Chickpea Salad

Lunch is my hardest meal of the day. Breakfast is usually tea with oatmeal or cereal or fruit. As I make my grocery list and go shopping, I plan my dinners. But lunches? Easy if there are leftovers in the fridge. Not so easy if there's no leftovers. I tend to eat a lot of egg salad or tuna salad just because I can't think of anything else and it's easy. But that gets boring. In order to chance it up a bit, I decided to make chickpea salad. Oh my god, so so so good. I have a new favorite, easy, heathly lunch!

Recipe adapted from here.

Ingredients:
1 15-ounce can of chickpeas (also known as garbanzo beans), drained, rinsed, and dried
1 celery stick, chopped
2 tablespoons onion, minced
1-2 tablespoons mayo (I tend to go super light on mayo. It's all personal preference)
1 tablespoon lemon juice, optional (sometimes I add it, sometimes I don't)
1 teaspoon dried dill weed
salt and pepper, to taste
a dash of garlic powder, optional

Directions:
Coarsely mash the chickpeas (you can use a fork, potato masher, I use a meat mallet) in a bowl. Stir in the rest of the ingredients.

Serve on bread, with crackers or veggies, or eat as is.

Enjoy!

~Krissy

More Chickpea Recipes:
Chickpea Veggie Burgers 
Hummus without Tahini
Cinnamon-Sugar Roasted Chickpeas 
Roasted Pumpkin Chickpeas
Sweet and Salty Chickpeas
Skinny Chocolate Chip Cookies (Made with Chickpeas)

Black Bean Tacos

I must be in a Mexican-inspired mood lately. In the last couple weeks, I've made pumpkin brie quesadillas and chicken nugget tacos. And now a black bean taco. I can not even begin to tell you how much I love this black bean taco. My husband was on the phone and I made him take a moment to try one--they were that good. He's not a huge bean fan, but even he liked these.

Recipe adapted from here.

Ingredients:
1 15-ounce can blackbeans, drained and rinsed
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon cumin
1/4 cup salsa
1 ounce cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup mozarella cheese, shredded
8 6-inch tortillas
Cooking Spray

Directions:
In a bowl, coarsely mash together beans, garlic powder, cumin, salsa, mozzarella, and cream cheese.

Heat of skillet over medium-high heat and spray with cooking spray. Place one tortilla in the skillet, spread 1/8 of the bean mixture on half of the tortilla and fold the tortilla in half. Cook until tortilla is golden and crisp, about 2 minutes. Flip and cook the other side for about 2 minutes.

Repeat with the rest of the tortillas.

Enjoy!

~Krissy

More Mexican Recipes:
Snowflake Tortilla Chips 
Homemade Flour Tortillas
Chicken Enchiladas with Fire-Roasted Tomatoes
Chile and Tomato Shredded Chicken with Cheese Sauce
Corn and Black Bean Skillet Chicken 
Margarita Chicken and Steak Fajitas 

Melt-in-Your-Mouth Chicken

I wanted a super simple chicken recipe with a lot of flavor that I didn't have to marinate first, and that's how I found this recipe. No marinating, not a lot of ingredients, and incredibly moist and tasty.

Recipe adapted from here.

Ingredients:
2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
1/2 cup mayonnaise (I used low fat)
1/4 cup Parmesan cheese, grated
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper

Directions:
Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Grease an 8x8 baking dish with cooking spray.

Cut chicken breasts in half horizontally so you have 4 thin chicken breasts. Place the chicken in the baking dish.

In a bowl, mix together mayonnaise, Parmesan, garlic powder, salt, and pepper. Spread mixture over the chicken breasts. Don't put it on too thick.

Bake for 45 minutes or until the chicken is cooked through.

Melt-in-your-mouth chicken with soy wax beans

Enjoy!

~Krissy

More Chicken Recipes:
Pizza Inspired Chicken 
Potless Chicken Pot Pies
Provincial Chicken
Orange Chicken with Fried Rice
Parmesan-Seared Chicken

Spicy Bacon-Wrapped Chicken

I also call this dish Because I love my husband chicken simply because of the bacon and his mad love of bacon. I've actually never wrapped anything in bacon before. I don't know what I was waiting for because bacon just makes everything better.

