Wishful Wednesday

 Today's Wishful Wednesday topic is.. 

'I wish' .... I had never-ending funds to donate to a charity and it would be         !

 

 I really liked this weeks topic and I knew immediately which charity I would pick.. 

 

I LOVE this foundation. Just reading the stories about all of the great things they do for those kids easily brings me to tears. Ever since I was little I can remember my family sending in checks whenever things came in the mail asking for donations. It is most definitely a charity that I will continue to support. 

(make sure to join in the Wishful Wednesday posts at Kelsey's blog!)

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This morning for work I had to get up at 4 am (and I am NOT a morning a person) so that I could be at a trade show by 6am. So, since I was exhausted when I got home I wanted to make something quick and easy for dinner... so I went through my cabinets to see what I could come up with and I ended up making a pretty good and SUPER easy casserole.

ingredients:

2-3 boneless chicken breasts cut into small pieces

2 cans cream of chicken soup (use low sodium so it's not too salty)

1 cup uncooked white or brown rice

1 can light sour cream (16 oz)

chopped celery (about 1 cup)

1 can sliced water chestnuts

1 1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese

1 sleeve of ritz crackers

salt and pepper to season

directions:

preheat oven to 400 degrees. boil chicken, then mix all ingredients together (other than the crackers), next crumble the crackers and sprinkle on top. bake for 40 minutes. This made enough for at least 4 people.

I forgot to take a picture before I served it, but it was SO good!  

 

Give it a try sometime! :o)

Happy Wednesday, the week is more than halway over!

Easy Appetizers

One of my best friends (and former big sister in my sorority) and I were chatting yesterday afternoon and she said she needed a couple of quick and easy recipes for some appetizers for a party she is going to. So I gave her two of my favorite (and REALLY easy) ones and figured I would share them with you too :)

The first one is just a corn salsa and all you do is mix the following 4 ingredients: 

1 can black beans (drain and rinse)

1 can yellow corn

1/8th cup of italian dressing (I like the zesty italian dressing) 

and then add salsa, I start with about a 1/2 cup and then usually add a little more as long it doesn't make it too runny. 

Then serve with fritos scoops. 

(like I said, super easy and really cheap to make!)

The second is one of my personal favorites and every time I take it somewhere I always gets lots of compliments. I actually made it last night for a game night we had at our house, so I have a picture of it too. 

Wasabi Dip: 

start with a block of cream cheese and cut in half (the long way) 

then spread a layer of wasabi** on one half and then place the other half on top like sandwich

cut a cucumber in really thin slices and put in a circle around the cream cheese

pour soy sauce on top of the cucumber slices (so that some of it runs down onto the cream cheese too)

Then sprinkle some seaseme seeds over everything

Serve with water crackers. (put some the cream cheese/wasabi on the cracker and then place the cucumber on top of that) 

**For the wasabi, there are a couple different types and you can really use whatever you want, but I have tried it a few different ways and this is the type that I like the best (you can usually find it in the Asian food aisle of any grocery store) 

It really is SO good, definitely give it a try!

New Recipe

This year was the first time I hosted our families Christmas dinner. At first I had no idea what to cook... Vince's mom did pasta and seafood on Christmas eve, so both of those were out.. No one in my family likes ham, so that was out.. and everyone just ate Turkey for Thanksgiving so I wanted to do something different. So, after looking through multiple recipes I ended up deciding on this one below for a seasoned pork roast with a pan sauce. I am really not a huge pork person, but this came out so GOOD, plus it was super easy! It takes like 5-10min to get ready and then you just stick it in the oven for a few hours and tada it's done :) You do have to make the sauce as well, but even that was really simple. (and as a bonus, a pork roast is super cheap! haha)

If you ever need something to make for a big family dinner, I highly recommend giving this a try. And trust me, you will get LOTS of compliments when it's done ;)

rubbed pork with bourbon pan sauce

1 tablespoon brown sugar

2 teaspoons black pepper

1 teaspoon paprika

1 teaspoon dried sage

1 teaspoon salt

1/3 cup jack daniels whiskey (we actually used Gentlemen's Jack)

1 can (14 oz) reduced sodium beef broth (regular broth makes it too salty)

1 teaspoon worcestershire sauce

3 tablespoons butter, softened

3 tablespoons flour

(this is meant for a 4lb pork roast, ours was a little over 7lbs so we doubled everything)

Mix sugar, peper, paprika, sage, and salt (save 1 teaspoon on the mix for the sauce later).  Rub the mixture over the pork roast, bake in a shallow roasting pan for 350 degrees for about 2 to 2 1/2 hours (until meat temp is 155 degrees).

To make the sauce add whiskey to pan with drippings, stir to scrape brown bits from the bottom of the pan. Bring to a boil over med-high heat. Add broth, worcestershire sauce, and the 1 teaspoon from seasoning mix. reduce heat and simmer until sauce is reduced by half. Then mix in butter and flour slowly until sauce thickens.

It really was super easy and DELICIOUS! (I served it with traditional holiday things like mashed potatoes and gravy, salad, rolls, green bean casserole, etc.) It is definitely something I will be making again in the future :)

I never said I was good at baking..

