Yesterday I received some great news. My cousin and his wife will be having a baby ;o) I am very excited for them! Congratulations Jay and Sara !
Monthly Archives: February 2012
Skillet Cheesy Chicken and Rice
Today I pulled out my recipe book to find out what I was going to cook for dinner! I got really excited because we chose to do a standing rib roast. That idea did not last long when I told Don to look up the current price for the meat. To say the least, we will keep the standing rib roast up the the folks for Christmas time.
As I threw that recipe back into the book, a small little paper fell out. It was literally tiny – appx 2in x 2 in ( if that ). It was a Campbell’s recipe for Skillet Cheesy Chicken and Rice . It was perfect for a picky eater. Chicken..CHECK… Cheese..CHECK..Rice…CHECK!! All I needed to do was omit the veggies and add them on the side for myself.
(Picture courtesy of Campbell’s Kitchen)
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 1/4 pounds skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
1 can (10 3/4 ounces) Campbell’s® Condensed Cream of Chicken Soup (Regular or 98% Fat Free)
1 1/2 cups water
1/2 teaspoon onion powder
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 cup uncooked regular long-grain white rice
2 cups frozen mixed vegetables
1/2 cup shredded Cheddar cheese.. We used slightly more. HUGE CHEESE FANS HERE !
- Heat the oil in a 12-inch skillet over medium-high heat. Add the chicken and cook for 10 minutes or until well browned on both sides. Remove the chicken from the skillet.
- Stir the soup, water, onion powder, black pepper and rice in the skillet and heat to a boil. Reduce the heat to low. Cover and cook for 15 minutes, stirring once halfway through the cooking time. I noticed during the rice cooking, a lot of water evaporated leaving the rice undercooked. I simply pulled out some beef broth I had in the fridge and kept adding as much as I needed till the rice was fully cooked.
- Stir in the vegetables. Return the chicken to the skillet. Sprinkle with the cheese. Cover and cook for 5 minutes or until the chicken is cooked through and the rice is tender.
I really enjoyed this chicken dish and will be enjoying it again in the future. I hope you and your family do also !
Off to watch The Oscars !
Chex Funfetti Cake Batter Buddies
We have been doing really well with keeping sweets out of the house. . . until I came across this sweet treat. I am a sucker for anything that taste like cake batter & don loves funfetti cake ! I had to make this!
I will admit this is my second attempt at making it and it still isn’t perfect. My mistake the first time was because I tried substituting butter instead of the shortening… WRONG ! The butter completely reversed the melting process and made the chocolate firm like icing . I did not realize this until I did it for the second time however, I was able to get some of the white chocolate onto the chex mix before it began to firm up. We threw out the remaining amount of white chocolate 
bummer…
Don quickly remembered we had some milk chocolate in the pantry from our neighbor ( Thanks Mara ) … We melted it… NOOO BUTTTER this time. . . and poured over the chex mix….
The dry ingredients ( funfetti cake batter and confectioners sugar ) were mixed together and then mixed in to coat the chex mix.
The treat is still delicious even though we had to use the milk chocolate !!! Need an easy, very quick treat to make? This is one I would recommend. I quickly learned you could take someones recipe and make it your own .
RECIPE BELOW :
Ingredients:
5 cups Chex cereal
10 oz (5 squares) vanilla flavored Almond Bark
1 1/2 cups Funfetti cake mix
1/2 cup powdered sugar
1 tsp vegetable shortening
Directions:
1. Melt Almond Bark according to the package directions, adding vegetable shortening to thin (I heard that you can make it without the shortening, but it worked great for me to use it).
2. Pour the cereal into a large bowl and drizzle the melted Almond Bark over the cereal. Mix gently with a large spoon or spatula.
3. Dump the cake mix and powdered sugar onto the cereal and mix gently with large spoon until all the cereal is evenly coated.
