Chicken with Goat Cheese, Sundried Tomato, and basil

This can be Southbeach friendly (view 30 day challenge)

This has been a hit (5stars) for everyone I've made it for (either that or they're all liars!) I like to make this with my famous green bean recipe.

Baked Chicken Stuffed with Sun-Dried Tomato Pesto, Basil, and Goat Cheese
(6 servings, recipe created by Kalyn)

Ingredients:
6 boneless, skinless chicken breast
1/2 cup 100% whole wheat pastry flour
3 eggs, beaten well
2/3 cup 100% whole wheat bread crumbs
1/3 cup Parmesan cheese
6 oz. goat cheese (log type, such as Chevre)
6 oz. Sun-dried tomato pesto
1/2 cup fresh basil, finely chopped

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 350 F. Trim all visible fat and tendons from chicken breasts. Put chicken breasts, one at a time, inside a heavy plastic plastic freezer bag and pound with meat mallet or other heavy object until 1/4 inch thick.

Put pesto, goat cheese, and chopped basil in food processor and buzz a few times until mixture is combined but not completely blended. Spread 1/6 of pesto/basil/goat cheese mixture on each chicken breast. Roll up chicken, starting with smallest end, tucking in loose pieces and securing with two toothpicks.

Put flour, beaten egg, and bread crumbs combined with Parmesan cheese into three separate flat dishes. Roll each chicken breast, first in flour, then in egg, then in bread crumb/Parmesan mixture.

Spray glass casserole dish with nonstick spray and arrange chicken so pieces are not touching. Bake at 350 F for about 50-60 minutes, or until chicken is slightly browned and firm, but not hard to the touch. I recommend you start checking it after 40 minutes, and remove from oven as soon as the chicken feels firm and is slightly browned.

Borrowed from Kayln's Kitchen http://www.kalynskitchen.com/2006/09/baked-chicken-stuffed-with-sun-dried.html

2nd Best Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe

For those of you who know me and my sisters, we have the Worlds Best Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe... however, it's a family secret, and we can't share it. However, in my year of making hundreds of batches (I'm not kidding, ask my guinea pig coworkers) of trying to perfect the chocolate chip cookie, I found there are just a few essentials to the perfect cookie... there's many ways to bake an excellent batch of cookies.

My inspiration for the best cookie started when I was young, my Aunt always made amazing cookies when we came to visit. When I moved to the bay area, I found a bakery called Specialties... and their cookies were something from an Alien Planet run by baking phenomenons. I had to have them.

There's a few tricks.
1. you don't want your sugars to be equal. You want your brown sugar to overpower your white sugar just a bit.
2. You always want to use butter, none of that Crisco nasty business.
3. If your batter is a little runny and sticks to your hands, add more flour.

If you're running into problems, check out this website (scroll to the bottom) for common issues and how/what you should do to resolve your problem moving forward.

Here's an excellent guide to follow: http://theperfectchocolatechipcookie.com/instruct.php

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray cookie sheets with Pam.

2/3 cup Sugar
1 cup Brown Sugar
2 Eggs
2 Cubes butter (non salted, melted)
2 tsp vanilla

3 cups Flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt (or a little less)

1 bag of semi sweet chocolate chip morsels. (The boyfriend likes white chocolate so sometimes I mix them in as well)

Add the top 5 ingredients together well using a mixer.

In another bowl, add the Flour, baking soda and salt. After well mixed, add the sugar/butter mixture. After well mixed, add the chocolate chips.

Roll a golf sized ball and place on baking sheet. Bake 9-11 minutes on 350 degrees (oven times vary).

Chicken Crescent Roll Ups $10 meal in 10 minutes

These received a 5 from everyone in the family, including my incredibly picky parents! Every time I visit, they ask me to make them. They're done super quick, there's little mess and they are super cheap!

