Well Merry Belated Christmas and Happy Belated New Years to everyone!  Let’s get caught up…Christmas was absolutely great, much better than I expected.  I was sick on New Years…lame.  And now that my family has gone back home, I figure it’s time to start blogging again (okay, they left a week ago, and yes I could have blogged while they were here because no they didn’t actually stay with me, but hey what can I say, it was a busy holidays!).

Here’s one idea I wanted to share with everyone for the next time you want to have friends over for “dinner.” My cousin, bless her heart, provided room and board, and entertainment, etc for our family while they were in town from Canada.  So, when it came time to dinners for ALL of us, she got pretty creative a couple times.  We all got together the Sunday before Christmas and she decided to have an appetizer fest.  We all brought a yummy appetizer.  And I decided that’s the perfect thing to do for entertaining!  It was simple for each of us (less stress is always great over the holidays), we were all filled, there was great variety (something for everyone!), and most important, my cousin didn’t have to slave over the meal or spend a ton of money because we all brought something…share the load people!!  This was also great because there were a few of us coming and going that night, so it was perfect to just keep this spread out so everyone could take as they please when we arrived, in between our board games, etc.

Here’s what we had at our Appetizer Fest:

• Avocado Eggrolls (a copycat that my cousin made from one of our favorites at The Cheesecake Factory.  I’ll get it from her & post it soon cause they’re amazing!!)
• Pumpkin Pie Dip
• Orange Julius
• 7 Layer Bean Dip (I don’t have the exact recipe that my cousin used, but this one looks really good and it was rated extremely high on allrecipes.com.)
• Salsa & Cream Cheese
• Pumpernickel Dip
• I brought Italian Chicken Sticks with 2 dipping sauces: marinara sauce & homemade honey mustard sauce

Some other ideas for an Appetizer Fest:

• Artichoke Dip
• Black Bean & Corn Salsa
• Crab Dip
• Mini Bagel Pizzas
• Buffalo Chicken Dip (I haven’t made this yet, but it was rated one of Recipezaar’s top 100 recipes of 2008 (#28) so I figured that’s pretty dang impressive.  I plan on trying it, so I’ll let you know how that goes…but definitely let me know if you try it before I do!)
• P.F. Chang’s Chicken Lettuce Wraps (Also haven’t made these but they were also one of Recipezaar’s top in 2008 (#2!) and I love the originals so I’m definitely going to try these soon).
• Awesome Bacon-Tomato Dip (Okay, so I haven’t made this one either, but it’s also rated really high on Recipezaar.  I usually don’t post recipes I haven’t tried, but I’m just trying to give you ideas here!)

The only thing I’d recommend if you’re going to throw an Appetizer Fest is to maybe find out from people beforehand and plan what you make around that.  Like if everyone is doing savory stuff maybe make brownies and cut them up small and cookies so there’s something sweet too.  Or if everyone is doing dips do chicken strips so there’s something hearty enough to make it feel like a meal.

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So normally when I need cooked cut up chicken for recipes I either use my quick cooking method or rotisserie chicken. I was watching Barefoot Contessa a while ago, and she insisted that her method was the only true way to make cooked chicken for recipes (she was making chicken salad that day). She said that it was the way she found that guaranteed the chicken ended up moist and flavorful. So, the other day I decided to put this theory to the test! I was making my family’s delicious recipe for chicken salad sandwiches, and instead of using my typical chicken (I usually use the quick cooking method for this one, don’t want the added flavor from the rotisserie chicken to mess up the other flavors!), I decided to try this method. And, lo and behold, what resulted was moist flavorful chicken just as promised! It was delicious in my chicken salad, it really did add just a bit more flavor, which is always a plus! The only downside is that it did take longer than my typical quick cooking method. Which, since I was making a big Sunday dinner (for my mother-in-law, she LOVES my chicken salad sandwiches!), it was worth the little bit of extra time! So, final decision on this one: if I’m making a recipe that I want to be extra special and I have some extra time, this method is for sure the one I’ll use. If I’m making a quicker weeknight meal, back to my quick-cooking chicken method! Anyway, here’s the “recipe” for you:

Barefoot Contessa’s Cooked Chicken for Recipes

• 2 chicken breasts, bone-in and skin on*
• 2 tsp olive oil
• salt & pepper to taste*

1. Preheat oven to 350º
2. Place chicken breasts on baking sheet with sides (to catch the grease), skin side up.
3. Rub olive oil on breasts, sprinkle with salt & pepper.
4. Bake for 45 minutes.
5. Cool, then chop or slice to use in your recipes.

