Last Minute Chicken Bake

This monday I decided to have my brother Alex over for Family Home Evening and dinner. So I was going to be making lemon chicken for dinner. Since I am still learning the whole cooking process, I am still getting familiar with recipes and what you have to do some foods before you cook. When I started to cook the meal I read the whole recipe and the first line said "marinate chicken for 24 hours." Right after that I was like what?! I didn't marinate the chicken but already had the chicken ready to be cook. I then called Casey, since he was going to stop at the store to get some ice cream for dessert and see what we should do. I told him to stay at the store until I figure something out incase I did something. In the mean while Alex was suppose to be on his way from provo meaning he would be at my house in like 30-45 minutes. So I started to look at other chicken recipes to figure out what I should cook. I wanted to impress Alex with my cooking skills that I have been developing since in high school I didn't cook much and if I did cook I cooked cookies but ate most of the dough.
After trying to find a recipe that had chicken in it and would only take about 30 to 45 minutes and not having any luck with figuring out one, I called Casey again to see if he knew if we had something that we could cook. He brought to my attention the shake n' bake that we got a while back at Walmart and didn't use. It was perfect. I have been wanting to had Chicken Bake for a while but never got the chance to make it or forgot that we even had it, like this situation.
I then read the directions and started to make. I told Casey to get some rolls so we can have some with our chicken. It only took 20 minutes so we had plenty of time to cook the chicken and still be ready for Alex when he got to our place. To add to the chicken and rolls we had mashed potatoes and some veggies.

It was delish! Alex was very impressed. I have became quite a cook. just sayin'. Alex and Casey both agree. Everything turned out great. Alex said that this was the best food he has had in a while. So go me!  

I love these men! :]
**notice that Casey has already drank his Kool-Aid before we started to eat.
Gotta love that man!**

It was great spending time with my husband as well as Alex. Since Alex lives in Provo now, we get to see him more. We decided that we are going to be getting together for dinner more often as well as hanging out at least once a week. I am a family person. So I am very glad that we get to see our family often, but I still wish I got to see my parents more as well as Casey's parents.

Adorable.

Okay I saw this picture on a blog and I absolutely love it!

 I want a picture taken like this when I have a kid! 

It is so adorable! I can't get enough of it!

Here is the cutest picture ever!

How can you not saw "aww" when you see this!?!

Ya, that is what I thought.

Kung Pao Chicken

Continuing on cooking at least one meal a week has made me love cooking more and more. I actually enjoy it. Casey use to be the one that cooked most of our meals but now I am like no I wanted to cook this tonight or I want to cook tonight, What do you feel like? I even caught myself looking up recipes and also at cook books at the store trying to find a good chicken salda sandwich recipe. (if you know of a good one let me know PLEASE!) So I have came to a realization that cooking is much more fun then I thought it would be. But yes, there is the thing I don't like.. dishes. But I deal with it.

One of the meals that I have made lately was Kung Pao Chicken. It was delish! Casey and I love Asian food. One of our favorite meals that we have a lot is chicken fried rice. So I wanted to try something that is still Asian but wasn't chicken fried rice. So that is what I did. 

I found the recipe for Kung Pao Chicken in my Worldwide Ward Cookbook: Secret Recipes! At first I thought that it was going to be complex and I was going to spend most of the day on getting the food ready  for dinner. But it was very simple. Since it was very simple, I decided to make it a nice dinner. I cleaned up the apartment, cleaned the kitchen, and set the table before Casey got home from work. We then had a candle light dinner with each other. It was great being able to just talk to one another about our day and also to spend some time with each other. The Kung Pao Chicken turned out great!

Here is the recipe if you wanted to try it out.

Kung Pao Chicken

1 ld. boneless, skinless chicken breast, cut into 1-inch pieces

1 Tbsp. cornstarch

2 tsp. light sesame oil or vegetable oil

3 Tbsp. green onions, chopped with tops

2 garlic cloves, minced

1/4 - 1 1/2 tsp. Crushed red pepper flakes (to your own taste)

1/2 tsp. powdered ginger (can use fresh-grated if preferred)

2 Tbsp. Rice wine vinegar

2 Tbsp. soy sauce

2 tsp. sugar

1/3 C. dry roaster peanuts

4 C. cooked rice, hot

Combine chicken and cornstarch in small bowl. Toss to coat chicken. Heat oil in large nonstick skillet or wok over medium heat. Add chicken. Stir-fry 5-7 minutes or until no longer pink in center. Remove from heat. Add onions, garlic, red pepper flakes, and ginger to skillet. Stir-fry 15 seconds. Remove from heat. In a small bowl, combine vinegar, soy sauce, and sugar; stir well. Add to skillet. Return chicken to skillet. Stir until chicken is well coated. Stir in peanuts. Heat thoroughly, string occasionally. Serve over hot rice. Makes 10 servings.

Hope you try it and enjoy!

It Summer Time!.. (kinda)

School is over for the semester! Yippie! This semestered seemed long but went by fast (if that makes sense). Casey and I both had a great semester. Casey now doesn't has school until Fall semester starts and I start summer semester in June. We are both excited to have some time off to just relax and spend time with each other. We are excited to see our families over this summer. We are hoping to be graduating next April so in a year from now we will be moving to California. We are super excited about that. No more bipolar Utah weather! 

My Summer To-Do List:

-  Take Pictures for maybe two weddings

-  Theobald Family Reunion in June.

- The Schroeder Reunion in August. 

