Monday and Tuesday

Monday: I am working all day and then in college from 4-10 p.m. with a 2 hour drive both ways. I will not be cooking on Mondays. My husband made dinner and he made Creamed Hamburger over noodles. This is a basic recipe- cook ground beef until done, add cream of mushroom soup and milk, serve over egg noodles (or mashed potatoes, or rice) The kids love it. I loved it because I didn't have to cook it. :)

Tuesday: Chicken Enchiladas
I buy a rotisserie chicken from the grocery store and shred it by hand. Set chicken aside. In a 9x13 inch casserole dish I begin with enchilada sauce, then I layer corn tortillas on that, then chicken, then shredded cheese (a mexican blend) and top with enchilada sauce. I continue this layering until the pan is full and I end with cheese on top. We (adults) like green onions on ours, notice in the picture half the pan has them - half doesn't. We have picky kids. :)  I bake this at 350 for about 30 minutes until hot and bubbly.

Tonight I even made dessert - brownies (out of a box!) they were yummy. :)

Breakfast for Dinner

Tonight's dinner consisted of: bacon, eggs, maple flavored smokey links, french toast, and oranges fresh picked from Florida!

I bought bakery fresh cinnamon swirl bread, made a mixture of eggs, cinnamon blend from Pampered Chef, brown sugar, and maple syrup to soak the bread in. I fried the french toast on the electric griddle and viola! Done.

The oranges were a gift from some friends of mine who just got back from a trip to Florida. The oranges grew on his parents' tree in their yard. For this Michigan girl a fresh picked orange is a treat, and yes, it tastes different.

As always, here's a picture of part of our meal. It's the french toast cooking!

Tomorrow we have been invited to a pot luck so I am not sure that I am going to be making dinner but if I do you'll be the first to know :)
Have a great weekend everyone!!

Chris's Chili

My husband makes the chili at our house and tonight I had to work late so he made dinner.

3 pounds of ground chuck
1 large can of Tomato Juice (He prefers Campbells)
Diced tomatoes (you can buy the flavored ones, the plain ones, the petite diced ones) Use as much as you like!
Beans (our kids don't like the beans so we only use one can of beans, tonight's beans were kidney beans)
Mushrooms (if you prefer, which we do, fresh or canned)
Chili powder, sugar, and salt to taste

Yes folks, that's it. He cooks the meat in a large pot, pours the juice, tomatoes, beans, and mushrooms in. Simmers for a while, adds the spices to taste.

He serves the chili with sour cream and shredded cheddar cheese. I also love corn bread with my chili.

Creamy Chicken in the Crockpot

I have a family of five. My youngest is 4 (almost 5), my middle child is 8, and my oldest is 10.  In preparation for today's dinner I trimmed and washed four decent sized boneless skinless chicken breasts that I bought on sale at my local grocery store for 1.89 pound. I sprayed the inside of my crockpot with cooking spray and placed the chicken breasts in the crock. I opened one large family size can of cream of chicken soup (today was Campbell's brand since it was on sale) and I spread this evenly over the chicken. I added about a half of a can of whole milk (that's what I had in the fridge). Looking back the flavor would have been better if I would have used canned milk. Please remember that! After adding the milk I mixed it around in the crock pot a little and turned it on low. It cooked all day. Tonight when we all got home and it was time to eat I boiled a bag of egg noodles (I forgot to salt the water - damn it!) I microwaved Bird's Eye Broccoli in light cheese sauce. Let me just tell you - HUGE disappointment. If you have children like mine who only like the "tree" part of broccoli then this veg in a bag is NOT for you. When we opened the two bags it wass filled with mostly stems or "trucks" as my kids call them. They are tough, have no flavor, and taste like crap. Shame on Bird's Eye. I won't be buying that again. I also did a steam friendly brand of peas. Below is a picture of what the meal looks like minus the peas.

Oh, I forgot the best part of this meal. When the chicken cooks all day it simply falls apart. When dinner was ready I just took the serving spoon and mixed the chicken around until it was shredded. You can see it in the black crock pot in the picture.
After dinner was over I saved the leftover creamy chicken in a gallon size freezer bag. I will freeze this for a later time. I will use it for when I make chicken pot pie!!!

This was my plate. I love veggies. Peas are my favorite.

Creamy Chicken in the Crockpot

Before I left for work this morning I put four chicken breasts (boneless, skinless) in the crockpot with a large can of cream of chicken soup and milk. I turned it on low and this will cook all day. When I get home the chicken will have cooked so much so that it will shred into the soup and I will serve this over egg noodles. I will serve this with two different veggies - probably green beens and broccoli - my kids favorites. Easy peasy. Of course tonight I will have pictures of dinner for you all :)

Baked pasta, garlic bread, and salad

Baked Pasta consists of whatever box of pasta we happen to have in the cupboard. Sometimes it's spaghetti, sometimes macaroni, today we had Rigitore. While your pasta is boiling fry one pound ground Italian Sausage and mix in whatever veggies you like (we do fresh or canned mushrooms, you could also do spinach, etc). When the pasta is done mix it with the meat/veggie mixture and add a jar of your favorite pasta sauce. Mix well. (I have to tell you that my family adores Spartan Brand pasta sauce. We used to be a Prego family but Spartan Brand has a better flavor.) When it's all mixed pour it in the bottom of a 9x13 inch casserole dish, top with a bag of mozzeralla or Italian blend of cheese and bake until the cheese is brown and bubbly. Serve with garlic bread and salad. :) Add whole wheat pasta to make this even healthier for your family and do a skim milk cheese if you desire. Personally, I'd rather add more veggies and leave the cheese alone, but that's me. 

Dinner on Night #2

Beef Roast in the Crock Pot

The meat turned out a little dry, I was very disappointed. Must have cooked it on high too long. Damn.
I served the roast with carrots that cooked with it all day. For sides we had a blend of red skin potatoes with green beans in a rosemary sauce (don't get all excited, it was a frozen blend, some sort of steam friendly brand).
Side note: I am totally okay with frozen helpers to go along with dinner. I loved Semi-Homemade with Sandra Lee on the Food Network. She taught me the many uses of a grocery store rotisserie chicken. Bless her heart.

This is Hannah's plate. She loved everything, mind you she is also my least picky child. Wait. Let me rephrase that. Hannah will eat most anything but she has this weird issue with picking her food apart. So saying that she isn't picky isn't accurate. She's very picky. She disects everything. She peels everything. Hannah loved the carrots the most. :)

We had a decent size roast, enough for the five of us with two large slices leftover. No carrots though, they went fast. Next time I won't cook the roast on high for as long as I did, I would do more than one pound of carrots, and I would add the potatoes to the crock pot like I usually do.

Eh, I'm not perfect BUT it was home cooked, everyone liked it, everyone ate it, and it was less expense than eating out. PLUS it was much heathier than take-out food. Bonus! Yay me!