Chicken Pot-Pie

I tried to think of a clever little name, failed miserably.  Although I decided that sometimes it is nice to know what you are reading about prior to jumping in and reading.  I made chicken pot pie and loved it! I feel like I say that I loved every recipe I try, but I don't, I promise I don't. I made this weird healthy brownie thing last night, did not love it (although Roland and I ate the entire thing...recipe is not blog-worthy...yet).  Sooooo I will get straight to the point, this is one of the recipes that Tara sent me!! Highly recommend it.  I didn't have a pie tin, so I snagged one at DI--and then ventured around and found that they actually have really nice pie tins at the dollar store, so if you don't have a pie tin, and need one (because you will need one after you see the pictures of how delicious my pot pie looks) hit up a local dollar store!
Also, one more thing before I post the recipe, this meal is an awesome "newly wed" meal, or if you are cooking for two (maybe 3, if you don't eat like me)--just cook it up and grab a couple forks!

(To-die) Chicken Pot Pie

Ingredients

1 pkg pie crust (for anyone like me, this can be found by the pillsburry stuff)

1 can cream of chicken soup

1 can cream of mushroom soup

1/4 c. milk

1 small bag of mixed frozen veggies (put about 3/4 of the bag in or however much you want)

1 russet potato - peal and chop into cubes and then microwave for 5 minutes to soften

1/4 c. sour cream

1 Tbs. mayo 

1/4 c. diced onion 

1 big can of diced white chicken breast (drain it)

Directions:

Combine soups, milk, mayo, and sour cream in a bowl. Add everything else into soup mixture. Add salt and pepper. Lightly spray a 9-inch pie dish (you can buy an aluminum one if you don't have a regular one). Put one shell on the bottom and form to pan. Add filling - there will be extra, don't use it all or it will overflow and crack the top of pie. (use most but not all). Then put the top pie shell over everything and seal the edges really good. Poke center of top three times with a fork to vent.

** So a few alterations to the recipe/directions that I did were first, I used miracle whip instead of mayo (the husband only eats mw) and it tasted fine. Then, when I was given the recipe my sister told me that she hadn't sealed the edges of the pie really well, so when I put the pie crusts on, I didn't remove any of it (the directions on the pie crust package say to cut off excess dough), I pinched both the top and the bottom crust together super well and then kind of rolled up the edge so it puffed up, to make a tasty crust (see pictures below) I don't know about you, but I LOVE the crust with the pot pie, and get kind of sad when it is gone. This made for extra dipping and a really tasty pie! Worked out great! 

Voila! And yes, it tasted as good as it looks.

So I seriously stuffed that pie FULL of the pie filling, but still had a little bit left over and decided to try wrapping it up with pillsburry croissants.  I wasn't sure how this would turn out so I only did a few (I absolutely love pillsburry croissants and didn't want to potentially ruin a whole package with my experimenting) to my surprise/delight it worked out very nicely! I just did a spoonful in the center and gently wrapped up the croissant, it was awesome! I would suggest this idea for left over sauce, or as a meal for larger parties! (this might help with portion control as well) Since we loved the combination so much we ended up dipping the plain croissants in the rest of the left over sauce! Needless to say, we don't have any sauce left over. All gone! AND 2 meals!

Thank you Katie

Pinterest once again inspired my amateur-cookin this past week. I stumbled across a seriously amazing blog. For anyone who really works hard to eat healthy while struggling with the conflicting condition of sweet-tooth-itis like I do -- http://chocolatecoveredkatie.com -- you can thank me later.

We play games with another couple in our ward every Sunday and it has quickly become tradition that we both bring a treat, I knew it the second I laid eyes on that post that this was to be my treat this past week, we ate the entire thing. I served it with graham crackers to dip in it, boy was it AWESOME!

Cookie-Dough-Dip

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups chickpeas (1 can, drained) (250g)

1/8 tsp plus 1/16 tsp salt

tiny bit over 1/8 tsp baking soda

2 tsp pure vanilla extract
1/4 cup nut butter (You can get away with using only 3 T. If you use peanut butter, it’ll have a very-slight   “pb cookie dough” taste, so if you don’t want this, you can sub oil.)

up to 1/4 cup milk of choice (Start with 1 T, and add more as needed)

Sweetener

1/3 cup chocolate chips
2 to 3 T oats (or flaxmeal) (you can omit, but also omit the milk if you do)

• • Add all ingredients (except for chocolate chips) to a food processor, and blend until very smooth. Then mix in the chocolate chips.

