Hello Everyone!!!

Okay.. so our crazy lives have been so incredibly busy!!!

I had back surgery at the end of March, Bean completed Kindergarten.. Stacy is in the process of moving from NC to Houston to Dallas.. So unfortunately, until we are stable again.. we don't have any recipes planned.. however, I have a new blog that I will be posting some baking/crafty stuff on.. it's simplyyummo@blogspot.com. Feel free to check it out in the mean time!

I can't wait to get back to making some total yummy goodness.. We will be back soon, and thanks oodles for following us on this incredible journey!!

Much love ~

Lynnette

~ Dinner 9 Menu ~

Hello Everyone!!

We thought we would go the semi healthy route for our next menu.. Notice I said.. semi. :)  For Dinner 9 we will be making Italian Chicken Packets along with Creamy Au Gratin Potatoes and Chocolate Marshmallow Pillows for desert! :) I did say semi! lol!

For the Italian Chicken Packets you will need:

Itlaian Chicken Packets photo courtesy of  readyseteat.com

foil
4 cups frozen broccoli cuts
1 can (14.5 oz each) Hunt's® Diced Tomatoes, drained
1/2 cup light Italian dressing
4 boneless skinless chicken breasts (4 breasts = 1.25 lb)

So as you can tell, this is the "healthy" recipe! haha! But it looks delish and fairly simple to make!
You can find the link to the recipe here:
http://www.readyseteat.com/recipes-Italian-Chicken-Packets-5417.html


We were thinking that we couldn't just eat chicken alone.. so we decided to make these yummy Creamy Au Gratin Potatoes. Okay.. so chicken and potatoes..not a unique decision.. but it does sound pretty good! :)



Creamy Au Gratin Potatoes photo courtesy of Allrecipes member Heather

 For the Creamy Au Gratin Potatoes you will need:

4 russet potatoes, sliced into 1/4 inch slices

1 onion, sliced into rings

salt and pepper to taste

3 tablespoons butter

3 tablespoons all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 cups milk

1 1/2 cups shredded Cheddar cheese

You can find the recipe here:

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Creamy-Au-Gratin-Potatoes/Detail.aspx

Now for the most NON healthy part of dinner.. I have to give Stacy full credit for picking this recipe out.. :) We both have a serious sweet tooth and these sounded to good to pass up!

I recently made homemade marshmallows, so I will be using them. However, you can use store bought marshmallows if you'd like! :)

For the Chocolate Marshmallow Pillows you will need:

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Chocolate Marshmallow Pillows  Photo courtesy of Bettycrocker.com



Cookies

1    pouch (1 lb 1.5 oz) Betty Crocker® double chocolate chunk cookie mix

1/4 cup vegetable oil

2    tablespoons water

1    egg

2/3 cup chopped pecans

12  large marshmallows cut in half

Frosting

1    cup semisweet chocolate chips (6 oz)

1/3 cup whipping cream

1    teaspoon butter or margarine

1    teaspoon vanilla

1/2 cup powdered sugar

You can find the link to the recipe here:
http://www.bettycrocker.com/recipes/chocolate-marshmallow-pillows/1ac8085a-c216-4998-81e6-118f7f4e3d23

Yup, these are totally NOT healthy..  but I'm betting they are totally worth it!! :)

Can't wait to see how these recipes come out! Be sure to share your results with us too! 

Happy Cooking!

Stacy's Kitchen- Dinner 8 RESULTS

Okay, so apparently, I completely fell through on my promise to stop being a slacker! lol! The last 2 weeks has been so hectic with Valentine's day and then we went out of town on vacation... so I PROMISE I will be more on top of things now! haha! (Let's see if I can stay true to my promise this time =P ) 

Now on to the results....

Lasagna Rolls

So, this recipe was good... but I did have to modify it a smidge. I make lasagna all the time in my house, and it's one of Brian's favorite recipes. Well he doesn't like it when I change alter recipes he likes lol. So with that being said, I tried to modify it a wee bit by adding ground beef to the mixture... The recipe as a whole was very similar to the one I cook just minus the spinach. As soon as brian saw it, he goes "EWWW what is that green stuff? Why did you change the recipe?" I swear I feed a 5 year old at times... lol! Anyways, he said it was good but he liked my original recipe better. Soooo, it looks like I wont be cooking this again. We did have company over that night, and Carly said she LOVED it. I personally didn't care for the prep of this recipe. It seemed really tedious with having to roll each one up. I much rather just slap it in a dish and throw it in an oven. lol.