- Projects that I want to get done.

- Working and going to school.

- Celebrating our one year anniversary!

- Find a place to move into in August.

I hope you have a great summer too! :]

Conference Weekend.

I love it when conference comes around. 

I admit that I use to love it for a different reason,  the reasons being that I was able to sleep and to catch up on that during the weekend. But this time I was so excited for it because a totally different reason. I was excited to hear the leaders of the church and to spend some time with the family. On saturday I watch the morning session by myself because Casey had to work. Saturday afternoon session my brother, Alex, came over my our apartment and watched it with me. It was great having some of my family there with me to watch it. It was also fun remembering how my mom had to wake Alex and I up alot during the speakers because I was waking Alex up a couple times. It was great to spend some time with my brother just me and him. That night I made meatloaf while Casey went to the Priesthood session.We then spent the rest of the night together. Sunday morning came around and we watched that session together. For breakfast I made Monkey Bread. It was good but a little underdone because I forgot to set the timer so I thought I burnt it but I undercooked it and then tried to put it back in to cook longer and it cooked most of it better. But I love monkey bread! I haven't yet made it the way my mom does but I am not giving up. After that session we got ready to go to Grandma & Grandpa Rozsa's house to watch the last session with them and Casey's parents. It was great being able to spend some time with the family and watch conference at the same time. We then celebrated Grandpa Rozsa's birthday. Since it was snowing Sunday... we made a snowman. Casey doesn't remember making a snowman in his life time and Robin wanted to make a snowman because it is fun. So Casey, Robin, & I made a snowman after the afternoon session of conference. It was fun being able to spend time with the family.

During conference weekend you need the following:

Family time

Breakfast food

A notebook and pen

and 

Someplace to watch Conference.

We had all 4 of those.

We love when Conference comes around! 

Breakfast for Conference

During Conference its a tradition to always have some sort of breakfast 

while listening to the morning session on Saturday or Sunday. 

Since Casey had to work on Saturday I made breakfast on Sunday.

We made Monkey Bread.

I grew up loving monkey bread 

and always wanted to be able to make it like my mom.

(which hasn't happened it..)

My mom makes the perfect monkey bread! 

And every time I try to make this PERFECT monkey bread, 

I forget to put something in, cook it to long or short, or something of that fact.

But I haven't given up on trying.

Sunday I thought it was going to be the day I would make 

the PEFECT monkey bread.

It didn't happen, but I am going to try again.

Still the monkey bread was good. 

It still had that delicious sugar and cinnamon taste.

Casey isn't a big fan of it because it is "too sugary."

Maybe one day his mind will change.

He still ate it thought. 

We ate half of it before I got to take a picture.
Shows you how good it was or how hungry we were.

YUM YUM YUM!!

I would so suggest making this and giving it a try.

Monkey Bread

4 cylinders Pillsbury Buttermilk Biscuits 

(10 regular size in each package. NOT EXTRA LARGE)

1/2 cup sugar

2 tsp. cinnamon

Put cinnamon & sugar in a large zip lock bag and mix. Place biscuits in bag, a few at a time, and shake until evenly coated. Place biscuits across the bottom and sides of a well greased 12" bundt pan. You will have about two layers of biscuits.

Sauce:

1 cube butter

3 tsp. water

1 cup sugar

2 1/2 tsp. cinnamon

Melt butter. Add sugar, cinnamon & water. Mix well. Pour over biscuits. Can pour a little over the first layer of biscuits as you are putting them in the pan.

Cover loosely with foil as they will rise while baking. Bake at 350 for 35 - 45 minutes. May want to cook on a cookie sheet as it tends to boil over. Let cool a minute or so in the pan and then invert onto a plate and serve warm.

Hope you enjoy, because I know I do every time I eat them!

YUMMY!! :]

Saturday Dinner

You might think that meatloaf is gross but we think it is good.
So Saturday night I made meatloaf for us.

My meatloaf turned out pretty good.
It wasn't the meatloaf that was rock hard, it just feel apart.
I have made meatloaf before for Casey and I but this was a different recipe.
This recipe had a sauce recipe that just makes the meatloaf much better!
And if I so myself, I did a pretty good job on it.
I got the recipe from the book called WorldWide Ward Cookbook: Secret Recipes.
It is a great cookbook and it has some really good recipes.

The meatloaf

Inside

In addition to the meatloaf, we had some green beans.

Green beans are my favorite veggie. :]

If you are a meatloaf lover, you should try this recipe.

School Meatloaf

Meat: 

1 1/2 ld. ground beef

1 slice of bread, finely chopped

1 egg

1 small sweet onion, finely chopped

1 tsp. salt

1/4 tsp. pepper

4 tbsp. ketchup

1/2 C. whole milk or half-n-half

Sauce: 

4 Tbsp. apple cider vinegar

2 - 4 Tbsp. packed dark brown sugar

1/2 cup ketchup

In a large bowl, combine ground beef, bread, egg, onion, salt, pepper, ketchup, and milk or half-n-half. Place into a load baking dish. In a separate bowl, combine vinegar, brown sugar, and ketchup. Pour over top and sides of meatloaf. Bake at 350 for 60 - 75 minutes, or until done. You can heat a second batch of sauce to serve with the meatloaf. Makes 12 servings.

My tweaks to the recipe:

Instead of using bread crumbs I used oatmeal flakes. 

(My mom uses oatmeal flakes other than

 bread crumbs in her meatloaf.)

Hope you enjoy.!