Recipe adapted from here.

Ingredients:
10 chicken tenders (or about 3 chicken breasts cut into 10 strips), rinsed and patted dry
10 strips of bacon
1 teaspoon paprika
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1 teaspoon onion powder
1/2 teaspoon Italian seasoning
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1/3 cup brown sugar, packed
1 tablespoon chili powder

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a small bowl, combine paprika, black pepper, onion powder, Italian seasoning, and garlic powder. Rub the spices evenly over the chicken strips so they are completely coated. Wrap each piece of chicken in a strip of bacon. Place the bacon-wrapped chicken in a baking dish.

In a small bowl, mix together the brown sugar and chili powder. Sprinkle this mixture over the top the chicken then press it down. Flip the chicken over and repeat.

Bake for 30 minutes or until the chicken is cooked through.

Optional: Transfer chicken to a cookie sheet and place under the broiler for 3 to 4 minutes to give the bacon extra crispiness.

Enjoy!

~Krissy

More Chicken Recipes:
Pizza Inspired Chicken 
Potless Chicken Pot Pies
Provincial Chicken
Zesty Shredded Chicken (Crockpot) 
Spinach and Cheese Stuffed Chicken
Tomato and Artichoke Chicken 

Fries with Garlic Cheese Sauce

I'm normally a ketchup girl when it comes to my French fries. No ranch dressing, mayo, or mustard for me. But when I made this garlic cheese sauce, I was willing to change my ways. I usually make my own French fries, but I don't quite have the skill or tools to make my own curly fries so when I saw curly fries on sale at the grocery store, I indulged. And what's better, the hubby was out of town when I made this so, I got all the sauce and fries to myself.

Recipe adapted from here.

Ingredients:
2 ounces cream cheese
2 to 4 tablespoons milk
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
1/4 cup cheddar cheese, shredded

Directions:
Melt cream cheese in a small sauce pan on the stove over medium high heat. Stir in 2 tablespoons milk and garlic powder. Add cheddar and stir until smooth. If you want a thinner sauce, add more milk until you reach the desired consistency.

Drizzle over your fries or serve on the side as a dipping sauce.

Enjoy!

~Krissy

More Side Recipes
Pepper Jack Cheez-its 
Homemade Bread Sticks 
Roasted Peas 
Bacon Barbecue Green Bean Casserole 
Baked Parmesan Tomatoes
Pull-Apart Spinach and Cheese Bread
Ranch, Cheddar, and Bacon Potatoes

Pull Apart Pizza Bread

Dinner the other night was an interesting mixture--sweet and sour chicken (three or four chicken breasts, a small jar of sweet and sour sauce, a couple tablespoons of soy sauce, and a healthy dose of garlic powder in the crockpot for 5-6 hours on low) and pull apart pizza bread. I had planned on making my Tomato and Artichoke Chicken, which would have made at least a little more sense with the pizza bread. But the husband loved the random meal--sweet and sour chicken just happens to be one of his favorites (I feel eh about it) and he definitely loves anything pizza. I may have been indifferent about the chicken, but I think I loved the pizza bread just as much as he did.

Recipe adapted from my Pull-Apart Spinach and Cheese Bread recipe.

Ingredients:
3 tablespoons butter, melted
1 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder, divided

1 8-ounce package cream cheese, softened

1/4 cup mayo

1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese

1/2 cup shredded mozzarella cheese 

64 pepperonis 
1/4 teaspoon oregano
1/4 teaspoon black pepper

2 cans of crescent rolls

Pizza sauce or marinara sauce for dipping

 

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray a bundt pan with cooking spray. (I used a loaf pan but only because I couldn't find my bundt pan).

 

Combine melted butter and 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder in a small bowl and set aside. In a medium bowl, mix together the mayo, cream cheese, Parmesan cheese, mozzarella cheese, oregano, pepper, and 1 teaspoon of garlic powder. Set aside.

