I am going beyond an acceptable measurable amount of slacking

Horrible blogger of the year right here! But that's okay, because it's a nice day outside. I have an extreme love for soup. I can eat soup in almost any weather and any time of year. I also have a moderate obsession with Pinterest. With these two things uniting, I bring you Chicken and Wild Rice Soup. Thanks to Pinterest, I found this little gem here at Moms By Heart. I liked that it was simple enough and looked amazingly delish! I also thought how on earth can I make it that much better. So here we go!

You Will Need:

a little olive oil

1 pkg Long Grain Wild Rice

1 cup Shredded Chicken

1/4 cup Diced Onion

2 stalks Celery

1 medium/large Carrot

3 1/2 cups Water

3 Tbs Butter

3 Tbs Flour

1/2 cup Milk

3/4 cup Chicken Stock

1/4 tsp Sage

pepper to taste

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know my ingredient list is like 10 times longer than the original, but that's okay and it's for a good reason. Also, Scott does not like crunchy veggies in his food so I have to make sure the carrots and celery are nice and soft. Hopefully you all have done your mise en place cause we are getting started!

Like usual, I get out that big soup making pot and splishity splash a little olive oil up and get it heating up in there for the veggies. Then I added the onion, carrot and celery.

This looks familiar

I cook that for about 8 to 10 minutes and then I shoved it all to the side of the pot making room to make my cream of chicken soup from scratch... Now if you wanted to be lazy and not as cool, you could just add 1 can of cream of chicken soup now.

Alrighty so melt that butter, add the flour, mixing the two together and cook for about a minute... Slowly add your milk and chicken stock, constantly stirring and incorporating everything together! Sprinkle the sage and a little pepper in there.

Now this is where things get complicated..... Toss in your chicken, wild rice (the seasoning packet too), and the water... Stir it all together.. It should be looking a little like this now

Mmmmmm... Yummy!

Now just let that goodness simmer for about 15 to 20 minutes... Take a fabulous picture of yourself in the meantime...

Not bad for no makeup that day :)

 

Get ready! It's time to scoop up that soup and enjoy!

Holy Moly! That looks great!

Close up! Don't you just want to dive right in?

Oh and was this ever some delicious soup! This made about 4-6 servings I'd say... Which was perfect for the two of us... Both got to enjoy big bowls of it and then well Scott had like 2 lunches out of it... No leftovers for this girl... Frowny face! :( That was probably my own fault for not having other meals with a good amount of leftovers for Scott to take to work.......... Next time though..... I'm going to advocate my rights to some leftovers!

I've been quite the slacker!

I'm so busy cooking and enjoying life that I just have had an epic fail with blogging about all the wonderful cookings and going ons! Since I had a friend ask me how do you do Mongolian Beef in the slow cooker.......... well here is how! I found the original recipe over at Notes from the Heartland... I had to make some changes because I refuse to spend $10 on a little bottle of cooking sherry and some of the things I had on hand and it's worked out every time just fine...

Crock pot Mongolian Beef
1 1/2 lb. ball tip steak or flank steak
3 cloves garlic, minced
4 sliced green onions
1 t. onion powder
1/2 c. soy sauce
1/4 c. white wine
1/8 c. red wine
1/8 c. balsamic vinegar
1/2 T. white wine vinegar
1 t. olive oil
1 t. toasted sesame seeds
1 t. molasses
1 t. powdered ginger
1/4 t. black pepper
1 t. red chili flakes
1/2 T. peanut butter
3 T. brown sugar
1/4 c. cornstarch

1) Slice meat thin, toss with cornstarch.
2) Put all liquid and dry spices into crock pot, add PB, mix well.
3) Add garlic and green onions.  Put meat on top, toss gingerly.
4) Cover and cook on low 4-6 hours (mine took around 4).

I also like to slice up half of a medium/large onion and then serve it over white rice. Since the husband doesn't really care for broccoli, I roast some asparagus to serve on the side...  If I remember I'll take a picture before I tear into it later! Otherwise check the original source for a scrumptious looking picture :)

Winner Winner Chicken Dinner

The theme this week seems to be chicken, aside from the Mongolian beef I plan to make... Yesterday was Chicken Parmesan the way my mom always made it with some wild rice, asparagus for the husband and broccoli for me... Tonight I adventured into chicken pot pie making... I didn't give a rats ass, a cows ass, a spiders ass (etc., etc. etc.) if the husband says he doesn't like chicken pot pie... I have not had one in like a year (basically since  before I moved down here to Lima) so god dammit we were having a chicken pot pie!!! I chose to try out this recipe from Annie's Eats... Instead of 6-8 little ones I did two larger (one for tonight and one that I'll freeze for the future) and experimented with a mini full crust one...

We ate half of this one

Plenty of left overs!!!

Good news is that the husband, Scott, did enjoy the chicken pot pie... He just doesn't have a fondness for them like I do... And as I told him, I can't help that Marie Callendar made delicious little microwaveable convenient little chicken pot pies for the "server on the go" (more like poor morning time management)... These I would have to say were more delicious... less convenient (and who cares, I have the time since I don't work), but much much more delicious!

