French Vanilla French Toast

Check out my recipe for French Vanilla French Toast.  I just finished eating this, and it always hits the spot!  I tend to be an 'eyeball it' kind of cook, so if you feel you need a pinch more of this or a dash less of that, feel free to change it to suit you.

French Vanilla French Toast

(yields 4 pieces)

4 pieces Texas Toast (or other thick cut 'white' bread)

2 eggs, beaten

1/3 c milk (I use 1%)

2 Tbsp French Vanilla Coffee Creamer

1 tsp Cinammon

1 tsp Sugar

Mix eggs, milk, creamer, cinammon, and sugar together.  I like to mix this in a deep plastic sandwich container, this gives a great size and depth to dip your bread!  Dip the bread into the egg mixture, the longer the bread is in the mixture, the more it will absorb.  After both sides are coated, put the bread in a pre-heated medium heat non-stick skillet.  Cook each side until it is golden brown and does not appear shiny or wet.  Serve with your favorite topping, I like maple syrup!

Get Your Grill On

Last night was "I don't want to clean the kitchen so let's grill" night.

Very basic barbecue chicken legs on the grill with some grilled corn! I'll spare you the super easy barbecue chicken legs, because really... they're the simple grill/brush glaze/grill some more/brush some more glaze... eat.

The corn is a little special. I'll share!

Hubs and I have been focusing for a while now on not being wasteful, saving money, paying off debt and living on a tight budget to make sure every dollar counts. This includes planning meals of course! I have been using E-Mealz since 2008; however, recently with my ever changing taste palate, it's been a little more challenging planning meals for all. So, we've been improvising! Our weekly budget for groceries/toiletries is $50.00. You can see how this could be a bit of a conundrum, but so far, we've managed it! Sometimes it means a little bit of compromise, but you'd be surprised at how far things can stretch!

Anyhoodle, the corn! It has been $.33/ear for the last few weeks, so we've been taking advantage of the fully husked corn.

Simple, easy, and juicy.

Ingredients:

4 ears of corn (with husk)

butter

sugar

grilling/cooking twine cut into 4 strips long enough to tie around ears

Instructions:

1) Soak all four ears of corn in a sink of cold water for approximately 30 minutes. (Fully submersed... I use a plate to hold them down)

2) Remove corn from water. Peel back husks to the base of the corn and remove the silk (the stringy stuff attached to the corn). The more 'ripe' the corn, the more easily the silk will detach itself. 

3) Spread a thin layer of butter (or EVOO if you prefer) around the entire ear of corn.

4) Sprinkle a generous layer of sugar over the layer of butter.

5) Push husks back into place. Try to leave no gaps (helps steam the corn in the grill). Tie with twine toward the top.

6) Place the corn over the direct heat source for 5-7 minutes on each side to avoid burning the husks. 

7) After each side has had a turn on direct heat, remove to indirect head and grill for 20-30 minutes. (We usually let the corn cook while the other meat is grilling.)

Before you eat, remove the husks! Enjoy!

I don't do anything to my corn (i.e. butter, salt) after it's been grilled this way. It's usually very sweet and juicy!

So, that'll do it! We're munching on leftovers (do you SEE how much chicken is there) tonight. 

Buffalo Chicken Calzones

So I broke down today and went grocery shopping (I was avoiding it since we are moving soon).  I really wanted to use the rest of a buffalo sauce we had in the fridge, so I decided to experiment with a buffalo chicken calzone.  This ended up being a very simple, yummy recipe that you could easily switch up to suit your spice tolerance.  Check it out!

Start with boneless skinless chicken breasts.  Cut the meat into bite size pieces.  Place the chunks into a preheated non-stick pan that has about a Tbsp of olive oil in it.  Season with salt and pepper and cook until golden.  REMEMBER always be clean and careful when working with raw poultry!

While the chicken is cooking, take your favorite pizza dough and divide it into two portions.  I find this is usually the same amount you would use to make one thin crust pizza.  If the dough is sticky, use a little flour on your hands to help out.

When the chicken is done, coat it with your favorite wing sauce.  I used a standard buffalo sauce, but if you want your calzones hotter or more sweet, change it up! 

Now for the fun part...construction!  Place a good amount of chicken on top of your dough, but make sure you will still be able to fold half of the dough over (see picture)....overstuffing will cause your calzones to leak while baking.  Top the chicken with sliced onion and a generous portion of blue cheese crumbles.  I used low fat crumbles, and it worked really well.

Fold your calzones over, making sure to seal any openings.  If you are fancy, try rolling the edges, but for me today, I just made sure they were fully sealed.

Bake them on a greased cookie sheet at 425 (or whatever you find works well with your dough type) for 15-20 minutes.  Keep an eye on them, they are done when they are golden brown!

Enjoy!



Magical Pepperoni Pizza

So this is a super simple recipe, and I'm sure I'm not telling you anything you don't know, but it's truly a simple and delicious (an inexpensive) recipe that is a repeat with us.