 

Separate crescent roll dough into 16 triangles then cut each triangle in half lengthwise so you have 32 small triangles. Roll out the triangles to make them slightly bigger. You may want to lightly sprinkle your work area with flour to prevent sticking. Place 1 pepperoni on the dough then spoon approximately 1 tablespoon of cheese mixture into the center of each triangle, place a second pepperoni on top of the cheese mixture, and pull the dough around the filling to form a ball. Press the edges of the dough together to seal. Dip each ball in the butter mixture then place in the bundt pan.

 

Bake 35 to 40 minutes or until the bread turns a golden brown. Allow to cool for about 5 minutes. To remove the bread from the pan, place your serving plate upside down over the pan then turn the plate and pan over. Serve with pizza sauce or marinara sauce.

Enjoy!

~Krissy

More Pizza Recipes:
Buffalo Chicken Pizza
Cauliflower Pizza Crust
Homemade Pizza Rolls
Ricotta, Basil, and Sun-dried Tomato Pizza 
Pizza Inspired Chicken
The Pizza Quiche
Pizza Zucchini Boats

Hobo Meal: Lemon Pepper Chicken with Garlic Potatoes

Eric's mom introduced me to hobo meals, and I quickly fell in love with them. Not because they are so delicious--which they are!--but because of the minimum clean up. For the first time in many years, I am living without a dishwasher, and I can't begin to tell you how tired I am of washing dishes. The amount of dishes and pans a meal requires has begun to greatly matter to me.

So anyway, what is a hobo meal? It's basically throwing your meat and veggies on a big sheet of tin foil, wrapping it up, and cooking it in a campfire or an oven. I bake it in the oven. Everything comes out so incredibly moist and flavorful. And there are no pans or baking dishes to scrub. You just throw out the tin foil!

Ingredients:
2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, thawed
Lemon Pepper Seasoning, to taste
2 small Russet potatoes, diced
garlic powder, to taste
salt, to taste
pepper, to taste
1 tablespoon butter, cut into small pieces

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Season both sides of the chicken breasts with lemon pepper seasoning and place them in a single layer in the center of a large piece of tin foil.

Season your potatoes with garlic powder, salt, and pepper and pile them on both sides of the chicken breasts. Distribute the small pieces of butter among the potatoes. Using the edges of the tin foil, wrap up the meal securely.

Place on a cookie sheet and bake for 1 hour or until the chicken is thoroughly cooked.

Enjoy!

~Krissy

More Chicken Recipes
Baked Garlic Chicken
Chicken Enchiladas with Fire-Roasted Tomatoes
Corn and Black Bean Skillet Chicken 
Crockpot: Brown Sugar and Garlic Chicken
Jalapeno Popper Chicken
Parmesan-Seared Chicken
Parmesan Chicken Casserole 
Potless Chicken Pot Pies
Provincial Chicken

Crockpot: Mashed Potatoes

Crockpot recipes require so little thought or attendence. And about the time you start to get hungry, your food is done and you can dig in. This past holiday season when your stove top and oven are full with food for Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner, Crockpots are a lifesaver. I hosted Christmas dinner and made mac and cheese in a slow cooker--the most amazing mac and cheese I've ever had, by the way. Well, my mom made these mashed potatoes in the slowcooker for Thanksgiving dinner. They were sooo yummy. And she didn't have to worry about boiling or mashing or whipping potatoes while making also the turkey, gravy, cranberry sauce, stuffing, or green bean casserole.

Recipe from here.

Ingredients:
5 pounds russet potatoes, peeled and cut into small chunks
1 1/2 cups chicken broth
1/4 cup butter, cut into pieces
1 cup sour cream*
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon onion powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoons ground black pepper
1/2 to 1 cup milk, warmed.

Directions:
Place the potatoes, chicken broth and butter into your crockpot. Cover and cool on high for 4 hours or until the potatoes are tender. Add sour cream garlic powder, onion powder, salt, and black pepper. Mash potatoes with a potato masher or beat them with an electric mixer on low. Stir in milk a little at a time until you have the desired consistency.

Cover and set the crockpot on low or warm until ready to serve. (Do not keep the crockpot on for more than 2 hours).

