Strawberry Spinach salad-Simple!!

So this a a quick throw together thing that I love.  Hope you enjoy it as much as I do.  I know my husband gets sick of this cause I want to eat it all the time.  What can you expect...I'm pregnant and have to feed those cravings.  If he doesn't want his...I eat it too!!

This is one of the reasons I almost always have strawberries on hand.  Even in the winter  splurge and buy them.  Or I get them in my bountiful basket and then I don't feel guilty at all.  

So strawberries cut into bite sized pieces

I love baby spinach, but if the bunches of regular spinach are only $0.78 I can't really justify in buying the bags of baby spinach.  So I just cut off the stems and tear it up.  Then add the cut strawberries and top with this awesome poppyseed dressing(below).  I buy mine at the local Winco.  Love this salad, it's almost like a dessert to me. 

The oval sticker above says it's good on fresh peaches.....MMMM I tried it and totally prefer it with the strawberries!!

Is this one more readable?  

Enjoy this simple salad!

Faith is the Power....

So I've been meaning to get this posted forever.  I made this window well over a year ago, along with several others to sell at the craft fair that I did. I only had one left over.  Man they sold like hot cakes!  But I didn't have a good picture of a finished product so I have been holding off posting them here.  SO you can see I still need a good picture of a finished product, cause the walls in the house we bought are almost the same exact color as some of my vinyl, (cream/light tan).  

I was just getting too anxious to get these posted, that I didn't wait until we'd painted a room a different color.  

I swear it's not going to be long and we'll my hubby will have 2 rooms painted.  I hate being pregnant and not being able to help with the painting. HEHE.  Okay I really do feel bad, but he's an awesome painter so shouldn't I leave it to him anyway?!

#1                                         #2

 You can see how striking this can be behind a colored background/wall!! That is if I didn't have the window reflecting on my glass.  *sigh*

If you're local to the SE Idaho area, I would sell this one for $75.00, but if you want to find your own old window or just put it on your wall the prices follow.

18in wide x23in. ht = $40+$5 s&h

*Note any orders over $40 get free shipping and handling

It comes in 2 parts/ and I need the 2 colors you'd like.  Find my current color selection here.

And which fonts do you like #1 or #2.

I can do custom sizes and they don't cost extra, if you have a space in mind that needs filling, shoot me an email and I'll get you a quote.

7-Up Chicken-Dutchoven turned oven recipe.

Got this awesome recipe from my Aunt Verla years ago and my Mom figured out how to do it in the oven.  Easily a family favorite, Home style meal.

Makes a lot, so you may want to half it.  Serves 8-10 depending on how much chicken you want.

Basic ingredients: 

1/2-1 pound bacon

little flour

8 chicken breast or 12 thighs

Lawry's seasoning salt

Garlic powder

pepper

Carrots 

potatoes

onions

1 can of 7-UP

Butter/margarine

Fry up bacon.  I cut mine before with my chicken shears to make it easier. 

Then  place your bacon in the roasting pan.  Save the bacon grease to brown your chicken.

Flour your chicken breast and then pan fry them in the bacon grease.  Add more oil if needed.

Then placed browned chicken breasts  in roasting pan.  Season LIBERALLY with Lawry's seasoning salt, garlic powder, and pepper.  This is where it gets most of the flavor.  I do it over board and then do some more.  You can always add it later in your cooking if it isn't flavorful enough for you.

I just use baby carrots so I don't have to cut them.  (I go for easy) And then I quarter a large onion when I'm making a half batch, but quantities all depend on your own preference of vegetables.

Then I peel the potatoes and throw them through my Bosch food processor french fry cutter (Love my Bosch)  A whole post in itself I'm telling you!!

Add 1 cube of butter/margarine, 1 cup of water, a can of 7-up and into the oven at 350 degrees.  Now depending on the size of your potatoes it can take between almost 1.5-2.5 hours .  With my potatoes cut like this 1.5 hours is usually sufficient.  If you are still in a dutch oven, it cooks over hot coals for about 45 minutes -1 hour. 

