Italian Chicken Crockpot Style

The hubs has been working nights since Thanksgiving which complicates cooking dinner since we now have to eat dinner around 3:30 in the afternoon. That combined with my work schedule has been my excuse for not trying new recipes the past couple of weeks. But this week I'm making up for it with 2 new recipes!

I have Pinterest to thank for this week's inspiration. Seriously, how did we ever come up with new recipes to try and diy crafts to make before Pinterest?

Anyways if you've seen my Pinterest page you've seen the following picture with this recipe:

(Photo Credit: The Girl Who Ate Everything)

Crockpot Italian Chicken

Ingredients:

4 chicken breasts (I used 6 tenderloins)

1 packet dry Zesty Italian dressing

8oz softened cream cheese

2 cans cream of chicken soup

1/2lb bow tie pasta

Cooking Directions:

1. Place chicken in crockpot and cover with Zesty Italian dressing.

2. Over medium heat on the stovetop, combine cream cheese and soup until well blended. Then pour over chicken in crockpot on cook on low for 4 hours.

3. Cook pasta and drain. Serve with garlic toast.

The chicken was so tender it fell apart on the plate so we ended up shredding it and mixing it in with the pasta and sauce. This was really easy to make and quite inexpensive. I think it would have been even better topped with cheese (which is kind of what it looks like in the picture she just doesn't mention it in the recipe?). Because I used chicken tenders instead of chicken breasts we had some extra sauce which is perfect by itself with left over pasta.

So there you have it. An easy, cheap supper (or mid afternoon lunch in our case.) It wasn't amazing, but it was good and we'll probably have it again.

Apple Roasted Chicken

It's only a couple of weeks until Christmas!! Trying to get our taste buds in the holiday mood (without baking cookies!) I pulled out my Lady and Sons Christmas magazine from last year and happened upon the following recipe (actually the original recipe calls for 2x what I have listed, but I was only cooking for 2 people so I reduced the portions).

Apple Roasted Chicken with Herb Vegetables


Ingredients:
1 whole chicken (4-5lb)
3 red delicious apples
4 carrots
1/2 clove garlic
1 tablespoon rosemary
4 springs thyme
2 tablespoons butter
salt and pepper

Cooking Directions:
1. Take one apple and cut in half. Place chicken in cast iron dutch oven and stuff with halved apple, garlic and rosemary. Tie legs together. Rub butter over entire chicken and cover with salt and pepper. Bake in oven at 400 degrees for 30 minutes.

2. Cut carrots into bite size pieces. Core and slice remaining 2 apples. After 30 minutes take the chicken out of the oven and carefully place carrots, apple slices and thyme around the chicken. Return the dish to the oven and continue cooking 30-45 minutes.

I cannot express to you how juicy and delicious this chicken was!! It was literally melt in your mouth goodness.. The carrots were perfectly tender without being mushy. The apples (though not a favorite of the hubs and mine) were pretty yummy but a tad on the mushy side.

This recipe is perfect for the season. It took a little time (not a quick casserole to stick in the oven) but totally worth the investment. I served it alongside mashed potatoes and it made the perfect December dinner for two! I'm thinking that it might also be good to add some sliced potatoes and onion. But that will be for next time.

Cinnamon Sugar Pretzel Bites

Ok, so, I have to admit that I can be some what of an addict when it comes to pretty much any thing cinnamon sugar flavored, especially pretzels!! So of course I was beyond ecstatic when I was wasting my day away on Pinterest and found this recipe for, what else, pretzel bites.

Get off Your Butt and Bake! has great pictures and step by step directions for how she makes her bites. I had to make a little adjustment to her recipe and I unfortunately don't have great lighting and a nice camera. Nevertheless here is what I did to make my very own cinnamon sugar pretzel bites.

Cooking Ingredients:
1 small can refrigerated biscuits
butter
1 cup sugar
1 tablespoon cinnamon

Cooking Directions:
1. Boil a large pot of water to a slow boil. Cut biscuits into quarters. Toss biscuits into water for about 1 minute. Remove pieces with a slotted spoon and place on paper towel for a few seconds to cool.