Stir before serving.

*My mom said that the next time she makes these, she's going to use cream cheese instead of sour cream. I will let you know how it turns out when she does. (Or if I bet her to it and try it first!)

Mashed potatoes with Brown Butter

Enjoy!

~Krissy

More Potato Recipes:
Salt and Vinegar Roasted Potatoes 
Ranch, Cheddar, and Bacon Potatoes
Twice Baked Potatoes
Twice Microwaved Loaded Potatoes

More Crockpot Recipes:
Alfredo Green Bean Casserole
Brown Sugar and Garlic Chicken
Creamy Butternut Squash Soup
Hot Spinach and Artichoke Dip
Orange Chicken
Pumpkin Butter 
Tomato and Artichoke Chicken

Spinach Balls with a Spicy Tomato Dipping Sauce

Christmas tree in front of the State Capitol in Lansing, MI

This past Christmas I hosted my first Christmas dinner! It was me and Eric, my parents, his parents, and his grandma. Seven people. I've cooked for more, but never for a special occasion like Christmas. Even though I love to cook, I will admit I was a little nervous and a little overwhelmed. I was testing out several new recipes and I'd never cooked a ham before. But I have to say, everything came together perfectly. Not just the food, but the company. Eric's grandma was smiling and glowing (she told me that she didn't remember the last time she spent Christmas outside of her own home). Our dads were gabbing and so were our moms. And they were all vying for the dog's attention. Arya just has that effect on people.

I prepared chocolate covered cranberries, bacon and cheese deviled eggs, and these spinach balls for appetizers. I had made the other two recipes before (totally addicted to chocolate covered cranberries) but the spinach balls were a first. I can't even begin to tell you how good there were. I can't wait to make them again. Both Eric and I were keeping our fingers crossed that there would be some leftovers so we could munch on them later. And there were, just not as many as we have liked.

Recipe adapted from here.

Ingredients:
Spinach Balls
1 10-ounce pack of frozen spinach, thawed and drained (making sure spinach is well drained is very
        important)
2 tablespoon onion, minced
1 heaping cup stuffing with herbs
3 eggs, beaten
1/4 cup unsalted butter, melted
1/2 cup Parmesan cheese, grated
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper

Spicy Tomato Sauce
1 cup marinara or spaghetti sauce
hot sauce, to taste

Directions:
Spinach Balls
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease cookie sheet with cooking spray.

In a large bow, mix all the ingredients together until they are well combined. Shape mixture into 1-inch balls and place on the cookie sheet.  

Bake for 18 to 20 minutes or until the bottoms of the balls are lightly brown. Makes approximately 30 balls. Serve warm.

Spicy Tomato Sauce
Pour tomato sauce in a bowl, add hot sauce to taste. We like things spicy around here and added quite a bit.

I spent the five days before Christmas baking and cooking in preparation. I made these on Christmas Eve, put then in the fridge over night then popped them back in the oven at 350 for 10-15 minutes. Sadly, things were so hectic Christmas morning/afternoon, I forgot to take pictures of my food. So I don't have a picture of the sauce. But both my mom and my mother-in-law commented more than once how much the sauce complimented the balls.

Dinner table

Dessert table

Enjoy!

~Krissy

More Appetizer Recipes:
Cheese Puffs for Cheese Lovers!
Cream Cheese Rangoons
Hot Spinach and Artichoke Dip
Jalapeno Popper Wontons
Parmesan Zucchini Bites
Snowflake Tortilla Chips

Homemade Taco Seasoning

My mom gave me a recipe for chimichangas (I still need to play with that recipe a bit before I share it) that called for taco seasoning. I didn't have any on hand so I just made my own--I already had all the spices I needed in my pantry. I don't think I'm ever going to buy it again.

Recipe from here.

Ingredients:
2 teaspoons chili powder
1 1/2 teaspoons paprika
1 teaspoon onion powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon oregano
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
pinch of cayenne pepper

Directions:
Mix all the spices together and store in an airtight container. I used a mini mason jar.

Enjoy!

~Krissy