I used to have the problem with my crust being too gooey in the center and burnt on the edges, and always had to use a fork to eat my pizza until I figured out a magic trick. (don't worry, no pixie dust needed) Seriously, who wants to eat their pizza with a fork? The best part of pizza is the utensil free eatage!

Second best part- it's ready in 25 minutes flat.

Magical Pepperoni Pizza

Ingredients:

 (warning, we use tons of GV products around here.. if that offends you, I apologize ;)

9x13 pizza stone or cookie sheet

GV pizza dough

1 cup shredded cheeze

40 pepperoni slices

3 tbsp tomato sauce

Garlic/onion powder to taste, italian seasoning/basil to taste

2 tbsp parmesan cheese
1 tbsp EVOO

Instructions:

Prehead oven to 450 degrees and unroll dough onto pizza stone.

Press edges to side and fork prick holes across whole dough.

(WARNING: MAGIC TRICK!) Brush with EVOO and season with italian seasoning.
Pre-bake dough for 5-7 minutes. Remove from oven.

 Spread tomato sauce thinly over the pre-baked dough

Season with garlic and onion powder and basil to taste.

Sprinkle cheese evenly over sauce.

 Lay pepperonis evenly over cheese.

(usually I add bell peppers, onions, mushrooms at this point as well if we're feeling it)

Sprinkle 2 tbsp parmesan cheese over top

Bake @ 450 for 15-17 minutes or until crust is golden brown.

 Serve up and enjoy! (with your hands of course because your crust is crispy and delicious now!)

If you have any super duper top secret pizza magic tricks you'd like to share, leave them in the 'comments' section. We'd love to hear them!

Tomato-Zucchini Tart

Jayme and I have been wanting to start a food blog for all of our kitchen mischief since we spent a week together food shopping and cooking last summer. Now that she's moving back 'home,' it's going to be even more fun exploring the kitchen with her!

Now, since I didn't actually cook today (we cleaned and did laundry though!), I figured I'd introduce one of my favorite recipes of all time!

This is a veggie laden- and therefor filling meal. I LOVE it.

Tomato-Zucchini Tart

Ingredients:
GV Pie Crust (the unfold and bake kind) 
1 medium zucchini 
(1 T olive oil) 
1 large tomato 
3 slices FF turkey bacon, cooked and crumbled 
1/2 c fresh spinach, chopped
1/3 c FF Parmesan cheese 
(1/3 c light mayo, 1/2 t salt, 1/4 t pepper)


Instructions:
Bake pie crust 9 min @ 450 until golden brown. Let cool.

Sauté zucchini in olive oil until tender

                                                          Arrange the zucchini in the bottom of the pie crust.

Layer fresh tomato slices on top of the zucchini slices.

Combine remaining ingredients and spread evenly on top of the tomatoes.

Bake 15-20 minutes @ 425 or until heated thoroughly. Divides into six portions. 

The best part is that you can improvise with any vegetables of your choice really! However, the tomato is definitely a my favorite flavor in this dish. 

Pair it with some delish green beans and maybe a slice of bacon for you meaties out there, and you're set. 

Toodles!

Loaded Potato Stuffed Bell Peppers

Well here is Jayme's post #1.  Kalyn and I have been discussing doing this for awhile now, since we usually drool over each others pictures of meals and treats.  I hope to bring some pretty fabulous ideas to this blog so that our friends out there can be inspired, or at least entertained :-).  

Tonight I made some pretty interesting stuffed peppers.  My husband and I are about to move, so my fridge/pantry is becoming meager at best.  Finding I had a ridiculously large red bell pepper, potatoes, a few pieces of bacon, and some broccoli, I went to work!  Don't you love improvising with random ingredients?

I started by blanching the halved pepper for about 5 minutes (per instructions from an online resource).  This worked well, preventing that oh so terrible cold crunchy texture.

The filling was more about what was in my fridge than any recipe I could find, thus allowing me to call this my recipe :-).  I peeled and boiled 3 medium sized potatoes just as I would to make normal mashed potatoes.  After this I added the standard milk and butter and salt and pepper to taste.  I had some cream cheese left over (about 2 Tbsp), which gave a wonderful creamy-ness to my plain ole mashers...I think I will continue to do this in the future!

Next was the broccoli.  I had a small amount from the farmers market, so I cut it up (including the stem, don't waste it) and again, boiled it.  I was looking to cook it through some so it would be soft in my filling.  After it was done, I added it to my potatoes.

You gotta have cheese, so I diced up the remaining amount of a mild cheddar brick we had.  I put a handful in the filling and saved another handful for the top.

Any of you ladies out there with a husband at home knows that any recipe will instantly be a winner if you add bacon.  I only had a few stripes left, so I fried it up, crumbled it, and like the cheese, put half in the filling and saved half for the top.

So there you have it, fill the peppers with the potato mixture, put the cheese and bacon on top, and pop it in the oven until the cheese is wonderfully melted (I would give you a time and temp, but frankly I don't remember!).  It was a winner in my house, with the husband adding a bit of ground beef would have made it perfect!  I guess you can already tell I will be re-posting a meatier version for the men out there at some point, but overall, a really nice dinner!