Super Easy and Very Delicious!

This meal was so easy to make and both Biscuit and I loved it.  Chicken baked in a curry-orange sauce.  The chicken made the whole house smell yummy.  I served this one over plain white rice with a side of steamed broccoli.  Meal took about 45 minutes total, and 30 of that was just the chicken baking!

Here's the recipe:

1 c. orange marmalade
1 T. curry powder
2 t. red pepper flakes
1 t. salt
1/2 cup water
1 lb. boneless, skinless chicken breasts

Preheat over to 350.  Mix first five ingredients together.  Pour over chicken and bake for 30 mins.  Serve over rice.

That's it.  It's that easy to have a delicious home cooked dinner. :D

I love pasta!!

I don't think I ever get tired of good old pasta with meat sauce.  Here's my cheater's way to almost homemade sauce:

Kath's Not Quite Homemade Spaghetti Sauce

3 16 oz. cans Hunt's Tomato Puree (not sauce, the sauce is icky salty)
1 small can tomato paste
1/4 c. red wine
1/2 lb. ground Italian sausage
1/2 lb. ground beef
4 cloves garlic
2 T. balsamic vinegar
1 T. sugar
1 lb. baby bellas
1 small onion
pinch of salt
oregano
basil
marjoram

Brown ground beef and Italian sausage over medium-high heat.  Add garlic and chopped onion, continue to cook for about 5 mins.  Add mushrooms and cook about 2 mins more.  Drain off any grease from the meat.

Add the tomato puree, wine, vinegar, tomato paste, sugar, salt, and spices to taste. Bring to a boil and then let simmer for at least 30 minutes.  Taste and adjust spices as needed.

Serve over the pasta of your choice.  Almost homemade, but faster!

Very Citrus Stir Fry

Because I can't always eat creamy fattening goodness, I'm always on the lookout for healthier recipes for balance.  Biscuit's a big fan of stir fries, so I decided that would be good for a lighter dinner.

I found a recipe for an Orange based stir fry sauce recipe, which had enough diversity in ingredients I felt it would be tasty.  The sauce was to be served over chicken and scallions, but I wanted to incorporate some additional veggies, so I doubled the recipe for the sauce and added broccoli, carrots, mushrooms, and snow peas.  The other change I made was to add a bit more orange juice to the sauce, probably equivalent to the juice of one whole orange for the double batch.

It turned out to be a really flavorful stir fry.  I served this over rice tossed with toasted sesame seeds. There was just the right amount of heat from the red pepper flakes and a nice strong flavor of orange in the sauce.  Fairly quick and easy to make as well, so good for a week night.  We will definitely make this again.

If you are interested in trying the recipe, you'll find it here: Yummy Orange Stir Fry.

Mango - Lime Icebox Pie

I've been trying to do more baking as it's an area of cooking that I'm weakest at.  Biscuit said he was in the mood for a fruit and meringue pie.  Though I've never made any kind of meringue pie, I knew I wanted to do something different than the traditional lemon.

I found a recipe for a Mango/Lime Pie.  I thought I would like this recipe because the Meringue is cooked with hot simple syrup instead of a baked meringue (which I'm not terribly fond of).

The mango/lime custard filling went perfectly.  Remembering my issues with my Boston Cream Pie filling, I made sure I didn't stop stirring for a second.  Perfect consistency.

The Meringue was super simple to make, mostly because my KitchenAide mixer did all the work.

I did cheat and use refrigerated pie crust.  Really, for all the additional work to make pie crust, and the minimal difference in taste, I'm happy to use the Pillsbury crusts.

I have to admit I was disappointed in this pie.  I really was looking for a stronger mango taste, and the lime was really overpowering.  If I had been looking for a lime pie, it would have been fine, but that wasn't what I had in my head.

The pie did come together well enough that I decided to try it again for my parents.  This time I omitted *all* of the lime and substituted more mango nectar.  This was more what I had originally had in mind.  I did run into a little trouble with the custard as my mom's stove heats up far quicker than mine at home and I ended cooking the egg a bit.  Once the pie was put together, you really didn't notice at all.

I'd like to try this recipe again using just orange juice.  Biscuit and I both think that would be delicious.  I'll let you know how it turns out!

If you'd like to see the original recipe you can find it here: Mango-Lime Icebox Pie.  It's a nice base recipe to experiment from at the very least.

Yummy, Yummy Pork

I had some boneless pork chops I needed to use up last night, so I made Chinese Marinated Pork with fried rice for dinner last night.

I let the pork marinate for about 4 hours and then Biscuit grilled it on the charcoal grill.  This was one of the best marinades I've had and we liked this so much I'm probably going to cook it again tomorrow for my parents, though I may substitute chicken for the pork as my Mom isn't the biggest fan of pork chops.

Here's the recipe for the marinade: Oh So Yummy Pork Marinade.  We were out of Hoisin sauce, so I added an extra tablespoon of black bean sauce as well as a tablespoon of Thai sweet chili sauce.  I added one extra tablespoon of soy sauce, as well.  One of the reviewers of this recipe said she thought it lacked flavor, but I strongly disagree.  The marinade was as close to perfect (for my taste anyway) as any I've tried recently.  As a side note, I looked up some of that reviewers other reviews, and the only recipe she liked had TWO TABLESPOONS of cayenne in it.  I think she must have killed her taste buds!

The fried rice was my standard recipe:

2 cups of medium grain rice (better if it's day old)
1/2 onion
garlic (I don't actually measure this, probably 1-2 cloves)
2 eggs
1 cup frozen peas/carrots
olive oil or butter
soy sauce

Scramble eggs and set aside.  Cook the onion and garlic over medium high heat until soft.  Add a little more oil (sesame oil is nice, but olive oil works in a pinch) and add the rice.  Stir fry for about 2 minutes then mix in the frozen peas/carrots.  Cook about two minutes more and add the egg and soy sauce (more or less depending on taste, again I don't measure this).  Mix well and cook until everything is heated, maybe 2 minutes more.  It's a really simple recipe that can be tailored to your individual taste (different veggies, more or less soy, etc).

This was one of the best meals we've had in a while.  I will definitely be making this again!

Late Night Crepes

Growing up, my Mom would sometimes make crepes.  We actually had this gadget called a crepe maker, and I thought I remembered crepes being a big pain to make.  I saw a recipe that looked interesting and decided to give crepes a try.  I didn't even pull out any fancy gadgets.  Just a skillet and a spatula.

Crepes are ridiculously easy to make in a pan.  In fact, I think it's way easier than using that silly crepe maker.  Who would have thought that?  (Well, maybe lots of people, but I'm not one of them)

It was a pretty standard crepe recipe, I made it up in my Magic Bullet Blender and let the batter sit for about 45 minutes so the air bubbles had time to settle.  Cooked the whole batch up in less than 20 minutes.

I stuffed the crepes with Monterey Jack Cheese and corn kernels.  For a heartier meal, you could definitely add chicken to this.  The stuffed crepes cooked in the oven at 350 for about 15 minutes.

I topped these with a Poblano Cream Sauce.  The recipe is here: Crepes and Poblano Cream Sauce.  I had to use Serrano Peppers as my infamously awful Kroger did not have Poblanos.  I read that they were an acceptable substitute, but have since learned that my sauce was probably far spicier heat-wise than if I had used the Poblanos.  I'll definitely hunt them out next time.

Both Biscuit and I loved this recipe.  Spicy, gooey cheese goodness, and a fairly quick meal to boot!