2. Place cooled pieces on a greased cookie sheet. Bake in oven at 375 for 15 minutes until they are golden brown. In a small dish mix together sugar and cinnamon and set aside.

3. Remove pieces from oven and coat in melted butter. Roll in sugar/cinnamon mixture until completely coated. And you're ready to eat, nice and warm!

I also made the vanilla glaze which was super easy - just mix 1 cup powder sugar with 2 tablespoons milk, 1 tablespoon melted butter and 1 teaspoon vanilla extract.
But, next time I'll leave out the vanilla extract or at least use a lot less because its flavor was too overwhelming.

So there you have it, your very own home made cinnamon sugar pretzel bites! The first couple of bites I could taste the biscuit flavor a little but I was probably just thinking too much about what I was eating. They may not win a taste test against Auntie Annie's, but they'll definitely satisfy my cinnamon sugar appetite. Plus they're easy to make and would be a great party snack!

Cheesy Chicken Spaghetti

It's official, I have had my first fiasco!

I was so excited when I saw this recipe for Cheesy Chicken Spaghetti on Pinterest. I couldn't wait to try it. The pictures looked yummy. The recipe sounded yummy. All roads looked like they headed to yummy. And then I tried it.

It was the most bland thing that I have ever made! And talk about cheese overload. Now I am one that loves cheese, and trust me when I say that this was way too much cheese.

The hubs was a darling and said it wasn't "that bad" and ate his entire plate. Talk about grin and bear it. He's the greatest :).

So, if you see the below picture for cheesy chicken spaghetti floating around Pinterest, don't say I didn't warn ya. Better luck next time.

Chicken n Dumplins

My grandmother loves to cook. I remember when I was growing up, whenever we went over to her house for a visit she always had something boiling on the stove or baking in the oven. She had some interesting concoctions at times, but one of my favorites was always her chicken and dumplings. Thick and creamy, the kind that cooked on the stove for hours before it was finally ready. I can almost taste it just thinking about it!

However, as delectable as it was, it also scarred me for life (ok, so that may be a little dramatic, but it has left a serious impression). Because in spite of what I am sure were her best efforts, there were always chicken bones in it. And for those of you that know me well know that I have a problem dealing with bones. I just can't handle them. Chicken, human, any kind of bone just freaks me out.

That being said, I have always been afraid to try chicken and dumplings and restaurants and other people's homes for fear of finding those nasty little chicken bones that are a result of cooking a whole chicken to put into the chicken and dumplings.

Well, thank you Pinterest and BubbleCrumb for showing me the obvious. Boneless chicken breasts for chicken and dumplings! Plus it uses a crockpot. Yippie!

Crock Pot Chicken and Dumplings

Ingredients:
4-6 BONELESS skinless chicken breasts
2 tablespoons butter
2 cans cream of chicken soup
1 can chicken broth
1 diced onion
1 tablespoon dried paisley
4 grands flaky refrigerator biscuits

Cooking Directions:
1. Place chicken, butter, soup, broth, onion and paisley in crockpot. Cook on high for 4-6 hours.

2.Break chicken into pieces (the chicken should just fall apart). Chop biscuits into pieces and add to crockpot and continue cooking 30 minutes or until done.

(photo credit: BubbleCrumb)

The results? Perfecto! Let's just say the hubs and I ate almost the entire crock pot full. I did, as usual, make a couple of minor changes. I used 6 chicken tenders and only had 1 can of cream of chicken soup on hand. Also instead of 4 flaky biscuits I used a small tube of 6 biscuits and flattened them out to get 9 pieces out of each biscuit. But it still worked out perfectly well. Thank you Pinterest!

Nacho Cheese Chicken Chowder

Back to Better Homes and Gardens' slow cooker recipes for this week's experiment.


