Crispy cheddar chicken tenders

Now doesn't the title alone make your mouth water....

Every now and then I find a recipe from a favorite food blog that looks good enough to try!

 I follow a couple of bloggers that make very enticing foods, 

easy recipes that you don't have to get all elaborate and go spend a lot of money

 buying ingredients that you don't have.

For dinner tonight I mixed and matched a bit from two different sites.  

The crispy cheddar chicken tenders come from 

Plain Chicken (Click on my link to get to her recipe).

NOW....

Instead of the gravy-like topping the "plain chicken" uses in her recipe,

 I close to go with a Honey mustard dressing made from scratch.

 I got the recipe from Rachel's Blog, easy peasy and oh-so-good!

Be sure to click on the link  above for Rachel's Honey mustard dressing!

Thanks girls, the hubby wants it on the "keep it" menu, so it was a hit!

To go along with the main course, I cooked up some tater-tots along side the chicken,

 and steamed us some broccoli. 

Pretty much everyday (except Mondays) Plain Chicken posts  Great recipes check her out I've made several of her recipes and I've never been disappointed

"Virtual pinning"

As the website states...

"Pinterest is a virtual  pinboard"

a place where you can create collections of things you love 

and, "follow" collections created by other people. 

So many great idea's to browse... it's kind of fun and yes....

It can be addicting

Some people I've talked to say,

 "oh, I don't have time for that, I'd be on it all the time"

That's not a problem for me...

I dont spend hours on Pinterest, (like some folks do)

 Sometimes I go for days without checking it out.

I usually just browse recipes and around the home kind of things,

and I've gotten some real cool ideas!!!

This one I tackled today

Centerpiece idea

Got me some supplies...

 added my own touch...

 and there you have it.... my new fall center piece!

~~~

Sunday we were invited to a Luncheon after church

a few weeks ago I had "pinned"

these little morsels on my virtual pinboard  hoping

 I would soon have an event to make them for!

Easy peasy...and oooohh so good! 

 I even made them with the FF caramel and just thinned it with 

a couple T. skim milk

Let me tell you, they went like hotcakes!

It's amazing how much they tasted like caramel apple bites.

~~~

Last weekend I tried 5 new recipes that I found on Pinterest

*No-bake Reese's krispies  - yummy

*2- ingred. Apple cake - Yummy but weird consistency

*Salted nut squares - Double yummy

*Caramel grape bites (pictured)  a hit!

*Creamy pasta ranch salad - I'd make it again.

Check it out if you haven't already, if nothing else it's something to do on a rainy day...

*Forecast tomorrow for Rochester, chance of rain & thunderstorms*

Romantic dinner for two

I like to fix a good old home-made meal for my Valentine...

on Valentine's day

MENU

Salisbury steak with mushroom gravy

Garlic mashed potato's

& roasted asparagus

But the best part....

Just the two of us...

no crowds, no timetable

candle light, quiet

Good conversation with my guy

Happy Valentine's Day

Hope you all had a sweet day 

Essence of apples

This weekend involved lots of projects around the house

but in between the projects I got a bunch of baking done

Out came the recipe box, I pulled all the recipes that had

 the word Apple in the title.

Cheri, this is your recipe

Recognize it?

 "Yummy apple dessert"

 That describes it perfectly...Yummy

Next....

...

Cream cheese apple tarts

These two beauties went in the freezer

My Dutch Apple Pie 

I love this crust

(Oatmeal, sugar & butter)

 Mmmmmm so yummy!

Tonight I broke out the desserts with some decaf coffee,

had some company over, and then we enjoyed

 these scrumptious little goodies 

What's all the hype

I've been noticing lately there's been a lot of hype about "smoothies"

They are becoming more popular in our heath crazed society.

I stumbled upon a recipe in this months issue of

 Good Housekeeping magazine, so I thought I'd try it out.

All good stuff... 

Strawberries, blueberries, orange juice, yogurt, ice and Ginger.

GINGER.... wait, I dont think I've ever used fresh ginger in my life 

( I bought the already processed ginger in a paste)

That got me curious...why ginger

Well Ginger really is a good thing to have in your diet along with all that yummy fruit

Cholesterol Reduction

Anti Inflammatory

Arthritis

Anti Fungal

Cancer Prevention

strong antioxidant

Antimicrobial 

helps eliminate congestion

kills cold viruses

So In the blender it all went

and out came this yummy smoothie

 A great afternoon snack with my guy.