Recommendations:

• Seasonings: The recipe only calls for salt & pepper, but pretty much any time I’m cooking any type of meat I always season it with salt, pepper, AND garlic powder first, so that’s what I used.
• Chicken: I did this with boneless, skinless chicken breasts, just because that’s what I always have on hand, and it still turned out great. But, the boneless skinless cooks faster (and dries out faster!), so it only took about 25-30 minutes to cook. Just make sure you watch the chicken carefully and check it often near the end! (for a quick way to tell if your chicken is done, try this trick)

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Just a quick tip for you…I know that a lot of people (um, like me!) have troubles figuring out when their meat is done, or in the case of steak, the exact “doneness” of their meat. People usually cut into their meat to check its doneness, but you don’t want to do that because all of the juices will flow out of your meat, leaving it dry (read this post for more ways to prevent this).

So, how do you know if your chicken is done, or if your ribeye is the perfect medium-well? Poke it! I first learned this concept from watching Barefoot Contessa. She said that the perfect way to check if your chicken is cooked, is to push on it a bit with your finger, and if it resists, it is finished. I know this sounds too easy, but I tried it, and I’ve used it many times since, and it really works! Just cook your chicken according to your recipe, and a few minutes before the recipe says it’s done, poke it softly with your finger, and if it resists or kind of springs back, you’re good to go. If it still feels kind of squishy, give it a couple more minutes and check again.

As far as steak goes, it’s a little more tricky because you’re not just checking IF it’s done, but HOW done it is…I used to want my meat almost burnt (I’ve since begun to appreciate a more juicy medium steak), and then there’s my dad who says, “as long as it’s not mooing anymore it’s cooked enough for me!” So, how do you tell if your steak is done to your liking? Use your own hand as a gauge. According to Men’s Health, you just press the steak in the center with your finger, and “then use your thumb, fingers, and the varying firmness of the base of your thumb as your guide.

So, you press the steak in the center with your finger, and then press your thumb to one of your fingers and feel the meaty part of your hand:

INDEX FINGER: RARE Internal temp: 125F
Soft and squishy, like a pink sponge

MIDDLE FINGER: MEDIUM RARE Internal temp: 145F
Firm but yielding, like a Nerf football

RING FINGER: MEDIUM Internal temp: 160F
Barely yielding, like a racquetball

PINKY FINGER: WELL Internal temp: 170F
Hard yet springy, like a tennis ball

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Do any of you make this mistake when cooking or grilling meat? You spend the time to pick out the perfect cut, marinade or season it perfectly, check it often to make sure you’re not over cooking it, and then slice into it to check it it’s done. Or maybe you’re a “smarter griller,” so you use a meat thermometer to check the doneness of the meat, and then once you take it off the grill you immediately slice it into the perfect serving sizes for your guests. What is wrong with this scenario?? Well, have you ever stopped to take a look at what is happening to your meat when you slice into it to check it’s doneness or carve it immediately? The juices from your perfectly cooked meat are running all over the place! And if the juices are sitting on your plate or cutting board, then they are not still in the meat, where they should be. If there is no juice left in your meat to keep it moist, then you end up with dry, tough meat.

So, to save us all from the dry meat syndrome, here is all you have to do…just let your meat rest for 10-15 minutes after grilling (or baking or roasting) before cutting it. Yes, it really is that simple!

Why is this so important? Well, it’s just a simple chemistry lesson. When you are cooking meat, the juices inside are heated so high that they start to move around quickly (almost like boiling inside the meat). After the meat is removed from the heat, the juices are still going crazy in there and they need a while to calm back down. If you cut the meat right away, the juices are still moving around so quickly, they will rush to the new opening and spill out. If you give the meat time to rest (like I said about 10 minutes, depending on the size of it), then the juices will have a chance to “calm down”, redistribute themselves throughout the meat, and stay exactly where they should when you cut the meat: in each individual bite.