Now that I've started a gaggle of leftovers going, I'll either make tomorrow a left over night or make some crock pot Mongolian beef and I've got plans for whipping up some chicken pad thai this week too!

Getting In Touch With Our Inner-Italian

Although neither of us have any Italian what so ever... Scott had been wanting a pasta maker for a long time, so we bought one with some of our wedding money... Last week was definitely a learning experience and a very late dinner as a result... Our spaghetti and meatballs (everything made from scratch!) was good none the less and looked like we were going to feed all of Lima with it... This week we adventured into flavored pasta, tortellinis and raviolis.... We again probably over did it on the product but have chosen to freeze some and go with a jar of alfredo sauce rather than doing that from scratch today... Well here are some picture highlights of our adventure today! Who knew I was a natural born tortellini making machine!

Scott rolling the dough

Smile!

My first tortellini

That's a chicken, garlic, parsley, oregano filling for the tortellini

This is how I assemble my awesome tortellinis

Cut off the excess

fold up

And then fold the other two ends together and ta-da!

The camera battery died between then and now! But again we made a feast!

 Because we had so much chicken filling we used that for tortellinis and took our cheese mixture and made 4 cheese raviolis.... And why is our pasta orange? That's because it's tomato pasta!!! Next time we are going to try and make spinach pasta :)

Dibble Dabbling!

I'm dipping my toes in the waters of meal planning... I find I go to the store almost every freaking day!!! I mean I guess it's good because it gets me out of the house but I guess my tolerance for dealing with mentally challenged drivers and people at the store is dwindling.... I kinda meal planned half way through the week last week and this week I think I've got a fairly decent plan in place...

Tonight: Southwest Chicken Salad (adding some corn and avocado)
Tuesday: Slow Cooker Salsa Chicken
Wednesday: LEFTOVERS! We have a ton of spaghetti and meatballs from our pasta making adventure last night
Thursday: Taquitos! Except I'm using our leftover pulled pork from Saturday instead of the chicken
Friday: Dijon Chicken Linguine this could be another pasta maker adventure

I'm imagining this will result in plenty of leftovers for the husband for work and possibly the weekend.... I also like to leave the weekend open for Scott to have some cooking/grilling fun!

This little piggy went to the market...

And came out in the form of a pork tenderloin smothered in peanut orange sauce... So during one of those moments when I had this brilliant idea and motivation to eat healthier and get in shape, I was browsing and scouring the Shape magazine website for workout ideas and found they had a few recipes.... This one caught my eye and turned out to be rather delish! I did do a little Lima Limitation change to theirs (you can find theirs here.)

1/2 cup orange marmalade

1/4 cup orange juice

2 Tbs reduced-fat peanut butter

1 Tbs Dijon mustard

1 tsp ground cumin

1 tsp vegetable oil

a dash or two of salt

a few dashes of cayenne pepper

a couple dashes chili powder

a pinch of red pepper flakes

1lb pork tenderloin, trimmed of fat

I gathered all ingredients and they say to process everything but the pork in a blender or a food processor, but I found some good ol' fashion man power (or in my case woman power) with a whisk works just fine... and seriously it's not like you have to whisk hard to blend it all....

Now at first it's going to look totally like a baby shit in your bowl which seems totally unappetizing.... but trust me it's safe to add your little piggy into that shit looking mess.... The piggy will be happy, it's like being back in its natural environment when it was alive....

The little piggy can go ahead and bathe in what will be later some delicious filth for about an hour....

When that hour is about up, preheat the oven to 400°F and place the tenderloin on a foil lined baking sheet... Don't toss that marinade!!! Instead put it in a little sauce pan... Bake the little piggy for about 20 to 30 minutes and in the mean time boil that marinade for a few minutes and turn it down to low while the pork cooks....

Ding! The pork is done, let it rest of a minute or two and then slice it up!!! Pour some of that goodness in the sauce pan on top and enjoy! I served it up with some wild rice...

See it really did go from looking like shit in a bowl to deliciousness on a plate ;)

Feliz Año Nuevo!!!!

Ok three things... Thing 1 is spinach and artichoke dip that was really damn good... Thing 2 is some awesome pasta I just made and ate.... Thing 3 is that both I can't take any credit for the goodness of the recipe {but I can take credit for making it and it turning out totally awesome as per what the recipe and their bloggers said would occur}

For New Years Eve I made up this spinach and artichoke dip from Annie's Eats.... I'm really sure it would have been totally devoured if there had been less food around and we weren't all so busy drinking... The plus to it not being totally devoured means leftovers for me! and well Scott too...

Tonight we decided to do a beer can chicken and I remembered this lovely pasta from The Pioneer Woman that we could do as a side to go with the chicken! And that was one smart decision made by me! Deeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeelish!!!!

In short, Happy New Year and Happy Cooking everyone!