I havent bought canned pineapple since I purchased this 

little beauty a few years ago.

It's a pineapple cutter/corer

 It's one of my favorite kitchen contraptions

It's easy and very efficient

Just cut off the top

Push the corer into the pineapple and twist

tip it on it's side...

and pull it out

There you have it, yummy fresh pineapple

Slice it up

Enjoy!

A few tidbit about pineapples that I have learned:

* To know if it's ripe, take ahold of the bottom and tug lightly on one of the leaves, if it comes out easily then it's ripe. If you have to pull on it hard, then it's not ready.

*  Fresh pineapple can be kind of spendy, Walmart usually has them for about $2... It's worth it!

* I wont pay $3.99 for a pineapple, that's ridiculous

The itty bitty appetizer

There is another creative side to my oldest son...

He's a great designer (graphics that is)

Yep...that's his "Lacuna label" (proud mom moment)

But there's yet another creative side to him...

He cooks from time to time!

No recipe involved,

hence... the creative side of him.

Every wifes dream.... A guy who cooks.

Brice's little creative way to serve us up his concoction from supper the other night.

One burger....4 people, and...

we got us an appetizer before lunch.

Thin style bun, burger, ketchup, lettuce.....appetizer style

Brice tells me he got the beef from the butcher, threw in some spices, onion and some crumbles blue cheese. I have to say it was amazing... nice job Brice

Truffles & Tarts

Do you have a favorite little place that you love to sneak away to,

for lunch with your girlfriends....or family.

I think I found mine :)

Truffles & Tartes...but so much more

salads, sandwiches, cakes and lots o' goodies

Mom & Jodi

My sister suggested this quaint little place in Anoka, MN

It was simply Marvelous

–interjection French (I wish you) a hearty appetite.

Broccoli & ham quiche along with a scrumptious "house salad"

Lemon Curd torte...

to die for !!!

I think I've had enough amazing food for awhile.

Monday = Back on track

It's been awhile since I've used this WOK

A little chicken fried rice....

A little orange chicken...

I finally ventured over to that new store over by the mall.

The one everyone's been ranting and raving about.

So while I was there, I picked up

DINNER ...

Compliments of

Trader Joe's

"Live well"

Mayo Clinic sends out a monthly (health) News Letter called

LIVE WELL

It's full of articles on your health, exercise and it also has recipe's

Today I saw a recipe in this month mailing that looked easy & yummy. I actually had all the ingredients, so I decided to give it a try.

Mixed berry whole grain coffee cake

All mixed-up and ready to bake

All baked and ready to eat

Rick & I both approve !

Next time I'll purchase some Fat-free whip cream to polish it off :)

Serving size 8 Calories 140, fat 5g, fiber 3gm = 3WW pts.

Ho Ho Heaven

Mom used to put Ho ho's in our lunch's for school....

remember those scrumptious little treats !

~

Heck maybe some of you still buy them for your family.

They still produce the little 4" buggers in mass quanity.

You can get them at wal-mart, Target, any gas station,

and I've even seen them at gas stations, and in vending machines.

~

While shopping in Cincinnati at a great grocery store called Jungle Jim's, Danae came across this giant "Ho Ho". Brianna commented, "we should get it and all of us get a fork and dig in"

Danae responded...It's a done deal (or something like that), and it was in Danae's hands that quick.

How many of you have seem a "Ho Ho" like this?

Now THAT's a "HO HO"

and yes.... we ate it,

Just little ole us :)

~

We each took a fork and sat around the table (at Cara's house in Cincy) and went to it.

We actually didnt finish it in one sitting, it really did take a couple of days.

It was amazing, but not something I'd want to do too often :)

*

A little side note...

for those of you on WW I figured that each fork full was probably worth a point...yikes

Scrumptous little morsels

I can't take credit for this idea, in fact I'm sure alot of you have done this but it had never crossed my mind till I saw what my friend Betsy did with her left over bread/buns.

She actually blogged about it...

and I thought it was a great idea so

I gave it a try....

Home made Croutons

In our nearly "empty nest" state of living our bread always seems to out last the date on the bag, so when that happens I throw what's left in the freezer.

I collect it until I have enough then throw it in the fridge for a few hours to soften it...makes it easier to cut into cubes.

Then according to Betsy....

...you melt a stick of butter and add some spices

a little of this and a little of that

then pour it over the cubed bread and mix it up.

Ya stick it in the oven at 350 for about 1/2 hour

and there you have it...

yummy home-made croutons