If you don’t believe me, just ask the same people that taught me this concept: the food network chefs. Just watch any of their shows when they cook meat…they will ALWAYS tell you to “let the meat rest to let the juices redistribute.”

Lastly, if you need a surefire way to know how done your steak is, run to target and spend $10 on one of those instant read thermometers! I’ve never used one myself, but I’ve heard great things about them! Also, you can try this trick to check the doneness. But, as I said, if you make sure to let your meat rest for about 10 minutes after cooking it before cutting or carving it, your meat will always end up more tender and juicy!

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So I know this may a simple concept to some, but why am I not using rotisserie chicken for every recipe that calls for cut up cooked chicken?? A few facts about rotisserie chicken:

• It’s always moist (as opposed to my chicken that I have a talent of always overcooking, leaving it dry!)
• it’s super flavorful
• it’s fast (does it get much faster than putting it in your cart and paying for it?)
• it’s not very expensive (about $5, and you can get enough chicken out of it for 2-3 dishes)

So again I find myself asking why I’m not utilizing this great (time saving) resource more! I’ve used it a few times for the chicken in different recipes, and I’ve been very pleased with the results (as I said, moist and flavorful). Usually what I do is have it for the meat in one dinner with like rice and a salad or something, and then cut up the rest of it that night after dinner and save the rest to use in recipes later (like last week we had rotisserie chicken for dinner on Saturday, then I used it in chicken pasta on Sunday, and I used the rest of it for chicken enchiladas on Tuesday). I’ve even frozen it a few times and thawed it quickly in the microwave when I needed cooked chicken quickly for a recipe.

So, like I said, I’m sure that’s a pretty simple concept for most of you, but I was pretty proud and excited when I discovered it! Try it out next time you need some cut up cooked chicken for a recipe (or, if you need cut up chicken for a recipe and don’t have any rotisserie chicken, try this quick method).

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So just a quick tip that I learned from the good old food network when it comes to pasta dishes. I know that usually when you’re serving pasta, you like to serve it in 2 separate serving dishes: one for the pasta & one for the sauce, & then you let people dish out their own servings of both. But, what I’ve heard a lot of the food network chefs say, is that you want to mix them together first. You want to do it RIGHT when the pasta is done cooking, you add it directly to whatever the sauce is…when the pasta comes straight out of the water like this it makes it so that the pasta really soaks up the sauce, making the dish all the more flavorful!

What I’ve found in my personal experience, is that this works best with thicker pastas, like linguine or fettuccine. When I’m serving something like spaghetti, I still like to serve it separate & let each person decide how much pasta & how much sauce they want, but with the thicker pastas I almost always mix the pasta & sauce together right when the pasta is finished cooking. I really agree (cause my opinion obviously matters more than the food network’s highly trained chefs, right?) that the pasta soaks up the flavors of the sauces this way, resulting in a more flavorful dish! Try it sometime, and let me know if you agree!

Also, don’t forget to subscribe to my newsletter for more tips & tricks!

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So as you know I am all about shortcuts in the kitchen! One of the most annoying things to me that seems to always take longer than it should (besides waiting for water to boil) is cooking chicken from frozen. SO ANNOYING! For some reason, even when I’m doing my OCD meal planning, I just can not remember to defrost my chicken for recipes. I hate defrosting chicken in the microwave (takes too long, smells funny to me (is that weird?), and it doesn’t defrost it evenly so you’re forced to cut off the rubbery outside…know what I’m talking about??). So, I’m left with a whole bunch of ingredients for an amazing meal but NO CHICKEN! But, about a year ago my sister-in-law shared with me her trick for cooking chicken fast, and I haven’t been left chicken-less since. Here’s how it goes:

I take the chicken (only really works for boneless skinless) straight from the freezer, put it in a pan, and fill it with water to a little higher than halfway up the pieces of chicken. I crank it to high, and let the chicken simmer in the water for a few minutes. Once the chicken is thawed enough to cut, I cut it into bite-sized pieces, put it back in the simmering water (pour out a little of the water if needed), add a bunch of seasoning salt, and simmer it until it’s almost cooked through. Then I pour out all the water and let it cook for another minute or so until it’s cooked through and browned.