Nacho Cheese Chicken Chowder


Ingredients:
1 pound boneless, skinless chicken breasts cut into small pieces (for a change I actually cubed my chicken instead of shredding it)
2 14.5oz cans Mexican stewed tomatoes (if you're not a big tomato fan I would recommend using diced tomatoes instead)
1 can Nacho Cheese soup
1 10oz package frozen kernel corn
shredded Mexican or cheddar cheese to use as a topping


Cooking Directions:
Mix together chicken, tomatoes, soup and corn in slow cooker and cook on low for 4-5 hours. Or if you're in more of a hurry, cook on high for 2.5 hours.

(Photo credit: Better Homes and Gardens)

Super easy right?? It was. However, the taste buds weren't quite as excited. It was okay but nothing special. It was actually quite bland to be totally honest. It needed a little something extra to give it more flavor. Any suggestions??


So, while not being a fiasco, it wasn't quite a success either. Time to wash out the slow cooker and try again next week.

Crockpot Potato Soup

Confession: I'm falling in love with my Crockpot! Lately I've been working the closing shift at my job - which means I don't get home until 10pm. Way too late to make supper, even in this house. Consequently I've been scrounging the internet for tasty Crockpot recipes and I'm loving what I'm finding.

I get Better Homes and Gardens weekly recipe e-mails and this past week's was ALL about my new favorite dish. That's right, tons of new recipes created just for the Crockpot.

There were so many to choose from, I have a strong feeling that I will be returning to the website frequently this season for more meal ideas. But for this week I decided to try the Smashed Potato Soup. I'm a big fan of O'Charley's loaded potato soup so I was curious to see how this home-made creation would compare.

It was delicious! The consistency was a little thick, but that was 100% my fault. I went to work and left it cooking (hence why we all love our Crockpots!) and forgot to tell the hubs to turn it off once he got home. Soo it ended up cooking for a couple of hours too long, making it thicker than planned. But it was still very tasty. Also, I added sour cream and some more cheese (you can never have too much cheese) to my bowl.

It was like eating a loaded baked potato... soup style!

(Photo credit: Better Homes and Gardens)

Smashed Potato Soup

Ingredients:
3 1/2 pounds peeled and sliced potatoes
1/2 cup yellow and/or red sweet peppers chopped
1 1/2 teaspoons garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
4 1/2 cups chicken broth
1/2 cup half and half
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
1/2 cup thinly sliced green onions

Cooking Directions:
1. In slow cooker combine potatoes, peppers, garlic and black pepper. Cover with chicken broth. Cook on low 8-10 hours or on high for 5 hours.
2. Mash potatoes. Stir in half and half, cheese and green onions.


SO EASY and so yummy. But... I had to make the 2 steps into 1 because the hubs was going to be home before me and he likes ready to eat meals. So I added in all of my ingredients at once and let it cook on high for 5 hours and it turned out fine (until it kept cooking another 2 hours on high and all of the liquid cooked out!).

This will definitely be added to the recipe book and used again. and again. and again.

Lasagna with Garlic Toast

The hubs has been petitioning me to make lasagna for supper for weeks now. I kept putting it off. For some reason when I think of cooking lasagna I have visions of laboriously slaving over the hot stove for eons of time. I have made it only a couple of times in the past 18 months we've been married.

But, when he called me from work this morning, asking yet once again for lasagna for supper I had to give in. After all, it is one of my 2 nights off from work, the least I can do is make him a nice hot meal.

So out came my cookbooks as I searched for the easiest and least time consuming lasagna recipe available. I really didn't have to search far because the first place I looked, Taste of Georgia (a Southern Living Hall of Fame-er), held my answer.

I used the Taste of Georgia recipe as a guide and here is what I came up with:

Lasagna

Ingredients:

1 pound ground beef (this was my first time making lasagna with ground beef - I've always used venison)

1 teaspoon garlic salt

1 can Italian diced tomatoes (if you like your sauce a little 'saucier' I would add another can of tomatoes)
1 can tomato paste

lasagna noodles (I used 8)

1 1/2 cartons 15oz ricotta cheese (I only had 1 on hand and it wasn't quite enough)

1 bag mozzarella cheese

parmesan cheese (you know, the kind in the green canister you sprinkle on top of your spaghetti)

Cooking Directions:

1. Brown ground beef with garlic salt and drain. Add in tomatoes and tomato paste.

2. Spray a casserole pan with cooking spray to prevent sticking. Layer meat, noodles, ricotta cheese, mozzarella cheese and parmesan until ingredients are gone.

