Vidalia Onion Chicken with cracker coating

This was a fantastic recipe! The picture doesn't really do it justice I don't think. It was a recipe that I created after we got home late one night from running errands, going to the gym etc. It was the first time I think I've ever breaded chicken with something. As you can see a few spots got a little darker than others, but overall it was delicious. The crackers gave it a nice crunchy coating while the vidalia dressing gives it a smooth flavor. The green beans on the side were a perfect companion.

Ingredients (everything is approximate. I used what I had available)

Chicken Breasts, I used 4, two for each of us

1 cup of Tastefully Simple's Vidalia Onion dressing

4oz of crushed Cheese It Up crisps (also from Tastefully Simple)

Sprinkling of parmesan cheese

Dip each chicken breast in the vidalia onion dressing, then coat it with the cracker crumbs. Place the chicken on a baking sheet sprayed with PAM. Bake at 400 for about 30minutes or until chicken is cooked through. Right after taking them out of the oven, sprinkle with parmesan cheese.

Serve immediately.

No Bake Key Lime Cheesecake

It's not the greatest picture, but the taste will definitely make up for it, I promise. I followed this Tastefully Simple recipe. The cheesecake was light, refreshing and a perfect dessert for a weeknight meal. It took no time at all to prepare, and was a hit with both my Husband and myself. I forsee this one a lot this Summer at potlucks and Birthday Parties!

Ingredients
1 Tastefully Simple Key Lime Cheeseball Mix
8oz softened cream cheese
8oz tub of thawed cool whip
1 prepared graham cracker crust

Combine the cheeseball mix and the cream cheese, make sure to blend it well. Fold in the cool whip. Spoon the mixture into the graham cracker crust. Chill for 2hours. Garnish with the crumbs from pkg 2 of the key lime cheeseball mix. Makes approximately 6 servings.

**If you use a fat free whipped topping, and a fat free cream cheese, the approximate points values for one slice (6 slices per pie) would 5pts. If you use full fat cream cheese and full fat whipped topping the approximate points value is 10pts per slice**

Crockpot Orange Chicken turned ugly...

This wasn't a succesful recipe, as you can see.  Which is very unfortunate because my Husband and I love Chinese food, and I was excited to find a recipe for one of our favorites! I saw it on this blog originally. Doesn't her picture look much, much better than mine? Yikes. I was so sad to let such a tasty entree go to waste! What happened was, we were gone much longer than I thought we would be and so our lovely orange chicken dinner, shriveled up and burnt. So, so sad.

(eww... just think how fun it was to clean this up!)

This one is definitely on our list to make again, we'll just need to make sure we're home in time!

Ingredients

1.5lbs of boneless, skinless chicken breast cut into chunks

1/2 cup flour

olive oil for browning the chicken

1.5 tsps salt

6 ounces orange juice concentrate w/ no pulp, thawed

3 tblsp brown sugar

1 tblsp balsamic vinegar (I omitted because I didn't have any)

3 tblsp ketchup

Use a 4qt slow cooker for best results (this may have been part of my problem too,I was using a large slow cooker). Dredge the chicken in the flour, shake off the excess. When you're done dredging the chicken, throw away the remaining flour, you don't need it for anything else. Heat the olive oil in a large skillet and brown the chicken on all sides. Sear it so that it gets a nice coating on each side.

Put the chicken in the slowcooker. In a small mixing bowl, combine the remaining ingredients (salt through ketchup). Taste a little, if you'd like the chicken to be sweeter add a little more brown sugar.Pour the sauce mix all over the chicken and gently coat all pieces.

Cover and cook on low for 6hours, or on high for 3-4hours.

We had the intentions to serve it with white rice, but since we didn't eat it...no rice for us. You could serve it with a brown rice too.

Check out Krista's blog here, she's got some suggestions at the end of her recipe.

Homemade Cream Puffs

I made these for our Valetine's Day dessert. I don't have the recipe right now,it's in my Taste of Home cookbook which is at home. For now, I'll share the delicious pictures with you. They are huge puffs, and next time I make them, I'll make them a lot smaller. This was my first time making any sort of dough recipe and it was a tasty success! I will definitely branch out into making more dough recipes.

