Simple Chicken and Pasta

I haven't been cooking many blog-worthy things lately.  It is eleventy billion degrees here (I can only be off by 2 degrees, max), so I've been all about quick, easy, light, and *not* heating up the entire house.  Due to the heat, I've also been cooking much later than usual which means LOTS of bleached-out flash pictures.  Sorry.

At any rate, this was born:

Take half a large purple onion and cut that puppy up.  Add 2-3 tbsp of minced garlic, 3 tbsp of olive oil, and pop those puppies into a skillet over high heat.  You want to cook all of this until the chicken gets nice and seared on both sides and the onions get transparent, but not caramelized.  Pro tip:  pat your chicken dry before putting it in the skillet.  This helps you get that pretty sear.

I also added a dash of sea salt, a bit of black pepper, a pinch of cayenne, and about 1 tbsp each of basil and parsley.

Add 2 cups of uncooked pasta of your choice and about a cup and a half of water.  Leave it in there with the chicken so that as the chicken cooks, the juices will come out and form sort of a tasty broth that will help flavor the noodles.  Keep cooking it on high heat until the noodles get soft.

The water should all cook off before then, so once it does, add water 1/2 cup at a time, until the noodles are al dente.  You don't want a lot of excess water because you want the flavor to really stick to everything instead of losing it down the sink when you strain.  :)

Once the noodles are done to the desired tenderness, dice up a few roma tomatoes (I used two large ones), and toss it all together.  Dice up the chicken, too, if you prefer.

Plate it up, top with parmesan, and you're good to go!  This is very simple and quick and only takes the one large skillet, so it is also easy clean-up.  It came out light, flavorful, and fresh-tasting, which is a super bonus when it is so hot you feel like you very well may keel over if you eat something too awfully heavy!!

<3

WW

Crustless Mini-Quiche

These are one of my favorite breakfasts/brunches to make on a really lazy day.  They almost always come out great and go wonderfully with coffee or tea.  Most people swear by a crusted quiche, but the first one I ever had was crustless and it has just always been what I've preferred.

Start off with a muffin tin or whatever you want to cook it in.  I use a muffin tin because they come out all cute and finger-food friendly.  Lightly coat your tin in butter, olive oil, or cooking spray.  I usually use olive oil.

Crack some eggs into a bowl.  I use 3 for this tin.  Add about 3 tbsp of milk, some salt and some pepper and stir them up like you're making scrambled eggs.  Chop up whatever else you are adding - I'm using frozen cooked sausage, cheese, and mushrooms in the Wookie's and green onion in mine.  Fold them all into the egg mixture.

Pour into the tins!  I added the cheese as an afterthought, so I just sort of poked it down in there with chopsticks.

Pop them into an oven at 350 for about 20-30 minutes or until they are cooked through, then let them cook a bit before removing and that's it.  These can be made more or less healthy depending on what you have laying around and are great to get rid of leftovers - the spinach and green onion was left over from a previous recipe and I was going to add some spinach as well, but I'd already used all of it.

Are you a quiche fan?  Crustless or regular?

<3
WW

Tuna Boats

This is a fun, light, crisp, easy recipe that is just perfect for summer.  The success of this depends on how fresh and nice your cucumbers are, though.  While this was good, the cucumbers I'd bought were a tad on the bitter/tart side, so I'd imagine with a sweeter one this would be ten times better.  I got the idea for this recipe off of Pinterest, but as so often happens, it didn't link back to a source.

This starts out with the tuna recipe I use faithfully - my grandmother's recipe.  I've had a lot of tuna made by a lot of different people, but nowhere else have I ever seen anyone put apples into it and that is a shame because it is just stellar.

Starting off, you'll need 3 cans of tuna in water or oil, your choice.  Drain it well and put it in a large mixing bowl or container.  I knew there'd be leftovers so I mixed it straight into a Tupperware bowl with a lid to save on dishes.

You'll also need 1/2 of an apple - red is best, but green works in a pinch - and half an onion of any color.  The cucumbers are for the little boats.  I made 4 boats and had plenty of tuna left over and could have made about 4-6 more.  My eyes were bigger than my stomach, I couldn't even finish one boat, but the Wookie came to the rescue and ate all the rest!

Other stuff you'll need includes mayonnaise (not Miracle Whip), spicy or brown mustard, salt, pepper, dill pickles or dill relish, and garlic powder, the last two of which seem to have been camera shy on this day.  -.-

Hard boil 3 eggs or one egg per can of tuna and let them cool completely.

Finely dice up the 1/2 onion and 1/2 apple and add them to the tuna along with 1tbsp of the mustard, 1 tsp garlic, salt and pepper to taste, and 2 tbsp of dill relish or finely chopped pickle.  The mayonnaise is up to you.  Some people like their tuna drier than others.  I add mayonnaise until it is to the consistency I like it at, then squeeze in a little more since I'll be adding the eggs in later.

Peel your cucumbers and remove the seeds so they are hollow.  I like to use a melon baller, it gets all the seeds out with one fell swoop.

Next, once they are completely cool, dice the eggs up and fold them into the tuna mixture.  I like to do this after everything else is all stirred up so that some of the chunks of boiled yolks stay intact.  If you mix them in as you mix everything else, they tend to break up and just sort of become one with everything.

Once your eggs are in, pop the whole thing into the fridge, covered, until it is nice and cold, then spoon the mixture into the cucumbers and sprinkle with some parsley.

That's all there is to it!

A close-up shot of the goodness.

Do you have a special tuna salad recipe that's been handed down?

<3
WW

Turkey!

The holidays aren't the only time of year to eat turkey.  In fact, we probably eat turkey more when its not a holiday.  This turkey breast I caught on sale and only needed half of it for the recipe I was making for dinner that night, so I decided to just bake the rest up for sandwiches or snacks.

This, admittedly, looks pretty gross.  But do not fret!  The turkey breast was pretty massive and came boneless, skin on.  I peeled the skin off the whole thing, cut it in half, and diced up the half I was going to cook for dinner that night.  The other half, I left in one big hunk, rubbed about 1/4 each of spicy mustard and honey (the real stuff only),  sort of wrapped it back into the piece of skin, then popped it into the toaster oven at 350 for about an hour and I had this:

It was simple, moist, and made one hell of a sandwich and wrap.

As with all poultry, once you take it out of the oven let it rest for 10 to 15 minutes before you slice it up so it will reserve its juiciness.  :)

<3
WW

Venison Taco Bowls

This is just a variation on my Taco Bowls!! post from a few months back using ground venison instead of ground beef.

I chopped up a poblano pepper and a few tomatoes...

And added the poblanos to a skillet of ground venison I'd browned, and also added a can of corn.

Then, I drained a can of black beans and rinsed them.

And added them and the tomatoes to the mix and seasoned it with chili powder, garlic powder, onion powder, paprika, cayenne, sea salt, cumin, cilantro and black pepper (all to taste, just add a little at a time, start with about 1/2 tsp of each and go from there).

Close-up shot of all that goodness!

Stir in some cheese until it looks all gooey and gross and you're ready to go!

<3
WW