Spoiled Floridians
Tonight Don and I decided to go grab dinner at a place with a nice outdoor dining area with televisions to watch this NBA Allstar nonsense ;0) It donned on me when it started to get a little chilly out ( 50 – 60ish degrees) how spoiled us floridians are!
As I pulled up my coat onto my shoulders the waitress asked us and the fellow diners wether we would like the heater turned on. Without a second to rethink, the heaters were turned on. I was thankful !
Most people in the northern regions think we are crazy and probably not thankful for this weather…as I wear flip flops and a short sleeve shirt in February!
Yes, i ll admit i am a spoiled floridian I am extremely thankful for this ‘cooler’ weather and not the 100+ degrees that is right around the corner.
It’s extremely nice to be able to sit outdoors and enjoy the weather ( with a little heat) in February ! Last year this time, I can assure you the temperatures were not this warm to enjoy !
I am happy to live in Florida !
Thankful Thursday
I am incredibly thankful that tomorrow is FRIDAY ! The past few days have been very hard at work! I don’t know what it is but my patients have been so hard … No cleaning in 5 years, smokers Lungs, alcohol breath, periodontal disease and TONS of bleeding ! This makes my job incredibly hard and stressful ! Today I was working on a patient and the calculus ( aka tartar to the public) was tough and very deep under the gums . After a patient like this, I am exhausted! I could have brought the patient back for a second cleaning but I didnt . . . The cleaning was so tough I broke and instrument as
I was cleaning ! Aghh… My heart started beating very quickly … I probably went into A-fib … It happens .. Just so happens it was my first time experiencing it .. Not uncommon especially with older instruments ! My patient quickly laughed and said ” I must be given you a work out ” …
Thank God Tomorrow is Friday!
Cook the Cover
This months Bon Appetit featured one of the most well known southern dishes we all know. So well known it made the front cover. . . good ole’ fried chicken. I can surely tell you if there is one debate in the south, its whose mom made the best fried chicken. I can only recall my mother making fried chicken once in my life time, but its probably due to the fact her momma made better fried chicken :0)
I knew Don was going to get excited the minute I told him I was going to attempt to make HOMEMADE fried chicken. TO be honest with you, the closer the cooking day came… the more nervous I got. So what if I burnt the chicken or under cooked it… We could throw it out and order in pizza BUT cooking in the skillet with oil at 350 degrees in my new home was what made me nervous. I have always been terribly nervous cooking with hot oil or grease.
According to the recipe ( Perfect Skillet Fried Chicken), We needed to start the cooking process the night before . We rushed to publix and picked up a whole chicken and the ingredients we did not have in the house. I cheated due to our time crunch and had them cut my chicken for me. We got home and I rubbed that little bird down with salt, pepper, paprika, cayenne pepper, garlic powder and onion powder ( click link above for exact amounts).
Sunday night came around we took the chicken out of the fridge until it came to room temperature. I made the dredge out of buttermilk, egg, and water. Flour, cornstarch, salt and pepper were mixed together to create everyone’s favorite part of the chicken – the crunch.
It was time to put the oil on the stove…duh duh duuuhhhhhhh ( The part I had been dreading all afternoon). After heating it for a few minutes, Don checked the heat with the thermometer. As he did that, the oil began to sizzle and pop. I totally freaked out and without a second thought I pulled out the fry daddy and used that instead. I felt a lot better doing it in the closed frier !
Each piece took about 10-12 minutes depending on which part of the chicken was being fried. It turned out delicious ! I will definitely pull this recipe out again when I need a southern comfort food! Don has mentioned several times already he wants me to try this rub on chicken fingers!!!
Hope you enjoy making this as much as we did ! Happy Monday !
Backyard Project #2
Its a whopping 75 degrees here in Orlando so we decided to continue working in the backyard. Thanks to our American Express points we cashed them in for a home depot gift card. We used them to buy plants and soil to continue our landscaping.