3. Bake in oven at 350 degrees for 30 minutes.

Three steps. That's all it took. It was so easy. And tasted pretty yummy too. I didn't have quite enough ricotta cheese so the top layer of noodles were a little crunchy. Besides that, I'd say this one was a hit.

In addition, I made some garlic toast. The hubs and I both love garlic Texas Toast, but we all know how horrible that stuff is for you.

Sooo. I had an idea one night to make my own Texas Toast. And it isn't half bad.

Take sliced sandwich bread (we eat whole wheat, but any kind will work) and cover one side in butter. Sprinkle garlic salt over the butter. Toast in the toaster oven at 375 degrees for 5 minutes and you have home made Texas Toast! with way fewer calories and at a much lower cost.


Got a tried and true lasagna recipe that you love? I would love for you to share it with me in the comments below!

Taco Soup

It is officially Fall. The season made for chili, soup and crockpots!


This week I tried Paula Deen's Taco Soup (as seen in "The Lady and Sons, Too"). A great crockpot soup recipe that couldn't be easier to make. The original recipe serves 12-16. Since it's just the hubs and myself, I halved the recipe and we ate off it for several days (it makes a great lunch warmed up the next day!).

Ingredients
2 pounds ground beef
2 cups chopped onion
2 15oz cans pink kidney beans (I'm not a fan of kidney beans so I substituted red beans)
2 15oz cans pinto beans
1 15oz can niblet corn drained
1 14oz can Del Monte Mexican tomatoes
1 14oz can diced tomatoes
1 14oz can Del Monte tomatoes with chilies
2 4oz cans diced green chilies
1 small can black olives drained and sliced (optional - I opted to not include them)
1/2 cup green olives sliced (optional - I opted to not include these too)
1 package taco seasoning
1 package ranch salad dressing mix


corn chips
sour cream
grated cheese
chopped onions


Cooking Directions
1. Brown the ground beef and onions.


2. In crockpot combine ground beef with onions, beans, corn, tomatoes, chilies, olives and seasoning packets. Cook on low for 6 to 8 hours.


3. Serve with corn chips and top with sour cream, cheese and onions if desired.




The consistency was a little more like chili rather than soup, but it was still delicious. It has just the right amount of spice kick for my preference. Perfect for chilly Fall nights. And the most expensive ingredient is the ground beef making for a very inexpensive meal that lasts for days (definitely a plus for those of us cooking on a budget!).

Strawberry Cake - Almost Made from Scratch

One of the hub's favorite desserts is strawberry cake. Plain box cakes just taste, well, too plain. My sister-in-law make a delicious Paula Dean version which requires lots of butter and lots of time. So thank you to Pinterest I found a recipe for a strawberry cake made from a box cake that requires a little more work than mixing and placing in the oven, but requires a lot less time and ingredients than Paula's version.


"Fresh Strawberry Cake With Cream Cheese Icing" from SouthernPlate.com (the website has great step-by-step directions with pictures!)


Ingredients
1 box plain white cake (I went with the 98cent Pillsbury one)
1 cup chopped fresh strawberries
3/4 cup milk
3/4 cup vegetable oil
1 3oz package strawberry gelatin mix
3 eggs
8oz cream cheese at room temperature (icing)
4 tablespoons margarine at room temperature (icing)
3 cups confectioners sugar (icing)


Directions
1. Grease and flower two 8in round baking pans or one 9x13in pan. In a large ziplock bag mash the strawberries and set aside.
2. Beat together cake mix, milk, vegetable oil, eggs and gelatin mix in an electric mixer until smooth. Add in strawberries and juice and mix until well blended. Pour into baking pans and bake in oven at 350 degrees for 25-30 minutes.
3. Allow cake(s) to cool. Mix icing ingredients together with an electric mixer until smooth and creamy. Ice cake and store in refrigerator.