1 can large croissant rolls (I used Pillsbury canned or the store's brand 2/$5)
2 1/2 cups shredded chicken (Buy mine $4 at Costco rotisserie and shred it)
1 jalapeno pepper (finely chopped)
Shredded Cheese
2 Tablespoons butter
2 Tablespoons Parmesan Cheese
2 Tablespoons Italian Bread Crumbs

Combine your shredded chicken, shredded cheese, and finely chopped jalapenos in a boll. Unroll your croissants. Add a large spoonful to the middle of the croissant. Roll it up as you normally would and pinch any ends to make sure the stuffing stays inside.

Melt your butter. With a pastry brush, lightly brush the butter over the rolls. Combine the Italian Bread Crumbs and Parmesan Cheese and lightly sprinkle it over the top.

Bake as directed on the croissant can.

In all honesty, I had to make 2 batches of these. One for those who enjoy spicy foods, and 1 for my parents, who don't like spice at all. It's still delicious either way, and the leftovers are just as good (PS: I hate leftover, so that means something!)

Whole Wheat Chocolate Chip Pecan Banana Bread

This is one of my FAVORITE recipes that I use pretty much every time I have bananas that don't get eaten in time!

I must credit a majority of this recipe to the famous Paula Deen. About 4 years ago (almost exactly actually), my in-laws and I, along with my FIL's mother, Grandma Angela, took a trip to Savannah, GA -- Not only did I fall in absolute love with Savannah, I fell in love with Paula Deen. For those of you who may not be familiar with Paula or her story, you truly are missing out on one of the South's most inspirational chefs (please see Food Network and Wikipedia for more details). While in Savannah, we had the opportunity of taking the Paula Deen tour (which we did and before that, I had no idea who she was). It was a fantastic little tour, taking us around the city, sharing fun facts about Paula's life, where and how she got her start, her struggles, determination, and dedication, as well as giving us a chance to eat at her brother, Uncle Bubba's, restaurant. One of the items I picked up on that trip was a signed copy of her Kitchen Classics cookbook, which includes both The Lady & Sons Savannah Country Cookbook AND The Lady & Sons, Too (one of my all time favorite recipe books). I absolutely LOVE Paula's recipes and I haven't made one that I don't like yet! Unfortunately, her motto "Everything tastes better with butter" adds LOTS of unwanted calories.... so I generally take her recipes and modify them into a healthier version. Here is my semi-healthy version of her Banana Bread recipe (you may want to skip the chocolate chips, but gosh they are so yummy!).

Ingredients:

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, at room temperature (you can sub margarine, but Paula would have a stroke if she knew)

1 cup granulated splenda for baking

1/2 tsp salt

2 eggs

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 1/2 cups Whole Wheat Flour

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp baking powder

3 ripe bananas, mashed

1/4 cup crushed pecans (optional)

1/4 cup Nestle Toll house chocolate chips (optional)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9 x 5 inch loaf pan. In a mixing bowl, combine the butter and sugar; mix well. Add the salt, eggs, vanilla, flour, baking soda, baking powder, bananas, pecans, chocolate chips, and mix well. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 50 minutes.

This is a pretty basic recipe and is so delicious. It always gets a 10 (unless, I burn it or something LOL). Try it out for yourselves and be sure to check out many other DELICIOUS recipes from Paula Deen and her family!

Parma Rosa Shrimp Raviolis

Tonight, pasta ala vodka! Oh yah, you heard it correctly, grey goose to be exact!

Ingredients:

1 package Knorr Parma Rosa sauce mix

1 cup milk

1/2 cup buttermilk (or

2 Tbsp Grey Goose Vodka

1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese

1/4 cup shredded mozzarella cheese

1/2 package of Bertolli Four Cheese Raviolis

15 shrimp

Cracked Black Pepper

1/8 tsp garlic powder

In a saucepan, saute deveined and detailed shrimp in butter. Sprinkle with cracked black pepper and garlic powder.

