Monthly Archives: May 2016

Chicken Teriyaki with Pineapple!

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After we found out about the plethora of allergies my son had, one of the very first sauces I learned to make from scratch was teriyaki. I had been craving it, but didn’t know how it was made, and didn’t trust oils and different things at restaurants to keep any cross contamination of allergens getting into the sauce or food. So… I pulled up some recipes and made teriyaki sauce! SO easy!! I couldn’t believe that I had all of the ingredients just in my house! Now, if you don’t cook often, you may not… but the ingredients last for a long time, so if you like teriyaki… run out and get these ingredients and MAKE some!! It’s so delicious!

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Ingredients
  1. 6 boneless skinless chicken tenderloins
  2. 1 zucchini, sliced and quartered
  3. 4 mini sweet bell peppers, any color, sliced thin
  4. 1/2 to 3/4 of a can of pineapple (or fresh!, whichever kind you like best)
  5. 1/2 small yellow sweet onion sliced
  6. 2 carrots diced
  7. 1 cup frozen broccoli cut into smaller pieces
  8. 1 1/2 cups cooked rice (1/2 cup uncooked… cook as per directions)
  9. salt and pepper to taste

For the Teriyaki Sauce

  1. ½ cup soy sauce
  2. 2 Tbsp rice vinegar
  3. 1 Tbsp sesame oil
  4. ¼ cup light brown sugar
  5. 1 Tbsp honey
  6. 1 tsp fresh ginger (I buy it like this)
  7. 1 tsp minced garlic (I buy my garlic like this)
  8. 2 tsp cornstarch+ 1 tsp water, mixed together

 

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Directions:

Start off by making the teriyaki sauce by adding all of the sauce ingredients to a small saucepan over medium heat. Bring to a boil, stirring constantly, and boil for about 1 minute. The sauce should be thick enough to coat the back of the spoon.

Cook your rice. I just put water and rice into my rice cooker and hit a button. Either way, start it now.

Prepare your skillet and heat it to medium and coat with 1 TB olive oil. Salt and pepper both sides of your chicken. Add 1/4 cup of the teriyaki sauce to the chicken in the skillet to help cook. Brown both sides of your chicken, remove and dice into bite sized pieces and then add the diced chicken back to the skillet.

While your chicken is browning, chop your zucchini and carrots and slice your onions and peppers. Put 1/4 cup more of the teriyaki sauce into the skillet with the chicken and then add the carrots and onions. Cook until the carrots start to soften, and then add the broccoli, peppers and zucchini and the rest of the teriyaki sauce.

To serve, add rice to each bowl. Top with grilled veggies, pineapple and chicken. ENJOY!

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And now, for the song of the day:

Just because I love Adele and carpool karaoke! 🙂

 

Chop, Dump and Sautee…

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I like the kind of dishes that you can make over and over again without a lot of effort or thought. The kinds that you can make with different ingredients, but it’s the same idea. This meal is like that. I’ve made it lots of different ways, but it’s the same main idea… like hash.Days like yesterday where it RAINS ALL DAY, the kids are restless and trying to break everything in your house, just to keep their hands preoccupied (seriously, me finding my little boy every few minutes, with his hands busy doing something he SHOULD NOT) and it takes everything in me to just MAKE DINNER. That was last night. But… I made dinner! I grabbed a bunch of ingredients out of my fridge, chopped them up, dumped them all in the skillet, added some seasonings, and SERVED. That’s it. Done. And Delicious. There’s a few ways to do it too, depending on what meats and ingredients you have! I’ll give you the alternatives in the ingredients list. Get creative with it!

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Ingredients

  • 4-6 chicken tenderloins chopped (You can also use kielbasa, or leftover rotisserie chicken)
  • 2 large carrots diced (you can also use frozen, even mixed veggies if you want!)
  • 1-2 small to medium zucchini cut however you’d like
  • 4 small red potatoes diced (I partially peel them)OR you can use sweet potatoes
  • 2 tablespoons olive oil
  • 1 TB butter
  • 1/4 cup white wine for deglazing pan and helping to soften carrots and potatoes (can use chicken broth instead!)
  • ½ teaspoon salt
  • ½ teaspoon black pepper
  • 1 teaspoon herbs de provence (or Italian seasoning… herbs de provence recipe)
  • 1/2 small yellow onion diced
  • 1/2 tsp minced garlic (or use garlic powder)
  • You can garnish with Parmesan cheese, parsley, dried pepper flakes, basil, whatever!!

 

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Instructions

Chicken:
    1. Preheat skillet with the olive oil
    2. Add onions, carrots and potatoes
    3. Then add chicken, sprinkle with sea salt and pepper to taste and herbs de provence (or seasonings of your choice!).
    4. After everything has browned (turn chicken over when browned on 1 side) add the white wine (or chicken broth) and butter.
    5. Cook for 8-10 minutes uncovered, stirring occasionally.
    6. Add the chopped zucchini towards the end so it’s not too mushy.
    7. Transfer to a plate and garnish and EAT!

 

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And now, for the song of the day:

 

Strawberry Jam!

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I am NOT a “canner” when it comes to jam. I literally had one of those small flats of strawberries that I bought off of my friends that were called “jam-berries” because they were quite ripe and DELICIOUS! The cost is about half price of what a normal flat is too! (check your local strawberry farm to see if they do that there too!)