NOTE: this is not a meal that freezes well for later,unless you removed some for freezing before all the vegetables are done.  Otherwise you loose all the texture once you freeze it.  I suggest just halving and eating leftovers for a small family.

Wednesday week menu #2

I feel like I'm becoming a cooking blog...Not that this is my intention, but between work and my family this is about all I've been doing lately. But I'll be posting quite a few recipes in the next week.


Monday- Lasagna/breadsticks Green salad with Olive garden dressing HMMM.

My mom's recipe. Not anything overly different than most Lasgna recipes I've seen...But we bought a bottle of Olive garden's Italian dressing and did a knock of salad!! It was yummy.

Tuesday- Washington Pork chops over rice with Mixed veggies

Got this recipe from my friend Amy. It made a very moist Pork chop with the perfect blend with apples and cinnamon(for those of you that love the pork chops and apple combo). I'll have to share this recipe someime soon. I do have it in a Word doc if anyone want a copy. I'll have to take pictures the next time I make it.

Wednesday- Country fried chicken, gravy, Mashed potatoes, and spinach salad.

Used this Recipe for the marinade and coating. Did a double dip as a few of the comments suggested and then I pan fried my thin pounded chicken breast in just a few Tbsp of olive oil. I also used This gravy packet (old fashioned Peppered gravy mix) that I got at my local Eddy's bread store, wonderful on mashed potatoes. Added my favorite Strawberry spinach salad to round it off. (This mini recipe will come this week) Not necessarily low-fat meal, but what comfort food!!

Thursday-Leftovers

Friday- Ham Fried rice and Thai won tons from my friend Tiffany's cooking blog.

Just your typical fried rice with pre cooked rice added with cut up ham, scrambled eggs, minced green onion, and soy sauce to taste. Then with the Won Tons, I used freshly ground coriander and I think I would go lighter on it by my taste, but it was all yummy!! Will make again.

Saturday-Chicken, Broccoli, and cheese soup- 

Recipe with lots of pictures to follow this week!! Can be adapted to make a topping for baked potatoes!!

Man I'm seeing how many fried food we had this week.  Man I enjoyed them all though!! I was just using what items I had in my fridge from my bountiful basket that I needed to use up when I made up the menu.

Wednesday Week long menu plan

So I've been a really slacker at sharing my menu plans for the week.  I have to admit that I didn't do a plan one week and chaos came back into my house!! I love having a menu, or even a list of ideas to pick from. I usually only come up with 6 ideas cause we'll eat leftovers or go on a date night at least once a week


I thought I'd share my first week that I thought came together great and I tried 2-3 new recipes that week.  Loved 2 of them and liked the 3rd.

Monday-Chicken Milano a made up recipe trying to knock off the Johnny Carino's Italian Restaurant (it's a work in progress, but it's getting closer, eventually I'll share a recipe) and Light whole wheat baguette from Here

Tuesday-7-Up chicken- It's a dutch oven recipe adapted for the oven. Recipe with pictures to follow shortly.  Eventually I get a link posted.

Wednesday-Black bean pizza from Here (using the same dough I made on Monday night) I did a few changes like no corn since my hubby doesn't like corn, but we enjoyed it for a change.

Thursday-Chicken Rosemary BLTs- Toasted hoagie buns with grilled/sauteed chicken with a little Rosemary, bacon, lettuce, tomatoes, cheese, and Ranch.  Just thrown together for a tasty warm sandwich 

Friday- leftovers

Sat/Sun-Tyler Florence's shrimp scampi from Food Network (with a few tweaks, I may still do a few more next time though) and bread sticks (In reality we liked the baguettes from Monday that I didn't go the mess of going smaller with bread sticks.  Again using the same dough I made on Monday.  Had my parent's and my brother over for dinner and we loved it!!

I hope this makes some one's week of cooking less hectic.  I know I'm in love with that baguette dough!!  I love that you can just keep it in the fridge all week!!