It's my favorite time of the year!!! Woohoo!
That is all.
Monday, September 23, 2013
Smothered Chicken
This is a recipe I have made a couple of times and I'm loving it! I love how versatile it is! I plan on making this many more times in the future. This is my inspiration for the recipe. I have changed it up a little each time I have made it.
Smothered Chicken
- 2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
- Spicy Brown Mustard
- 3 large peppers (any color you prefer)
- Rotisserie Chicken Seasoning (or any seasoning you like)
- 1/2 cup cheese of choice
- Bacon grease (if you don't have any, you can use vegetable or olive oil)
Instructions
- preheat your oven to 350
I love cooking meats in cast iron. It just has such a unique flavor that I love. Feel free to feel whatever cookware you have handy. Same goes for the bacon grease. I realize it's not the healthiest option, but it gives great flavor. When we cook bacon, we pour the grease off into a glass container and keep it in the fridge for times like these!
- Season the chicken on both sides with your choice of seasoning. I used Rotisserie Chicken Seasoning this time, but just salt and pepper is absolutely fine. Cook the chicken almost all the way through. Make sure you have a nice crust on each side, but you will finish cooking in the oven.
- While the chicken is cooking, cut your peppers into strips.
- Remove the chicken from the pan and let cool just a little
- Scrape the pan and add more grease if needed. You can leave the little bits of chicken, they will just add more flavor for later. Add the peppers and cook until they're slightly charred. Season with Montreal Steak Seasoning (or any other seasoning you would like to try). You can use any peppers you like. This time, I used a mixture of red, yellow and orange peppers.
- While the peppers are cooking, cut the chicken breasts into strips and cover in spicy brown mustard. I didn't measure, but I probably used around 1/4 cup.
- Once the peppers are nice and charred, mix them in with the chicken and mustard mixture. Cover with cheese and bake for 30 minutes.
I like to serve mine over white rice, but feel free to try whatever sounds good to you. You can use onions, mushrooms, any color of peppers that sounds good. For a Southwest mix, you could add in corn and/or black beans with some Mexican flavorings. I think I'm going to try a Southwest version next time. You really can do whatever you like with this recipe. You could even substitute the chicken for other meats. Maybe a Philly Cheesesteak version? Or even smothered squash and zucchini for a vegetarian option!
Let me know if you try any other combos that are delicious!
Wednesday, September 18, 2013
Friday Favorites!!!
Alright, I'm going to try to get back on track with this blog thing. This is sort of a Friday Favorites post I suppose, because today is my Friday!!!
Meeting Baby Jaden - Of course meeting our nephew and being able to spend the weekend with him was a favorite! I really enjoyed spending time with the family while we were home and I'm so glad we were able to go down to help out for a few days. I can't wait to see Jaden and the rest of the family again for Thanksgiving!
Keeping Baby Zach - I got to keep Zach for the day a week or so ago. It was an adventure for sure! I enjoyed keeping him. He's such a happy little boy. Bailey liked watching him and she has discovered that she likes the taste of spitup (GROSS! I know!). I loved having him for the day and I liked watching Josh interact with him too. It's nice practice, but I am mostly glad it was just temporary. I want to enjoy my full nights of sleep while I still can ;-).
Football Season - We have some major improvements to make, but I'm still hopeful for a good season. We'll be making our way down to Raleigh to see our Wolfpack take on Clemson. Hopefully it's a good one! Either way, I know we'll have a great time and I'm so glad football season is back!
Ferguson's - I don't remember if I posted about Ferguson's when they had their fire last year, but it's a restaurant back home that Josh and I LOVE. The owners are good friends and it's a small town staple that has definitely been missed. Well, after being closed for over a year after the fire, they have finally re-opened! Josh and I were able to stop by for an early lunch while we were in town last week. It was SO nice to be able to catch up and have a delicious Fergie burger!
Cherrywood Smoked Bacon - This may seem silly, but I LOVE bacon and we have found a new favorite. I grabbed this stuff last week and it is AMAZING! We've been eating it for breakfast ever since. I don't know if I can ever go back to regular bacon again.
The Weather - It has been AMAZING! Cool mornings, warm afternoons, low humidity. It's beginning to feel a lot like Fall!!!
Brewing - We tried our first batch of all grain beer. We named it Fantasy Draught, because it was meant to be consumed at a fantasy draft party. The party fell through, so we got to keep the beer for ourselves! It's a pineapple wheat. Really nice flavor, but a bit lighter than we were hoping for, we're working toward getting better grain efficiency, so our beers should improve in that area over the next couple batches. The pineapple isn't really evident. You pick up the bitter from the pineapple, but not the sweetness. The sugars all got fermented out. The next time we do this, we'll chill the beer once we add the pineapple juice (or whatever sweet thing we're adding) so some of those yummy sugars stick around. In the end, it's not exactly what we had in mind, but still pretty dang good. :-)
We converted our pumpkin recipe to all grain and tried it for the first time. It's in the secondary right now, so we're not sure exactly how it will taste. It's close, but not the same. We will get a second go at it this weekend, and we know we need to adjust the mash temperature a little bit. I'm looking forward to seeing how both of these turn out!
Running - I REALLY slacked on training after we visited Raleigh, and I really thought it was going to do me in. Josh and I went to the park to train this weekend since they have some hills to run on. We went in planning to run 5 miles, but we stuck it out and ran the whole 6.2!!! I was so excited and I feel much better knowing I can finish the race! I'm not going to finish it in under an hour, which was my original goal, but I'll shoot for that next year.
