)
1 t ground cumin
1 t ground coriander
1 t cayenne pepper

If chicken is not boneless, skinless, remove skins, wash & pat dry with paper towels, then cut into pieces, and place on a shallow dish. I used a plate. Sprinkle with salt & lemon pepper. Set aside.
In a seperate bowl, combine the rest of ingredients until smooth. Spread over chicken pieces - make sure to coat both sides.
Cover tightly with plastic wrap and refridgerate for at least 4 hours, although it's best to marinate them overnight.
Heat a grill up to medium heat (about 400 for my grill)
Grill about 5 minutes on each side, until no longer pink and juices run clear.
At this point, I added the pieces directly to my sauce and simmered for about 20 minutes while I made the Naan.

Chicken Tikka Masala
submitted by user Yakuta on allrecipes.com (with my changes)

1 T butter
1 clove garlic, minced (I found minced garlic in my fridge at this point... can you tell how lazy I was today?)
1 jalepeno pepper, finely chopped (I used a can of chopped jalepeno peppers)
2 t ground cumin
2 t paprika
3 t salt, or to taste (I used 3 t kosher salt... I used kosher salt on the chicken too, actually)
1 8oz. can tomato sauce (or, if you're like me, spaghetti sauce)
1 cup heavy cream (or milk... and yogurt... for fun)

Melt butter. Saute garlic & jalepeno for about 1 minute.
Season with cumin, paprika, and salt
Stir in tomato sauce and heavy cream (ahem... spaghetti sauce and milk!)
Simmer on low heat until the sauce thickens - about 20 minutes (this is when I threw the chicken on the grill)
When the chicken was done, I added it to the sauce and let it continue to simmer on low until everything else was done (or... until the grill caught on fire and I abandoned further pursuit of making Naan).

confession, meal plan, and 3 weeks!!

2010-04-01T12:25:00.000-07:00

We have 3 weeks left. Three. That's it. And my calendar, despite efforts to keep it somewhat clear, is still just as full as ever. I had a doctor appointment today. He measured me. He did a test. He said "You're all baby, aren't ya?". We listened to the heartbeat - it was so strong this time! He also confirmed that Andrew is head down - something I could've easily told him myself with all that pressure down there... kinda like a big bowling ball between the legs. Sounds great, right? :)

I must confess that after my "false labor" scare last week, and with everything that happened with Sam, I kinda let things go food-wise. We ate out a lot... I ate a lot of comfort food... it was bad. My 2 pounds heavier in one week weigh-in today told me as much. Grrr @ stress eating! So, back on track this week.

My basket was wonderful. I loved all the fruit, and the only scary veggie in the bunch was a fennel, which I quickly incorporated into a chicken salad recipe. I can't try it again until next week or the week after because I have no money for chicken this week (*tear!*). I went to Sprouts intending to not buy any meat, and ended up spending almost our whole week's budget on two pork roasts, a beef roast, a bag of red lentils, a bag of popcorn kernels (very, very important, if you ask me), and some yogurt. I saved about $5 for a random ingredient or two I would allow myself over the next week after I completed my meal plan. In the end, though, I don't need to buy a single thing... except, I might purchase some frozen spinach for the lasagna and some extra sour cream.

Ok! Meal plan time!
Thursday - Chicken Tikka Masala with Basmati Rice & Naan
Friday - Lasagna (the same one I've been trying to make for two weeks)
Saturday - Fried Rice
Sunday - Mexican Stuffed Baked Potatoes
Monday - Ground Beef & Lentil Burritos
Tuesday - out
Wednesday - Grilled Pork Loin with Steamed Asparagus & Roasted Sweet Potatoes

goodbye Buddy!

2010-03-29T15:09:00.000-07:00

Well... the saddest day that we've had in a long time arrived. I woke up to find my puppy, Sam, looking absolutely horrible. He just laid there looking up at me instead of giving me his usual "I'm out of control excited to see you" greeting. I called the vet first thing and made a follow up appointment from this last Friday.

He was diagnosed with a heart arrhythmia and prescribed medication. A side effect of his condition and his medication was that he would be nauseated. I couldn't figure out if the medication was keeping his appetite from returning, or if he was just on a decline that he couldn't recover from. When I took him in this morning, he had already lost 3 pounds over the weekend - absolutely heartbreaking. The doctor examined him and basically told us we could either spend thousands of dollars trying to figure out what was wrong with him, or we could do the humane thing and not allow him to starve to death. He was already well on that road.

