Chicken and Broccoli Alfredo Pasta

I found an alfredo recipe on Pinterest, and I felt it was challenging me to try it. It claimed to be better than Olive Garden's alfredo sauce. I don't think O.G. has the best alfredo sauce, but I don't think it's horrible either. Guess that means I'm neutral, but whoever named this sauce named it "Better Than.." and I agree 100%.

Well, challenge accepted. I give it a pretty good score, too! Creamy and flavorful! Take a look...

Find the original recipe here: Better Than Olive Garden Alfredo Sauce.

Honey BBQ Chicken Strips

One of mine and my daughter's favorite appetizers is Boneless Honey BBQ Chicken Strips from Applebee's. The sauce is just perfect for us. My husband loves Parmesan Garlic Wings from Buffalo Wild Wings. So for the Superbowl we decided to attempt at-home versions of both flavors. Unfortunately, my husband's recipe was a flop, but the BBQ strips turned out perfectly. Not exactly like Applebee's, but we were good with that because this sauce was really great. It was tangy and sweet.

The strips we chose were Tyson Crispy Chicken Strips, I'm telling you... they are just right for this sauce. We had leftover sauce and strips so I had this meal for lunch 2 days in a row. Just thinking about them now makes me crave them. These little sweeties will leave your tastebuds yearning for more. You'll be totally set with ranch or bleu cheese dipping sauce and a small side of slaw or these delicious homemade potato chips.

Let's get saucy...

Honey BBQ Sauce

1/4 C brown sugar
1/2 C + 2 tbsp BBQ (I used Sweet Baby Ray's)
1/4 C water
1 tbsp honey

Mix everything together and the sauce is ready to go!

Bake the desired amount of strips. The quantity of sauce was enough for the entire bag. We only made about of the half the bag and baked the rest when we ready to eat more. I like my strips extra crispy so I always bake them longer than the bag recommends.

Once your strips are done, give them a honey BBQ bath. Flip 'em and flop 'em around in the sauce.

 Now you are set to sit down and enjoy some tasty, tasty Honey BBQ Chicken Strips!!

Slow-cooked Salsa Chicken Enchiladas

Like Mexican food? Great! You'll love this recipe then! It's basically your typical enchilada only amped up A LOT. It's creamy, cheesy and tasty.

Salsa Chicken Enchiladas

1 lb chicken, cut into large chunks

8oz cream cheese

½ cup cheddar cheese, cubed

1 jar of salsa, after poured into crockpot fill jar about ¾ of the way with water and add to crockpot

¼ tsp cumin powder

½ tsp onion powder

½ tsp garlic powder

1 tsp minced onion

Black pepper to taste

Handful green onions, chopped

Handful cilantro, chopped

8 Flour tortilla shells

2 cups Cheddar cheese, shredded

Sour cream

In a crockpot, combine chicken, cream cheese, cubed cheese, salsa, water and spices. Cook on low heat for at least four hours or until chicken is cooked thoroughly. Remove chicken chunks from sauce and shred. Return shredded chicken to sauce and continue to cook on low for another hour or so.

When you are ready to make the enchiladas, cut up the green onions and cilantro. Add to chicken mixture.

Preheat oven to 375. Set aside a 9x13 baking pan.

With a slotted spoon, add a spoonful or more of the chicken mixture to one side of the flour shell. TIP: let the sauce run through the slotted spoon before adding it to the shell.

Roll the shell and place into the pan. Make 8 rolled shells. Pour the remaining sauce and chicken over the rolled shells.

Sprinkle shredded cheese on top.

Bake for 25-30 minutes or until cheese is melted.

 My slow-cooked refried beans are the perfect side this Mexican dish. Top beans and enchiladas with sour cream and you are good to go. You’ve got yourself a good gut-stuffin' plate of deliciousness.