Blend Knorr Parma Rosa sauce mix, milk, buttermilk, and vodka in small saucepan. Bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring constantly. Reduce heat to low and stir in cheeses. Slimmer until cheese are melted and mixture is thickened about 2 minutes. Add cooked shrimp and stir

Cook pasta according to package.

I served this with a green salad. It was soooo good!!!!! I received a 9 on tonights dinner as well as a "this is the best sauce you have ever made."

I have to say, it was pretty good :) Buon appetite!

Savory Pot Roast

Pot Roast... man's best friend = woman/vegetarian's worst nightmare....

Tonight I decided to make a pot roast. I don't make this kind of thing very often (not sure if ever) so I figured I'd try it out.... not literally of course, simply just the recipe.

Since I got home a bit too late, instead of cooking it in the crock pot, I cooked it in my small roaster in the oven.

Here is the recipe I used for my "Savory Pot Roast"

Ingredients:

1 2 1/2 to 3 lbs boneless chuck roast

1 cup water

6-7 russet potatoes

1/2 Yellow Onion (cut in chunks)

4 stalks of celery, chunked

1 white corn on the cob (broken in half)

1 cup of water

1 tbsp olive oil

1 pkg McCormick Slow Cookers Savory Pot Roast Seasoning

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

To seer the roast, put 1 tbsp olive oil into a frying pan. Place the frying pan on high. Once pan is hot, place roast in the pan. Let cook for about 1 minute and then flip the roast to cook the other side for one minute. After both sides of the roast are brown, place into roaster (or glass pan).

Add vegetables (you can also add carrots -- I just left them out because they are not a household favorite veggie).

In a separate bowl, mix 1 cup of water and Savory Pot Roast Seasoning until well blended.

Pour combined mixture over roast and vegetables. Cover and cook for about 1 hr and 15 minutes or until roast is done until likeness.

Serve and enjoy.

This pot roast was paired with Sutter Home Sweet Road wine (don't ask), but apparently both received 8.5 for flavor! The roast was a bit tough, but the flavor prevailed. I probably could have cooked it for a little less time, but all in all, a successful meal :)

Best Brownies...Only Time Will Tell

about 25 minutes to be exact...

So you get a random craving at 10PM at night for Brownies... hey, it happens to the best of us...

Don't have a box of Duncan Hines Brownie mix.... Make your own!

My Aunt Kathy gave me this awesome recipe book for Christmas 2003 called "Old Fashioned Cookies." It's one of my absolute favorites! When my sweet tooth overtook my willpower, I decided to check for a brownie recipe and found none other than the "Best Brownie" recipe. With a name like that, who could argue? So I tested it out...

Ingredients

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter or margarine, melted

1 cup sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 cup all-purpose flour (I used all-purpose wheat flour)

1/3 cup HERSHEY's Cocoa (I used Nestle Toll House Cocoa)

1/4 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

1/2 cup chopped nuts (optional -- I didn't use any nuts this time)

*Creamy Brownie Frosting (recipe follows -- but I didn't make it tonight)

1. Heat oven to 350F. Grease 9-inch square baking pan

2. Stir together butter, sugar and vanilla in large bowl. Add eggs; beat well with spoon. Combine flour, cocoa, baking powder, and salt; gradually add to butter mixture, beating until well blended. Stir in nuts. Spread into prepared pan.

3. Bake 20 to 25 minutes or until brownies begin to pull away from sides of pan. Cool; frost with Creamy Brownie frosting. Cut into squares (makes about 16 brownies)

Creamy Brownie Frosting

(I didn't make the frosting, but it does sound delicious!)

Ingredients

3 tablespoons butter or margarine, softened

3 tablespoons HERSHEY's Cocoa

1 tablespoon light corn syrup or honey

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1 cup powdered sugar

1 to 2 tablespoons milk

Beat butter, cocoa, corn syrup and vanilla in small bowl. Add powdered sugar and milk; beat to spreading consistency. Makes about 1 cup frosting.

Enjoy your chocolate fix!!!