When I came across a white chicken pizza recipe, I thought it would be perfect for spicing up and decided to start adding my own Tony’s inspired recipes.

It’s a quick and easy meal using store bought rotisserie chicken – perfect for a mid-week meal. My kiddos do NOT do spice… so this is a pretty tame recipe as far as Cajun goes… feel free to walk on the wild side – just add more seasoning.

Check out the Grilled Creole White Chicken Pizza and many, many more Tony’s recipes here >>

The Tasteful Life is about making the everyday more meaningful and redefining what it means to live a rich life. We take these experiences from the kitchen to entertaining while embracing cultures and traditions.

My first post was a recipe to honor my Mother-in-Laws Birthday… Pink + Champagne + Cupcakes!

This is the recipe on the inside of the top of the Oatmeal… it really is the best one!

Vanishing Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

Ingredients

• 1/2  cup (1 stick) plus 6 tablespoons butter, softened
• 3/4  cup firmly packed brown sugar
• 1/2  cup granulated sugar
• 2  eggs
• 1  teaspoon vanilla
• 1-1/2  cups all-purpose flour
• 1  teaspoon baking soda
• 1  teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2  teaspoon salt (optional)
• 3  cups Quaker® Oats (quick or old fashioned, uncooked)
• 1  cup raisins

Preparation

Heat oven to 350°F. In large bowl, beat butter and sugars on medium speed of electric mixer until creamy. Add eggs and vanilla; beat well. Add combined flour, baking soda, cinnamon and salt; mix well. Add oats and raisins; mix well.

Drop dough by rounded tablespoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheets.

Bake 8 to 10 minutes or until light golden brown. Cool 1 minute on cookie sheets; remove to wire rack. Cool completely. Store tightly covered.

Notes: I generally double, if not triple, the amount of cinnamon I use – and I know to add a little nutmeg as well. Or – you can use 2 tsp of apple pie spice.

Thanx for the pic! http://www.flickr.com/photos/saad/23070859/

This week’s menu included meatloaf and you may think Oatmeal? Meatloaf? Yep, replace the breadcrumbs with oatmeal and you increase the nutritional value of your meatloaf… something this mom is ALWAYS trying to do.

So, here’s the recipe…

1. Preheat over to 350 degrees
2. Mix in a large bowl (the best is really just with your hands):
   1. 2 lbs of good quality ground beef *
   2. 1 1/2 cups chopped onion
   3. 1 cup old fashioned oatmeal
   4. 1 cup ketchup
   5. 1 cup chopped cilantro (you can use parsley)
   6. 3 large eggs, slightly beaten
   7. 2 tsp non-salt garlic herb blend (like Mrs. Dash)
   8. 1 tsp salt
3. Form mixture into a loaf, about the size of a loaf pan, on a cookie sheet
4. Glaze the loaf with ketchup
5. Cover the loaf cross-ways with 8-10 slices of bacon. Tuck the ends of the bacon underneath.
6. Cook for 1 hour to 1 hour 15 minutes , until internal temperature reads 160 degrees.

Enjoy! … and go create your day over at Quaker Oats so they can donate some more!

*Costco is one of the few places that check their ground beef at the store for E-Coli.

Quaker has created an application that allows you to Create Your Day.   Go to their website and create the perfect breakfast for you, for a friend, your child’s teacher, your husband.. whomever you’d like.   Using their application, answer a few questions and it creates a fun card with the ideal oatmeal to get them revved and ready for whatever lies ahead of them that day.  It then allows you to share it via email or facebook.  For every dish that you create (4 per day) through March 31, 2010… they will donate $1 up to $25,000 whoops… $25,o0o has already been donated!!! So they’ve upped the ante to $50,000.

Let’s make Quaker eat that $50,000 and up it to $75,000.

Please help me in this.  No child, no family, no person in this country should go hungry.

The App is super cute and fun… I could play around with it all day… @thisisnotapril says I am like a cat… which is so totally a compliment in our neck of the woods.

So here is my super cute Create Your Day story…

(How did they know peaches and cream is my favorite oatmeal? It’s like oatmeal magic!)

Anyway… whether you are as entertained by this as I am or not… go check out the oatmeal magic… create your day… and help Quaker Oats do a little towards ending hunger.

Go on now… go… now>>> oooo… and then tell me what kind of oatmeal did you get… I wanna know – and then go tell Rachel cause she’s got some cool stuff to give away!

