Cook. Craft. Enjoy.

Holidays

I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday (no matter what you celebrate!)  Ours was quiet but nice.  I'm just posting today letting you know I'm working on things behind the scenes and haven't forgotten about this blog.  :) 

As you can see we have a new format plus a new banner that Adrienne made (she did a great job!).  I'm hoping to change the format a little more but for now the CSS frustrates me and I really don't want to be frustrated.

Unfortunately I don't have anything new to share today, but I'm going to leave you with a few links of things I need to try:

• From The Food in my Beard:  Sausage and Broccoli Melt
• From We Are Not Martha: Gingerbread Rolls with Eggnog Glaze
• From A Veggie Venture:  Broccoli, Cauliflower & Dried Cranberry Salad
• From Once Upon a Feast:  Grilled Greek Chicken

I'm also in search of the perfect recipe for a white pizza with broccoli ... anyone know of a good one?

Semi Wordless Wednesday

First, for all those that celebrate, may this holiday be joyous!

We've been busy the past week getting ready for both Hanukkah and Christmas.  Adrienne and I did some baking this past weekend (fudge (in cookie cutter molds), pretzel "cookies", sugar cookies, and chex mix), I made 4 jars of beyond bitter grapefruit marmalade (which I can't give as gifts - ugh, it's really bitter - so I'm going to try to incorporate it into BBQ sauce over the next few weeks), and Adrienne and I have done a little crafting (yeah!).

Sometimes Things Don't Work Out Like We Plan

Last night I was planning on making the pork tenderloin (roasted) with a side of black beans and chorizo, topped with Cotija cheese.  Sounds really good, right?  Well, would have been except I put the black beans in the crock pot, covered them with water, and forgot to turn them on.  When I got back from my errands yesterday I did so to a cold crock pot.  Heavy sigh.  I immediately turned it on to high but by the time dinner rolled around those beans were not ready to be eaten so a quick look around and a Plan B had to be formed.

Not bad for a Plan B, hm?

Cranberry Apple Chicken

My normal way of going grocery shopping has always been make a menu for the week, write down all the ingredients I'll need, go shopping.  Lately, though, I've been short on inspiration so I've been showing up at the grocery store sans list.  It's a little daunting sometimes walking in there and trying to figure out what we're going to have for the next 6 or 7 days, but I think I've been doing ok.  My focus has been figure out what meat is on sale and build our meals from there.

This week I went to Gerrity's and they had chicken breasts (bone and skin), pork tenderloin, and quarter boneless hams on sale.  The ham I'll slice and serve with a mac and cheese I've been meaning to try, tonight is the pork with an interesting side dish, and last night I roasted the chicken breasts and created a cranberry apple sauce to top it.  What a great choice.

The Holiday Season is Upon Us

PPN: Cajun Chicken Pasta

How was your weekend?  Ours was good - Saturday we did some cleaning around the house and yesterday we went to a Christmas tree farm and picked out a tree.  We ended up with a 7 foot tall Frasier - and it's beautiful.  I'll post pictures later this week - promise!

If you've noticed, since I've started blogging again I'm less into trying new recipes from cookbooks than I am from throwing our meals together.  I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing but so far we haven't had a complete disaster.

One of the things the kids really like is Cajun chicken pasta.  I've blogged about the recipe I used to use here, but have since changed things up a bit and I thought I'd share.

Spicy Chicken Sandwich

Liam loves spicy foods.  And when I say loves I mean loves.  He had his palate expander taken out last month and they told him he couldn't eat spicy foods for a few days because it might irritate his mouth and he was crushed.  They told him, he could try it, but don't be surprised if the hot sauce would hurt - well, he tried it, declared it "okay" and ate spicy things anyway.

Whenever we go out to eat he scours the menu for spicy chicken sandwiches - and if he doesn't find them, orders plain chicken and hot sauce on the side.  While I appreciate the fact that he loves them so much, I don't like the fact that when he does eat them they're deep fried and so unhealthy.  In comes my latest brainstorm that came out really good.

A Roast That's Actually A Roast

I'm one of those strange people that love winter.  I was never happy in Las Vegas with its brutal heat and wind - give me a nice Pennsylvania winter anytime.  So it was nice when we woke up yesterday morning to this:

It's our second snowfall of the year (the first was a few days before Halloween!), and I love the beauty of it.  I didn't even mind cleaning off the car when I had to run to the store - though I'm sure that will get old (last year I got to park in the garage - this year not sure that'll happen).   I also love that this time of year brings thoughts of comfort food - and food that you don't mind spending hours cooking.  This week the grocery store had a roast on sale and I decided to tackle it.

Now, my normal way of cooking a roast is in the crockpot.  I've tried several recipes for it but really, none of them I would consider a roast.  You know, that you could slice thin if you were talented enough - the kind that you can slice without it falling into many stringy pieces?  Well, I think I found what I was looking for.

Hey, Jerk!

I've only been to Jamaica once, and since we had an almost 2 year old with us, it wasn't the most memorable of trips.  I wish I could say I remember finding the best jerk chicken and how it tasted but, alas, I can't.  I do remember walking across the street from the hotel and playing miniature golf (or what comprises miniature golf there), does that count?

I am a sucker in the grocery stores for buying new things that catch my eye.  Wegmans is particularly bad for me because they have the coolest things.  (Trader Joe's is bad too ... wish we had one close!)  One of my latest purchases was Busha Browne's Authentic Jerk Seasoning along with Busha Browne's Spicy Jerk Sauce.  In looking over their website, it looks like they have a bunch interesting products I may just have to get my hands on.

PPN: Beef Stroganoff

First, a public service announcement.  I'm off this morning to get my mammogram done - have you had yours done recently?  I know it's not one of anyone's favorite activities, but for you and your family it's probably one of the most important things you can do.  Now go make that appointment!

This week's meals are pretty back to the basics -  I wanted things that were good tasting, but easy enough I didn't need a recipe and could just throw them together.  Sunday night we had tacos - tonight we're having a chicken stir-fry and last night was beef Stroganoff. 

Beef Stroganoff isn't one of those things I think about when I think "quick cooking" - but this came together nicely in about 25 minutes (and yes, that does include the cutting).  The supermarket I went to this week has packages of small diced meat - they market it for stew, but it's really lean and in smaller pieces than what I think of for stew.  I sliced them into either halves or thirds depending upon how thick the slices were and they were a good bite size piece once the Stroganoff was done.

I have to say this photo doesn't make it look appetizing ... I really need to figure out the lighting and camera situation.  Oh, I didn't mention I bought the Nikon L105 camera that Target had on sale on Black Friday - so far I'm happy with it but I'm still learning.  Anyway, I served it with buttered Amish egg noodles (not sure what makes Amish egg noodles better, but that's what the package said - they were on sale and they actually were good), an apple cheddar salad with an apple vinegarette (yes, that's a prepackaged salad, see... quick) and a slice of the bread I had made the other day toasted with a little butter and garlic salt.