... but I thought it would be fun to try :) I am actually decent with cooking these days, but baking is a whole other story. Normally when I make cookies I buy the break and bake type (which I guess doesn't really count as making them, more like I pull them apart and put them on a cookie sheet).. you know like these:

The only time I have ever actually made cookies was when I was little and really my mom did those, all I did was help pour in a thing or two and then pretend like I did it all myself  :) So last night my friend Angela and I decided we wanted to do something festive since it's almost Christmas and we thought it would be fun to make holiday cookies.

 So I started pulling out some ingredients..

and she started mixing them together.

 

..and while it was a good idea, I guess we didn't really think it through. Neither of us had ever made cookies ourselves before, but for some reason we both figured making them from scratch was super easy and we didn't even need a recipe.  After our first batch we realized we needed a little help, and decided to call Ang's grandmother for some advice (thank goodness for her, otherwise we may still be in the kitchen trying to figure it out!).Thankfully our next batch turned out much better:

 

Then we attempted decorating some of the sugar cookies....

 

my side got a little bit messy

So after almost 4 hours in the kitchen we ended up with 3 dozen sugar cookies, 4 dozen chocolate chip cookies, and TONS of laughs! We each only decorated about 6 sugar cookies before deciding to call it quits and just put the rest in bags haha... but Ang did get us these cute little containers that we used for the chocolate chip cookies :)

Also, I had to share this picture of what Vince and Ty did the whole time we were busy in the kitchen:

Overall it was a really fun night and now maybe next time I decide to bake some cookies I will have a better idea of what the heck I am doing! lol.

Thankful Thursday

I am thankful to have a job I really enjoy and also very thankful that I have satellite radio in my car to keep me entertained as I drive around doing that job all day :)

I was reminded today how thankful I am that I am no longer in high school... you couldn't pay me enough to go back and have to deal with all that b.s drama anymore

I am thankful for all of the technology available these days so that even though my family moved and now lives in Missouri, I can still talk to them whenever I want through phones/emails/webcams etc.

I am thankful for Vince giving me my anniversary gift early so that we can go in a hot air balloon ride this weekend when it's still not freezing and while the leaves are still pretty colors <3

I am thankful for everyone offering to bring food and drinks to our Halloween party Saturday so I don't have to worry about doing it all :)

And lastly, I am thankful for Vince calling and asking if I want to go out to dinner tonight so I don't have to worry about making anything!

 

Quick. Easy. Delicious.

Since it was a cold and rainy day I was thinking about making a big pot of warm chicken noodle soup for dinner, but then I remembered I had a great simple recipe for chicken noodle casserole which sounded even better.  So I made that instead and was glad I did because it was REALLY good :)

 

(I forgot to take a picture of mine before I had already served it, so this is the one from the recipe, but it doesn't have the French's fried onions)

I changed just a couple things in the recipe and Vince and I both really liked it. If you ever want a quick and easy meal this is a great option.

Ingredients:

2 cups cooked chicken

2 cups egg noodles, cooked and drained (I like the medium size)

1 can cream of mushroom soup

1 cups frozen mixed veggies (I also added some cut up celery, but you don't have to)

1/2 cup milk

1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese

1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese

1 cup french's fried onions

1/4 tsp pepper

1/4 tsp salt

Mix everything (except cheddar cheese and fried onions) and bake at 400 degrees for 20 minutes. Then take out and sprinkle the cheese and friend onions on top and bake for an additional 3-5 minutes (or whenever the onions are a little crispy and the cheese is melted). Then let cool for a few minutes and enjoy. ;-)

it's getting c o l d

It's starting to get really cold and while I love the fall I am NOT a big fan of the cold. The whole morning at work I was freezinggg and was craving something warm... so on my break instead of getting lunch I went home and quickly made chili and left it in the crock pot. There's nothing better than a pot of hot soup on a cold day. ;o)

It was so nice when I got done work and opened my front door and could smell our yummy warm dinner just waiting...

now if vince could just hurry up and get home so we could eat it, that would be great.

Learning to Cook

Before getting engaged I very rarely cooked... and when I did I didn't enjoy it and was never any good at it. However, once I got engaged my mom told me I needed to start learning and once I did I would like it more. So, in order to make me learn my mom put me in charge of the meals at our house a couple days each week. (she was rather excited about this idea, I was not) I would plan out a couple meals, go grocery shopping (ugh), then of course actually make the meal, and then the worst part was doing the dishes afterwards. Now, I wish I could say I made fabulous food and was great right away, but that would be a lie. There were plenty of times I would spend way too much time in the store looking for one small ingredient, get frustrated and just leave and order dinner (seriously).. or I would cook and pull things out of the oven that were either over-cooked, under-cooked, or looked nothing like the pictures in the cookbook.

Needless to say it could be really frustrating... BUT the more I cooked the better I got with it and eventually I even started to enjoy it (a little). Now don't get me wrong, I am still learning to cook and I still have a long ways to go before I am as good as my mom... but at least it's not something I dread anymore. I actually like coming home and making dinner for us (except for on weekends, I refuse to cook on saturdays). Plus Vince and I do the grocery shopping together now (which makes me not mind it as much) and he usually even cooks once a week which is a nice treat to come home from work and just get to r e l a x. And the best part, we have a deal that whoever does the cooking, the other person does the dishes. (love that) So my goal now is trying to make some of my own recipes, or at least making adjustments to other ones instead of having to follow everything step by step... we'll see how that goes ;-)

Now if only I could learn to love doing the laundry..