Category: recipes

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Chicken Caesar Supreme

OK, everyone is familiar with a Chicken Caesar salad, but let’s dress it up for this recipe entry.

First, barbeque the chicken with a healthy slathering of “Chicken and Rib” BBQ sauce, whichever you prefer. I like to use boneless, skinless chicken thighs as they keep their juices the best, especially when barbequed on the grill.

For several reasons that fill my bag of hammers quite often, I trim the thighs so they are extra lean and throw them into a bowl of BBQ sauce as I go. One hand trims, and the other mixes, ensuring the thighs are covered in sauce. If you have time to marinate, by all means, go ahead; otherwise, you can prep and go straight to the grill.

Usually, five minutes a side, flipping twice, will work quite well when cooking at high heat (our grill has two settings: off and firestorm).

Once cooked, let the chicken rest while you prepare your Caesar salad. A simple salad can be made with two baby romaine hearts and two tablespoons of your favorite Caesar dressing. Cut and chop the romaine into small pieces, add the Caesar dressing, and shake well. Dice the chicken and add it to the top of the salad (a pasta bowl works great for this).

Now for the “Supreme” part of the recipe. Get a medium to medium-large apple; you’ll need half for each serving. Did I mention this was a meal? Peel and core the apple however you prefer, then dice half and sprinkle over the chicken and salad in the bowl. Now, add a handful of craisins (dried cranberries) on top of that. Feel free to add slivered parmesan cheese to top off the whole thing.

Enjoy!

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Simple Chili

Here’s another recipe for cold winter days: a simple slow-cooker chili that requires 15-20 minutes of preparation and 5-6 hours to cook in a slow cooker set to high temperature.

Here are the ingredients:
– (1) can of tomato juice (large)
– (1) can of diced tomatoes (whole tomatoes cut down works too)
– (1) can of red kidney beans (drained)
– (1) pound of ground turkey (or beef)
– (1) medium to large onion rings(my preference is Spanish or sweet)
– chili powder (add to taste – 4-1/2 to 6 tablespoons is a good range)

Now that we have the ingredients gathered together, let start with the preparation.

Start with the onion. Split it in half; finely dice one half of the onion and start sautéeing the diced onion in a pan large enough also to hold the ground meat. For the other half of the onion, chop into large pieces.

While the diced onion is sautéeing, add the tomato juice, diced tomatoes, drained kidney beans, and chopped onion to the slow cooker. Sprinkle each ingredient with one tablespoon of chili powder (spread evenly).

Once the diced onion is sautéed, add 1/2 to one tablespoon of chili powder and mix well in the pan. Next, add your ground meat of choice. Start browning the onion and meat mixture.

Once the meat is browned, add one tablespoon of chili powder and mix well. Cook a few more minutes to ensure the ground meat and onion mixture is well blended.

Add the pan ingredients to the slow cooker, add another tablespoon of chili powder for a spicier flavor, cover the slow cooker, and set the timer for six hours.

While you wait, enjoy the day and think about the peanut butter sandwiches you will dip into your bowl of chili. Yes, peanut butter sandwiches—don’t knock them until you try them.

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Pork And Rice – Winter 2024

One of many comfort foods we like to eat that is also relatively simple, easy, and quick to make. In short, Pork & Rice; in a bit more detailed of a title Pork Tenderloin with Spanish Rice. The following is my Winter 2024 iteration of the recipe followed by some thoughts for future iterations.

To start, the ingredients are rather straightforward. You will need, at a minimum, a Pork Tenderloin, a package of ready to make Spanish Rice (I typically use Uncle Ben’s), sliced mushrooms (fresh are nice, but canned work well and what I generally use), some salsa (as spicy or as mild as you prefer or that fits your diet), and some chicken broth.

First up, start the Spanish Rice. This does require the rice be cooked in a pot big enough to add the tenderloin to at the end. Adjust the recipe to use chicken broth and salsa in place of the water the package calls for. In this case, a full package of rice calls for 3-1/2 cups of water. Switch this to 3 cups of chicken broth and 1 cup of salsa. Set your timer to the low side of the recommended cooking times.

Next, trim down the pork tenderloin as needed. Our diet requires an extremely lean version of any meat. This may take a few minutes. You might consider doing this before starting the rice as needed. Once the tenderloin has been further trimmed, cube it to reasonable bite size pieces and put in a pan to brown and cook to a medium level.

As the meat approaches the medium level, add the sliced mushrooms. These can be prepped while the meat is cooking or you can open the can and drain the majority of any liquid the mushrooms are packed in.

Continue cooking the pork with the mushrooms until most of the liquid has been cooked off and with a bit of luck this will time out to the rice timer you set earlier.

Turn off all the stove burners.

Add the pan of pork and mushrooms into the rice pot. Mix well, and leave to cook on the cooling range burner for approximately 5 minutes.

Stir and serve with a tablespoon, or two, of sour cream on top. Enjoy!

Future considerations:
– adjust the rice recipe to 2 cups or water and 2 cups of salsa.
– and/or add a cup of salsa to the pork pan when you add the meat.