This is the pudding I grew up eating… I can whip it up in 15 minutes or so… 10 on a good day… and for the life me I can not make instant pudding that is not lumpy, which is a good thing cause compared to this EASY to make (I promise, after practicing a few times, this recipe just flies) I can’t stand to eat instant pudding.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup Sugar, organic really is better… nudge, nudge
• 3 tbsp cornstarch
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 2 1/2 cups whole milk (don’t substitute, I’ve tried, trust me)
• 5 egg yolks (make omelets with the whites, ya know – to make up for the pudding with whip cream)
• 3 tbsp butter, cut into small peices
• 4 oz unsweetened baking chocolate (like Baker’s Brand 100% cacao) stuck in the microwave for 30 seconds and stirred to thick liquid. DO NOT over nuke!
• 1 tbsp Mexican Vanilla, if you can get it, double strength like Penzey’s will work

Directions:

1. In a medium sized, heavy bottomed, scratch resistant sauce pan mix the sugar, cornstarch, and salt with a wire whisk.
2. Add 1/4 cup of milk and whisk to a paste
3. Over high-heat – whisk in the rest of the milk and then the eggs. Whisk until no yellow streaks remain and then keep whisking continuously until the mixture thickens and begins to bubble deep slow bubbles  – sounds weird, but you will see what I am talking about. DO NOT stop stirring – it will burn on the bottom. (You can do like all the other recipes say and cook it over medium heat, slowing stirring… I ain’t got that kind of time or patience)
4. Once it starts to bubble, keep stirring – count to 60  in your head then take it off the heat. Don’t just turn the heat off… move it to another spot.
5. Stir in the butter, chocolate, and vanilla – keep stirring until all the butter is melted and the chocolate is evenly mixed in.
6. Pour into a 3 cup bowl – cover with a plate – stick in the fridge to set.

Tip: You can use this as pie filling – just pour it into a baked pie crust (preferably NOT one of those store bought graham cracker things.) You can also spoon it into 6 individual bowls. I think most recipe say to wrap in plastic wrap – I don’t believe in plastic wrap, its terrible for the environment, I would rather have cracks on the top of my pudding and just cover it with whip cream.

Whip Cream:

Put 1 cup of whip cream, 2 tbsp sugar, 1/2 teaspoon vanilla in a blender – turn that baby on – and whip it up till there are those beautiful whip cream peaks – ’bout a minute. (check it at 45 seconds – cause you really don’t want to make butter)

JJ Note: I have been known to serve this pudding warm out of the pot into a bowl with the whip cream melting on top… I really do prefer it this way to any other.

Thanx for the pic: http://www.flickr.com/photos/23701579@N00/437069665/

Ingredients:

1Cup Miracle Whip or Mayo… whichever you keep in the fridge.
1/4 cup vinegar (any kind, Balsamic has sugar in it – just an FYI)
1/3 cup Splenda
1/2 Cup whole milk
2 Tblsp poppy seeds

How To:

1. Mix It Up. Stick in the fridge for at least 2 hours. (Or just use it if your in a rush)
2. Now that’s easy.

My suggestion for how to use it – Salad made of spinach tossed with red onions,  grilled chicken, little bit o’ bacon, strawberries,  and sprinkled with sunflower seeds… Yum!

Ingredients

• 1 – 8 inch round of Brie
• 1 package of frozen puff pastry (like Pepperidge Farms, 2 packages come in 1 box)
• 1 egg, beaten
• Jar of Fig Preserves
• Sliced French Bread, crackers, flat bread, or anything of the like

Instructions

1. Take pastry out of freezer and drop in on the counter – leave it to thaw, about 30 minutes
2. Preheat oven to 425 degrees
3. Unroll the pastry inside a 9 inch glass pie dish. Take the cheese out of the package, place it in the center of the pastry and wrap the pastry around the cheese, stretching it to close completely around the cheese.
4. Flip it over and brush it with the beaten egg
5. Pop it in the oven for 20 minutes
6. Drop the temp to 325 degrees and let it cook another 20 minutes
7. Take it out of the oven and let it sit for 20 minutes
8. Spread about a cup or so of the preserves around the baked brie.
9. Cut a wedge out and watch the cheesy goodness flow out to the ooh & aahs of those who get to partake in this wonderfulness.
10. Spread it on a piece of bread and eat that up – cause it’s good!

Variations: Use any kind of preserves you want, Raspberry Chipolte is pretty rockin’. You can also place chopped, sugared walnuts or pecan on top of the cheese inside the pastry… I haven’t tried this one, but I have read it pretty dang good as well.

Thanx for the pic! http://www.flickr.com/photos/87704691@N00/390316205/

This weekend I cooked up the whole lot in one fell swoop – it has served as lunch for @lassberg and me a couple of times this week and a quick (like the time it took to cook rice) dinner for the whole fam-damily last night. Some recipes really don’t last into the week and are pretty unappetizing when I pull them out for dinner… this one I think has really just gotten better.

