Quick Fix- Chicken Breast

When I made the chicken breast I wanted to do something that was easy, quick, and different that way if someone needed a quick fix for dinner they could use this one! Since I already had the chicken breast cut and ready to go, I wanted to make a rub that wouldn't have to marinade to make it faster. I used butter, garlic, salt, pepper, and onion powder. I melted the butter then just added the rest of the ingredients. I only did two chicken breast so I use half a stick of butter, 1 large clove of fresh garlic, and a dash of everything else. I decided to grill the chicken breast, so I brushed the rub on both sides once before I put in on the grill, cooked them completely and then coated them again on both sides when they were done! I loved this! I like garlic though, and the garlic really stuck out in this recipe but I really enjoyed it! The chicken from Jones and if you have not had their chicken, you honestly should go try it! It is a few dollars more, but totally worth it..it is free range, no hormones or additives and so fresh compared to store bought, in my opinion anyway.



Here are a few pictures!!...

Chicken Broth!

I hope you all enjoyed all of the veggie post and will try out some new recipes! The next two weeks I will be telling you about the different chicken dishes that I have made. Now, looking back on it, I wish I would have made more of a meal out of the chicken rather than JUST the chicken, so starting with the next group I will try to be better about this! When I went out to the farm I picked up a whole chicken, I had never cut a chicken up before, so needless to say I was a bit nervous. I watched a video on Utube first, and then with my mom's help we got to work. It was a lot easier that I thought! I cut it into breast, thighs, wings, and legs. Then I used the bone to make broth. I boiled water in a stockpot then added the chicken bone, with some carrots, celery, onion, along with salt and pepper! I let it boil for 3 hours and then let it completely cool before I poured it into another container and put it in the refrigerator until I need it. I can't wait to use it and see if I can tell a difference from store bought, I am sure I will be able too because it smelt soo good!!!

Here is a picture of the bone cooking to make the broth! It doesn't look very good, but trust me it smelt great!

Hope you guys have a great day!

Erin

Okra, Peppers, Tomatoes..Oh My!

I have never been a huge okra fan, unless it is fried and dipped in ketsup! But I thought I would try something new.

It was super easy and not too bad if you like okra. All I did was wash and cut all of vegetables up in bite size pieces and sauteed them!

I used two okra, one large green pepper, one smaller dark pepper, and one large tomato. Started with a little oil in the pan and put everything in but the tomatoes. Let them get almost all the way done and put the tomatoes in for about 5 minutes, that way they didn't get too soggy and drowned all the other taste out. I then just added salt and pepper and it was ready to eat! This was a great side dish to go with any entree. It had plenty of different flavors in it, and if I were to make it again I would have added an onion, but I didn't think about it!

Here are the pictures!

I obviously did not put corn or eggplant in this, but I had them so put them in my basket for the picture!

Have a good day!

Erin

Cucumbers-My Favorite!

In the summer, cucumbers are one of my favorite afternoon snacks! I usually just slice the cucumbers and let them soak in vinegar, water, onions, a little dill, and salt and pepper. But, after a while that can get a little old, so I wanted to try something new. When I was out at the farm getting my 25 cent cucumbers, yeah 25 cents I picked up some of their sun dried tomato and garlic vinaigrette dressing. I sliced the cucumbers up and let them marinade in the dressing over night and ate them the next afternoon...they were delicious! That dressing is great, and a lot easier than making the onion and vinegar mix!

Here is a few pictures of the cucumbers marinading and of the dressing I used..enjoy

Have a great day!

Erin

Eggplant Pizzaria

Hello!

Warning: I had never made eggplant before so I am going to be going into a lot of detail because not many people make a lot of eggplant, at least people that I eat meals with!

Like I said, I have never tried eggplant before, but decided that I was going to try many different things that I have not ever eaten for this blog. I went to Jones and got an eggplant, but still had no idea what I was going to make with it. One of my moms friends told me that it is good fried with pizza sause on it, which sounded delicious to me, but I am trying to stay away from as much fried food as I can! So I just got out my mom's small stone from Pampered Chef, sprayed it with oil, and placed three slices of eggplant on it since I knew no one in my family would be trying it, there was no need to cook the whole thing.

I preheated the oven for 350 degrees and placed the eggplant in the oven for about 15 minutes. I then got the dish out and flipped the eggplant(do not know if this step was totally necasarry, but I did it), and covered it with pizza sauce and shredded moterellza cheese, put it back in the oven for another 10-15 minutes or until the cheese was melted on top.

The recipe itself was really simple and fast. I was a bit hesitant to try it, but I did and it was not too bad! I actually ate both slices and enjoyed it. I would definatly make this again if I had other people to eat it with, that way I would not waste more of the eggplant than I actually ate, but that is okay.

Here is a few pictures of my finished product!...

Have a great day!

Erin

Corn on the Cob

Hello!

So I know a lot of people think corn on the cob is something very basic, but I think everyone makes it differently, so I am going to share my favorite way! My soon to be sister-in-law showed me this not too long ago, thanks Emily!

During the summer we like to grill everything we possibly can that way we can avoid turning on the oven and heating up the house! We started by pulling back the shuck, but do not rip it off. Pull it down as far as you can without it breaking off and remove off the hair from inside, and rinse. Then, I always soak it in water for about 30 minutes to make sure it is moist for the grill. After it is finished soaking, I rub it in butter and dash salt and pepper all over it. You can use a different spice if you wanted to, but I prefer salt and pepper. Then, pull the shuck back up and either use a rubber band to hold the shuck tightly upright, or i always just use a smaller part of the shuck that falls off and tie it around the top to hold it all together. Lastly, place on the grill for about 30 minutes, or until corn is tender, but it will still be crunchy because it is on the grill. Peel the shuck back and eat! I think it gives the corn more flavor because you cook the butter, salt, and pepper into the corn. Unfortunately I do not have any pictures of me making this, but at least it is something that is easily in-visioned!

