I'm back! I've been pretty busy lately - trying to get a few websites built (I will work for myself someday!!!! well, I hope so... I wish I were a coder, this would all be so much easier) and moving next week, not to mention looking for a new job - is taking its toll.

But I've still been cooking! I haven't made much new - but I thought I would write a little about what I've done recently...

Easy Baked Chicken Parm

This is pretty easy - you can do it two ways, fry the chicken in canola or peanut oil first- making sure that you have flattened the chicken out a little first to make it cook quicker - or just cook in the oven.

To fry:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees

Flatten out chicken to around .5" thick

Coat with flour

Coat with egg

Coat with breadcrumbs (italian seasoned)

Heat Canola or peanut oil

Fry chicken until almost done and the breading is browned.

For oven:

Preheat oven to 400

Coat chicken with bread crumbs

Cook chicken until almost done (about 20-25 mins), coating will probably not become as brown as the frying method.

Add some tomato sauce - any kind will do, use your favorite

Add some fresh basil (optional)

Add some Fresh Mozzarella cheese to top of chicken

Add some salt and pepper

Cook until cheese is fully melted and starting to brown.

Thats it!!! Not much to it. The 2nd method is a little healthier, but both are easy to make and taste great!

Easy Thai Peanut Chicken

This is really easy to make if you buy Thai Peanut Sauce at your local store.

Noodles:

1) Get some asian rice noodles - or use angel hair pasta

2) Cook noodles until done

-You could use rice too if you want

While noodles are cooking, do the chicken:

1) Cut up some boneless, skinless chicken breasts into bite sized pieces

2) Heat peanut oil in pan until hot

3) Fry chicken in hot oil until done

In the meantime, toast some sesame seeds for a few mins in a pan over med-low heat - until brown.

Mix Chicken Pieces with Peanut Sauce - put over noodles - and sprinkle toasted sesame seeds on top!

Easy to make, tastes great - and something different! After cooking the chicken, you could also drain out most of the oil and stir fry some veggies like sliced carrots, snow peas, broccoli, etc.!

Should make a good amount of food - and this is something that you can easily make for just one person.

Well the holidays are coming up, and I've found that I've been too busy to cook anything really interesting, but even so I don't order out if I can help it (one exception is when I am in the mood for chinese food- I never seem to have the proper ingredients, and buying all the exotic sauces, etc for your meal can get expensive unless you eat it often).

Lets see if I can remember what was pretty good that I made...

One thing was really simple, and tasted pretty good too!

Feta and Tomato on Flatbread:

This is pretty much just what it says up there - You buy some Feta cheese, cut some tomatoes up, and buy some flat breat from the store.

Fire up your broiler (I used my toaster ovens broiler), put the tomatoes on the bread, add the feta, sprinkle some olive oil on top - and add some salt and fresh pepper. Cook until cheese is melted, and things look done. That's it!

You can also just leave out the bread and just do this with tomatoes - still tastes great and makes a great side dish.


Beef Braccioli:

This is something I am making myself tonight - so if it doesn't turn out well I will post about it. Beef Braccioli is pretty much just really thin steak (flank steak I think). It was pretty cheap- at about $4.20 for two nice sized steaks. It's the first time I ever have seen it in my store, but you can make it on your own by buying flank steak and pounding it thin (see notes on pounding steak below).

I got this idea from Alton Brown's show Good Eats. You basically just take your flattened steak, sprinkle some canola oil on, add some salt and pepper.

Take a very very hot frying pan (cast iron skillets work great as they hold their heat better) and add the steak, one min per side. Alton likes to flip over the hot skillet (so you cook on the bottom flat side) so it is easier to flip the meat.

Thats pretty much it! You can add some parmesian cheese, or some butter (or herbed butter) on top- serve with a side salad. Keep it simple- it's an easy meal that tastes great!


Steak pounding notes - again I learned this from Alton Brown...

Take your steak, put it between two sheets of plastic wrap that have been sprayed with a little water (keep the meat sliding instead of tearing). Spray meat with a little water as well, and once you fold over the top plastic sheet, spreay top with some water. Take a meat pounder (the OXO meat pounder was recommended), and using moderate force pound out meat while pressing out ward once the mallet hits the steak. This distributes the force of the hits, and causes the meat to spread out more evenly and not tear!