This whole process takes less than ten minutes from the time I pull the chicken out of the freezer until it’s completely cooked. I use this chicken in anything that I need cooked cubed chicken for…enchiladas, chicken tacos, Hawaiian haystacks, etc, etc…I’ve even served this on it’s own a few times as a quick meal with some rice-a-roni and a salad (drizzled it with barbecue sauce once, and once with teriyaki sauce, those were both really good). The thing I love about cooking my chicken this way (other than how unbelievably quick and easy it is) is that I have a tendency to overcook my chicken, leaving me with dry chicken, but cooking it in the water this way leaves me with moist tender chicken every time!

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So I have a roast that’s been in my freezer for over a year. I just discovered it in the back of my freezer the other day, I had totally forgotten it was there! I almost threw it away when I found it, because like I said it’s been in there for over a year! But, I called my mother-in-law and she said that it should still be fine. I wasn’t quite convinced yet, so I did a little research on the internet and found that she was right: food can keep indefinitely in the freezer. Didn’t know that. All of the sites and articles I found (including the usda’s site) said the same thing…that as long as your freezer stays at or below 0°F, your food will keep indefinitely because that temperature “inactivates” the growth of bacteria. I found an article that I felt really explained all of this (freezing meat, freezer burn, thawing meat) really well to me. Here’s what they said about freezing your meats:

“Frozen meats can be safely frozen indefinitely as long as your freezer maintains a temperature of 0°F or lower. At this temperature, bacteria, yeasts, and molds are inactive (not destroyed). Freezing meat simply stops the clock when microbes are concerned. So, if a piece of meat is about to go bad when you freeze it, it’s about to go bad when after you thaw it. It’s best to freeze fresh meat shortly after purchase unless you plan on using it.”

Makes sense! I would definitely recommend reading this whole article, like I said he explains really well freezing meats as well as thawing them safely.

So, as I said, your food will stay safe indefinitely in your freezer. Now, what about quality? What all of the articles I found said was, although your food will stay SAFE, that doesn’t mean that it will still TASTE good by the time you get around to cooking! If you keep it in the freezer too long, it can affect the quality (but not safety) of your food. So, since I’m one of those weirdos who actually likes my food to taste decent, again I ask, How Long Can I Freeze Meat? This chart is from the USDA’s website, & it tells you how long different foods can be frozen before it starts affecting the quality (but again, it’ll stay safe pretty much forever if kept at the right temperature). I have found this chart SO helpful…just make sure when you freeze your foods you write on them in permanent marker (on a piece of masking tape if needed) when you need to use them by (so they don’t end up sitting in your freezer for, say, a year):

I got this chart from the USDA’s article I found. I’d also definitely recommending this whole article if you want more info (what better source to use than the USDA right?). It just gives more in detailed information about food safety and how freezing your food affects it’s quality and nutrients. Click here to read the whole article.

So I guess my roast is still safe to eat…maybe I’ll cook it in some sauce or something so it doesn’t taste too funny! I’ll let you know how that one goes…

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Have you ever used refrigerated pasta? I just tried refrigerated pasta for the first time last weekend and I’m so happy for my new discovery! I think pasta is a great resource for quick cooking, it seems to me like you can add almost anything to pasta to create a quick meal. The only thing is, with how impatient I can be, sometimes when I’m in a rush I don’t even feel like waiting for the pasta to cook! That is why I love refrigerated pasta. While most normal dry pasta cooks in about 10-13 minutes, refrigerated pasta takes only about 2-3 minutes to cook! Amazing!…although it doesn’t do much to alleviate my annoyance of having to wait for the water to boil!…just make sure that whenever you do boil water for pasta that you put the lid on while you’re waiting (sounds like common sense, but I’m embarrassed to admit how long it took me to realize that that really does make it faster!)! I’ve used refrigerated linguine and fettuccine and there was a very big taste difference, much better than dried.