So, I had to find a couple of recipes and BLEND them. I can’t ever do things the way can I? HA!

Here’s the 4 links for the jam that I made, and then I will post what I actually did.

Ina Garten Strawberry Jam
Pioneer Woman’s Strawberry Jam
Martha Stewart’s Quick Strawberry Jam
Strawberry Jam

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I don’t think that I exactly made it in the traditional way… but I’ve gotta say, it turned out WONDERFULLY!!! My entire batch is delicious…!!!

Disclaimer: I DID sanitize my jars, but in the dishwasher and then heated them up in the sink, not by boiling them. Follow whatever instructions that it shows on the above recipes for the proper way to do so.

Strawberry Jam:

5 cups crushed/hulled strawberries
1 1/2 cups organic granulated sugar
2 1/2 TB powdered pectin
zest of 1 lemon
juice of 1 lemon

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Directions:

  1. Put a small plate in the freezer. Place the mashed strawberries, lemon zest and lemon juice in a nonreactive 10-quart stockpot set over medium-high heat. Stir in the pectin until dissolved. Bring the strawberries to a strong boil.

  2. Add the sugar (measure beforehand so you can add it all at once), and then return the mixture to a full (violent) boil that can’t be stirred down. Boil hard for 1 minute 15 seconds. Skim foam off the top.

  3. Perform a gel test: Place a spoonful of jam on chilled plate, and return to freezer. Wait 1 to 2 minutes; remove plate from freezer, and gently press jam with fingertip; it should wrinkle slightly.

  4. After jam passes the gel test, remove from heat. Pour warm jam into jars; seal, label, and refrigerate up to 4 months.

  5. Fill the jars so that they have 1/4-inch of space at the top. Run a knife down the side of the jar to get rid of air bubbles. Wipe the rim of the jar with a wet cloth to remove any residue or stickiness.

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And there you have it! That recipe made 1 LARGE jar (the size of a spaghetti sauce jar) and one small jar full (the size in the pictures above). Try it, you’ll like it!!! You can add sugar and reduce pectin, or vice versa. I honestly made it that way because I completely RAN OUT of sugar!!! AAAH! 🙂

Turned out good though!

God Bless!

And now, for the song of the day:

Wednesday… Back to it!

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It seems as though I can’t get “into  the groove” of constantly blog posting. I think it’s really just since I went to mainly “gluten free” and low carb. I try to use as much vegetables as possible and clean eating.

But, I’m determined. If I could do it before, I can do it too! I’ve gotta post more recipes for my jam that I am making today (YUM!) and dinner.

I’ve said in a previous post, every 2 weeks, before I go grocery shopping, I meal plan. I use pinterest to keep the recipes. Sometimes I only search on pinterest, otherwise I use it to save recipes from other websites that I find new and yummy recipes. From those 10 recipes that I’ve chosen, (I only plan for dinner. For lunches we eat leftovers or salads, and we have toast and oatmeal for breakfast.) I make a grocery shopping list. Once I make that shopping list, I add anything else I needed for other meals or odds and ends.

I will say this, my kids do NOT always eat the same thing we do. My husband comes home after 6 or 7 pretty regularly during the week, so my kids eat around 5 or 5:30, and it’s usually something different than we eat. On the weekends I try to have them eat the same thing as us, and we try to all eat at the table together. My son also has A LOT of food allergies, which adds to his picky eating…. there’s so little I can serve him, I’m constantly working on giving him a variety. SO… don’t assume my kids willingly eat everything I make. They don’t. They are normal. They do not have amazing “pallets” like chefs say about their kids on t.v.. Nope. Not my kids. My daughter’s favorite food is Little Ceasars bread sticks. Yeah. My son at least has an actual that’s his favorite: meatballs made by mommy. I do have them try the things that my son isn’t allergic to, and my daughter LOVES to sample my salads (as long as theirs no chicken… that’s a no-go.) etc. Beyond that, it’s smoothies. I give vitamins, smoothies and probiotics. They’ll get it one day. They don’t have to be perfect and put together and eat everything I want them to try now. We will slowly get there. I won’t give up… but I’m not worried about it either. We’ll get there.

Here is my pinterest board for the next 2 weeks (with extra meals in case suddenly everything I pinned looks gross… that happen to you ever??) http://pin.it/tLV_PYf

Anyone reading this, if you have suggestions of some great websites for low carb recipes, please share!!

Most recipes I find, I change at least 3+ things, and therefore the recipe becomes mine. If I do not, I share the recipe, how AMAZING it was, and a link to that person’s site.

Instead of a song of the day, I’m going to share a website that I think more people need to know about.

In the last few months, the MASSIVE problem of human trafficking has been brought to my attention. Not that I didn’t know about it before, I did. I just didn’t realize how BIG it was, or that it even happened so much HERE, in the U.S.! You always think of it as a problem way out east. Not true! You can support this AMAZING ministry who is helping the women and children brought by force into the slave trade! This ministry is giving them a completely different occupation! Giving them their dignity back!  Consider checking out their website! SO full of information on ways you can help!!! Let’s give back! 🙂

http://store.nightlightinternational.com/default.asp

You can also read more about this amazing woman who has given so much of her time to help so many women on her blog:

http://hegivesmecourage.com/

 

God bless!!