Chicken Cordon Bleu Casserole (Pinterest Copycat)

I'm sure a lot of people have seen this pin on Pinterest. It's been pinned/repinned about a bazillion times. The pictures made me drool so I added the recipe to the top of my must-try list. I finally got around to making it last night. I cut the recipe in half because I knew my boys would reject the meal. They just don't understand good food sometimes.

This meal was very tasty. It was creamy and quite filling. I might play around with the sauce a little next time. While it was good, I think it could be even better with a few tweaks. For example, I think a sauce similar to Alfredo would be great!

Chicken Cordon Bleu Casserole (adapted from Tasty Kitchen)

1 lbs chicken, slow-cooked or boiled then shredded
1 can chicken broth

10-12 slices very thin honey ham
5-6 slices thin baby swiss cheese

For sauce:
2 tbsp butter
3 tbsp flour
2 cups milk
1 tbsp fresh squeezed lemon juice
1/2 tbsp Dijon mustard
3/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp smoked paprika
1/8 tsp ground white pepper
1/4 garlic powder
2 tbsp sour cream

For topping:
3 tbsp butter
2/3 cup panko crumbs
1/3 tsp season salt
3/4 tsp dried parsley
(next time I would double this)

Clean and trim chicken. Cut chicken into chunks. Add it to the crockpot along with the broth and cook for 4ish hours. Shred the chicken once it is fully cooked.

Preheat oven to 350. 

Add chicken to baking pan. Cover shredded chicken with some broth. Just enough to wet the chicken.

Add a layer of ham, tear it up a bit first.

Add cheese.

For the sauce:

Melt butter in saucepan. Add flour and stir well. Slowly add milk. Stir until flour mixture is well combined. Add lemon juice, mustard, salt, paprika, white pepper and garlic. I split the original recipe in half and then being the absent-minded person I am, I forgot and added the full 1/2 tsp of smoked paprika. Doh!!!! To fix this I added sour cream to the sauce before pouring it over the cheese. I think it really added a creamy texture and will do it again when I make this dish in the future (I'll also use the correct amount of paprika).

Again, if you follow the recipe correctly, your sauce won't be this orange

Pour sauce over cheese.

For topping:

I also split the recipe for the topping in half. I thought it wasn't enough topping though so I would definitely double this recipe next time. Melt butter in microwave for 45 seconds or until melted. Add Panko crumbs and seasonings. Stir together and sprinkle over sauce.

Add the Panko topping


Bake dish for about 45 minutes. Eat, enjoy and get a full tummy. 

Honey Mustard Bacon Wrapped Chicken

Chicken, bacon and honey mustard... dang, they go well together. Today I have an easy recipe for you. I like recipes that are hard to mess up and this is definitely one of them. You can easily adjust the quantity to family size too.

Bacon Wrapped Chicken

2 boneless chicken breast
8 slices of bacon

Honey Mustard
(makes a little less than 3/4 cup)
1/2 cup mayo
2 1/2 tbsp yellow mustard
1 1/2 tsp honey
1/4 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp black pepper

For a spicy version of the honey mustard check out this post: Grilled Honey Mustard Turkey Sandwich

Cut the chicken breasts in half (making 4 pieces) and fry it until fully cooked. Add any seasonings you wish. I added onion and garlic powder. Fry the bacon just until it's not so limp.

While the chicken and bacon are cooking, mix together all of the ingredients for the mustard.

Preheat oven to 350.

Once everything is cooked, wrap two slices of bacon around one piece of chicken. I inserted a toothpick to keep the bacon in place. Place chicken in a baking pan. Bake for 15-20 minutes. If you choose, add a slice of swiss cheese and bake for another 5 minutes or until cheese is melted.

Pour honey mustard over chicken and serve.

Oven Roasted Rosemary Chicken

Husband and I celebrated our 8th anniversary awhile back. It was on a Tuesday. Tuesdays aren't great for "date night". We had plans to go out on Saturday evening so it wasn't a huge deal to stick to our normal routine on our actual anniversary. On a normal Tuesday evening I would be headed to my kickboxing class and Husband would be hanging with the kids. This was the plan all day until about 3:00pm.