I also like refrigerated pasta because I feel that it tastes much better and has so much more taste than regular dried pasta. Again, probably another common sense statement because doesn’t everything fresh always taste better? The only obvious negative is that it’s more expensive than normal dried pasta. Right now when I’m only cooking for 2 it’s not a huge deal, but I might have to make the change back to dried pasta (and just deal with waiting the extra 10 minutes!) when we have a big family.

The only other concern I had with refrigerated pasta is that it wouldn’t last very long? But I was very happy to find out that it lasts in your fridge for a few weeks, and you can freeze it for a few months, and cooking it from frozen supposedly doesn’t add any time to the cooking time. Great.

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So here’s the deal. One of the things I found REALLY helps me to actually get home-cooked meals on the table every, or mostly every, night is to plan my meals for the week. I had a lot of people recommend this to me and it always sounded like just too much work (like I have time for something extra!). But, one lazy Sunday (before starting my business…I haven’t had very many “lazy” days since then!), I decided to try it. And now, whenever I do take the couple minutes that it takes to do it, I find that I am able to get a meal on the table most nights of the week, if not all (as opposed to MAYBE one or two when I don’t do the planning beforehand). I’ve tried a few different methods, and this is the one that I’ve found works best for me. Mine has gotten pretty detailed, which works very well for me. Because I am an extremely disorganized person with pretty much NO short term memory whatsoever (wait, what am I writing about again??), I have to be very detailed and organized when doing my meal plans. But, like I said, that is what I found works best for ME…that definitely does not mean that this exact process will work for you. What I’m trying to say is, please don’t get stressed by all the steps I take…the purpose of this is to try to help save time and this detailed process works for me, but by all means take out whatever steps you think would be unnecessary for you. So, here goes…first the preparatory steps (AGAIN…if you think this will take too much time for you, just SKIP this! This is meant to save you time, so if you don’t think it will, move on to the rest!):

1. Put all of your recipes in one place. Anytime I get a recipe (from a friend, off a website, tv show, etc) I put it into some sort of a document on my computer. I know that a lot of people like to have their recipes printed out in a book or written on note cards, and I think that would work great also, I’m just ALWAYS in front of my computer, so that’s works best for me. The main idea here is to have them all stored in one place. Also, this is kind of an obvious one, but having them separated into categories (poultry, fish, desserts, vegetables, etc) helps out A LOT when trying to plan and be somewhat organized.
2. I have a list of all of my recipes in a document (for me it’s just a google doc, again separated into categories. Anytime I get a new recipe I put it into the list in its category (poultry, vegetables, etc). This way when I’m going to make my meal plan for each week I don’t have to try to rack my brain for all of the recipes I have access to, I can just look at the list. I find this also helps a ton with keeping my weekly meals from getting to repetitive. It’s nice to be reminded of the recipes I haven’t used in a while! Again, this is supposed to help save you time, so if you don’t think this step will help, don’t do it!

K sweet, moving on. Here is the actual process I go through when planning my meals for the week. I go through this process once a week, usually on a Sunday. I am a very busy person! But like I said, I’ve found that taking a few minutes to do this saves me TONS of time (ever walked through the grocery store for forty five minutes trying to figure out what to make for dinner that night? You get my point.):

1. Look at my handy dandy meal list and decide which meals I’d like to make that week, obviously trying to have a good variety (with me that pretty much just means don’t do chicken every night!). I don’t just choose entrees, I also choose sides, etc…this helps me with my grocery shopping (then I know I’m not gonna be stuck with a piece of grilled chicken and nothing to eat with it!).
2. I like to plan my meals out per day (tomorrow I’m planning on trying a recipe I found the other day for chicken with fettuccine alfredo. I’ll let you know how it goes). I know a lot of people that think this is too restrictive (what if they decide they’re not in the mood for spaghetti on Tuesday?), but I think it’s nice to have some sort of idea, so if I need to thaw or marinade meat or something that I know when to do it.
3. Then I make my grocery list for the week (I try to go to the grocery store once a week…again, it seemed like it might be a lot at first, but I found it actually saved me time because I spent less time at the store each trip, and it saved me time during the week because I had everything I needed for each meal).

And there you have it, simple enough right? Hey, I said it a few times…this has helped save me SO much time (and made it so I actually cook meals!), but take what you think will help you and forget about the rest!

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