Crockpot Baked Potato Soup

I've never had baked potato soup before but after seeing it on Stephanie's blog, it looked like something I'd really like to try. I have to say, I was unimpressed. I am pretty sure my disappointment comes from never having the soup before so I didn't know what to expect. It was definitely an easy recipe, and it surely makes enough for a large crowd. I'll add my suggestions after the recipe.

Ingredients

5lbs of potatoes, peeled and chopped

1 onion, diced (I used Tastefully Simple's Onion Onion Seasoning)

4 cloves of garlic, minced (I used Tastefully Simple's Garlic Garlic Seasoning)

1 tsp seasoned salt (again, I used Tastefully Simple's Seasoned Salt)

1/2 tsp black pepper

1/2 tsp red pepper

2 quarts chicken broth (8 cups)

2 pkgs cream cheese

crumbled bacon, shredded cheese etc for garnish

Make sure to use a large slow cooker. I'm not sure the size of mine, but I used the largest I had. Put the peeled and chopped potatoes in the stoneware of the cooker. Add the seasonings and pour in the broth. Cover and cook on low for 8hours or high for 4hours. When done, the potatoes should be fork tender.

You'll need to blend the potatoes, broth and seasonings all together. You can use your blender or an immersion blender. I used the immersion blender I got for Christmas from my parents. I love it! It was so fun to make, and it made a heck of a lot less mess than it would have it I had to blend it in my blender. (I'm a messy cook. If you can transfer from crock to blender back to crock without mess, go for it!) After that's all blended together, crumble in the cream cheese, cook on high for about 30 minutes or until the cream cheese is completely dissolved.

Dish it up, garnish and enjoy!

My Suggestions/Comments

I didn't realize how thick of a soup it would be. I swore I was forgetting something in the recipe, milk or more chicken broth or something. It was so thick. Almost too thick to even enjoy it. It definitely stuck to your ribs! The night we had it we had a friend's 7yr old Daughter over and she kind of picked at it, but mostly at the (turkey) bacon that was crumbled on top. I wouldn't say it's kid tested or approved.

Since we had 3/4 of a crockpot FULL of leftover soup, I added about a cup of milk to it and that really helped the consistency. I ate it a couple days afterwards for lunches, and then ended up tossing the rest because neither my Husband or I enjoyed enough to keep eating the leftovers.

I think I'll definitely try this again, maybe using more chicken broth and see if that helps, or if it really just needs some milk in it?!

Almond Pound Cake Trifle

Yum! This was so easy, so tasty and very refreshing! I prepared a Tastefully Simple Absolutely Almond Pound Cake, crumbled it up and layered it with fresh strawberries, banana slices and cool whip flavored with Tastefully Simple's Strawberry Chiller drink mix (just the powder).

You can purchase the Almond Pound Cake here. The strawberry chiller mix was a Seasonal item so it is no longer available for purchase. If you're interested in purchasing it and live in the Minneapolis area, email me (address along sidebar) and I can see if another consultant has one available.

This made quite a few servings and would be perfect for an Easter Dinner dessert, or even a picnic treat!

Garnish with some chocolate shavings for extra pizazz!

Enjoy!

Bacon Bacon Stuffed Mushrooms

I don't have a picture of these tasty little morsels, but as soon as I make them again I'll definitely post a picture. They were so easy to make, and most of all, they were delicious! I made them for my Husband while he was watching the game and I thought he was going to eat the whole plate full! They are a Tastefully Simple recipe that I found when trying to decide what to make with the products I still have from Fall/Winter. Search all of Tastefully Simple's recipes by going here.


Bacon Bacon Stuffed Mushrooms
1 pkg Warm the Oven! Savory Cheese Dip
8oz Cream Cheese (I used neufchatel)
1 1/2 tablespoons Bacon Bacon
~22 mushrooms, cleaned and stems removed (I used one large package)
1/4 cup shredded cheddar cheese (I didn't have any on hand, so I omitted)

Mix the cheese dip mix, cream cheese and Bacon Bacon together. Let chill for 2 hours.

Spoon about 1 teaspoon of cream cheese mixture into each mushroom. You're going to have leftover cream cheese mixture, so feel free to spoon a little extra in, or purchase some extra mushrooms and you'll have a large recipe. (I spooned a little extra into each mushroom). When stuffed, put mushrooms in a glass baking dish (I think this would work better than the cookie sheet I used!) and broil on low for about 10 minutes or until cheese is melted.