At 3:00pm, I thought "nope, I'm skipping class and making a nice meal for the fam". Because of the kickboxing class, I have missed out on many family dinners. I love having dinner with my family. Everyone sits at the table and complete chaos erupts... but I still love it. So I put my foot down and decided to play hooky.

Now it's 3:00pm and I want to prepare a special dinner for everyone. I run a daycare so I don't have a lot of time to spend prepping a meal. Oven Roasted Rosemary Chicken would be perfect!

What you'll need:

Chicken (breasts, legs, thighs, etc.)
Veggies (potatoes, green onions, carrots, etc)
rosemary (fresh or dried)
salt and pepper
Olive oil

I had chicken legs (Husband's favorite) and chicken breasts in the freezer. I thawed them in water for about 45 minutes. While they thawed I cut up potatoes and onions.

I prepared a baking pan with olive oil and preheated oven to 375. You don't want to cook the chicken too fast, it will dry out.

In the baking pan, I added legs to one side and the breasts to the other side. In the middle, I added the veggies. Then I sprinkled on dried rosemary and salt (I used sea salt) & pepper.

I covered it with foil and placed it in the oven at 4:00pm. At 6:00pm, I removed the foil and added about 2/3 cup of water. The chicken is done when it reaches 165 degrees.

This meal doesn't require a lot of maintenance and it is delicious! That's a win win, my friends.

We shared this at: Who Needs A Cape?

Midwest Chicken Enchiladas

A few weeks ago, Chicken Enchiladas were popping up all over Facebook. I had leftover ingredients from my Creamy Cheesy Chicken Wraps so I jumped on the enchilada train too. 

This simple recipe, from my mom, doesn’t require much time or too many ingredients. Bonus and bonus, right?

Here we go!

What you’ll need:

·         

• 3lbs chicken breast
• 4- 6 medium to large flour shells
• 26 oz. cream of chicken (or mushroom) soup
• 1 large onion (I used up my leftover scallions)
• 8 oz. can of chiles
• 1 cup sliced mushrooms
• 2 cups of your choice of cheese
• Pepper
• 1 large tomato (diced)
• Sour cream

Boil chicken in water or chicken broth. Cut up onions and mushrooms. Combine onions, mushrooms and chiles. Once chicken is cooked thoroughly shred it and add it to the onion mixture, sprinkle in some pepper and mix well. 

Preheat oven to 350. Spread some of the cream of chicken soup on the bottom of the baking pan, just enough to cover the bottom. Spoon some chicken mixture into each flour shell. I tend to put it on the left of the shell and roll it semi-tight. Add them seam side down to the baking pan.

Spread the remaining soup over each enchilada. Add cheese to the top. 

Bake for about 20-30 minutes or until cheese is melted. Top with sour cream and diced tomatoes. 

I'm seriously craving this now!

 

Super Wife BBQ Chicken Nachos

Want a real crowd pleaser for your next party?  Whether its a late holiday family party or the upcoming Superbowl, these BBQ Chicken Nachos are so delicious and they disappear quite quickly!  The best thing is they are easy to make but look pretty impressive.  I don't really follow a recipe when I make them so the amounts below are just estimates - you should definitely adjust them to your taste.

BBQ Chicken Nachos

1 tub of bbq chicken - heated per instructions
1 package of shredded cheese of your choice - cheddar, colby, pepperjack (I like doing a mix)
1/2 bag of shredded lettuce
1 - 2 tomatoes, diced
1/2 cup frozen corn - heated
1 small can of sliced black olives
1 bag tortilla chips (I like the big restaurant style)

On a cookie tray or oven safe dish. spread desired amount of tortilla chips.  Sprinkle cheese on the chips.  Heat in 375 degree oven for approximately 10 minutes or however long it takes to melt the cheese.  Add the meat, lettuce, and remaining toppings.  Other topping ideas include onions, peppers, and beans.

Go Packers!