So, confesion. This might have been slightly on the fiasco side. First, I didn't have cake round cake pans (how do I not own cake pans!). But I wanted to have a 2 layer cake so in an effort to improvise for my lack of a cake pans I baked my cake in a 9x13in pan. Once the cake cooled I transferred it to a cooling rack and cut it in the middle creating two rectangle cakes.

The cakes weren't quite ideal. They weren't perfectly level or even. But, once it's in your mouth does it really matter so much what it looks like on the plate? Haha, of course it does.


In spite of the looks, it tasted pretty yummy. Not quite as delicious as Paula Dean's, but way better than a boring ol' out of the box cake without too much extra effort. Oh and the homemade icing definitely beat store bought!

Chicken Pot Pie

We moved into our new house in Denham Springs this week which meant re-stocking the refrigerator. I was basically starting over from scratch so I decided to only buy the basics to get us through the week to help save a little money. Hence, no new exciting recipes this week.


But, I did try a new chicken pot pie recipe. Growing up, chicken pot pie was always one of my favorite meals and I have only cooked it once, maybe twice, since being married (aka the last year and a half). So I turned to Paula Deen and The Lady & Sons Too cookbook for the home made how-to of my tried and true favorite.

"Hurry Up Chicken Pot Pie"
serves 4-6


Ingredients
2 cups cooked chicken breast (I used 6 chicken tenderloins and shredded the meat)
2 hard boiled eggs, sliced (I skipped these because the hubs doesn't like them)
1/2 cup thinly sliced carrots
1/2 cup frozen green peas (I used half a can of green peas)
1 cup chicken broth
one 10 3/4 ounce can cream of chicken soup
Salt and pepper
1 cup Lady and Sons Biscuit Mix (I just used Bisquick)
1 cup milk
1/2 cup (1 stick) melted butter


Cooking Directions
1. Mix chicken, eggs, carrots and peas in casserole dish


2. Mix chicken broth and cream of chicken soup. Mix into the casserole dish and add salt and pepper.


3. Mix biscuit mix and milk and layer over the top of the casserole.


4. Drizzle butter over the topping. (This step is optional and not really necessary in my opinion. I only used 1/2 stick of butter)


5. Bake at 350 degrees for 30-40 minutes, until topping is golden brown.




In our house, you can't really go wrong with Paula Dean. Hubs loved this one so much he asked me to make it again a few days later.

Poppyseed Chicken + Broccoli Casserole

I hope that everyone had a wonderful Labor Day weekend. We traveled back home to Georgia for the long weekend and get to spend some much needed/wanted time with family and friends.


To start this shortened week off on the right foot I decided to try out a new recipe. Pinterest, yet again, provided some inspiration for tonight's supper: "French Chicken Broccoli Supreme" from Get Off Your Butt and Bake!

I tweaked the original a little bit, so bellow is my version and how it turned out.


A bit of warning before I begin. The prep time for this dish... for me, for the first time... was 1 hour. I'm hoping that it only took this long because I was constantly referencing back to the recipe to make sure I was doing it correctly. Or I could just be a very slow cook :)

Ingredients


1 lb chopped broccoli steamed 'til softened
10 chicken tenders boiled and shredded
2 cups shredded mild cheddar cheese
2 sleeves of Ritz crackers
1 and 1/3 sticks of butter
1 tablespoon poppyseeds
1/4 cup corn starch dissolved in 1/2 cup cold water
1/3 cup chicken broth
1/4 teaspoon of each salt and pepper
2 cups milk


Directions


1. Boil and shred chicken and place in a 9x13 inch baking pan
Chop and steam broccoli and place on top of chicken in pan


2. In a saucepan over medium heat, combine 1/3 stick of melted butter with dissolved cornstarch, chicken broth, milk, salt and pepper. Stir continuously as sauce thickens.


4. Once sauce thickens, stir in 1 cup of shredded cheese. Pour sauce over chicken and broccoli. Use 1 cup of cheese to cover the chicken and broccoli.