Rating: B

Spumoni Cookies

O.M.G! These little things were AMAZING! I was soooo nervous about cooking something that had pistachios and cherries inside of a cookie... but by golly miss molly, i was soooooooo wrong! We alllll ate these little guys up like there was no tomorrow! The only thing I did different was I added dried cherries and it was fabulous! These were so moist, and soft, and then when you would bite into them you would taste a nut with some tart but sweet cherries covered in chocolate! YUMMO! I will make these again, and again, and AGAIN!

Rating: A+

Hope you all had a wonderful almost 2 weeks, while we went on hiatus lol! Check back soon, because we will be posting Dinner 9 recipes today or tomorrow! :)

~ Lynnette's Dinner 8 Results ~

Hello all!
I finally have time to fill you in on the Dinner 8 results!

So we decided to try a potentially delicious and difficult recipe, Lasagna Rolls.. Well, let me just say that this was HEAVEN!  I did not change a single thing in it.. I know, SHOCKING! lol! I was really excited when we selected this, and also a little intimidated, because it looked a little challenging. Let me tell you, this recipe was very well written!  

The filling was sooooo good! Well really, the entire thing was super delish! I could have eaten the entire dish!!! 

So if you haven't notice by now, I have a slight obsession with weird dessert names! lol! So when we selected the Spumoni cookies I was over the moon!
OH' MY WORD!!!

These were AMAZING! I will be making them again and again and again! Matter of fact, my loyal test subjects had about 8 after dinner alone!! :)  They were so pretty and so incredibly yummy!

Can't wait to see how Stacy's turned out!

~ Dinner 8 ~

Happy THURSDAY morning everyone!

Wow, it seems like an eternity since we last blogged.. I had mentioned earlier about how life gets in the way of our wicked cool project.. Well that was totally evident this week.. So, with that said, our apologies for lagging on posting Dinner 8!

Since we visited Mexico for our last dinner, Stacy and I thought it would be fun to take a dinner journey to ITALY! :)

We will be making Lasagna Rolls! I will warn you, this is an intermediate recipe.. Not that it should be super difficult, but that it does have many steps. :) But I'm sure it's bound to be very tasty! I mean, lasagna noodles, ricotta cheese, Parmesan cheese and mozzarella too?? YUMMY! My mouth is watering!

photo from foodnetwork.com

For this recipe you will need the following:

Sauce:
2 tablespoons unsalted butter

4 teaspoons all-purpose flour

1 1/4 cups whole milk

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/8 teaspoon ground black pepper

Pinch ground nutmeg

Lasagna:

1 (15-ounce) container whole milk ricotta cheese

1 (10-ounce) package frozen chopped spinach, thawed, squeezed dry

1 cup plus 2 tablespoons grated Parmesan

3 ounces thinly sliced prosciutto, chopped

1 large egg, beaten to blend

3/4 teaspoon salt, plus more for salting water

1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1 to 2 tablespoons olive oil

12 uncooked lasagna noodles

2 cups marinara sauce

1 cup shredded mozzarella (about 4 ounces)

The link for the recipe can be found here: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/giada-de-laurentiis/lasagna-rolls-recipe/index.html

For Dessert we will be making Spumoni Cookies! If you like pistachios and cherries, you are bound to enjoy these cookies!!

Spumoni Cookies photo by labellefood - Allrecipes.com member



For this recipe you will need:

2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 cup butter, softened

1/4 cup white sugar

3/4 cup packed brown sugar

1 (3.4 ounce) package instant pistachio pudding mix

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 (16 ounce) package semi-sweet chocolate chips

1/2 cup chopped maraschino cherries

1/4 cup chopped pistachios

The link for the recipe can be found here: http://allrecipes.com//Recipe/spumoni-chocolate-chip-cookies/Detail.aspx

Can't wait to see the results and hear how everyone enjoyed these 2 recipes! :)

Lets get cookin'!

