Chicken Enchiladas

Chicken Enchiladas are one of the reasons why I love freezer meals! These taste just as good after they have been in the freezer as they do fresh.

1 c. onion, chopped
1/2 c. green pepper, chopped
2 T. butter
2 c. cooked chicken or turkey
3 T. butter
1/4 c. flour
1 t. ground coriander
3/4 t. salt
2 1/2 c. chicken broth
1 c. sour cream
1 -1/2 c. Mexican blend shredded cheese
12 -6 inch tortillas

Cooking day instructions
Cook onion and green pepper in 2T. butter until tender. Combine onion mixture in a bowl with chicken; set aside.

For sauce, melt 3 T. butter and stir in flour, coriander, and salt. Stir in chicken broth all at once; cook and stir until thickened and bubbly. Cook and stir 1-2 minutes more. Remove from heat; stir in sour cream and 1/2 cup of cheese. Stir 1/2 cup of sauce into chicken mixture.

Fill each tortilla with 1/4 cup of chicken mixture. Roll up. Arrange rolls in a lined baking dish for freezing. Pour remaining sauce over enchiladas and sprinkle with remaining cheese. Freeze.

Serving day instructions
When you are ready to serve it, thaw completely in the refrigerator. Bake uncovered at 350 degrees for about 25 minutes or until bubbly.

Hawaiian Chicken

This is another good meal to prepare ahead of time and put in the freezer.  I got this out of the Don't Panic - dinner's in the freezer, cookbook.

6lbs boneless, skinless chicken breast halves

2-16oz cans pineapple slices or chunks, drained

2-15oz cans mandarin oranges, drained

1/4 cup cornstarch

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/4 cup soy sauce 

1/4 cup lemon juice

1 t. salt

1 t. ground ginger

1/2 t. ground red pepper

Original recipe yields 8-10 servings

Cooking day instructions

Place chicken in freezer bag.  Mix together fruit, cornstarch, sugar, soy sauce, lemon juice, salt, ginger and ground red pepper.  Pour over the chicken in bag.  Freeze, using freezer bag method.

Serving day instructions

Thaw chicken mixture.  Place in Crock-Pot, cover and cook on low for 4-5 hours or on high for 2-3 hours.  Optional - add green pepper chunks to crock pot one hour before serving.

We serve this over rice.  So yummy!

Freezer meals

I have recently become obsessed with having meals readily available in our freezer. Most of them just need to be thawed out and put in the oven or crockpot.  I get great satisfaction when I look in the freezer and find it full!  

There are two books that I have been making meals out of.  Don't Panic - Dinner's in the Freezer: Great-Tasting Meals You Can Make Ahead by Susie Martinez, Bonnie Garcia and Vanda Howell.  And their second book Don't Panic--More Dinner's in the Freezer: A Second Helping of Tasty Meals You Can Make Ahead.  I checked them out from the library and will be doing a review on them soon on my book review blog.  I just wanted to let everyone know about these two great books.

Sophilla Cheesecake Pie

This week the menu is filled with all sorts of recipes we've never had before.  Here is one that I found on Allrecipes.com

Ingredients

• 2 (8 ounce) packages cream cheese, softened
• 1 cup white sugar
• 1 teaspoon Mexican vanilla extract
• 2 (8 ounce) cans refrigerated crescent rolls
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 cup butter, room temperature
• 1/4 cup honey

Directions

1. Preheat an oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Prepare a 9x13 inch baking dish with cooking spray.
2. Beat the cream cheese with 1 cup of sugar and the vanilla extract in a bowl until smooth.
3. Unroll the cans of crescent roll dough, and use a rolling pin to shape each piece into 9x13 inch rectangles. Press one piece into the bottom of a 9x13 inch baking dish. Evenly spread the cream cheese mixture into the baking dish, then cover with the remaining piece of crescent dough. Stir together 3/4 cup of sugar, cinnamon, and butter. Dot the mixture over the top of the cheesecake.

Bake in the preheated oven until the crescent dough has puffed and turned golden brown, about 30 minutes. Remove from the oven and drizzle with honey. Cool completely in the pan before cutting into 12 squares.

Cucumber Salad

The other night I had a craving for something lite and crisp which resulted in us having Cucumber Salad with our grilled brats.

Ingredients

1 large cucumber
3 Tbl mayo
2 Tbl milk
1 Tbl Vinegar
salt and sugar to taste

Peel cucumber and slice
Mix mayo, milk, vinegar, salt and sugar.
Pour sauce over cucumber slices and chill.

French's Crunchy Onion Chicken

We've seen this on TV commercials for a while so I decided to make it for supper tonight.  It was very good.

What you need:

2 cups (4 oz.) FRENCH'S® Original or Cheddar French Fried Onions

2 tbsp. all-purpose flour

4 (5 oz.) boneless skinless chicken breasts

1 egg, beaten 

Make it: 

Place French Fried Onions and flour into plastic bag. Lightly crush with hands or with rolling pin. Transfer to pie plate or waxed paper.

Dip chicken into egg; then coat with onion crumbs, pressing firmly to adhere. Place chicken on baking sheet.

Bake at 400°F for 20 min. or until no longer pink in center. I baked ours for 40 minutes.

Mozzarella chicken roll-ups

My husband couldn't stop talking about how good this was tonight.

2 oz. Cream cheese, softened

1/2 tsp. dried oregano leaves

1/4 tsp.  Garlic salt

1/2 cup Shredded Mozzarella Cheese

2 small boneless skinless chicken breast, pounded to 1/4-inch thickness

HEAT oven to 400°F.

MIX first 4 ingredients until well blended.

PLACE chicken, top-sides down, on work surface; top with cheese mixture. Starting at one short end, tightly roll up each breast, tucking in ends of chicken to completely enclose filling. Place, seam-side down, in 9-inch square baking dish sprayed with cooking spray.

