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More Than Just a Meal Plan
It’s been almost a year since the seed of an idea was planted, when I began exploring the notion that perhaps my success in the kitchen wasn’t about my recipes, but about my process. I started to ask some questions… Was there a process to unpack beneath my dinnertime routine? Could my method work for other people? The answers, to my great delight, are yes and yes. And thus, Dominate Dinner was born. So what is Dominate Dinner? The words began as part of the subtitle to my (work in progress) book… Biscuits ‘n Crazy: The Busy Mom’s Guide to Dominate Dinner. And then they were the name of my…
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Green Bean Casserole (Gluten Free!)
Green bean casserole has always been one of my favorites on Thanksgiving. Fun fact – it was also the topic of my informative speech during public speaking class in college – how to make a green bean casserole – ha! But once I started getting funny about cream of whatever soups (trying to avoid MSG), I thought my relationship with green bean casserole was over. Until I found Alton Brown’s Best Ever Green Bean Casserole, that is. What I love most about his recipe is the homemade cream of mushroom sauce that makes the casserole. I’ve made this several times, first exactly as he wrote it, then I tweaked it…
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Dominate Dinner
When you take a girl who loves to cook, loves to write, and loves to help and encourage people – and let her do all those things – fun stuff starts to happen! It’s crazy how a simple idea for sharing my meal planning process – which turned into a book idea – which turned into an experiment – which dozens of people are actually doing – is actually helping folks gain control of their dinner routine. Y’all, I can’t even with how freaking excited this makes me! So I have a few updates: First, I am writing a book. I’m actually a few chapters in already. This thing is…
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How to cook a weeknight meal
Hot off Jen Hatmaker’s Of Mess and Moxie, thought I’d give my own “How To” a whirl! How to cook a weeknight meal in 1 hour and 53 minutes and 36 easy steps… Meal plan while hungry and decide to make a Greek dinner – grilled chicken and your fav orzo salad will do Overlook the fact that the orzo salad requires a TON of chopping – you like chopping! When it’s time to cook, get out ALL your ingredients and your printed recipe! You’re ready to go! Stop to get child a glass of milk. Start marinating your chicken, then boiling your water and chopping your veggies. Half way…
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Coconut Curry Chicken
This is one of my favorite weeknight meals – it’s pretty easy, it’s pretty quick, and it’s a crowd-pleaser. All three of my kids like it. Berkley (by far the pickiest of my children) went as far as to call it “her favorite chicken”… and coming from the child who basically lives on scrambled eggs and cereal, whoa! This curry dish a nice change of pace when you just can’t make spaghetti or tacos again. I serve mine with edamame. Enjoy! Coconut Curry Chicken 3 tbsp canola oil 1 large sweet onion, julienned 2 tsp minced garlic 2 to 3 tbsp curry powder 2 lbs chicken tenderloins, sliced into 1/2” pieces 1 tsp salt 1 tsp…
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Mushroom Stroganoff
We’ve been trying something new in the kitchen lately – adding some vegetarian dishes to the dinner rotation. And the craziest part of this menu modification is that it was my husband’s idea [gasp!]. The meat eater of all meat eaters actually suggested that we add some vegetarian meals to the line up (thank you Netflix and the documentary Cowspiracy). While I love meat, I like to mix it up and so I saw this as an opportunity to try out some new recipes. Yay! So let me introduce you to Mushroom Stroganoff. This dish is ahh-mazing. I’ve always been a stroganoff fan, but mine had always had beef. I…
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Gluten Free Buttermilk Pancakes
When our family first started going gluten free, one of things I was most bummed to give up were pancakes. Sure, I’d come across gluten free pancakes at the store, but what I longed for were my homemade pancakes. At the time I hadn’t cracked the code to turn my normal recipes into gluten free ones without compromising the taste or consistency. Well my friends, thanks to King Arthur’s gluten free multi-purpose flour and some tips on their website, I did crack the code! Add 1/2 tsp xanthan gum and an extra egg and voila! Behold, I give you really delicious gluten free pancakes. You’re welcome. 😉 Gluten Free Buttermilk Pancakes…
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Gluten Free Banana and Chocolate Chip Muffins
Baking – ohh, how I have missed you. Ever since earlier this year when we learned my youngest son Beckett had food allergies (the most serious being gluten), I’ve put my baking on hold. Weekends used to mean homemade muffins and pancakes and biscuits, but trying these things without regular flour was more hassle than I felt like dealing with. It was unknown territory, and frankly with the baby, I didn’t have much time for experimenting. But a few weeks ago I wanted real pancakes and so I googled “how to substitute gluten free flour for regular flour” and was amazed by what I found – it’s actually pretty simple. Add…
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Bacon Wrapped Pork Roast
A bright spot in our allergy struggles has been that we can all eat bacon. And so we eat bacon a lot. So when I was searching for a recipe for a pork roast I had bought, and came across a bacon wrapped pork roast, I was pretty excited. Turns out, it was for good reason. The roast was awesome and I’m already plotting how long I must wait to put this on the dinner menu again. Next week too soon?? Below is the whole dinner… it’s gluten-free, dairy-free, egg-free and nut-free. I cooked it all in the same oven (once it went to 425), and there were very few dishes…
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Chicken Tikka Masala
I have to admit that I’m no expert in Indian cuisine. But this dish is one that I’ve loved since the first time I tried it a couple of years ago, and so I finally decided to make a from-scratch version myself. Total success – despite the fact that new baby Berkley needed mommy’s attention about 58 times during this meal preparation. I persevered and 3 hours later I finally had the spices measured and the chicken marinating. Not to worry, while this recipe does contain a lot of ingredients, it’s really not too complicated to make, especially if you measure out the spices for the marinade and sauce at the same…
