Leftovers for lunch!

Last night we had lemon-herb chicken for dinner, and we had a couple of leftover breasts. Today for lunch I decided to make some rice, saute some mushrooms, shred a leftover breast, and mix it all together. Great lunch! And I've got a lot of leftover!

Sauteing the mushrooms with some olive oil spray

I used pre-sliced baby portobello mushrooms

Rice in the rice cooker, which I added a little extra light olive oil to while cooking

Leftover breast, about to get shredded!

And final product. Delish!

Dinner idea: lemon herb chicken

This was our dinner last night... Lemon-herb chicken, chicken stuffing with chicken gravy, and green beans. Very easy! Just coat the chicken (we used a store-bought mix), fry it up, boil the water and add it to the stuffing mix, and then steam the green beans. Mmm.

Simple snack for kids

This really isn't difficult, and you don't need pictures for it... But this is a blog, so I'm going to include pictures anyway.

My 4 year old loves this snack! It's been a great substitute for what would typically be peanut butter toast, or a peanut butter sandwich. She eats all of this - where with bread, she doesn't eat the crust. I haven't really looked to see if a tortilla is any healthier than a slice or two of bread, but I'm not really worried about it. It's easy, she loves it, and she consumes more of it than she does with bread.

Dirty rice (crock pot)

I was searching for something to make in the crock pot today. I figured if I made something in it, using the Italian sausage I had on hand, I'd be less likely to bake treats and then eat them all LOL. I found this on 365 Days of Slow Cooking, and adjusted it slightly. 

1 pound Italian sausage
3 cups water
1.5 cups uncooked medium grain rice
1.5 cups chopped onion
1 large green bell pepper, finely chopped
1/2 cup finely chopped celery
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp crushed red pepper

Brown sausage in skillet. Drain. Place in slow cooker. Stir in remaining ingredients. Cover and cook on low for 3 hours or until rice is done.

The dish was spicy. It could have used less spice. Perhaps less crushed red pepper. Or milder sausage. It was yummy, but too spicy for children, definitely. I won't even attempt to give it to my 4 year old, but I'll eat it for sure, and I'm sure my brother will appreciate it as well.

This is the Italian sausage I used - generic brand

And this is the rice I used

My helper happens to love bell pepper, and she stole a bite when I was checking the recipe

And this is everything stirred together and ready to cook

Finished product

The best chip dip!

This is the best dip ever. I seriously love it. I came up with it myself, but clearly it is NOT complicated and I KNOW I'm not the first person to ever do it. They're all no-brainer ingredients.
Please forgive the low quality cell phone pictures.

Start with an empty bowl LOL.


And an avocado.


Cut it in half, remove the pit, and scoop out the insides into the bowl.





Empty 1 can of refried beans into the bowl - they don't have to be vegetarian.


Mix the two together.


Take a can of beef chili WITH beans


And mix that in as well.


Take some shredded cheese - I like cheddar best.


Put a couple handfuls on the top of the mixture.


Microwave it as is for 2 minutes.


And you'll end up with some melty goodness.


Mix it all together and voila!


Now just take some good tortilla chips - thick ones are best.


And there ya have it!


Mmm

Funnel Cake mix

My mom knows how much I love funnel cake, so when she was out shopping and saw this (though I'm not sure where), she bought it for me. It took be a while to use it, because I'm not into frying things in oil like that (it scares me, to be honest), but I finally got around to it.

This is the mix kit she got. It took me a couple minutes to find it online, so I'm just using the first source I found for it.

It was easy to use, and it came out yummy. But if I remember correctly (it's been a bit), it gave a time estimate for how long it should take, and it took me longer. Still, I liked it and I would buy it again if I saw it - I wouldn't go out of my way for it unless it were a special occasion. I've also seen better kits while searching, and I think I would prefer to check out one of those. They're the same brand, but they come with the tongs and a little circle mold to keep the size/shape at what it should be.






As you can see, I like to top mine with cinnamon/sugar.

South Carolina Catfish "Stew" (crock pot)

This ended up more of a "stoup"

I found this recipe online, and decided to give it a try. Here it is as I found it:

1. Layer the bottom of the crock pot with bacon
2. Dice up potatoes, add to pot
3. Add 1 can diced tomatoes to pot
4. Cut 2lbs of catfish into squares, add to pot
5. Dice up onions and carrots, add to pot
6. Add 1 can stewed tomatoes to pot
7. Add cayenne pepper to taste

Add ingredients in layers, and do not stir. Cook for several hours and serve over white rice. 

So, first I layered the bottom of the crock pot with thick cut bacon. I wanted to use the whole package, so I ended up with a double layer.


Then I added the "diced" potatoes. I did some by hand, and did some with a cheap chopper thing. It didn't say how much, so I just did one medium sized russet potato. I decided not to peel because I knew the pieces would be small so I didn't think it'd really matter.


Next I added the diced tomatoes.


