Cook. Craft. Enjoy.: Beans, Pasta and Chicken Wings

The birthday party yesterday was a raving success and the girls actually got some sleep so it's all good. Today I took Adrienne to spend her Toys R Us gift card that her friend gave her and tonight I need to wrap the couple of presents I bought her. She wants Panda Express for dinner tomorrow night so I guess that means I won't need to cook dinner. I will, however, make her a cake so hopefully I'll have a good recipe to share.

I'm a little overwhelmed right now with all that's going on with the house -- just thinking about moving all our stuff is daunting and I better get started on it or we won't be out in time. :-) Hopefully this week we can find a house we like in the price range we're willing to pay and I won't have to worry about us being homeless at the end of the summer.

To alleviate my stress today I did some cooking. Earlier in the day I made a fantastic 3 bean salad using up what we had in the house. I know it would look better with kidney beans but the pinto ones had to do. Most recipes call for canned green beans but I substituted steamed fresh ones. Tastes much better I think. All the healthiness of this salad makes it a perfect submission for Sweetnick's ARF/5-a-day. A great way to get us to cook (and eat) healthier. Check out the submissions on Tuesday.

I also made some pasta salad from All Recipes (recipe can be found here) -- it was one on my home page this morning as having a fabulous review. I thought it was a little dry and kind of bland but with some extra seasoning it would be good. The only meat I have in the house right now is chicken wings so I BBQ'd them and then tossed them with hot wing sauce (butter, Frank's hot sauce and some dry ranch seasoning mix). I wasn't in the mood for the chicken wings so I ended up not eating them but this is one of Travis' favorite meals and he ate enough for all of us.

Three-Bean Salad
(courtesy of The American Century Cookbook by Jean Anderson)

1 (15-ounce) can cut green beans (I used 2 cups of fresh steamed green beans)
1 (15-ounce) can cut yellow wax beans or garbanzo beans (I used the garbanzo)
1 (15-ounce) can red kidney beans (I used pinto)
1 small green bell pepper, cored, seeded and finely chopped (omitted)
1 small yellow onion, peeled and finely chopped (I used 1/2 a red onion)
Dressing
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/3 cup white vinegar (I used 1/2 cup)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper

Dump beans into large colander and rinse well under cold running water. Drain well, then place in large bowl (not metal). Add green pepper and onion and mix gently.
Whisk together all dressing ingredients, pour over salad and mix gently.
Cover salad and marinate in refrigerator at least 24 hours. Mix gently once again.
To serve, lift salad with slotted spoon to individual plates.