Ingredients:

• 10 chicken thighs with the bone in (they are cheaper more ecomical this way)
• 3 slices of bacon
• 2 medium onions, sliced
• 2 celery stalks, chopped
• 2 cloves of garlic, minced
• salt and pepper to taste (less than you think due to the bacon)
• One regular 14 oz. can of chicken broth
• One pouch of onion soup mix

Directions:

1. Pre-heat oven to 350
2. Mix the soup and broth together in a med. bowl and let it sit
3. In large skillet cook the bacon on med-high heat
4. Add the onion, celery, garlic, salt and pepper – cook until onion is translucent and starting to brown and then dump it all into the a large casserole pan
5. Work in 2 batches – add the chicken to the skillet and brown on each side for 3 minutes and then add to the casserole pan on top of the onions, celery and bacon
6. Pour the soup / broth mix over the chicken
7. Cover with aluminum foil and cook for 1 hour in the oven.

Serve with rice or buttered noodles or just a quick salad… yummy!

With a degree in Chemistry (little know fact right there) I know enough about nutrition to be dangerous concerned and alert about what we eat. For better or worse I come from a family where from scratch is the only option… I let that go for a few years but I have to admit that cake mix in a box does really nothing for me. I am always looking for those from scratch recipes that don’t require a riduclous budget of both time and money.

With my sis’n'law here this weekend I gave her a couple of recipes to get her started. My pesto pizza, crock-pot beans and corn bread, crock pot chicken, pesto chicken pasta… the one we missed was my homemade mac’n'cheese. She was surprised to here that in the time it takes the pasta to cook – I can have the cheese sauce ready to go. I made it up once to use all the little remenants of shredded cheese bags I had in the drawer of the fridge. 5 ingredients and no powdered cheese!

So, tonight we had Mac’n'Cheese, Apple Yogurt Salad, and Green Salad with Lemon Vinagrette… all in about 45 minutes… all from scratch. I think the Mac’nCheese had enough calories in it even with 2% milk… I didn’t want to add meat to the meal. I made up the Apple Salad cause I knew the boys will eat it and the apples cover my raw requirement and the nuts and raisins added some protein. The sugared yogurt covering on the raisins was enough sweet, I didn’t need to add anything else – thus fulfilling my not too much sugar ratio.

Here are the recipes:

Mac’n'Cheese

• Box of elbow pasta (or something similar, whole wheat if you want) – 8 servings
• 3 cups cold milk
• 3 tbsp cornstarch
• 3 tbsp butter
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp black pepper
• 1 cup smoked Jack or  Smoked Muenster cheese (it doesn’t have to be smoked, but it makes a big difference in the taste this dish)
• 3 cups chedder, jack, or mozzarella cheese  or any mix there of (You can also do 2 cups shredded cheese, 1 cup Parmesan if you want a more tangy mac. )

1. Start the water to boil to for the pasta.
2. In a large sauce pan put in the cold milk and turn the heat on high. With a whisk mix in the corn starch, salt and pepper. Keep whisking until the mixture starts to boil – maybe 10 minutes.
3. Somewhere in the middle the pasta water will start to boil – dump in the whole box of pasta – give it a stir now and then until it is cooked.
4. Once the sauce starts to boil – keep whisking – count to 60. Turn off the heat. Drop in the butter and the cheese. Keep whisking until all the cheese it melted. Move it to a back – cold burner. Drop the lid on it.
5. Drain the pasta. Put it back in the pot with a lid to keep it warm.
6. Once you have the salads all ready to go. Toss the sauce on the pasta and give it a stir… your ready to go

Lemon Vinagrette

• 1/4 cup apple cider vinegar
• 1/4 cup water
• 1 tsp course salt
• 2 tbsps lemon herd spice mix (in the spice aisle, the one I use is by McCormick… this is NOT lemon pepper!)
• 1/2 cup olive oil

1. Put it all in a bowl or salad dressing container… mix it up!Add it to what ever kind of greens & veggie salad you can rustle up.

Apple Yogurt Salad

• 1 large granny smith apple – chopped into about 1/4 inch peices
• 1 individual serving size box of yogurt covered raisins – chopped
• 1 cup mixed nuts – chopped
• 2 heaping tbsp plain yogurt
• 1 tsp Saigon cinnamon (this cinnamon tastes more like a red hot candy than apple pie)

1. Put it a bowl – mix it – serve it… eat it!

I had to hustle to get it all wrapped up quickly… I am generally moving at a Rachael Ray 30 minute meals pace for dinner anyway. I feel pretty confident that this easy, homemade meal is do-able by anyone who wants to quickly and cheaply frugally feed their family.

Enjoy!