Hawaiian Chicken

It's always nice to walk in the door from work and have the wonderful aroma of dinner hit your nose!  It means I don't really have to think about dinner because it's basically ready - I Love IT!!  The greatness of the crock pot! 

4-6 boneless, skinless chicken breasts or thighs
8 oz. pineapple, crushed
16 oz. favorite BBQ sauce

Place chicken in crock pot.  Mix pineapple and BBQ sauce together and pour over chicken.  Put lid on crock pot and set for 3-4 hours on high or 6-8 hours on low.  Once chicken is cooked, using a fork (or two), shred the chicken and let it soak up all that yummy sauce.  You can serve it over rice, on a bun or all by itself!

Recipe adapted from 101 Things To Do With A Slow Cooker by Stephanie Ashcraft and Janet Eyring

**HINT:  My one concern when using the crock pot for chicken is drying it out.  Since I am gone over 8 hours to work, what I usually do is put the chicken in frozen.  Once I come home, I check it and it is usually done, so then I'll turn the crock pot to warm.

Sausage Broccoli Pasta

I think we all love those throw together quick recipes!!  This is one of them!  It's not a rocket-science, thought provoking thing...  It's a what do I have on hand kind-of meal.

1 lb. pasta, (I prefer penne or rigatoni for this recipe.)
1-2 pkgs. smoked beef sausage (the already cooked kind), sliced
16 oz, approx. broccoli florets, fresh or frozen
1 bell pepper (preferably red or orange), chopped
1/4 cup olive oil
Seasoning
Parmesan cheese, shredded

Cook pasta, steam broccoli and cook sausage in frying pan.  Combine all ingredients (except cheese)in bowl and season.  I use the Parmesan Garlic seasoning from Pampered Chef, but you could use lemon-pepper, Italian Seasoning, Herb Seasoning, etc.  I use a generous amount about 1-2 tablespoons. Top with Parmesan cheese.

The great thing about this dish is it can be served warm, room temperature or even cold.
Be creative!  Add other vegetables or use kielbasa sausage, turkey sausage, ground sausage or diced chicken if you want to shake it up!  Try any kind of vinaigrette dressing??  The possibilities are endless!
Enjoy!

Navajo Tacos

Where do I start?  Who doesn't love Navajo Tacos??  You start out with a lovely fried scone, top it with chili or taco meat and then douse it in all kinds of smothered goodness!

I decided to try a new scone recipe.  Don't let this intimidate you!  If you don't want to make your own scones, just use frozen roll dough.  Obviously it will need to thaw, but it works great!

 

Old Fashioned Utah Scones

1 Tbsp. dry active yeast

3/4 cup luke-warm water

1/4 cup sugar

1 beaten egg

1/4 cup shortening

2-1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1-1/2 tsp. salt

vegetable oil/shortening for frying

 Combine water, yeast and sugar in a bowl.  Stir gently, and let sit 10 minutes.

In a separate bowl, combine the flour and salt.  Cut in the shortening.  Mix it together with a fork or pastry mixer.

Add the beaten egg to the yeast mixture.  Add the flour mixture.  Mix thoroughly.  Dough should be very smooth and pliable and only slightly sticky. Cover and let rest 1 hour.

Fill a large pan with 1-1/2 to 2 inches of oil and heat to 350 degrees. Punch down the dough and divide into 10 balls.  Use your fingers to stretch the balls of dough into 1/4 inch thick squares (depending on how thick you like your scones...we like 'em thick).  Place the dough in the oil and fry until golden brown on each side.  Add more oil if needed.

Place fried scones on a paper towel to soak up excess oil.  Serve HOT with butter, honey, cinnamon or powdered sugar, or use for Navajo tacos.

Recipe from Pennies & Pancakes

**NOTE:  I made my scones larger, so it only made 6, but it's all about preference.

The topping for this particular taco is ground turkey seasoned with salt, onion powder, cumin and taco seasoning.  After I browned the turkey and drained it I then added 1 can Rotel and 1 small can of tomato sauce.  I was going to add a can of kidney beans, but didn't have any.  Remember, you could use chili or your favorite taco meat recipe too!

Cherry Limeade cookies

Taylor and I found this recipe on Pinterest.  The blog it's from is Sweet P's Baking Co.

Cherry Limeade Sugar Cookies

3/4 cup unsalted butter softened
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup icing sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 pack cherry Kool-aid ( unsweetened )
2 1/2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt

In stand mixer combine butter and sugars.

Beat until light and fluffy.
Add kool-aid, vanilla and eggs.
Mix well then add flour, baking powder and salt
Mix until all combined.
Divide dough into two 8 x 2 inch logs.
Wrap in plastic and chill for at least one hour.
Preheat oven to 350 F
Line cookie sheet with parchment
Remove cookie logs from refrigerator.
Cut into 1/2 inch slices.
Bake for 10 to 12 minutes
Remove from oven and cool on cookie rack.

Limeade Frosting
1/2 cup unsalted butter
2 1/2 cups icing sugar
1/2 pack lime Kool-aid
3-4 tablespoon milk
maraschino cherries with stems

Beat butter, icing sugar, kool-aid and milk

together until frosting is fluffy. Adding more
milk if needed.

Frost cooled cookies using a piping bag or just spread
frosting on top of cookies. Complete with cherries on top
of each cookie.

Pink sprinkles would be good too.

These cookies were so good!  Tangy, flavorful - they'd be great for a summer get-together!!

 

Couscous

How many of you have tried couscous??  It's a small bead like pasta.  It cooks up really quick and makes for a great side dish or possibly meal.  You can buy it in boxes, flavored or plain.  I have found that either is great!  The other night, again we needed a quick meal, so I cooked up 2 boxes of couscous (Pine Nut Flavor), added some baby spinach, halved some grape tomatoes, sliced some cucumber, crumbled some feta cheese.  Mixed.  Added balsamic vinegar and olive oil and voila!!
The combinations on this are limitless...  You can add any kind of protein (chicken, turkey, sausage, etc.), plus some fruits and/or veggies. 

Green Enchiladas

I don't know about you, but around here I would say Mexican food is definitely a favorite!!  I would even bet that if I made tacos, enchiladas, "Cafe Rio" salad, tostadas, burritos every week there would be no complaints here.  I needed something quick one night, but had no red enchiliada sauce, so we opted for the green version.  Enchiladas are super simple...  Here's our basic enchilada process:

10 flour or corn tortillas (we prefer flour)
1 lb.+ Shredded cheese, options are endless:  pepper jack, cheddar, monterey, colby jack, etc.
1 lrg can enchiliada sauce (red or green)

Warm your tortillas (a few at a time in the microwave, wrapped in a wet paper towel).  Fill with shredded cheese and roll.  Place in greased 9x13 pan.  Once the pan is full pour enchilada sauce over the tortillas.  Top with more cheese.  Bake at 350 degrees for about 30 minutes or until bubbly.