Roasted Potatoes

Love potatoes? Well, potatoes are good for you regardless of this anti-carb epidemic.
They are loaded with Vitamin C and gosh darn it, they taste good.

Cut up some Yukon Gold potatoes into chunks
Sprinkle with olive oil and rosemary and stir
Heat your frying pan and add a little olive oil
Put potatoes in pan and cook for about ten minutes
Meanwhile preheat oven to 350
Remove from pan and put in a glass baking dish,stir once or twice
Cook for about 20 minutes or until done, it depends on how big or small you cut your potatoes.
Delicious!

And if the kids want ketchup on them, it's okay!!!

Lemon Chicken

Tonight, I was baffled as to what I was going to make for dinner. Friday night is usually a night off for me but I have to work tomorrow and know that I need to have a clear head for a big organizational project on Saturday. So, I went to my fridge to see what I could whip up quickly and without to much prep. I had chicken breasts, lemon, chicken broth, flour,rosemary, and salt and pepper. Perfect, I thought, I'll make some lemon chicken with rice and some fresh greens beans.Not only is this dish simple, it's delicious.It appears as if you have been at the stove for hours. I think it's a rather romantic dish as well,light some candles, eat in the dining room and serve a nice bottle of wine; you will have yourself a romantic dinner, of course after the kiddies have gone to bed.

You will need:
Boneless thin chicken breasts
Flour
Salt and Pepper
Chicken Broth
Butter
Lemons
Rosemary
Parsley

Salt and pepper the chicken
Lightly flour each piece
Heat your frying pan, add 2 tablespoons of butter and 1/4 cup of olive oil
When the butter melts, add the chicken, cook on each side for about 4 minutes
Remove chicken
Stir up the drippings from the bottom of the pan
Add 1/2 cup chicken broth
Add 1/4 cup of lemon juice
Stir till it boils
Add chicken again and let it simmer till it is fully cooked.
Add some slice lemon to the pan.
Add the rosemary
Garnish with parsley and sliced lemons

Serve with rice or pasta.

What's Cooking for This Week

Stuff Peppers
Lemon Chicken
Fried Chicken; It's So Good!(Serve on Sunday)

My son Doug, is a chef that works in Boston. Once a week we have lunch and I pick his brain on current recipes. He sometimes works as a private chef so I get to know first hand what he is making for his clients or just for himself, and it is always something simple, yet yummy. Today, we talked about the pork roast he made with fresh rosemary, served it with red bliss potatoes drizzled with olive oil and butter and roasted fresh asparagus.It's funny, I never think to make a pork roast but after today's foodie discussion I am going to go out and buy one; roast it slowly with a little olive oil, salt and pepper and rosemary, just like Doug told me. When I think about it, making a roast is easy. Add some baked potatoes(for easier cooking) and a veggie and your meal is complete.

A Garden for Kids

I have had a vegetable garden ever since my children were small. We lived in a different house then and had a huge field where we planted two large gardens. I would send the kids out to pick peppers and tomatoes, summer squash; whatever was ripe, right before dinner. Those days of small children picking tomatoes is vivid in my memory.

Now is the time for you to start your vegetable garden or flower garden indoors.It is such a great activity for kids to see things grow and become stewards of the earth. Believe me when I tell you it's simple, it's simple.

I had stopped growing my vegetables during my divorced but resumed the following summer.I found great solace being in my garden, digging in the dirt and watching my flowers and vegetables spike and grow. I had no little children that were interested anymore and thought they had forgotten what it was like to be involved in a garden.

After planting rows and rows of vegetables and tending to them like a mother hen I had to let them take off, just like my children. One morning while my 20 year old was out in the yard with the dogs, I heard her calling to me,"Mama, Mama, come quick." I thought something had happened to one of the dogs, and when I went to the back door found my daughter picking the freshest green beans. The art was not lost, and she has helped me in the garden since, whenever she can, always inquiring and picking and tending to our vegetables and flowers like a mother hen. Her favorites pumpkins, we had a bumper crop of five this year, and it was so wonderful to see them grow, also sunflowers,so beautiful!!!

So in the coming weeks when spring is just around the corner we will begin our gardens indoors.Fresh veggies from your garden to your table and beautiful flowers as well, will make you cherish this wonderful place we call mother earth.

Porcupine Meatballs with Rice

This is the easiest of recipes and smells great while they are cooking.
1 pound ground beef
1 cup rice
2 large cans of tomato soup
salt and pepper
Additonal rice

Season ground beef with salt and pepper
Add the one cup of rice to ground beef
Stir or mix with very clean hands and fingernails
Make meatballs
Take the tomato soup and put in crock pot or dutch oven
Put the meatballs in the soup.
Cook for about 2 hours if in a dutch oven or four hours in crock pot.
Serve with rice

I don't know why this dish is so delicious but it just is; simple, yummy and time saving. Give it ago gals.

Meals for the Week

In one afternoon I made a meatloaf, meatballs with sauce, American chop suey, a roasted chicken and cod piccata.Yeah,I know it's alot of beef in one afternoon but I made the American chop suey with ground turkey(no one will know, so that doesn't count.)Save the ranchers, eat beef! And I'll make a chicken soup with my leftovers.
My daughters that live with me work crazy hours so I like to have a variety of foods for them to eat for lunch or a late supper.I made the cod piccata for Andy and I so you can do the same for your spouse.I freeze some things and leave notes that food is in fridge.
My Mama always had yummy things to eat in her fridge, it was great to come home and find leftovers.
As a mother of adult children who I rarely see I feel as if I am leaving a little bit of love for them like my Mama did.

How To Make Chicken Stock

Don't buy the broth in the box, make your own.It's easy and delicious!
Use a leftover chicken or roast one for a broth. I always use a leftover chicken.
Put the chicken in a big pot and cover with water, add a couple of big carrots, a few celery, a whole peeled onion and salt and pepper. Cook till the chicken falls off the bone, strain into another pot. You now have just liquid, let cool, after cooling put in freezer till you see the fat come to the top.Skim off the fat and put the broth back on the stove reheat. You now have plain chicken broth. We will move on to chicken soup next.