I also got new running shoes. SO comfy! I had a Groupon for a local running store. These were a treat to myself for finishing my first 5K.
I'm REALLY going to try to post more often. Hopefully with more pictures that are actually mine. Haha.
Brewing - We tried our first batch of all grain beer. We named it Fantasy Draught, because it was meant to be consumed at a fantasy draft party. The party fell through, so we got to keep the beer for ourselves! It's a pineapple wheat. Really nice flavor, but a bit lighter than we were hoping for, we're working toward getting better grain efficiency, so our beers should improve in that area over the next couple batches. The pineapple isn't really evident. You pick up the bitter from the pineapple, but not the sweetness. The sugars all got fermented out. The next time we do this, we'll chill the beer once we add the pineapple juice (or whatever sweet thing we're adding) so some of those yummy sugars stick around. In the end, it's not exactly what we had in mind, but still pretty dang good. :-)
We converted our pumpkin recipe to all grain and tried it for the first time. It's in the secondary right now, so we're not sure exactly how it will taste. It's close, but not the same. We will get a second go at it this weekend, and we know we need to adjust the mash temperature a little bit. I'm looking forward to seeing how both of these turn out!
Running - I REALLY slacked on training after we visited Raleigh, and I really thought it was going to do me in. Josh and I went to the park to train this weekend since they have some hills to run on. We went in planning to run 5 miles, but we stuck it out and ran the whole 6.2!!! I was so excited and I feel much better knowing I can finish the race! I'm not going to finish it in under an hour, which was my original goal, but I'll shoot for that next year.
I also got new running shoes. SO comfy! I had a Groupon for a local running store. These were a treat to myself for finishing my first 5K.
I'm REALLY going to try to post more often. Hopefully with more pictures that are actually mine. Haha.
Tuesday, September 3, 2013
Playing Catchup Again!
Wow!!! I can't believe it's been almost 3 months since I have posted! I will try to do a couple catchup posts on the major events that have happened since I last posted. Time has been flying by and the last few months kind of run together now.
Babies Everywhere!
Remember when I said that between friends and family, we have 6 babies coming this year? Well, We've finally met them all!
I've already posted about our niece and the triplets being born. The latest addition is...
Our nephew Jaden! He was born August 26th. We got to spend last weekend with him and we had such a great time! He's a great baby and doesn't cry much at all.
Our nephew Jaden! He was born August 26th. We got to spend last weekend with him and we had such a great time! He's a great baby and doesn't cry much at all.
Baby Zachary! He joined us on July 20. He was a week old in this picture. So precious!
Visits
The Martins visited us. We got lucky and we were able to tour my favorite MD brewery, Flying Dog! We had so much fun, but I don't have any pictures of the humans from our trip.
This was the first time Carter has been to visit Bailey! They played SO much!
Then a couple of weeks later, we went to visit the Martins! We visited some breweries that were not around back in our Raleigh days, Crank Arm and Raleigh Brewing Company. I enjoyed them both, but RBC was my favorite!
While we were in Raleigh, I visited my old hairdresser. I've had enough bad haircuts up here and I've decided to stop my search. I'll just plan my haircuts around trips home when I can go see Whitney.
Yay for getting what I asked for!
After a couple days of hard playing. They love each other a lot, but they don't really cuddle, so this was special :-).
Bailey went to the dog beach for the first time.
Fitness
I completed my 5K program and ran my first official 5K! I finished the Dirty Girl Mud Run on August 10th. It was SO much fun! I am now training for the Dogfish Dash 10K that is at the end of September. Training has been a challenge, but overall I am enjoying it. I have been using Runkeeper and I love it!
Brewing
We've graduated to all grain brewing!!! We've been wanting to convert to all grain for a while and we finally bit the bullet! We're both really excited about this! It takes a bit longer, but it gives us more control over our beer.
We were able to build a nice mash tun for a lot less than we would have paid for one assembled. We've only brewed one batch of all grain so far, and we haven't tried it yet. It goes in the keg tomorrow. We have plans to brew again this coming weekend!
Football season has started!
Go Pack!!!
Visits
The Martins visited us. We got lucky and we were able to tour my favorite MD brewery, Flying Dog! We had so much fun, but I don't have any pictures of the humans from our trip.
This was the first time Carter has been to visit Bailey! They played SO much!
Then a couple of weeks later, we went to visit the Martins! We visited some breweries that were not around back in our Raleigh days, Crank Arm and Raleigh Brewing Company. I enjoyed them both, but RBC was my favorite!
While we were in Raleigh, I visited my old hairdresser. I've had enough bad haircuts up here and I've decided to stop my search. I'll just plan my haircuts around trips home when I can go see Whitney.
Yay for getting what I asked for!
After a couple days of hard playing. They love each other a lot, but they don't really cuddle, so this was special :-).
Bailey went to the dog beach for the first time.
Fitness
I completed my 5K program and ran my first official 5K! I finished the Dirty Girl Mud Run on August 10th. It was SO much fun! I am now training for the Dogfish Dash 10K that is at the end of September. Training has been a challenge, but overall I am enjoying it. I have been using Runkeeper and I love it!
Brewing
We've graduated to all grain brewing!!! We've been wanting to convert to all grain for a while and we finally bit the bullet! We're both really excited about this! It takes a bit longer, but it gives us more control over our beer.
We were able to build a nice mash tun for a lot less than we would have paid for one assembled. We've only brewed one batch of all grain so far, and we haven't tried it yet. It goes in the keg tomorrow. We have plans to brew again this coming weekend!
Football season has started!
Go Pack!!!
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