About Me

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Who am I? Wife. Mother of 2. "Newbie" to fitness. Personal Trainer-in-training. Lover of health. Fitness. Religion. Family. Gluten and refined sugar intolerant. Welcome to my journey. Learn with me.

Wednesday, July 1, 2009

Sticky Fingers like Wingers!

Yummy! Who doesn't like Wingers Original Sauce? I found this recipe on the internet (can't remember where) and we really enjoy it. I like to double my sauce so that we have some to dip the finished chicken in to. This is really great served with a baked potato! Picture courtesy of this site: FAVORITE FAMILY RECIPES

STICKY FINGERS LIKE WINGERS

1/3 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup Worcestershire sauce
1/4 cup ketchup
1 Tbsp. honey
2 tsp. hot sauce (more or less as desired)
2 tsp. apple cider vinegar
12 - 16 oz. box frozen breaded chicken tenders

In a saucepan over low heat, combine all ingredients, except chicken. Warm sauce, stirring occasionally, while you cook the chicken. Prepare chicken as directed on package in the oven. Toss chicken in sauce and remove with a slotted spoon to a cookie sheet sprayed with non-stick cooking spray. Bake in a 350 degree oven for 5 - 7 minutes, or until sauce thickens and becomes sticky.

*Make sure that you use chicken with a crunchy exterior. If you use chicken like chicken nuggets, the breading will just soak up the sauce. It is good to use chicken nugget type chicken if you want to have the sticky fingers on top of a salad.

Saturday, June 20, 2009

Buffalo Chicken Wing Soup

Despite what the title may lead you to believe, this soup does not have chicken wings in it - rather it has chicken with the flavor of buffalo wings. We LOVED it. Like, seriously! My husband is not a big soup fan and we ate this up! Below is my modified recipe. The original recipe only calls for a very small amount of hot sauce but you could hardly taste it and so we really turned up the heat!

BUFFALO CHICKEN WING SOUP

6 cups milk
3 cans condensed cream of chicken soup, undiluted (10 3/4 oz. cans)
3 cups (about 1 lb.) shredded or cubed cooked chicken
1 cup (8 ounces) sour cream
2 cups frozen corn (optional) - I added it for more substance
Hot pepper sauce to taste (we used at least 3-4 Tbsp!)

Combine milk and soups in slow cooker until smooth. Stir in chicken. Cover and cook on Low 3-4 hours. Fiftenn minutes before serving stir in sour cream and hot sauce (and corn if you decided to use it.) Cover and contine cooking just until bubbly.

Makes 8 servings. AT LEAST! If you are cooking for just a few people you will want to cut this recipe down because it makes a full crockpot of soup.

*This is REALLY fantastic with some crumbled tortilla chips and cheese on the top!
*Our favorite hot sauce is the Louisiana hot sauce. It has a slight tang to it instead of being just heat.

Thursday, May 21, 2009

Skillet Enchiladas

It's been a million years! So it seems... Our place has been under construction and so I haven't had real access to a kitchen while we have been staying with my grandparents. I was so excited to get back home and make dinner again! This was a new recipe I tried and we LOVED it! I got this recipe from Real Mom Kitchen - love that site! For a link to the recipe go here.

SKILLET ENCHILADAS
From Real Mom Kitchen

1/2 to 1 pound ground beef (I use the 1 lb)
1/4 cup onion, chopped
1 can (10-3/4 ounces) condensed cream of mushroom soup, undiluted
1 can (10 ounces) enchilada sauce
1/2 cup milk
2 tablespoons canned chopped green chilies
Vegetable oil (I use canola)
8 - 10 corn tortillas
2-1/2 to 3 cups finely shredded cheddar cheese, divided

In a large skillet, cook beef and onion over medium heat until meat is no longer pink; drain.

Stir in the soup, enchilada sauce, milk and chilies. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat; cover and simmer for 20 minutes, stirring occasionally. Meanwhile, in another skillet, heat 1/4 in. of oil. Dip each tortilla in hot oil for 3 seconds on each side or just until limp; drain on paper towels. When meat mixture has simmered for 20 minutes, top each tortilla with 1/4 cup cheese. Roll up and place over beef mixture, spooning some of mixture over the enchiladas and sprinkle with remaining cheese. Cover and cook until heated through and cheese is melted, about 5 minutes.

Yield: 8- 10 enchiladas.

*I use flour tortillas (cut in ½ instead of corn tortillas), ¼ tsp. of cayenne pepper instead of the chopped green chilies, and onion powder instead of chopped onion. :-)

Thursday, April 9, 2009

Sweet & Tangy Chicken

I'll be honest - I wasn't sure if the men I was cooking for were going to like this recipe. But it was SOOO easy and required so few ingredients and such a small amount of my time that I HAD to try it... just to make sure. Plus, I was looking for something easy and healthy to cook. Well, it turned out to be a hit! There wasn't any left of it and there were only 3 of us eating it. It isn't my all time favorite recipe, but it's good and worth keeping around because of the simplicity. I got this recipe here: http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Sweet-and-Tangy-Chicken/Detail.aspx.

