Here’s the menu plan for this week. After a several new things last week I’m just making some old favorites this week.

Monday: Beef stroganoff

Tuesday: Beer battered fish, homemade fries, veggie

Wednesday: Leftovers

Thursday: Terryaki meatballs, rice, veggie

Friday: Beef/bean tacos, Mexican rice, (not) refried beans

Saturday: Father’s Day dinner

Sunday: Slow cooker pork ribs, pecorino fries, veggie

Made these for lunch today. I used a whole chicken breast and some scraps that were left in the last bag. Added some garlic and onion powder too for a little more seasoning. You can add just about anything to these, even make them spicy.

Cheddar Bacon Chicken Tenders

Ingredients:

 
1 egg
1/2 cup panko
1/2 cup finely shredded Cheddar cheese
¾ cup bacon chopped finely
2 chicken breasts cut into strip
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp onion powder

 
Directions:

 
Heat oven to 400°F. Spray large cookie sheet with cooking spray.

 
In shallow bowl, beat egg. In large resealable food-storage plastic bag, place bread crumbs,
cheese, seasonings and bacon. Dip chicken into egg. Place in bread crumb bag; seal and shake to coat. Place
chicken on cookie sheet.

 
Bake 15 to 20 minutes, turning once, until chicken isno longer pink in center and bread crumbs
are golden brown.

Houlihan’s serves three dipping sauces with their Parmesan frites. I tried as best as I could to duplicate one. You’ll have to taste it as you make it to get it just right. Remember to add a little Parmesan to your fries as well to bring this whole thing together. If the fries aren’t seasoned right the sauce isn’t nearly as close as the real thing. You can easily double this, or make enough for one serving.

Parmesan Garlic Sauce

Ingredients:

1 cup of mayo

2 cloves of garlic finely chopped

1/4 cup Parmesan cheese finely grated

1 tsp apple cider vinegar

1 tsp Worcestershire sauce

1 tsp Dijon mustard

salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

Whisk all ingredients together. Add a few more drops of apple cider vinegar if it doesn’t have enough bite. Serve immediately and refrigerate any leftovers.

This was a nice weeknight dish. I served it with roasted red potatoes. The potatoes took the longest out of the whole thing. I ended up adding some lemon pepper seasoning to this as it needed more lemon flavor. I only used 2 breasts so there was a lot of sauce left over for later use.

Lemon Cream Chicken

Ingredients:

 
1/2 cup plus 1 T. flour divided
1/2 t. salt
1/2 t. pepper
6 boneless skinless chicken breast halves
1/4 c. butter
1 c. chicken broth
1 cup whipping cream, divided
3 T. lemon juice

 
Directions:

 
In a large resealable plastic bag, combine 1/2 c.flour, salt and pepper. Add chicken and shake
to coat. In a large skillet, cook chicken in butter for 8-9 minutes on each side or until juices run
clear. Remove chicken and keep warm.

 
Add broth to the drippings. Bring to a boil over medium heat; stir to loosen browned bits from
the pan. Simmer, uncovered for 10 minutes or until broth is reduced approximately 1/3 cup. Sir
in 3/4 c. cream and lemon juice. Cook over medium-low heat for 5 minutes

.
Combine remaining flour and cream until smooth; stir into skillet. Bring to a boil; cook and stir
for 2 minutes or until thickened. Return chicken to skillet and heat through.

I started watching Nip/Tuck this weekend and have become completely addicted. Julian McMahon is delicious eye candy!

Monday: Rigatoni with meat sauce, garlic bread

Tuesday: Salmon with crispy shallots, rice, veggie

Wednesday: Leftovers

Thursday: Lemony chicken breasts, roasted red potatoes, veggie

Friday: Cheddar bacon chicken strips, homemade fries, veggie

Saturday: Crispy oven baked drums, pecorino fries, veggie

Sunday: Slow cooker roast, garlic mashed potatoes, maple roasted carrots, beer bread

I was inspired by last month’s Food and Wine Magazine. The featured ingredient was chives and this recipe was the one I wanted to try. I didn’t find loose yukon gold potatoes so I used butter potatoes instead. This came out creamy and a bit sweet tasting. Served this alongside steak. At least for us, there was plenty left over for another meal.

Creamy Chive Potatoes

Ingredient:

 
4 large Yukon Gold potatoes (about 1 ½ pounds), peeled, cut into ½ inch cubes
1 ½ cups heavy cream
4 tbsp (1/2 stick) unsalted butter
Kosher salt
¼ cup chopped fresh chives

 
Directions:

 
Combine potatoes, heavy cream, and butter in a large saucepan. Season with salt. Bring to a boil then
reduce the heat and simmer very gently, stirring occasionally until the potatoes are tender (the tip of a
paring knife meets no resistance) and sauce is thick. 25-35 minutes.

 
Season with salt, stir in most of the chives. Top with remaining chives before serving.

It’s been a crazy weekend. Thursday started out well, got my haircut, went for my yearly physical (everything and my blood work test results were just fine), then came home to relax. Owners of the house are replacing the roof and they were just about done, just had to do some work on the sides. They tarped it up with three tarps and were coming back the next day.

Around 8 I took a shower and it started to storm, heavy rain and wind. I heard it starting to rain inside the house. It was. My husband and I ran around getting enough pans to to catch the water in the bedrooms while my 4 year old was sitting in our bed. It only got worse and the drips became a waterfall when the ceiling in our spare bedroom collapsed. At that point my son was crying he wanted to “get out of the house now”. We called my fantastic sister in law if we could drive up and sleep there. She said yes and we quickly got dressed and drove up there. Just before we ran out I got all the clothes out of the closet where it was leaking, moved some furniture, and hauled the beds up and out of the way against the safe parts of the walls where it wasn’t leaking.