Have a good day!

Erin

Squash and Zucchini Sauteed in Herb Butter

This was one of the first recipes I made this summer. Let me tell you after this recipe, that I thought was going to be easy peezy, I knew this blog was going to be a challenge, but a fun one! I started out gathering all of my supplies and finding a large enough pan. Here are the ingredients that I used--

3 tablespoons unsalted butter

2 zucchini's

2 squash

1 tablespoon of sea salt

1/2 tablespoon of ground pepper

3/4 cup of basil, torn and loosely packed

Once I got all of that together I washed the squash and zucchini and cut it up-zucchini I cut lengthwise and cut the squash in patty rounds. I started melt the butter into a large pan. Let me tell you, I had no idea how much smoke burnt butter could make! My mom was laughing at me! I guess I will only learn from trying with cooking. Anyways, after I got the butter melted, I added the zucchini and squash started to saute them, stirring occasionally to prevent them of burning. After about 8 minutes or until they are tender. I then added the salt, pepper, and basil. Simmer for a minute or two and you are finished!

After eating this recipe and if I would make it again, I would defiantly put a lot less basil in, it ended up overpowering the dish, in my opinion. Oh, and I will try not to burn the butter either! Ha.

Here are a few pictures!!

Have a great day!

Erin

Green Beans

Hello!

This post is short and sweet. There is not a long detailed recipes for my green beans. I like my green beans hard and not super cooked, or in a casserole. I know I'm a little different, but I honestly just started liking green beans within the past year, so this is a big step! Ha.

I just start out by rinsing and snapping the ends off the green beans. Then, putting a drop of olive oil in a skillet and waiting until it gets warm and putting the green beans in. after the green beans are starting to sizzle and soaking up the oil, I just dash salt(sea salt is the best) and pepper over them and then sometimes add a little crushed red pepper, depending on who I am cooking for. Then, I just wait until they are a little browned, but still hard and they are done!

Here is a few pictures....

Have a great day everyone!!

Erin

Erin

Grilled Pizza

I was looking for something fun to make for lunch online one morning. I came across a lady who made pizza on the grill. I instantly wanted to try this out! So after work I ran out to Jones farm and picked up some ingredients. I wanted to make my own sauce because I knew my mom didn’t have any and I didn’t want to go to wal-mart, since it was only me eating I didn’t want to make too much. I knew I had an onion, garlic, and fresh basil/pesto that my mom and I had made, so I only needed a tomato for the sauce and a green pepper for my toppings.I had bought some shredded cheese from when I made my eggplant(post coming soon), so I already had that as well.

I knew I didn’t want to make the crust because I wanted to eat it for lunch and didn’t have make it, then wait an hour before I could use it. But, my sister lives in St. Louis so I go up often, and there is a Trader Joe’s there and they have frozen pizza crust in a bag for $1.99, that’s cheap! I get the wheat crust and it is so easy! You just get it out and let it sit for 20 minutes at room temperature and then it is ready to go!

When I got home I went and got the crust out of the freezer so that could start to de thaw as I started on my sauce. I also went and started the grill (for the first time by myself btw) because when I read how the other lady did it, she said it worked the best when the grill was at its max heat. To make my sauce I started by cutting the onion. Again, since it was only for me I used ¼ of a medium onion. I put a pot on the stove and put a little olive oil in the bottom and started browning my onion. I got one clove of garlic and used my garlic press to get the garlic in small pieces straight into the pan with the onions that are still browning. Then I peeled the tomato and used my pampered chef food chopper to cut it into small pieces. Then turned the stove up to medium heat and added the tomato and pesto that was already chopped and kept in my fridge, I didn’t really measure my pesto, I added probably close to one tablespoon though, maybe a little more. Then I let it simmer on medium heat for about 15 minutes.

While the sauce was simmering I rolled out the dough. I knew I was going to use my vegetable grilling basket to make the pizza, but didn’t want to put it on the heat directly because it would burn the bottom too quick. So I put a cookie sheet on grill upside down that way I could just set the basket on that instead of straight on the grill. I set the cookie sheet in the grill that was 550 degrees by this time. I came back inside and finished rolling out my dough, greased the basket, stretch the dough out on the basket, spooned the sauce onto the dough, it was a little chunky but I didn’t mind I had to spoon it though so that the extra juice from the tomato didn’t make the dough soggy. Lastly, I added the shredded cheese and green pepper to the top, then I put the pizza on the grill! I checked it after 5 minutes and the cheese was melted but I wanted the crust a little harder so I wanted 2 more minutes and it was finished! …in 7 minutes!!

Hope all this makes sense! It is one of my longer ones since I kind of made it up by myself! Hope I didn’t lose you! Here are some pictures of how it turned out! Enjoy!!

Hope you all have a great day!

Erin

Weekly line-up

I hope everyone had a great Labor Day and enjoyed their long weekend, I know I did! I thought since I did vegetables all summer, I would start by posting all of those dishes. I have been thinking about how I wanted to lay this blog out to fit everything in and making sure it is organized, since it is for a grade ;) I have decided to dedicate two weeks to each food group with at least two recipes a week and more in some categories. Here is the categories I have decided to cover(they are not listed in any certain order):

Vegetables
Chicken
Pork
Lamb
Beef
Eggs
Dessert
then the last two weeks I will do a wrap-up, talk about the cookbook, condiments, and changes that have been made at the farm since I started this blog!

I hope you all enjoy all the different types of recipes and try something new out of this because I know I will be!

Have a good day! First recipe post coming soon!
Erin