SWEET AND TANGY CHICKEN

1 tablespoon butter or margarine
4 skinless, boneless chicken breasts
1 (10.75 ounce) can Campbell's® Condensed Tomato Soup (Regular, 25% Less Sodium or Healthy Request®)
1/4 cup water
1 tablespoon packed brown sugar
1 tablespoon vinegar
Hot cooked regular long-grain white rice

DIRECTIONS
Heat butter in skillet. Add chicken and cook until browned. Add soup, water, sugar and vinegar. Heat to a boil. Cover and cook over low heat 5 minutes or until done. Serve with rice.

*NOTE: I served it over fettucine noodles and it was really good. I also added a little bit of salt, onion, and garlic to my mix.

Wednesday, March 11, 2009

Fallen, and Ham Fried Rice

I have fallen off the face of the earth. Lol - not really. I had a baby girl and have not made ANYTHING that is not already listed on this blog. I will try to get around to being creative again sometime... until then, try this one out!

HAM FRIED RICE

2 C. Water
1 C. Long Grain Rice
¼ tsp. Salt

Bring 2 cups of water to boil in a medium saucepan with a RIGHT-FITTING lid. Stir in rice, and salt. Reduce heat until mixture just simmers; with a fork, stir once. Cover pan and simmer WITHOUT STIRRING OR LIFTING THE LID, ABOUT 20 MIN.

2 slices thick Bacon (3-4 slices regular bacon)
2 Tbsp. Soy Sauce
1 ½ tsp. Garlic Powder
½ Carrot, grated
1/8 Head of Cabbage, shredded
½ C. Chopped Ham
1 egg
1 Green Onion, chopped
½ C. Frozen peas

1. Cut bacon into small pieces. Cook in a large frying pan until browned and completely cooked. DO NOT DRAIN FAT!
2. Add to frying pan ham, grated carrot, shredded cabbage, sliced green onion. Heat ingredients until the cabbage wilts.
3. Scramble the egg and cook with vegetables.
4. Add cooked rice and peas to mixture and stir fry for 2 minutes.
5. Add soy sauce and garlic powder to mixture.

*1 ½ tsp of garlic powder makes it very strong. You can definitely taste the garlic. If you are not such a big fan of garlic, use less. (I like to use 1 tsp.)
*Vegetable fans - I love cabbage so I use ¼ a head of cabbage and it doesn’t make much difference.

Sunday, February 8, 2009

Waffles

I woke up this morning craving waffles and decided that that is what we were going to have for breakfast. I started browsing a lot of different recipes but they all called for buttermilk which I don't happen to keep on hand at all time. I finally found this one and was so encouraged by the reviews and the ease of the recipe that I had to try it. It was fantastic! The picture doesn't really do them justice. I loved the unique flavor of the waffles and probably ate more than I should have. Jake really loved them too. The recipe says it only makes 4 servings, but this recipe could easily fill 4 people. (Unless you have an extra hungry husband. :-)) I made some modifications to the original recipe. My modified recipe is listed below, and here is the original recipe: Waffles.

WAFFLES (WITH NO BUTTERMILK)
From: Allrecipes.com

INGREDIENTS
2 cups all-purpose flour
4 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups milk
6 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 eggs, separated
2 – 3 T sugar
2 – 3 tsp. Vanilla
1 cup fruit (optional)

DIRECTIONS
Preheat waffle iron. In a large mixing bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, sugar and salt. Stir in milk, oil, vanilla and egg yolks until mixture is smooth. (Blend in fruit, if desired.) In a separate bowl, beat egg whites until soft peaks form. Gently fold egg whites into batter.

Spray preheated waffle iron with non-stick cooking spray. Pour mix onto hot waffle iron. Cook until golden; serve hot.

Tuesday, February 3, 2009

Classic Family Chicken Noodle Soup

My dear sweet Jake is SICK! So after work let out I sent him straight back to our room to get in his jammies and to rest while I made a big pot of our classic Chicken Noodle Soup! It's really great tasting and Jake loved it. Hopefully he will be able to get some sleep now and get better! This recipe is really easy and doesn't require very many ingredients!

CHICKEN NOODLE SOUP

1 1/2 lbs. noodles (I just use 16 oz.)
3 chicken breasts
1 package baby carrots
2 cans cream of mushroom soup
3-4 cubes chicken bouillon
Onion powder to taste

Cook chicken breasts in approximately 8 cups water with carrots and shake a bit of onion powder in. Start noodles cooking in a separate pan. Cook until carrots are soft. Take out chicken breasts and carrots but KEEP THE WATER. (Use a strainer on top of the pan). Add chicken bouillon and cream of mushroom soup to "juice." Cut up chicken and carrots to add to soup. Add noodles. Salt and pepper to taste.

*This recipe makes a HUGE pot of soup. If you have less people to feed cut the recipe in half, or even in fourths.