Moist Baked Chicken

My last entry discussed a recipe which used baked chicken. In the recipe I cautioned over cooking.

I wanted to reiterate that warning!

My husband normally dislikes baked chicken, he says it’s dry. And looking back, it usually has been. When I came up with that last recipe, I cooked my chicken a bit differently than I had in the past. After washing with water, and patting dry, I brushed the chicken with olive oil, and placed it on a cookie sheet. After seasoning the chicken with lemon pepper and Lawreys, I baked for about 350 degrees for 30 minutes. The chicken was sooo moist!

Well, several weeks later my mom offered to bake some chicken. I gave her directions, and warned her not to over cook. But, mom is from the old school that bakes chicken for at least an hour. She tells me she baked the chicken for 45 minutes, and was worried it would be undercooked. I explained to her that all she needed to do was cut one in half, and make sure it was white inside.

Anyway…the chicken was dry, and I didn’t want to say anything and hurt her feelings. But it was amazing how those extra minutes made all the difference in the world!

So I tried some baked chicken a couple of nights ago. At 30 minutes I tested the chicken, it was a little pink on the bottom. So, I left it in the oven for five more minutes. I pulled it out of the oven at 35 minutes, knowing it would continue to cook internally.

Once again, so moist!

Many of us are trying to eat more baked chicken…and there is no reason it has to be dry!

Portabella-Chicken-Pasta

Yum…. came up with a good recipe tonight. You like pasta? How about chicken? Portabella mushrooms?

Serves 3 or 4:

Ingredients:
9 ounce package of fettuccini (not dry, pasta from refrigerated section)
Chicken breasts, skinned and boned (one breast per person, or ½ breast per person, depending on individual appetite)
Portabella mushrooms (package of 6 small, or 3 large)
2 cloves garlic, diced
Parmesan cheese (hard, not processed)
Extra Virgin Olive oil
Lemon Pepper
LAWRY'S® Seasoned Salt

Rinse your chicken breast, and pat dry with paper towel. Set on cookie sheet. Brush with olive oil, and season with lemon pepper and LAWRY'S® Seasoned Salt. Bake uncovered for about 30 minutes, at 350 degrees.

While chicken is baking, complete the following preparations.

Rinse and dry mushrooms. Slice mushrooms. In a skillet, sauté sliced mushrooms and diced garlic in several tablespoons of olive oil.

Cook pasta according to package instructions. Rinse in hot water, drain. Toss hot, drained pasta with a tablespoon of olive oil.

After chicken is baked, cut one breast in half. If pink, cook a bit longer, until internal meat is white. To avoid dryness, don’t overcook. When finished baking, slice in strips, or cut in bite size pieces.

In 3 or 4 pasta bowls, divide up equal portions of pasta. Top each serving of pasta with equal portions of sautéed mushroom-garlic. Add a serving of sliced or diced chicken to each bowl. Top with generous helping of shredded parmesan cheese.

Olive Oil instead of Mayo

Eating healthy and delicious sometimes just takes a bit of imagination. Thin slices of crisp vegetables, such as bell peppers, onions, along with slivers of tomato and avocado, and thinly sliced meat wrapped in a fresh wheat tortilla, makes a satisfying summer lunch, without tipping the calorie scale.

But even wraps need a little spread, to keep them from being too dry. Mustard is a low calorie choice, but if you are like my husband, it wouldn’t be an option. Mayonnaise is our preferred spread, but that seems to defeat the goal of a low calorie meal. As for low cal mayo, I’d rather go dry.

It’s time to think outside the box, which takes us to extra virgin olive oil, and red wine vinegar. But, I don’t drizzle the oil or vinegar over the filling. First, I take a bit of crisp iceburg lettuce and shred it thinly. I place the lettuce in a bowl, and toss it with about a teaspoon or less of olive oil, and toss well. To that I add a splash of vinegar, either red wine or balsamic, and toss again.

When creating my wrap, I top the filling with the lettuce mixture, then roll and wrap, and enjoy!

Contacts first!

For breakfast I love hot peppers in my omelets, yet I’ve learned to put my contacts in before touching the spicy vegetable. I think of this now because I just made the mistake of rubbing my left eye. And yes, earlier this evening I diced several small hot peppers.

Some peppers are definitely hotter than others, and sometimes it just hurts like heck if you get a bit of that pepper juice in a paper cut.
But I love them diced in eggs, tacos, burritos, chili, beans and rice. They add flavor and zip.

Just keep them away from your eyes!

Frozen Bananas

Bananas are a favorite fruit. They are versatile, come in an easy to open package, are a great garnish for cereal or as an addition to a smoothie. But, sometimes they ripen quicker than you can use them. What to do?

Around our house we freeze bananas. Before they over ripen, we take the surplus bananas, those we don’t think we will consume within a day or so, and peel them. The peeled bananas are then placed in a zipper lock freezer bag, and stored in the freezer.

It is best to use the frozen bananas when they are still partially frozen. Allowing them to thaw will produce mushy fruit, which is okay if you plan to use them for baking. But, a frozen banana works well in a smoothie, and slices of frozen banana are a nice touch on cereal. My Alaskan Ula makes slicing a frozen banana a snap.

Of course, you can always use your frozen banana in the traditional way, dipped in chocolate and rolled in chopped nuts.

Publish your own cook book!

Do you ever have a desire to publish those family recipes you’ve been collecting all these years? Perhaps you don’t have aspirations of becoming Rachael Ray, but you would like to share and preserve those recipes for your family, perhaps share them with friends.

With today’s innovations in print-on-demand publishing, it is possible to publish a book at a ridiculously low price, even if you just want one copy.

Of course, you will first need to type up your recipes, using a word processor, such as Microsoft word. But then what? You want the book to look professional, something to impress the family. Maybe something to have ready for next Christmas?

We can help you! Check out our new eBook, Self-Publishing Handbook, which will take you through the steps of self-publishing, including obtaining an ISBN number, should you want to market your book in the local book store. It is available for immediate download, so what are you waiting for?

Cheater shake

My mother tells me she invented a delicious and refreshing beverage. I haven’t tried it yet, but thought I’d share it.

She started with a Seven Up, and to it added a bit of Hershey’s chocolate syrup, and then stirred. I imagine it is reminiscent of the old fashioned fountain drink.