Stacy's Kitchen- Dinner 7 RESULTS

Hola Amigos! Yeah, that's about as much spanish as I know! lol! Even though I did live in San Antonio for 6 years and I did take 3 years of spanish in school... Hola is as good as it gets! So we will have to leave the spanish speaking stuff to Lynnette! haha! Well let's get to the Mexican Fiesta results and you do NOT want to miss out on these!!! =P

Lime Chicken Tacos

Recipe

Ohh my, you little chicken tacos really are a taste of home!! I dont know if you all know, but I just moved to NC from TX, and mexican food is the one thing I MISSSS oh so much! I was so thrilled that lynnette found this recipe and I could not wait to cook it!! Well I followed all the directions to a "t" at first minus the corn (ew, slightly creeps me out having corn in my chicken!)... then after about 4 hrs of cooking I started to shred the chicken and it looked EXTREMELY dry... and honestly I started having MAJOR doubts about how it was going to turn out. I even took about some more meat from the freezer for "back-up." lol. Before I gave up on this little guy, I decided to try and doctor it up... I put some chicken stock and 1/2 a package of taco seasoning with about 1/2 cup of the salsa. I also added some fresh chopped onion and a sprinkle of garlic and wine seasoning. The results were AMAZING!! The meat was so tender and juicy and had flavor enough to kill! It wasn't too over powering but I do like a spicy chicken taco so the extra spice did hit the spot! I actually put the shredded chicken on a romaine lettuce leaf, I like to call it a "lettuce boat," it makes a healthier option to a tortilla or taco shell. I did make tortillas and shells as well, just to try it on all three. Brian's vote was for the tortilla, but he said all 3 were YUMMY! My personal favorite was the chicken on the lettuce boat and I made some homemade jalapeno ranch sauce over top with some freshly shredded cheese. It was to DIE FOR!! ah so good!!!  



Romaine Lettuce for the "lettuce boats"




Crunchy taco and lettuce boat taco



Lettuce Boat- My Fav!




Traditional Soft taco- Brian's fav

So needless to say, this dinner was a major HIT at this house!! It is so easy to make it cater to your tastebuds and change it up! I highly highly recommend making this! Just try it with some chicken stock so it doesnt dry up!

Rating: actual recipe I am only giving it a "B" because it was icky until I doctored it up... wayy too dry! But definitely try it with some modifications! :)



 Sopapilla Cheesecake Pie

Recipe

Oh my goodness gracious! This is by far the yummiest thing we have cooked!! My pic looks a little crazed due to me being so impatient while it was cooling! It tasted like a cinnamon sugar gooey yummy pastry with a oh so delicious cheesecake surprise! If you looove cheesecake you MUST try this! I actually halved the recipe and found the no seam crescent rolls so it made it suuuuper easy to put in the dish! It is the easiest recipe and by far the yummiest we have made thus far! Try it! Try it! TRY  IT! It truly is a no fuss, easy peasy, yummy-licious recipe!

Rating: A++++ Delish! 

~ Lynnette's Dinner 7 Results ~

Los buenos amigos por la noche! a.k.a. Good evening friends!! :)

I am very excited to post my results for Dinner 7! Let me get right to it...

Lime Chicken Tacos

As you can probably guess I did make a few changes..  Due to not realizing what time in the day it was, I went ahead and precooked the chicken in a skillet with lime juice, chicken stock and a dash of chili powder. Once it was completely cooked I put it in the crockpot and let it do it's thing. :)  I was about to scrap this recipe because I was not happy about having to shred the chicken.. I mean so much so, that I pretty much complained the entire time until my knight in abu's came and finished the job for me! :) Thanks Ry! :)

Let me tell you these were simply maravillosa!! They were so full of flavor!

Now for dessert..

The Sopapillia Cheescake Pie was AMAZING! HOLY COW!!! 

I mean one of the easiest most completely DELISH recipes ever!!! This one is going in my dessert arsenal for SURE!!! :)  I made one change, and that was that I added 1/4 cup white sugar and 1/4 cup brown sugar.. SO YUMMY!!!  If you only try one dessert that we have suggested so far.. TRY THIS ONE!!! :)

Can't wait  to see how Stacy's turned out!! If you tried Dinner 7, let us know! :)

After such an amazing dinner my tummy is full and so I'm going to take a siesta! :) 

Keep an eye out for Dinner 8!!