WW pts= 1pt per mushroom. If you use full fat cream cheese and cheddar cheese, your points values will likely increase.

Chocolate Candy Cane Cookies

These were a super simple and fun recipe to make! I made them for a treat to bring to a baby shower at work. I think they turned out delicious! I won't be able to make them too often, Matt doesn't like anything with mint so if I make them...I'm the only one that'll eat them...and then I'm in trouble!

I googled for a 'cake mix cookie' recipe, and found this one. I changed it up a bit to meet my needs and it worked perfectly!

(sorry for the dark picture, I was using my phone)

Candy Cane Cookies
1 chocolate cake mix
2 eggs
1/3 cup oil
Hershey's Candy Cane kisses

Mix the cake mix, eggs and oil together. I had to add a little more oil, probably about 1 teaspoon because the mixture was so dry.Scoop using a cookie scoop and place on a baking sheet. Bake at 350 for about 8 minutes. Cookies will be very fluffy and soft. I immediately pressed a candy cane kiss onto the cookie and the kisses began melting. The melted so much so that they don't even look like a kiss anymore!

They took awhile to cool, but I placed them in plastic ziploc bags and took them to work! I made them on Tuesday and it's now Thursday. The cookies are very, very soft and chewy.

Some suggestions I have for trying this recipe:
Let them cool a little bit more before putting the kiss on so they keep their kiss shape.
Bake them a little bit longer for a harder cookie, maybe 9-10 minutes instead.
Chop up the kisses and incorporate them into the batter for a mint chip type cookie.

Enjoy!

Birthday Recap

We went downtown to a little cupcake bakery/cafe to celebrate my Birthday. This place was recommended by some of the girls on my local Nest board and it wasn't too far from my work, so off we went!

I didn't think to take pictures of the actual cafe, it was kind of a cramped space and it was pretty busy. I wasn't expecting that at first, but we were on University Avenue right by the U of M campus so I should have known. We even drove by the new TCF Stadium, which Matt was pretty impressed with. Little did he know, a wrong turn on my part took us that way, but hey, we'll pretend we had to go that way.

We went to.... Cupcake!

The handles on the door when you enter the cafe, look like whisks, I thought that was pretty clever :-) It was a cute little shop, it was also a cafe so you could order sandwiches, soups etc. I wish I would have taken more pictures, ooops!

We chose four cupcakes, two for the each of us. We decided to sit down and eat a couple and save the other two for another time. We rushed ourselves along because we weren't exactly sure the time limit of our parking spot. There was a sign that said both 1hr limit and one that said 15min limit. We didn't exactly know how to decipher them so decided we would hurry!

I ate the chocolate mint cupcake, and Matt ate his mocha cupcake. They were both very good. My frosting had a strong, but not too strong, mint flavor and Matt said the same thing about the coffee taste in his (strong, but not too strong). My cupcake was pretty crumbly and fell apart, but Matt's had nice texture and stayed together nicely.

They were both good, I just wish mine would have held together better. I'm excited to try my other one, The Betty Crocker. A vanilla cupcake, with a swirl of pink icing and sprinkles. Typical Birthday Girl treat, don't you think? Matt has The Coco Loco waiting for him at home, a lemon curd filled vanilla cupcake topped with marshmellow frosting and shredded coconut.

Overall it was a fun atmosphere. The employees were friendly, it was a nicely decorated cafe, tabletops were clean, there were seats available. I also enjoyed being able to watch the decorator pipe icing onto the cupcakes.

There was something that really freaked me out while we were there. While I was getting us some ice water, I noticed they had their patio door open, and as I looked over, what did I see? A baby mouse! Not kidding!  The mouse did not, I repeat did not, go in the cafe, but it very easily could have.  That really kind of grossed me out.  If you own or even work at a cafe, I would suggest not leaving the door open intentionally!  Eeek!  The only other con that I have is there was literally, no parking other than the paralell parking right in front of the cafe, which had no room when we were looking for a spot.  We parked a little ways up the street and took our chances with our time limit. 