5. Melt 1 stick of butter and stir in poppyseeds. Crush Ritz crackers into crumbs and spread over the shredded cheese.


6. Bake at 350 degrees for 25 minutes or until the crumbs turn golden brown and the sauce bubbles.




Yet another yummy chicken casserole dish going into the recipe folder! The hubs was less than thrilled with the broccoli (said it took away from the yummy chicken flavor - he really just doesn't like broccoli). However, I liked the idea of having a vegetable in the casserole rather than as a side. Oh well, you win some, you lose some.

Hmm, two chicken recipes in a row... maybe next week I will get a little more adventurous. Maybe.

Chicken Florentine and Cheddar Biscuits

Tonight was the first venture into unknown cooking territory. I originally found these recipes on Pinterest (my newest obsession. are you pinning?). The main dish: chicken florentine bowtie pasta, and the side: cheddar biscuits Red Lobster style.

Chicken Florentine Bowtie Pasta from pickypalate.com

(photo credit: http://picky-palate.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/Chicken-Florentine-Bowtie-Pasta-text-539x700.jpg)

Ingredients

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

1 cup finely chopped white onion

1 clove minced garlic (I cheated here and used garlic powder)

4 cups baby spinach leaves

2 cups cooked shredded chicken

1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

1/4 freshly ground black pepper

2 cups Philadelphia cooking cream (I couldn't find this at the store so I just used store brand heavy whipping cream)

1 pound bowtie pasta

1 1/2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese

Cooking directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. and spray a 9x13in baking pan with non-stick baking spray.

2. Cook pasta according to package directions.

3. Cook oil in a dutch oven/large pot over medium heat. Add in onion and cook 5 minutes until tender. Stir in garlic for 1 minute. Add in spinach leaves and cook 2 minutes until wilted. Stir in chicken, salt and pepper. Slowly add in cream, stirring to combine.

4. Add pasta to mixture. (I also added a handful of cheese at this point).

5. Pour mixture into sprayed baking dish and top with mozzarella cheese. Bake for 20 to 30 minutes until cheese is slightly golden.

Makes 8 servings.

As you can see, I made a few adjustment. It was very tasty. The sauce wasn't very thick and the spinach helped me not feel too guilty eating only a pasta dish for supper.

This one is definitely going into the recipe box for future reference.

Red Lobster Cheddar Biscuits from RasaMalaysia

(photo credit: http://rasamalaysia.com/uploaded_images/biscuits/biscuit.jpg)

Ingredients

2 cups Bisquick mix

2/3 cup milk

1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese

1/4 melted butter

1/4 teaspoon garlic powder

1/4 teaspoon dried parsley

Cooking directions

1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees F.

2. Mix Bisquick, milk, parsley and cheddar cheese into thick batter

3. Spoon the batter onto cookie sheet and bake for 8 to 10 minutes until golden

4. Melt butter and mix with garlic and drizzle over warm biscuits

Makes 12 servings (serving size = 1 biscuit)

These were delicious! Not exactly like the ones from Red Lobster, but they were quick, easy and cheap which is definitely the better thing in my opinion.

So overall tonight's adventure turned out scrumptious.

Newlywed: 1. Kitchen: 0.

Introduction

After being married for only a year and a half I have found myself in a horrible place. I've gotten lazy in the kitchen!

The hubs works hard out in the sun and heat every day, and I'm sure to have a hot meal waitin' on him whenever he walks through the door. The problem is, those meals are becoming more and more predictable. It goes something like this:

hamburger mac and cheese casserole one night

chicken alfredo, usually on Thursday

spaghetti and least one night a week

and grilled chicken with green beans pretty much every other night

Not a bad assortment, I guess, but week after week after week... yeah, it's become a little too predictable and consequently my taste buds are bored. Hence, my new blog here.

I am making a promise to myself to cook - at least - one never before tried recipe a week. I will post them here as a way to keep myself accountable. I'm going to try a variety of cookbooks and some times it will be an entire meal while other times it may just be a dessert.

So stay tuned for what are bound to be some interestingly delectable fiascos from this newlywed's kitchen!