And the catfish. It says 2 lbs, but I only had 1 lb on hand as this was a last minute idea. I originally had planned to do something else with it. This resulted in it being more of a soup than a stew, due to the liquid to fish ratio.


As we all know, I don't cut onion so on the step where you add carrot and onion, I just did carrot. This also didn't help it with the soup factor, but I don't mind. I like soup


After that came the stewed tomatoes.


For some onion flavor, I decided to add some dried, minced onion.


And then for the cayenne pepper, I probably used 2 or 3 teaspoons I'm not sure. I just eyeballed it. I think it was a good amount. It gives it some heat, but not so much that Kaylyn can't enjoy it.


The recipe said not to stir, so I didn't. I cooked it on low for about 8 hours.

This is it 3 hours in


And here it is all done


I really like it! Next time I'll get a second pound of catfish in there to make it more of a stew, and I'll try those pre-chopped onions so I don't have to deal with it. I haven't actually eaten it yet, I just tried a few bites. I'm not sure if I'll serve it over rice like the recipe suggested, or just eat it as is.

I liked that it didn't create a fishy scent in our house. My dad can't stand that, and he didn't even know what it was cooking because there was literally fish smell coming from it. That might change when using the correct amount of course, but I was relieved that it didn't stink up the house.

Pizza soup (crock pot)

An online mom group that I'm apart of had "pizza soup" as the weekly food challenge. This was my submission.

-5 links of turkey sausage
-1 small green bell pepper
-14.5-ounce can stewed tomatoes
-14.5-ounce can Italian style diced tomatoes
-14.5-ounce can low fat beef broth
-1 container sliced white mushrooms
-half a cup of cut up summer sausage
-1 teaspoon onion flakes
-1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
-1/2 teaspoon "pizza seasoning"
-shredded mozzarella

-I took the sausage out of the casings and then browned them in olive oil in a frying pan, breaking them up into small pieces.
-Cut up the green bell pepper into chunks.
-Put the meat, bell pepper, broth, diced and stewed tomatoes in the crock pot and cooked it on low for 5 hours.
-I added the mushrooms, summer sausage, onion flakes, garlic powder, and pizza seasoning and cooked on low for an additional half hour.
-Once it was done, and cooled to room temperature I put it in the fridge and then today for dinner heated it up and added mozzarella if desired (Kaylyn doesn't like cheese on things so she goes without).

It was mighty yummy. Very much pizza soup. We ate it all up and it's definitely something I'll make again.

Pork stoup (crock pot)

My mom group did "soups and stews" as one of it's food challenges, and this was one of my submissions. I wanted to use up some of the pork I had on hand.

Ingredients (my version):

* 2.25 pounds pork boneless loin, cut in 1-inch pieces
* 3 medium carrots, cut in 1-inch chunks
* half cup chopped onion
* 6 cups fat free chicken broth
* 3 small-medium russet potatoes, diced
* half blue container of sliced white mushrooms
* 1 teaspoon salt
* 1 teaspoon pepper
* 4.5 tablespoons all-purpose flour
* 4.5 tablespoons butter, softened

Preparation:
Mix all ingredients except flour and margarine in a 4 to 6-quart crockpot.

Cover and cook on LOW for 8 hours (or high heat setting 4 hours), or until pork is no longer pink and vegetables are tender.

Combine flour and margarine; stir until smooth. Stir flour mixture, 1 spoonful at a time, into pork mixture until blended.

Cover and cook on high heat setting 30 to 45 minutes longer, stirring occasionally, until thickened.

The way the recipe is originally written, it's supposed to be more of a stew. Less chicken broth. But Kaylyn prefers soups over stews, so I altered the recipe to make it more soupy. She's calling it a "stoup". It was a little bland. It could definitely stand for more salt and more pepper. Probably another spice, but I'm not good with figuring out what to add, I can just say what I'd like more or less with an already included ingredient. Anywho, Kaylyn loved it (though I didn't serve her any mushrooms, as she doesn't like them).

Next time I'm going to include some squash, and more onion.

Crock pot Zuppa Toscana (crock pot)

As part of the "soups and stews" food challenge that my mom group was having, I did this. It's apparently a very popular soup at Olive Garden, though I had never heard of it before a friend posted about it. I found a crock pot version online, and made it.

1lb Italian sausage
2 cans chicken broth
1 cup water
1/4 cup onion
3 large russett potatoes (cubed)
1 clove garlic
1/2 cup bacon bits
1 cup whipping cream
1/2 container of sliced white mushrooms
Kale

Crumble Italian sausage and put in crock pot with chicken broth, garlic, potatoes, onion, and mushrooms and cook on high for 4 hours until potatoes & sausage are cooked. Add bacon bits, whipping cream and cut up kale right before serving.

My mom and I both really liked it. She said it's right up there with my South Carolina Catfish Stew. The Italian sausage could easily be swapped out for different meat and also be good.