On our way home, we were stuck in rush our traffic! Bad idea Birthday Girl! I should have known going that way at around 4:30pm was going to be trouble. However, I really wanted to try Cupcake after hearing so many positive reviews. Although it really wasn't what I expected, it was still fun to go to! It kind of makes me want to start my own cupcake shop :-)

For dinner we went to ... Rey Azteca! We had a coupon, and it was close to home so we decided to go there. YUM! I definitely give it two thumbs up! We were seated promptly, they took our drink order shortly after we sat down, and then our server dissappeared. They were a little busy so I can understand though. The food was excellent and they have huge portions! Matt had fajitas and I had a plate of enchiladas that came with two tacos and a stuffed pepper. Very delicious, and very filling! They also serve tortilla chips with salsa and a white dip. The best I can describe it is a cucumber, ranch, sour cream type dip.

I have no pictures :( I think we were so hungry we were ready to eat! The margaritas were excellent as well!

I had a great Birthday! Lots of love and wishes from my family and quality time with my Husband! We closed off our night by stopping at Target and picking up toilet paper and paper towels (ahhh..the life of being an adult!) and went home to get ready for my Tastefully Simple party.

Our First Anniversary!

Don't mind that this post is ten days late :-/. Oops!

We had a lovely Anniversary weekend. We spent both Saturday and Sunday enjoying eachothers company, reminiscing about a year prior. "What were you doing at this moment a year ago" I often asked my Husband. I even asked my parents, the Friday (10/9) of our Anniversary weekend, what they were doing a year ago to the day. My Mom thought I was talking about the 9th, which would have been the Thursday before the wedding, the day that my Dad was stung by a large group of bees! My Dad replied to the question, "Running all over the place!" Which yes, he was right! The few days before the wedding were a flurry of errands, last minute checklists, "Where's this?" "Who's got that?" "Did we remember..."

We had a gorgeous day for our wedding. We truly could not have asked for a better day. I will always say, the weather we had that day was the gift from our Angels in Heaven. They truly were smiling down on us. Here are a few pictures from our wedding:

It's fun to look back! I can't believe how fast a year went though! I don't think life will slow down either! I'm thankful to have Matt in my life, and I'm thankful for the memories we've had during our relationship. We're approaching four years together, and it's been wonderful! Here's to many more!

To celebrate our Anniversary, we went to The Melting Pot in Minneapolis. It was delicious! Neither of us had ever had fondue, and were excited to try it! It was a wonderful experience. It was such a romantic environment! Although I had told him about it, I was shocked to see red roses sitting at our table when we arrived. My Hubby followed my clues and asked them to add it to our table when he made the reservation. How sweet! This is our cute little booth, minus the roses. I didn't remember to take a picture until we were leaving!

The meal started with fresh cheese fondue, prepared right at our table by the waiter. Made with shredded cheese, a little bit of beer, and some other spices, it was ooey gooey deliciousness waiting for us to dig in! We enjoyed the cheese fondue with bread, cold vegetables, and apples.

Next up was our salads. We both chose caesar, a favorite! As we were finishing up our salads, our main course came. Our little booth table was now filled with food! We had a plate of our meat (lobster, steak, filet mignon, brat pieces, chicken and shrimp), we had plates to eat from, as well as a dish of vegetables to cook, and many sauces for our dipping enjoyment! We also ordered a couple drinks, mine was SO good! I ordered the 'Love Martini' made with peach schnapps, malibu rum, cranberry juice and garnished with a fresh strawberry. Matt ordered the Blackberry Margarita and wasn't too fond of it. Mine was so good, we ordered another and shared it during our fabulous dessert!

Here's an 'action shot' of our food cooking. We chose the Bourguignonne oil to cook our meat. It's a European style fondue. We had many sauces to choose from, including tempura batters which fried our food. My favorite was probably the Honey Mustard and the Sweet and Sour type sauce we had. A very full plate of delicious meats!

Last, but certainly NOT least, our decadent dessert platter and our ying yang chocolate fondue. We chose the best of both worlds-white chocolate and milk chocolate creatively swirled together! It was almost too pretty to even eat. We dug right in, and realized we didn't take a picture of our dessert options. This plate came chock full of gourmet desserts. Marshmallows rolled in crushed graham crackers and crushed oreos, cheesecake, pound cake, strawberries, bananas, and I think some brownies too.

As you can see, we (shamelessly) cleaned up our chocolate!! The waiter even brought us some additional strawberries and marshmallows for us. It was pure delight!

I think we're well accustomed to fondue, and we can safely break out our fondue pot we received as a wedding gift! I think fondue nights will be at least, a monthly occasion in our house!

I would highly recommend going to The Melting Pot for any special occasion!