Friday's Quickie: Creamy Cheesy Chicken Wrap

I pinned this recipe quite a while ago, but like a lot of things I pin I forgot about them. I go in spurts of “gotta pin everything” and don’t back for quite some time to look for fun, new ideas. While scrolling through, I found the following wrap. It’s got cheese, chicken, sour cream and cilantro… what’s not to love right? 

I started out following the recipe closely. It didn’t take long before I went off course and started dashing this and that into the mixture. The original recipe doesn’t call for even one spice (it does call for hot sauce though). To me, it screamed "spice me up"!

This wrap is creamy, cheesy, very filling and simply delicious! It’s also easy and quick to make.

Here we go!

What you need:

1/3 cup mayonnaise, light or regular
1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
3 scallions, sliced very thin
1/3 cup chopped mushrooms
2 tablespoons sour cream, light or regular
1/4 teaspoon cumin
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
1.5lbs chicken breast
2 cups shredded cheddar or fiesta blend cheese
4 large flour tortillas
 

Boil chicken until fully cooked. Pull chicken from heat and shred. In a mixing bowl, add chicken, mayo and sour cream. Chop up cilantro, scallions and mushrooms. Add it to mayo mixture. Add spices and stir together. 

Place one large tortilla on a plate. Sprinkle cheese down the center, avoid getting too close to the edges. Spread chicken mixture down the center over cheese. Fold top and bottom of tortilla up and in toward mixture. 

Fold sides up and over the mixture and the already folded sections (think… burrito).

Hold the folded wrap in your hand and spray both sides with cooking spray. 

Put the skillet over a medium heat, waiting 30 seconds to 1 minute and place the SEAM SIDE DOWN into the skillet (a very important tip… possible big mess if you do it the opposite way). Cook for 3ish minutes and flip. Cook for another 3ish minutes. 

When both sides have reached a golden brown, it’s time to serve. It’s creamy enough you shouldn’t need a dollop of sour cream but a side of shredded lettuce and pico de gallo would be a nice addition.

Enjoy!

Southwest Chicken Tortilla Soup

Nothing beats a good soup. Once the cold weather hits, soup is commonly found on our weekly meal plan. It’s a comfort food full of warm and delicious bits of this and that. You can have a broth base or cream base. You add chicken, beef, vegetables or whatever you choose. You really can’t go wrong. 

The soup I’m bringing you today is Southwest Chicken Tortilla. I made it for the first time about a month ago. The ingredients told me I wouldn’t be disappointed. It’s a broth base soup with a flare of Mexican goodness. 

Prep does take some time, but I wouldn’t let that scare you. The blood, sweat and tears are totally worth it. I’m being dramatic, it’s not that bad. 

Here we go!

What you need:

1 pound boneless, skinless chicken breasts

1 15 oz. can of sweet whole corn kernels, drained

1 15 oz. can of diced tomatoes, drained

5 cups chicken broth

1 medium onion, chopped

1 medium green pepper, chopped

4 oz. mushrooms

2 cloves of garlic, minced

1/2 tsp. chili powder

2 tsp. ground cumin

1 1/2 tsp. kosher salt

1 tsp. pepper

Shredded cheese, cheddar or fiesta blend

Tortilla strips

Boil chicken breasts in 5 cups of broth until fully cooked. While chicken is cooking, chop the vegetables. Pull chicken from pot (keep medium heat on) and shred it. Once shredded add it back to the pot. Add the vegetables (both canned and chopped), stir it up. Add the seasonings. Bring the soup to a boil, stirring here and there, simmer, uncovered, for 30-45 minutes. 

Top soup with shredded cheese, sour cream (I didn't, but it's an option) and tortilla strips*. 

As with any soup, add or substract any ingredient you want. Want a kick? Add serrano pepper or green chiles. Be creative!

*I had a hard time finding the tortilla strips and almost gave up. I finally found them at another grocery store. Please don't give up on the strips, the soup really is boosted by these sly dogs. Another idea… substitute Dorito Cool Ranch chips.

Cozy up by the fire and enjoy!