Catch Up

So it's been almost a week, I thought I would play catch up. I haven't made allot of stuff that was very photographable so I didn't post anything about it.

I did make a cake the other day, but didn't post pictures because I melted the icing...I didn't want to make a new batch of icing, so we just ate the cake without icing. I accidentally put the bowl of icing on top of the stove while the oven was on, and that was just enough heat to melt my icing entirely. Next time I will not make the same mistake!

On Thursday night I made chicken scalloped potato casserole. Very yummy! Trent loves this dish. Once again, not very healthy, but very good! This is a very easy dish. Just scalloped potatoes, cooked chicken, and lots of cheese. You can make the potatoes yourself, or use a box. I put everything in a pan and baked until the potatoes were done and the cheese was melted.

Tonight I made our very favorite meal ever, fettucini alfredo with shrimp! I think this was the first meal I ever made Trent. We absolutely LOVE fettucini alfredo! It is so delicious! This recipe is 100% mine. When I started making fettucini alfredo when I was in high school...about 17 or 18, I used a copy cat Olive Garden recipe. Since then I have completely changed the ingredients, and the amount of ingredients. To make my alfredo sauce I start with a heated skillet. I then pour a carton of heavy cream into the skillet. Into the heavy cream I add about two table spoons or more of chopped up cream cheese(I normally use fat free cream cheese to make it a little less fattening!). I whisk this together on medium heat until all the lumps are gone. I then season the sauce with garlic(fresh or powdered...depends on what I have or what I am in the mood for), salt, and pepper. I constantly taste to make sure I have seasoned enough and not too much. I continue cooking the sauce for awhile. I then add several handfulls of grated parmesan cheese(NOT powdered) and whisk continuously to keep the cheese from sticking, burning, and lumping up. If too much cheese has been added, and the sauce is too thick, I add a little bit of milk to thin it. I normally end up cooking the sauce for 30 minutes or more. I have tried making this with half and half and milk only, and it does not come out very good. The heavy cream is the trick to making this. While cooking the sauce I boil the fettucini noodles with a couple of table spoons of extra virgin olive oil. After the noodles are done, I drain them and toss them with a little more olive oil, so they don't stick together. Sometimes we have the fettucini alfredo with shrimp, sometimes with chicken, and sometimes by itself. Tonight, I peeled and deveined the shrimp, seasoned with salt, pepper, and garlic. Then I sauteed the shrimp in butter. Once everything was done, I combined everything in a big pot and stirred it all together. You can also keep everything separate so that the dinners can choose how much noodles, sauce and shrimp they want. This is just so delicious. The fettucini shrimp alfredo was the perfect cap on the end of the week. We are stuffed, and enjoying some champagne now!

Baking

I've decided that I really want to start baking. I know how to bake, but I don't do it very often because I don't want it to make me super huge. Cake is definitely my favorite dessert to eat. Specifically, white or yellow cake with white icing. It reminds me of birthday cake when I was little. I have decided to start practicing on my cake, cupcake, cookie, icing, and fondant making skills. I will of course be posting pictures(good or bad). When I feel comfortable enough, I'll be taking orders! It's something I can do on the side and make a little cash while I'm having fun! Making birthday cakes/cupcakes, and cookies for special occasions and holidays for friends, family, and friends of friends/family, is what I have in mind. I might even post an add or two on Craigslist to see what business I could conjure up. I think I will do a practice run tomorrow...Pictures tomorrow! My sugar high has already started!

Potato Soup

Tonight I made potato soup for dinner. It was so good. I skinned then boiled about ten red potatoes. Once the potatoes were tender, almost falling apart, I drained them and put them back in the pot. To the pot of potatoes I added a carton of heavy cream, milk, salt, pepper, and butter. I then mashed everything together and brought it all to a boil. I let it boil for about ten minutes. Once it was soupy enough I served it in bowls with shredded cheese, real bacon pieces, and chives. Trent had his without the chives and had sour cream instead. This soup was so good. I can't wait to have this again when it gets cold outside.

Spaghetti Sunday

Tonight I made spaghetti for dinner. It was yummy. I boiled 8 ounces of spaghetti noodles. While the noodles were boiling I began cooking my sauce. For the sauce I used two cans of tomato sauce, two cans of tomato paste, a little bit of water to thin it out, allot of garlic powder, onion powder, salt, pepper, basil, and parsley. While the sauce was simmering, I browned a pound of ground beef.

After the sauce and the meat was done, I combined the meat with the sauce, and simmered it together for a few minutes. After the meat and sauce was done simmering, I combined the meat and sauce with the drained noodles.

We topped our spaghetti with shredded mozzarella and grated parmesan cheese.

We have plenty of leftovers and the leftover spaghetti is always better the second time around!

Lasagna; Mexican Style

Tonight was Mexican lasagna night. Very good. I cooked ground beef then seasoned with taco seasoning. I then layered corn tortillas, taco seasoned beef, enchilada sauce, Mexican blend cheese, and repeated twice. I topped it off with another layer of corn tortillas, a thick layer of enchilada sauce, and a thick layer of Mexican blend cheese.

I served the Mexican lasagna with cheesy rice. Dessert is a glass of wine!

Chicken-N-Biscuits

Tonight we had chicken and biscuits. It was extremely delicious! We almost ate the entire dish. We only have enough leftover for one meal...which will be my lunch tomorrow!

For this meal I baked three chicken breasts seasoned with salt, pepper, garlic, and onion in about an inch of water. I then cut the breasts into bit sized chunks. I put the chicken to a square pan, added two cans of cream of chicken soup, added some more seasoning, and then put raw biscuits on top of the dish. I then poured the chicken stock from dish that the chicken was cooked in, over the top of the biscuits, and baked until the biscuits were done all the way through.