BAKE 30 min. or until chicken is done (165°F).

Variations

 Mix in 1/4 cup finely diced green pepper with the cheese mixture. 

-OR-

Prepare as directed, topping the flattened chicken pieces with a layer of baby spinach leaves before topping with cheese mixture.

-OR-

Top chicken breasts with 1 cup spaghetti sauce before baking.

Turkey Burgers

Another recipe from the cookbook that we love!

What you need:

1 lb ground turkey

¼ lb mushrooms, finely chopped

1-cup Italian flavored breadcrumbs

¼ cup grated zucchini

1 Tbl Worcestershire sauce

2 Tbl ketchup

½ tsp salt

1/8 tsp pepper

Make it:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

In a large bowl mix everything together.  It will be moist.  Form into 16 or so little patties.

Coat large skillet with cooking spray and set over med-high heat.

When skillet is hot add oil.

Add burger patties and brown for 4-5 minutes.

Put burgers on cookie sheet and bake for 4-5 minutes

Macaroni and Cheese

I recently checked out a cookbook from the library titled Deceptively Delicious.  The book aims towards getting more vegetables into your kids diet.  I've made this recipe twice now and we really like it.

What you need:

1 ½ cups elbow macaroni

1 Tbl olive oil

1 Tbl flour

½ cup milk

½ cup squash puree

1 ½ cups shredded cheddar cheese

4 oz cream cheese

½ tsp salt

1/8 tsp paprika

1/8 tsp pepper

Make it:

Cook macaroni until al dente. Drain

While macaroni is cooking coat a saucepan with cooking oil heat to medium. Add oil and flour and cook.  Stirring constantly until thick but not browned. 1-2 minutes

Add the milk and cook, stirring every now and then, until the mixture begins to thicken, 3-4 minutes.

Add the vegetable puree, cheddar cheese, cream cheese and seasonings.  Stir until the cheese is melted and the sauce is smooth.

Stir in macaroni and serve.

Baked Chicken Kiev

What you need:

4 boneless chicken breasts

½ cup dry breadcrumbs

½ cup grated Parmesan cheese

1 ½ tsp dried oregano

½ tsp salt

¼ tsp pepper

4 Tbl butter- room temp.

¼ tsp garlic powder

4 oz cheese of choice – I used mozzarella string cheese

2 large eggs beaten with 2 Tbl water

Make it:

Place chicken breasts one at a time between 2 sheets of plastic wrap and flatten until ¼ inch thick.

In a shallow pan combine breadcrumbs, Parmesan cheese, 1 tsp of the oregano, salt and pepper. Set aside.

In a small bowl mash butter with garlic powder and remaining ½ tsp oregano.

Spread about ½ Tbl of the butter mixture on each breast about 1 inch from the lower edge; lay a piece of cheese on the butter mixture. Fold lower edge of breast over filling, then fold in sides and roll up to enclose filling.

Roll each bundle in egg mixture and let drip briefly; then roll in breadcrumb mixture until evenly coated. 

Place bundles, seam side down, without touching in 9x13 inch baking pan.  Cover and refrigerate for at least 4 hours or overnight.

Bake, uncovered, in a 425-degree oven until done.  About 30-40 minutes.

Chocolate Truffle Cheesecake

I was recently invited to a birthday party where the guests were each to bring a dish to pass for the meal.  To make sure we didn't end up with 8 desserts the host had each person pick a course of the meal; appetizer, salad, meat etc.  We have since named this a "Foodie Party"  For this party I picked dessert.  My friend, Katrina, the birthday girl really wanted this as her birthday cake.  This is my first time making such a wonderful dessert.

I knew I would need more that one 9 inch cheesecake so I doubled the recipe and made it in a 9x13

What you need:

2 cups chocolate graham cracker crumbs
1/4 c butter, melted
1/2 c whipping cream
6 oz semisweet chocolate chips
3 8oz packages cream cheese 

1 c sugar
1/3 c unsweetened cocoa
3 eggs
1 Tbl vanilla



Make it:

1.  In a food processor crush the graham cracker in to crumbs. If you don't have a food processor take a ziploc freezer bag, put some of the crackers in the bag, seal it up and crush with a rolling pin.  Pour into a 9-inch cheesecake pan with removable rim; add butter and mix.  Press mixture over bottom and 1/2 inch up sides of pan.  Bake in a 350 oven until crust looks dry, about 10 minutes.

2.  I a 1 or 2 qt pan, bring 1/4 cup cream to a boil.  Remove from heat, add 2 ounces chocolate, and stir until smooth. You'll have a nice chocolate sauce.

3.  In a large bowl, with a mixer, beat cream cheese, sugar, and cocoa powder until smooth.  Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.  Add chocolate sauce mixture and vanilla;  beat until blended. Scrape into crust; spread level.

4.  Bake cheesecake in a 325 regular or 300 convection oven until center jiggles only slightly when pan is gently shaken, about 1 hour.  cool for 1 hour.

5.  In a small pan, bring remaining 1/4 c cream to a boil.  remove from heat, add remaining 4 ounces chocolate, and stir until smooth.  Pour over cake and spread level.  cover and chill at least 8 hours or up to 1 day.

6.  Run a knife between cake and pan rim; remove rim.  Cut cake into wedges.

Banana stackers

I stole this recipe off the back of a box of "Ritz" crackers from Target.  These are so simple to make and my girls love them.

What you need:

"Ritz" type crackers

Peanut butter

Banana

Chocolate syrup

Chopped nuts- any kind will do.

Make it:

Place crackers on a plate.

Smear on some peanut butter.

Top with a slice of banana. 

Drizzle a very small amount of chocolate syrup.

Top with some chopped nuts.

Enjoy!!