Cranberry Chicken

One of our favorite go-to meals is cranberry chicken. It is very easy, and very tasty.

Ingredients:

• 1 can whole cranberry sauce
• 8 oz thousand island or Russian salad dressing
• 1 package onion soup mix
• 3 chicken breasts, filleted to make 6 fillets
  

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 300 degrees.
   
2. Mix the cranberry sauce, thousand island dressing and onion soup mix in a large bowl.
3. Fillet 3 chicken breasts to make six fillets.
4. Spread a layer of the cranberry mixture (roughly 1/3 of the mixture) over the bottom of a 13x9 glass baking dish (or similar). Spread the fillets on the cranberry sauce. Then cover the chicken breasts with the remaining mixture.
5. Cover with tinfoil (or glass lid).
6. Bake at 300 for 90 minutes.
7. Serve over (jasmine) rice.

HT: the Pucketts and the Cagwins :)

Brownies

My wife has long contended that brownies made from scratch just can't contend with the mixes that come in a box. Yet when the latest Every Day Food arrived, she was excited by the whole section on brownies.

So I decided to try my hand at making brownies from scratch. It was not as hard as I had expected, and the brownies were good: better than the average brownie mix, but not as good as a Ghirardelli mix. So if you're up for a brownie experiment, this is a great place to start.

Asparagus, snap pea & avocado pasta

We recently went through a season of eating meat-less, and realized quickly that we didn't have that many go-to vegetarian recipes. One of the ones that we discovered (and have repeated) is asparagus, snap pea & avocado pasta from Every Day Food.

It is quick, easy, healthy and tasty!

Leek and potato galette

We tried out this recipe for Easter lunch, and it was excellent! I highly recommend it!

It takes a moderate amount of preparation time (which would be greatly reduced if you have a food processor to slice the potatoes), but is worth the effort.

Chocolate Ganache Tart

Rebecca made a superb chocolate ganache tart from Everyday Food this weekend.

It is certainly going to enter our regular rotation of fun desserts - and so it gets to appear here, so that I can remember it later when I'm stumped on what to make for a nice dessert.

(In the next few days, I'm going to post a lot of recipes that we have done in recent weeks, for next time we wonder what to make for dinner.)

The Best Recipe = the best hummus

Yesterday I made hummus by following the recipe from The New Best Recipe for the first time. Once again I was not disappointed. It was far better than any hummus I have made before. (I have yet to try anything from this book that does not turn out to be the best version of it I have made or had).

So I realized the The New Best Recipe is worthy of a book review. If you don't own a cookbook, this is the one to get. If you have a dozen, this one is better. You can get a smattering of the recipes from the folks who publish it at America's Test Kitchen right here.

Mediterranean couscous with roasted vegetables

I've been on the lookout for good vegetarian recipes, and this one was excellent, from epicurious.

Orzo and Peas

I couldn't find my regular orzo and peas recipe, so I googled "orzo peas" and found Cook's Illustrated's recipe. Not surprisingly, it was excellent, and not too involved for a Cook's Illustrated recipe.

Tomato and Sausage Risotto

Risotto never tops the list of quick meals, but if you're up for some stirring, this one is excellent.

Leftover Turkey

If anyone else is like me, you're looking for tasty diverse ways to use turkey. Look no further.

Roasted Fall Vegetables

We've tried this recipe a couple of times now (and again tonight), and it is delicious and healthy!

Southwest Chicken Chili

Tonight we had another fantastic meal from Cooking Light. We checked out another recipe by Jaime Harder: Southwestern Chicken Chili. Topped with Australian Cheddar, it was excellent!

Zucchini Lasagna

We discovered this Zucchini Lasagna recipe in Everyday Food, and have enjoyed it on a couple of occasions. If you're looking for a vegetarian entre, this may be it.

Tomato Chickpea Curry

Tonight we tried a new recipe from Cooking Light contributed by our friend, Jaime Harder. It was fantastic, in my opinion because of the garam masala. If you're up for a light, flavorful, meat-free dinner, here's a good one!

Turkey Tetrazzini

If you find yourself with leftover turkey or chicken, here is the best recipe for tetrazzini that I have found. It is easy (most ingredients may be found in the pantry without going shopping), quick (in prep time), and very tasty!

Shredded Pork Tacos

Here's a great recipe for what to do with leftovers from the Teriyaki Pork Roast. It, too, was simple, quick and very tasty.

Teriyaki Pork Roast

On Sunday I made this teriyaki pork roast in the crockpot. It was super easy and very tasty, so I thought I'd pass it along:

3/4 cup apple juice
2 Tbs sugar
2 Tbs soy sauce
1 Tbs vinegar
1 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp garlic poder
1/8 tsp pepper
1 lean boneless pork loin roast (2 1/2 lbs.)

1. In the crock pot, mix apple juice, sugar, soy sauce, vinegar, ginger, garlic powder and pepper. Add roast, turning to coat. (I seared mine in the frying pan before putting it in the crock pot.)
2. Cover and cook on high for 3 1/2 to 4 hours, or on low 7 to 8 hours or until meat is very tender.

The outcome was delicious, and the preparation only took about 10 minutes!

Pesto Pizza

We tried out pesto pizzas with the basil pesto we made on Sunday, and they were excellent, a great variation on our regular pizzas.

What's cooking?

We love to cook, and I've thought about trying to integrate that into this blog, to share some of the good recipes we've found. One of the (many) weaknesses of Blogger is that you can't easily tag your posts or categorize them. If they did, I would have a Recipe tag.

So, notwithstanding Blogger, I'm going to share some fun ones that we've found recently.

Yesterday we made a big batch of basil pesto that we put on green beans last night and tonight we used the pesto to make chicken fettucine with pesto cream sauce, which I highly recommend. It was very easy (since we made the pesto yesterday) and full of flavor.