This was very delicious comfort food and I can't wait for to have this again when it gets cold!

First Christmas Menu Items

The first items on my Christmas menu are:

Eggnog Cheesecake

Red Velvet Cake

Shortbread cookies with Royal Icing

I just wanted to share that!

Dinner later!

Grocery Night

I didn't cook dinner tonight because I was grocery shopping instead. So we had a pizza. I will definitely be cooking tomorrow night and showing more pictures.

Good night!

Kids Meal

So my meatloaf was a success! First time ever and it was delicious! This was definitely not low fat, low calorie, or good for you in any way but it sure was tasty.

I used one pound of ground beef, egg, breadcrumbs, a package of ranch dressing mix, real bacon bits, a handfull of shredded cheddar, a handfull of chopped Velveeta, garlic, salt, pepper, onion powder(not real onions of course since Trent does not like them), and barbecue sauce. I mixed all of these ingredients together, put the loaf in a loaf pan, and topped with hashbrown.

I served the meatloaf with macaroni and cheese because this kind of reminded me of a kids meal. This was the best meatloaf I have ever had. Juicy, tasty, and delicious!

We didn't have dessert tonight...we are just too full!

Strawberry Crepes Forever

Strawberry Crepes! Yum!

Monday Monday Leftover Day

I was going to make meatloaf for dinner tonight, but when I got home we both agreed that we aren't that hungry...so we are going to have leftovers instead. Since we do still have crepes leftover from last night, I'm still going to make strawberry crepes so I'll post a picture of that. Tomorrow I am definitely going to make the meatloaf. Meatloaf isn't that interesting or creative, but I've never made meatloaf and I'm ready for the challenge of trying to make it an outstanding creation. I'm going to try and jazz it up and make it very tasty and juicy. It's not going to be a normal meatloaf that's for sure!

Since I'm on here right now here is a list of some of the stuff I can't wait to show on here:

Fettucini Alfredo(This is my absolute favorite thing to make!)

Spaghetti

Lasagna

Chicken Parmesan

Chicken Pot Pie

Chicken Spaghetti(Thanks mom!)

Creamy Parmesan Salmon Cakes

Mexican Cornbread

Baked Potato Soup

Fish Tacos

Roast Rice and Gravy(My favorite Sunday meal ever...reminds me of Gramie's after church!)

Crawfish Ettoufee

Chili

Cheese Enchiladas

BBQ Baked Potatoes

Hashbrown Casserole

Cheesy Scalloped Potato Casserole

Stuffed Chicken Breast

And much more!

It will take me awhile to get these all up here...but, since I cook almost six days out of the week, I think I will manage.

Back later with crepe photos!

Sunday Night Delicious

For dinner tonight we had a taco casserole. It was so good.

I browned a pound of ground beef. I then drained the fat off and rinsed the meat in a colander. I put the meat back in the skillet, added taco seasoning and water. I let the meat boil until most of the water was out. Then I added melted Velveeta to the meat skillet. I added some frozen corn to the skillet, and mixed everything together. In the meantime, I mixed about a cup of baking mix, one egg, about a half a cup of milk, and a handfull of shredded Mexican blend cheese.. I put the meat, cheese, and corn mixture in a greased square dish, then topped it off with the batter. I cooked the casserole for about 25 minutes at 400F. I served the taco casserole with Santa Fe rice, guacamole, salsa, and sour cream.

For dessert I made cinnamon apple crepes. They were delicious! I peeled about five small apples and then cut them into strips. I melted a couple of tablespoons of butter in a skillet. Then I added the cut up apples, and sprinkled cinnamon and sugar in the skillet. I cooked the apples until they looked tender. I made the crepes with about a cup of flour, 3/4 cup of milk, two eggs, a sprinkle of sugar, and about half a teaspoon of vanilla extract. I sprayed a skillet with cooking spray and poured about 1/4 cup of the crepe mix in the skillet. I cooked each crepe between medium and low until each side was slightly golden brown. When the crepes and apples were done, I put a line of apples down the middle of each crepe, rolled the crepe and laid them seem side down on a plate, and then topped with a small scoop of vanilla ice cream...did I mention they were delicious!

The history behind the chef

When I was little, I liked to help out a little bit in the kitchen. On Thanksgiving and Christmas, I was usually responsible for making the fruit salad, and doing most of the taste tests. I guess I have a good palate. When we lived in Rowlett and my dad was working in Houston, mom used to play restaurant with us. We would sit at the coffee table and mom would come and take our order with her pen a pad of paper. I thought it was so much fun. It was my mom's creative way of making dinner fun. When I was in high school I started watching The Food Network, which really got me interested in cooking and food. I would make recipes that I saw on tv for my family. I realized that cooking wasn't hard at all. It is a way I can be creative. I love homemade food. I especially love creating homemade food. I love to eat something, or see food and then going into the kitchen and trying to create my version of that particular dish. Cooking is a little bit tricky for me since my husband is such a picky eater. Veggies are not a staple in his diet, therefore I have to take my creativity to another level. It is always a big challenge to make food that we both enjoy, without boring my taste buds. I would say that I can attribute my style of cooking to my mom for teaching me the basics, my grandmother for her authentic southern homemade cooking, and my dad for throwing a little creativity in everything that he cooks. I by no means am a cook by the book. I pretty much eyeball and guess and create everything I make. I very seldom make a recipe step by step...I might follow one or two steps in the recipe, but I add my own twist the rest of the way. I cook from scratch better than I cook a box of macaroni and cheese. I am my own biggest critic, and my husband is my guinea pig. I can honestly say, I haven't made many things that he doesn't like. Me, on the other hand...I always think I can do better!