Hey, Mom here.  Posting my recipe I made last night that Pops was raving about.  He thought I needed an iron skillet like you guys, so guess what I got for my birthday?  I used it for the first time with this recipe.  It's really easy and healthy too.  I didn't take any pictures of the process, so here is nothing but the plain and simple instructions.

BALSAMIC CHICKEN

1 tsp. olive oil
3/4 cup coarsely chopped onion
4 garlic cloves
2 boneless chicken breasts (I cut mine in half to make 4 smaller pieces)
1 cup sliced green, red or yellow bell peppers or combination of any
1/2 cup sliced mushrooms
1/3 cup balsamic vinegar
1 tsp. Italian seasoning
14 oz. can diced tomatoes, undrained

Heat the olive oil in a skillet (I used iron, of course) over medium high heat. Add onion and garlic, saute 3 minutes.  Add chicken, cook 4 minutes on each side or until browned.  Add peppers, mushrooms, vinegar, tomatoes and Italian seasoning.  Reduce heat to medium-low, cook 20 minutes or until chicken is done.  Serve over cooked rice.

I had some marinated artichoke hearts leftover in the fridge and threw those in with the mixture too. 

Try it.  Let me know how you like it.

better part of waking up...

Tired of the daily cereal grind? Set that alarm clock 10 mins earlier, lay off the snooze button and mix in some bacon and eggs.

I delayed this for weeks thinking I didn't have time to squeeze it into the morning routine. But when the bacon starts looking questionable you make time to avoid tossing it out.

Easy system. I'm weird and I'm 83% sure I don't really like scrambled eggs. So I typically hard boil them when it's up to me. So wake up, throw 2-8 in a pot (pending protein necessary to take on the day), bring to a boil, remove from heat, hop in the shower.

 

Post shower, throw some slabs onto you fancy bacon cooking sheet that Mom got you and wave for about 1 min per slice. (Hint: undercook can be fixed. Chargrilled cannot.)

 

Throw on the wrinkle free slacks, tuck in the tee, crack off the shells and you have breakfast. Nice glass of O.J. really completes nutrient trifecta.

 

Fast Fact Friday

One out of four Americans eats fast food every day. 

Oh, no surprise... 60% of us are considered overweight or obese. 

Learn to cook peeps. Steam you some veggies. Make you a fruit salad.

[source: http://blog.partnersforyourhealth.com/Blog/bid/85971/Shocking-Fast-Food-Statistics-You-Should-Know]

The Professional

Amatuer hour is over. Brought in the big guns this weekend to show me how its done, and a quick guest blog.

MAMA! says -

Pops and I had the pleasure of helping Alex move into his new apartment in Atlanta where he will also be starting his “big boy” job soon as a Structural Engineer. And we all say YAY! As everyone knows, moving can work up quite an appetite and can also leave you with food in the pantry and refrigerator that you don’t know what to do with. My mama always taught me never to be wasteful and boy has that stuck with me. Because of that, I love to see what I can throw together with things on hand. So, that was my mission…to use up the leftovers. And this is easy to do, especially with pasta. Really. Read on and see what I came up with.

First of all, here are all the ingredients I used.

I cut up 3 chicken breasts that were left in the freezer.

I sliced a green pepper and cut grape tomatoes in half. I must confess these items I picked up at the grocery store.

Then, I began cooking the chicken in some olive oil and garlic in a skillet and sprinkled some oregano for seasoning.

I added the green pepper. Onion, mushrooms, or zucchini would be good to add here too, BUT those I didn’t have.

Then I added a jar of leftover vodka pasta sauce and simmered about 10 minutes.

Just before serving I threw in the sliced tomatoes. You do not want those to cook to mush.

During this time, I was cooking the pasta so it would be done at the same time. Timing of everything getting done at the same time may be challenging for some. All I can say is practice makes perfect.  
 

I wanted a salad and threw together something easy and delicious using a salad kit I found on “Manager Special” at Kroger’s, my “go to” store. Since I love a good bargain, finding those stickers always brings me great joy. I added fresh strawberries and blueberries to the spinach kit, which makes for a very healthy and yummy side to the pasta.   

Voila! Here is the finished meal ready to eat after a long day of moving in “hotlanta”. I grated some fresh parmesan on top of the pasta that was left from the fridge too. I have a garden at home and the cucumbers are plentiful right now and I share them with everyone I see, including Alex. As another side, I sliced and marinated a cucumber in red wine vinegar and sugar, which is something I learned from my mama growing up when we had a bounty of garden cucumbers. You can use regular vinegar too, but since I found the other in the pantry, well then, that’s what we used.      

 

Hey friends and family, Alex would love visitors at his new Atlanta apartment. I bet he would whip up something yummy for you in the kitchen too.

 

 

MAMA's performance: A+

She wins, she always does!

Dog Days

Getting into the dog days of summer. It may not be exciting & certainly doesn't make Mom proud but its quick, delicious and on budget. (Yes. That is bread instead of buns. So I forgot to buy buns. Everyone makes mistakes!!)

Personal performance: A

Great 'wave dogs are great

How not to Stir Fry

You would think stir fry would be easy and would be good every time. Well I figured out the trick to screwing it up. Fact #1. Thin sliced chicken does not need to be cooked in a crock pot. It's thin, it's a quick cook, 6 hours in a crock pot renders that nice dry, leftover, reheated chicken taste no buddy loves. Fact #2. If at first you don't use enough seasoning / Worcestershire sauce, soaking it does not make it better. Fact #3. Brown rice with assorted veggies boil in a bag + steamed broccoli can in fact disappoint. An all around lack luster effort.

Personal performance: D-

:(

Fast Fact Friday

Fast Fact Friday makes it's triumphant return!

The chances of getting a double yoaked egg is 0.1%

 

 

I WIN! right?