Hugh and his crew came in the middle of the storm while we were driving up to my sister’s house. They retarped everything, covered ALL the furniture, beds, and tv, and even were able to save my pots and pans. They shop vacuumed the rooms to get rid of the water, removed padding, and set up fans. He called/left messages all throughout this process, left messages when I had to get to bed.

The next morning Eli insisted on going to school, so we drove back down to Kindercare and headed to our house. Hugh (the owner of the company) came by first thing in the morning along with his crew and let us know exactly what had happened. The winds were so strong it started to move the layers of tarp around, then it began to rain so damn  hard (we had flash flood warnings here at the time) the rain was going through the tarps. Later on in the day after we came back home from Eli’s eye appointment he showed us and Eli what they had done and explained to him it would never happen again. He showed us (and Eli) how they finished the roof, fixed the attic fan, were going to add up to code insulation the next day, etc. When we got there they were using a high pressure hose to soak the roof and were looking through the still open ceiling sections to make absolutely sure there were no leaks. This made us and Eli feel much better. Everything is still messy upstairs but they are almost done. They finished everything they could through Saturday and will be back Tuesday to complete painting and clean up. They were so kind to fix other problems we were having while they were there like recaulking windows and whatnot.

This was all due to a storm that wasn’t expected and heavy winds. Hugh and his company: http://www.hughsservices.net/ were fantastic through this entire ordeal. He kept up informed step by step and was so kind to us and our son. With the new attic fan, insulation, and proper caulking I hope to see much lower heating/cooling bills in the future!

All in all this has been one heck of a weekend!

Monday: Crispy baked drums, pecorino fries, veggie

Tuesday: Fish sticks, homemade fries, veggie

Wednesday: Leftovers

Thursday: Beef/bean tacos, Mexican rice, (not) refried beans

Friday: Chicken apple sausage, cheesy tater bites, veggie

Saturday: Steak, potatoes in a creamy chive sauce, zucchini and squash with onions

Sunday: Crispy chicken, bacon fat fried potatoes with spicy aoli, veggie

I made these for our appetizer night. They weren’t bad but need more flavor. Next time I’ll add some more seasonings like garlic powder, onion powder, and a touch of cayenne pepper. I used white cornmeal as that is what I had in the pantry. Tasted good all weekend, we had plenty leftover. Good warm or cold.

Baked Hushpuppies

Ingredients:

 
1 cup yellow cornmeal
1 cup all-purpose flour
3 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/2 cup onion, finely diced
2 eggs, beaten
2/3 cup milk
4 tablespoons canola oil

 
Directions:

 
Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

 
Spray cups of mini muffin pans with nonstick vegetable spray.

 
Blend cornmeal, flour,baking powder, salt, sugar and red pepper in medium bowl. Then stir in
onion.

 
Beat eggs, milk and oil in small bowl and add to cornmeal mixture stirring just until blended.
Spoon batter into prepared muffin pan, filling cups 1/2 to 2/3 full.

 
Bake until golden, about 15 to 20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into center comes out
clean.

 
Serve immediately.

Things are almost back to normal with my back. I’m fine enough to exercise back to normal levels but it still aches now and then. I’m going for a full physical Thursday so we’ll see what’s up. Got most of my blood test results back from last Thursday (I love how Kaiser posts everything online) and among other things my cholesterol levels are better than ever. Bad is low and good is nice and high. Calf is still a little swollen though, it’s more noticeable when I’m wearing pants and they are tight in the left calf area.

I’ve decided to switch to making salads for lunch instead of a sandwich. That should help with continued weight loss and health. Still will bring half a cup of fruit and half a cup of either yogurt or cottage cheese. I want to up the distance on the treadmill too, a little harder during the week but I’ll do it.

I have a bunch of new things I want to try for appetizer night, but we’ll see how much I actually do. Depends how hot it gets and how motivated I am. I’ve been meaning to try a new pretzel bites recipe with mustard dipping sauce for awhile now.

Monday: Beef/bean tacos, Mexican rice, (not) refried beans

Tuesday: Salmon, rice, veggie

Wednesday: Leftovers

Thursday: Slow cooker pork ribs, homemade fries, veggie

Friday: Loaded potato soup

Saturday: Appetizer night

Sunday: BBQ

I made these for work last week. They came out moist and tasted just like the drink. I doubled the recipe but didn’t double the frosting. Next time I’ll double that too. I found this recipe just surfing around.

White Russian Cupcakes

Ingredients:

 
1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup sugar
6 tablespoons butter, softened
1 large egg and 1 egg white
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup milk
1/8 cup Vodka
1/4 cup Kahlua, divided

 
Directions:

 
Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Line a cupcake pan with paper liners.

 
In a large bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Set aside. In a separate bowl or
in a stand mixer, beat together the sugar and butter until combined. Add egg and egg white,
one at a time. Then add the vanilla, Vodka, and 1/8 cup of Kahlua. Gradually add the flour
mixture in three additions, alternating with the milk in two additions, ending with the flour
mixture.

 
Bake 17 -20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the middle of a cupcakes comes out clean.
While the cupcakes are still warm, brush the tops with the remaining 1/8 cup Kahlua. Remove
from pan and cool completely on a wire rack before frosting.

 
Kahlua Buttercream

 
Ingredients:

 
1 stick of butter, softened
3 cups powdered sugar
pinch of salt
3 – 4 tablespoons Kahlua

 
Directions:

 
Beat butter until creamy. Add salt. Add powdered sugar 1 cup at a time, beating until
combined. Add Kahlua 1 tablespoon at a time until you reach desired consistency.