Not your everyday chicken; Skillet chicken and vegetables

This is my current favorite quick meal.

Things you need:
Skillet
tongs
wooden spoon
lid for skillet
olive oil
defrosted chicken breast 1 or 2
bag of frozen veggies. I use broccili or carrots, cauliflower and broccoli mix.

1.Turn on burner and drizzle olive oil on skillet

2. lay chicken breast in center of skillet

3. pour veggies around and on top of chicken. They are going to cook in the olive oil an chicken juices, which will give them amazing flavor.

4. Put lid on skillet.

5. Brown chicken on both sides, takes roughly 5 minutes each. Check on it and see if it needs to be turned or not.

6. Stir veggies a little, to give them a even cooking. You want to get a little browning and char on them.

7. Put on plate and dig in. You can cut it up into cubes before or after cooking if you like.  You can sprinkle sea salt if you want, but it is perfect on it's own.

I also like to top it with my homemade guacamole sometimes. As someone that can't have actual cream sauces, the guac acts as one. 

Dairy free rice crispy treats

I am someone that really loves rice crispy treats, but I can't eat storebought because they are made with butter...like many things are made with butter. Butter is something that tends to make the culinary and baking world go round. I can't do dairy, so for this I use olive oil as a replacement.

Rice Crispy Treats

What you will need:

Large pot
spray olive oil
half cup olive oil
spatula
wooden spoon
medal spoon
serated knife
measuring cups
square silicone baking dish
wax paper
1 box rice crispies
2 bags of regular size marshmallows
2-3 tablespoon unsweetened applesauce

1.Spray walls of pot with olive oil, completely covering all insides.

2.Pour half cup olive oil in heated pot.

3.Spray the spoons and spatula with olive oil.

4.Pour both bags of marshmallows into pot, stir continuously as they begin to melt. You don't want them to burn at the bottom.

5.After they begin to melt, pour in 2-3 tablespoons unsweetened applesauce. Continue stirring until completely melted.

6.Once completely melted, remove from heat.

7.Add rice crispy cereal one cup at a time. Add one cup and stir in then add another. Repeat this until all cereal is combined. We do this so that it's easier to completely combine it all or else it gets to be a mess and not all the cereal is covered in the marshmallow.
This will be an arm workout.

8.Once everything is combined. Spray the square silicone baking dish with the olive oil so that it's easier to remove them when they are done chilling.

9.Pour the combined mixture into the dish. Once you get it all into the dish, take wax paper and cover the dish with it and press down. Make sure to get the mixture evenly spread out in the dish and level.

10.Store in refridgerator for 3-6 hours. I do it over night.

11.After chilling to firm them, take out of baking dish and onto cutting board or large plate. I cut them into 3 pieces horiztonally and about an inch thick each vertically with a serated knife.

Store in refridgerator.

Getting chilly? Heat up some chili

With my chili I'm feeding 2 grown men and a sister that eats like a man, plus myself and my mom (my dad doesn't eat anything with tomatoes). So I typically use 3-4 lbs ground turkey. You can use as much as you want to use. I like a smokey flavor with a bit of kick to it.
I use red, yellow and orange bell peppers because my brother wasn't eating his veggies, but he liked onions...they resemble onions when cooked.

Skill level; moderate

Time: If I want this ready by 6 I start this around 4/4:30

Things you will need:

Skillet (I use a large cast iron)
Wooden spoons
Potatoe masher (optional)
something to drain the greese into
a large spoon to drain greese with
A large pot
Cutting board
a good sharp knife
strainer

ground turkey
red, yellow and oragne bell peppers, diced
red onion, diced
1 can chili beans (drained and rinsed)
1 can kidney beans (drained and rinsed)
1 can tomatoe paste
1 can crushed tomatoes
1 can diced tomatoes ( you can dice your own if you want)
2 tablespoons salt
dash of pepper
few shakes of chili powder
few shakes of cumin
few shakes of paprika
few shakes of garlic powder
couple shakes of dried red pepper flakes
couple shakes of cayanne

If the ground turkey is frozen it will need about 4-6 hours to defrost, so accomadate time for that.

A lot of people season their meat with salt and pepper first, I do it as it's cooking, but I use so many seasonings in the cooking process that it's never lacking. Start browning your ground turkey in the skillet, have a can or container at the ready to drain the greese into. I like to use a potatoes masher to break down the meat. Stir it occasionally. Make sure it doesn't stick to the skillet.

While the meat is cooking and you check it every few minutes, now you start dicing the onion and the bell peppers.

Note: We are using a red onion because it will give the chili amazing flavor that other onions can't give, it takes it up a notch, and never forget to add a dash of salt. Salt brings out the flavors of any dish, without a little salt most dishes are bland.