Adam came all the way down and we both cried over our sweet, sweet Sam. He seriously was the sweetest dog in the world - once you got him to calm down! I used to call him my angel. He protected us from everything, alerted us to all strange events happening around our house, greeted passing police cars and fire trucks with howls, and he was just about the happiest creature alive. The doctor took him away, and we cried even more. I'm still crying!!!

Now we have a few weeks left with just Adam, me, and Kona. We're trying to be extra sweet to her, since she lost her brother... her companion since almost the very beginning of her life. We've had these two since just a few months after we got married. It's so weird not having him around. Well, we'll see how she does adjusting over the next few weeks to him being gone. She and I already went for a walk, and Adam and I have been smothering her with love and attention. She seems to enjoy it, but I definitely think she senses that something isn't the same.

Ok, enough sadness. I'm not going to worry about dinner, my disastrous kitchen, or anything else for that matter. I'm going to cuddle with Kona and cry as much as I want and then try to get back to normal tomorrow!

chicken salad, cameras, and Sam

2010-03-28T08:43:00.000-07:00

Well, I made a really yummy chicken salad recipe yesterday. I'm going to try it again, because I sort of made it up - my first made up recipe! Well, I stole a couple of different existing recipes and threw them together and added / took away a few things... does that count? Anyways, I wasn't 100% thrilled with it, so I'm going to wait to post my recipe and pictures.

To preview it, it was a combination of Tzatziki sauce, and this Chicken & Fennel Salad Sandwich recipe. The sauce was very saucy... which was the main problem, and then I added a few extra things to it that sounded good. So again, I'll post the whole thing soon.

On another note, I won my first contest ever, and I honestly didn't even realize I had entered! I think I didn't totally pay attention because, again, I never win these kinds of things. This was a good win too. :) I won a camera!!! I won a Nikon D5000! I can't wait to play with my new toy, taking pictures of my very delicious (ahem!) food. I recently joined a food bloggers network found here - Food Blog Forum run by Jaden Hair, and I've been having so much fun just browsing the forums and throwing in my two cents here and there - my very inexperienced two cents. I've been eating up all of the photography advice, so it's completely fabulous that I can experiment with my new camera!!

My posting has been a bit slower because I'm at the end of my pregnancy - hopefully. Will it really end? I think it will... I tell myself it will. Also, Adam and I are dealing with our poor black lab, Sam, who we recently found out has a major heart condition. I have a feeling he won't be with us for much longer. It's been pretty sudden... out of the blue! So, we're sad... and excited... and having all kinds of emotional moments.

I do plan to make dinner tonight and take pictures. I must warn you though - my kitchen is a complete disaster. And... I guess that's just going to have to be ok. :)

yay for burned dinners!

2010-03-24T18:00:00.000-07:00

Tonight, I burned my dinner.

*sigh*

Oh well, I'm going to show it to you anyways, because I promised myself I would! Also, a quick update on my budgeting and meal planning! I spent a total of $73 this week, including my Bountiful Basket order, which was $25 - again, for 2 weeks (and more!) worth of organic produce. Pretty snazzy, if you ask me.

I made a BBQ Chicken Pizza that I found here. I did not make my own pizza dough, and I used cheddar cheese instead of mozzarella. Oh also... the plastic bag contains cilantro that I froze. It looks lovely in this picture, but I quickly found out that frozen cilantro is best used when used in something where you won't see it, like guacamole! It smelled fresh and delicious, but looked like... dead, wet leaves. Appetizing. I miraculously found a bag of prepared cilantro in my fridge that I was able to use instead - you can see it in my final picture. It was strategically placed to cover up the really burned spots. :)

Here are most of the lovely ingredients I had on hand! I forgot to take a picture of my dough!

First, I baked the chicken in some BBQ Sauce at 350 for 20 minutes.

While the chicken was baking, I sliced up some red onion...

...and prepared this cookie sheet with a drizzle of olive oil. OH! And! Trader Joe's made me some pizza dough, since I forgot to make mine ahead of time! Wasn't that nice??? I followed the directions and let it sit out for a bit. Then, I spread it out over this oil... which I forgot to take a picture of. Just use your imagination!

I then removed this beautiful cooked chicken from the oven... (isn't it lovely? It smelled soooo good!!)

... and then sliced it lengthwise, and then again to dice the chicken.

I then brushed some more BBQ Sauce on the dough, sprinkled the red onion, cheddar cheese, diced chicken, and MORE BBQ sauce on top. So, so good.