• • • • 
        

• • So I decided to try to make this blog short and "sweet" this time, less yacking more "snacking"... When making this I found the salt amounts a little odd, so I just did 1/4 tsp just a little under-filled. Also, I didn't have actual nut butter on hand, so I used 1/4 c peanut butter, it did taste a little peanut-buttery, but who doesn't like peanut butter? For the sweetener, the blog has multiple options--you could go and check out other options (I bought some stevia today and I want to try it) but I just used brown sugar, only did 3 Tbs and it was fine! Also, I chose to put oats in mine, loved it! 
    
    
    
    
    

Blogging my house-wifing attempts

So I made a blog. Hopefully I can live up to the title of "blogger", I guess we shall see.

After discovering the beautiful website called Pinterest.com (feel free to follow me, I do enough pinning for everyone) I decided I needed some place to record what I find/try from Pinterest, what better than a blog!? So, this blog is mostly dedicated to cool or complicated recipes I discover, not only from Pinterest, but recipe books, other's blogs, or maybe even make up on my own (if I get feeling daring).

I also have this weird faddish with healthy things, especially for healthy desserts, even ask my husband--it is almost out of control. So the majority of the recipes I try will hopefully be lower calorie or short on sugar and fat. 

So, let's cut to the chase, BLOG #1... hopefully of many.

Macaroni Grill Rosemary Bread

paired with
Carrabaa's dipping Herbs/Spices

My sister Tara sent me an email with 5 recipes to try. I decided, like any good sister would, to make an effort to try making all of them. Not all at once of course, but over time. Yes, I know, 5 recipes? I could do that in a week! But if you know me at all, you know that I eat in fads. Maybe fads isn't the right word, but I get a meal and eat it for weeks and weeks and then switch. It's weird I know. Last Spring semester I had spinach wraps for lunch for 5 weeks straight--using different dressings of course--but you get the point.

So last week on Thursday, January 19 I made my first of these 5 recipes, the Rosemary Bread! And again, if you know me at all you know that I would start with the bread, I have a serious weakness for carbs. So here is the recipe, complete with pictures of my tasty creation, of which my husband and I loved so much I made it again 3 days later!

Rosemary Bread

Ingredients

1 T. yeast

1 T. sugar

1 c. warm water

2.5 c. flour

1 t. salt

1 T. rosemary

1 T. butter

Directions:
Place yeast, sugar, and water in bowl of mixer. Wait about 5 minutes to let it get bubbly. Mix in 1 Tbs. butter, salt, and 2 c. flour.
Add 1 Tbs. of the rosemary. Knead for about 10 minutes by hand or 5 minutes by bread mixer. until smooth and elastic. Add more flour if necessary.

Oil a bowl, put dough in bowl and cover with a towel. Let dough rise in a warm place for one hour or until doubled. Punch down dough and divide in half. Let dough rest about 5 minutes. Spray baking pan or cookie sheet with cooking spray (I use my stone for this) Shape the dough into 2 small rounded oval loaves. 

Brush loaves with remaining 1 Tbs. butter and sprinkle remaining 1 Tbs. rosemary over loaves and sprinkle with sea salt. Let loaves raise again until doubled (about 45 minutes. Preheat oven to 375 and bake for 15-20 minutes, until lightly browned. 

can you say, best smelling kitchen ever

While I was cooking up these tasty loaves I mixed up some spices for dipping with olive oil and balsamic vinegar! If you haven't had fresh bread dipped in olive oil and balsamic vinegar, you definitely need to get our more... or just try it. So here is the recipe. (Found this one on Pinterest, which was pinned from macaroniandcheesecake.com, which apparently stole it from recipelink.com--maybe check them out for other ideas?)

Dipping Spices

Ingredients

2 T. chopped Italian flat leaf parsley
1 T. minced garlic
1 t. dried thyme
1 t. dried oregano
1/4 t. dried basil (or 1 tbsp. fresh-if using fresh reduce parsley to 1 tbsp.)
1/8 t. dried rosemary (or 1/2 tsp. fresh)
1 t. ground black pepper
1/2 t. kosher salt
1/8 t. ground red pepper (or 1/4 tsp. red pepper flakes)
1/2 t. extra virgin olive oil
1/8 t. fresh lemon juice

*This is the recipe, although I didn't have any garlic on hand so I used garlic powder, I think it worked just fine. Also, I didn't have ground red pepper so I just didn't add any. First time we made it I also didn't add the olive oil and lemon juice, didn't really notice a difference when I did add them the second time.

Perfect drowning in olive oil and balsamic vinegar! I suggest not using a black plate, the majority of people won't have that problem, but it is nice to see how much vinegar you have (I LOVE vinegar) and a black plate makes it a tad difficult.

There it is folks, the first blog! Enjoy. I know will, again and again!