Blog Archives

Is it Spring Yet?

4/30/2018

Southern Barbecued Chicken

Alas. I forgot to check the recipe before hand to see if the chicken had to marinate overnight. Guess what? It did. That’s okay though, I did it really early in the morning so it had about half a day to marinate. Good enough I think because I could still taste the marinade.

I wanted to do this recipe because I’m anxiously waiting for spring to stay. Apparently, it's coming a bit late this year and I'm not happy about it. I thought grilling would be the perfect thing to do over the weekend to kind of force spring to happen.

Well, we got a little side tracked and didn’t end up grilling until around 7 pm (that’s a late dinner for us!) and by that point it was getting darker, getting cooler, and starting to drizzle. So our hopes of sitting on the newly stained patio and enjoying some barbecue was not a thing. But we still ate it inside the house.

I wasn’t the biggest fan of this chicken because I don’t think it cooked long enough, and the marinade didn’t give it too much taste (because it wasn’t overnight? I’m not sure). I needed to add some hot sauce to give it some more flavor. It’s a really easy recipe to make if you’re interested in just grilling up some bone-in chicken (actually, maybe that’s why I didn’t love it… bones and tendons are gross while I’m trying to eat plus I can’t use a fork and knife).

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Texas Tea

There aren’t too many drink recipes left in this cookbook, but since I wanted to barbecue I thought let’s do a tea from the south. I found this one named after Texas, and immediately thought it would be somewhat like a Long Island Iced Tea. And it pretty much is.

It just has some cola in it and a ton of other liquors (I’m sorry, I can’t remember what exactly is in a LIT). All I know is that this was a lot better than those LITs we made for this blog last year or so. Feel free to peruse the "history" section of this Dinner and a Movie blog to find the LIT recipe if you're at all interested.

I ended up putting my water enhancer flavor in it to make it easier to drink, but we sure polished off a pitcher of the stuff… all while watching IT. I’d pick this recipe over LIT, but not the ones from Applebee’s with Strawberry in it. YUM.

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Some of This, Some of That

4/26/2018

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Saucy Chicken and Asparagus

I like Chicken and I like Asparagus, so it's only fitting fort his to be my next chicken recipe. And it was fairly simple too. I decided not to boil the asparagus before hand (it was optional in the recipe), but I wish I would have because I think the asparagus would have been more cooked and less stringy.

The chicken itself, I'm not so sure I bought a good batch. Either that or it didn't cook quite right. It was really hard to cut with a knife because it really wanted to shred.

I really liked the sauce that came with it, made from mostly condensed cream of chicken. I thought overall it tasted delicious and I'd probably make this again. Put I'd probably make more chicken with it. I feel like there was way too much asparagus for the lack of chicken. A better ratio is definitely needed. Thumbs up!

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Chili Artichoke Dip

I was a little worried about this recipe because it called for so much artichoke. Two whole cans/jars. That’s a lot! And honestly, it was a lot, but it was so delicious I didn’t even care. The green chilis really brought up the taste of this dip and it was so good on my multigrain tortilla chips.

Since I’m the only one that will eat this, I’m going to have to do some damage as the week progresses. I didn’t have enough cheddar cheese so part of the cheese was made with mexican blend. It works right?

I say thumbs up on this recipe, and I would say I’d make it again but it would just be for me so it may not be worth it. Mmm I’m thinking about it right now. Should have brought some for lunch.

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Three Bean Salad

My friends decided to have an impromptu BBQ this weekend, so I decided to make a side. This three bean salad was perfect to go with the hot dogs and burgers, and since I knew no one would eat it I made sure to pick something that I would eat myself throughout the week. I plan to put this in my salads for lunch for this week.

Like the shrimp po boys, I can taste the cayenne pepper in this. There are actually a lot of spices in this dish, but I feel like they all go together perfectly. The three beans are great together… I don’t think I’ve ever eaten Northern Beans before so that’s a new one for me.

The best thing about this dish is that it cost me less that $10 for everything (except for the tortilla chips, but that wasn’t really necessary to buy). I don’t think I would make it again, but it’s still good for now!

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New York, New York!

4/18/2018

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New York-Style Cheesecake

So April is my month at work to bring in treats to celebrate monthly birthdays. I chose to make a cheesecake because other people would have to eat it… mwahahaha. I remember making that lime coconut cheesecake a while back and absolutely hating it. This time however, was so much simpler. There was NO BEATING of the cream cheese. It was just a mixing and a baking. I was pretty excited when I read that.

Being a New York Style Cheesecake, there’s sour cream in this recipe. Thankfully I had already bought sour cream in the past and didn’t know, so I was able to have the right amount. Y’all know I won’t be eating this cheesecake, so I’ll base my thoughts on how it was to make it and the reactions of those around me. I say thumbs up because I didn’t have to beat the damn cream cheese. I do however, need to learn to soften it more before using. I mean, I did have it sitting out for several hours, but I don’t think it was enough. I had a hard time getting it to not be chunky looking batter.

The crust looked scrumptious and I can’t say I didn’t eat some leftover chocolate wafers. I didn’t have enough to press onto the sides of the pan, so it’s just a bottom layer. Good enough I think. Hopefully people like cherries (I do not… man am I picky? I didn’t think so…) because that’s the pie filling I got to go on top.

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New York State Apple Muffins

Muffins. This is the second muffin recipe I made over the weekend and I think they are much better. There’s a ton of stuff packed into this batter: apples, raisins, walnuts, and even cream cheese. Thankfully it only called for 3 oz… damn now what am I going to do with the leftover in the package?

The muffins themselves were really good. I wasn’t able to get a full 2 dozen due to my over pouring of the batter into the muffin tins, but I was only short by two. Luckily none of them over flowed while baking like cupcakes usually do when I make them.

I think the muffins were great and would recommend. Maybe as a fall muffin instead of spring (if you can even call this spring… it was snowing this morning STL). Thumbs up.

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