The picture above is before we started the second part of our landscaping. Notice all the rocks and pavers along the back fence. I am so sick of rock I want it out of my sight for a very long time. I almost paid a neighborhood kid to pick them up for us.
These pictures aren’t the best however you get the idea. We planted podocarpus along the fence line. The goal is to have them grow up the fence to hide the neighbors back yard junk !!! They are supposed to grow very quick. Tomorrow we plan to lay mulch around the bushes !
Thankfully Dons parents came over to help us ! I was very grateful for that !
Next Project : Pick up more rock and pavers. Lay sod.
Tomorrow I am trying TWO new recipes for dinner. Will post results!
An Unexpected Positive !!!!
Almost one year ago I moved to Orlando due to a job shortage in Tallahassee. Instead of renting an apartment, Don’s parents offered for us to live with them until we arrange something different. March 5, 2011 we moved into his parents house. We were very grateful for this because it allowed us to find employment, save some money and find a home.
During this time I was not my usual, fun, outgoing self. I left ALL of my friends and family back home. One of my close friends, who coincidentally moved to Orlando at the same time, ended up moving to Jacksonville on endeavors of her own. I was then left with Don, myself, and very few of Dons high school buddies I met when visiting his parents on holidays or vacations. They are great!
Late July, We found the perfect home for ourselves and our four-legged friend, Lola! This home actually had been put on the market for ONE day. Two days later, we had a contract on the home and we were moving in a few weeks out. We moved in, painted (still not fully finished), decorated and made it our own.
The first night we stayed at our place, I ended the afternoon with a nice swim in the pool. Unexpectedly 4 people walk out the back door with Don. They were some of our neighbors. I could only think to myself, ” Woah, They are our age and live next door? ” They brought a few bottles of wine as welcome gifts. I knew we were going to get along JUSTTTTTT fine!
Since then, We have become great friends with five of our neighbors. We have block parties, celebrate birthday parties, end a horrible day with a glass bottle of wine, or simply have a relaxing night watching a movie.
God does watch over us. Even at weak moments we must realize there is a purpose for things done, feelings felt or things said.
My AMAZING neighbors were an unexpected positive in my life and I am so happy they are here in my life! To make it even better, they all have four-legged friends to play (except one… they do have four extra legs,,, however,,, those four legs belong to 2 children)
Last Minute Chicken
Monday … Monday…Monday …
My day acutally started off pretty darn well for a Monday morning..except how chilly it was ! By the time I started cleaning my second patients teeth my stomach started to growl. Naturally I began to think of food.. thinking of food made me think of what I was going to cook for dinner!
Shoot….I completely forgot to take something out of the freezer to defrost ! Ahhhh – not to panic! I remembered this delish BBQ Crock pot chicken I came across on one of the blogs I follow.
(Picture Courtesy of Stick A Fork In It)
As soon as I finished with my patient, I scrambled for my phone to email Don the recipe.
4-6 pieces boneless skinless chicken breasts (i threw them in frozen… even easier!)
1 bottle BBQ sauce (sweet baby ray’s all the way!)
1/4 c vinegar
1 tsp. red pepper flakes
1/4 c brown sugar
1/2 – 1 tsp. garlic powder
mix BBQ sauce with all ingredients listed under it. place chicken in crockpot. pour sauce over it and cook on LOW for 4-6 hours. you pretty much don’t even have to stir it… how easy is that!? !!!!!
All I did when I got home was make rice to go along with it!
Whew… Saved by a blog :0)
Seriously Shedding
A few days ago I began to realize Lola was beginning to shed REALLY bad . . . I woke up this morning and said to Don, “Lola needs to be furminated today.”
I met a few girl friends out for brunch this morning at cheesecake factory … ( we actually all ate pretttttttty healthy ) and while I was there don sent me this picture
My reply — ” WOAH ”
I am glad he did that while I was out of the house . My allergies are already bothering me as it is 
Sadly… Tomorrow is Monday..