For real... so good. The one mistake I made was to turn my oven to the full 500 degrees recommended. My oven cooks hot, and I was silly. I'm still going to eat it though. I sprinkled some fresh cut cilantro on top, and it doesn't look so bad. :)

I shamelessly copied this recipe, for the most part, and it came out soooo great (besides being burned to death, poor pizza.) I just have to remember to not be so oven-happy next time!

meal plan 3/25/10 - 3/31/10

2010-03-23T14:47:00.000-07:00

Last week I didn't exactly get to my meal plan - at all. Not whatsoever. I wasn't upset about it, but this week it's back on! I am recycling my original meal plan, which is great! Most of my grocery shopping this week will be preparation for future recipes! I'll stock up on some meat that's on sale and freeze more berries. I'm beginning to feel that you can never have too many berries.

Thursday - Lasagna (one large, two small - freezing 2 of them, eating one of the small ones)
Friday - Chicken Curry & Dill dish that I wanted to make last week
Saturday lunch - BBQ Chicken baked potatoes (seriously didn't get to my meal plan at all last week!)
Saturday dinner - out!
Sunday - Chicken Fajitas w/ Guacamole
Monday - Chicken Marsala
Tuesday - out
Wednesday - pizza (I'm out for the evening!!)

Cooking projects for the week:
Thursday - roasted vegetable stock & cauliflower soup (to use up remaining shower stuff!)
Friday - applesauce in the crockpot - yum. I'm hoping I can do my first canning experiment with this one.

2010-03-22T19:48:00.000-07:00

Ok... this may not look like much, but this is the work of a panicked woman who realized that dinner was in peril. It's also a great example of my poor camera skills. But, I am posting this anyways, as my first attempt at posting a step-by-step recipe complete with pictures. This weird looking picture was actually a delicious dinner. It got a thumbs up from my hubby, who said "Dinner smells good!" when he walked in the house. Total triumph!

Here are some of the ingredients.

Tonight's dinner wasn't exactly what I had planned. I ended up throwing a meal together when I realized that the pizza dough recipe I was supposed to make needed at least 24 hours in the fridge.

I had chicken thawing in the sink, no pizza dough, and tons of ingredients. So, I decided to improvise and not cut myself any slack.

My rules for this blog are as follows:

Pictures must be taken during meal prep, cooking, and final product! No matter how terrible they are. :)
I must take pictures for every single meal... even if I never publish them. Again, no matter how bad!
I cannot post recipes until I've tried them, no matter how good they sound.

Ok, so anyways, back to my meal.

I took this plate of flour, garlic salt, pepper, and oregano:

and this chicken, which I patted very dry, and then dredged in the flour mixture, like so:

and then I fried it! Mmmm... fried chicken. Yummy!

Whilst the chicken was frying, I started a pot of water boiling (for noodles) and a sauce pan for the marinara.

I sliced up some mozzarella since I didn't have any shredded, and then realized that I still had tons of leftover cheese slices from my baby shower, so I grabbed some of that too. See that spot on my counter? Nice, eh?

I also decided to eat this cookie bit. It was really, really good.

I then sliced my fried chicken into strips:

And the finished product was my poorly photographed, but delicious tasting fried chicken parmesan meal! Talk about unhealthy.

Hey, even though I've been buying all of this organic stuff, that doesn't mean that I can't enjoy a little fried chicken and starchy pasta every once and awhile!

Recipe:

3 boneless, skinless chicken breasts (trimmed and pounded flat)

1 cup flour

1 tsp garlic powder

2 tsp salt (or more to taste)

1 tsp pepper

vegetable oil

1 lb. uncooked spaghetti noodles

1 jar/can of favorite marinara

1 cup shredded mozzarella or other cheese

1. Start a large pot of water boiling.

2. Mix flour, garlic powder, salt, and pepper in a small bowl or on a plate. Heat a skillet on the stove on medium-high heat. Pat the chicken breasts until very dry. Dredge in flour mixture. Wait until the pan is very hot, and pour in enough vegetable oil until the pan is about 1/4 to 1/2 inch covered. The oil should be very hot. Place each breast in slowly. Cook on each side for about 5 minutes.

3. While chicken is frying, use a sauce pan to heat the marinara sauce on medium heat. When gently bubbling, lower the heat to low and allow it to continue to warm.

4. Cook noodles according to directions on the package.

5. When the chicken is done frying, remove from oil and either slice or cover with tin foil on a plate.

6. Drain noodles, and serve with chicken slices and marinara sauce. Sprinkle cheese on top.