I have no particular order that I through everything in the pot. So you can start through in your crushed tomatoes, diced tomatoes, tomatoe paste, onion and bell peppers, chili beans and kidney beans when the meat is almost done. through in the turkey. Start adding all the seasonings.
I seriousy just eyeball all of my seasonings.

I drain and rinse the beans to get rid of the extra salt and startch.

I like to let it simmer until it boils while stirring it occasionally and just keeping an eye on it. Once I can really smell it I let people dig in.

Chill out: How to upgrade your cupcakes.

These are classing yellow cupcakes with vanilla frosting, decorated with red icing that I bought already in a piping bag. I made these in honor of the World Series and just because I felt like baking.

I just used a box mix and followed the instructions. These should make 24 depending on how much batter you put in each. Mine came out to 27.
Preheat your oven to 350, it takes roughly 15 minutes to get to that temperature.

Things you'll need:
Box of cake mix
Water
Oil (I prefer olive oil)
Measuring cups
3 eggs
Medium sized mixing bowl
Hand mixer/standing mixer/whisk/ spoon
Ice cream scoop or serving spoon
Spatula
Cupcake trays
Cupcake liners
Tooth picks
Icing, room temperature

Pour  your cake mix into a medium sized mixing bowl, make a small well in the middle to put your wet ingredients. Pour in your water and oil, the box calls for vegetable oil but I stick with olive oil, and your 3 large eggs (the package will say Large).
Mix it all together, I use a hand mixer, if you are using a standing mixer make sure everything at the bottom is combined. You can use a spoon it just takes more energy and takes longer.
Put your cupcake liners in the cupcake trays.
When pouring my batter I like to have a spatula on hand.

To scoop and pour my batter I use an ice cream scoop, you can also use a serving spoon.
Fill the liners up half way or a little higher.  I use the spatula to catch the batter drippings on the edge of the bowl. Later I use it to scrape excess batter to put into the liners.
Put both trays next to each other on the middle rack so they bake evenly. The box will say to bake for roughly 18-23 minutes. I went with 21 minutes. I try to stay in between times, always steer away from the maximum time because you can always keep them in longer but you can't unburn your food.
When the timer goes off, check your cupcakes by inserting your toothpick in the middle. If it comes out clean then they are done, if not they must go in a little longer. You can also use a fork or a knife to check for doneness.

Once they are done, the trick is to put them in the refrigerator. The reason for the title of this post. I put mine in for 30-60 minutes, I wasn't really watching the clock. Chilling them helps cool them faster,  which is good for 2 reasons.
1) it makes sure they don't crumble apart when you are putting the icing on.... and the icing won't melt.
2) it makes them less spongy and more dense, which is how I prefer them.

You want to make sure your icing is about room temperature, easy to spread. You can also throw it in the microwave for 5-10 seconds. I just spread on a nice even layer of vanilla and then I piped on red icing to make it look like a baseball. After icing you can eat them or put them back in the fridge to chill.

A little about me

I discovered my love of cooking roughly 2 years ago when I decided that I needed some time off from school and was suddenly put in charge of feeding my 2 teenage brothers. During this time I learned how to find the best deals on groceries during the week and at which stores, when to stock up and where to splurge. My first love in the kitchen was baking, which is all science and precise measurements, so I was definitely intimidated by the flexibility of cooking. I wanted to know exactly what to do,exactly what ingredients to put in I didn't know how to just "wing it". I basically learned from the food network shows I watched and researching recipes. Wow, have times changed!! I love being in charge of every ingredient that goes into my food and how much I put in. I'd rather cook from scratch than go out to eat or use prepackaged anything. I recently stopped using store bought sauce, thank God! Although my sauce is still to be tested by Italians, need their approval first.

I have had a number of friends ask me for quick and healthy cost efficient recipes to throw together quickly or for any of my favorites to cook. So I figured I'd put together a blog where they can go and sift through and pick what they want to make.

My own diet is dairy free, but I do use it when cooking for my family, I just make myself something without it. My sister is soy free and my dad has high blood pressure so I tend to avoid using a lot of salt and stay away from most soy products. However I will be writing about what products a person on a normal diet would use in these recipes if that's what you want to use, I just won't use them myself. I mostly cook with chicken and veggies, so don't be surprised by what most of my dishes have in common.

My hope is to make cooking seem more approachable to people who have no idea what's happening. It really doesn't have to be that hard. I seriously learned by reading the directions in the recipes.

As I said about my first love in the kitchen was baking, so in addition to posting cooking recipes I'll also be postin some of my favorite baked goods recipes, from apple cake to my favorite chocolate cookie and rice crispy treats.