Sweet & Sour Pineapple Chicken

Sorry for the poor quality.


2 Chicken breasts, cut into chunks
2 "shakes" each of the following: soy sauce, sesame oil, rice wine vinegar.
1/2t hoisin sauce
1T honey
salt and pepper

Combine these ingredients and marinate in the fridge for an hour or 2.

1 can pineapple chunks (we actually only had slices on hand and I cut those up, I think the "tidbits" are a little too hard)
SAVE THE JUICE!
1c broccoli florets
1/2c snow peas or snap peas whatever
2T minced white onion
3T corn starch
a "dash" of crushed red pepper flakes, optional
2T brown sugar (goes into the sauce)

1. Save one half of the juice for the sauce the other half you can drink.
2. Drain the chicken marinade into the reserved pineapple juice.
3. Put the cornstarch in with the chicken chunks and toss to coat.
4. Heat a skillet on high with veg oil.
5. Add the chicken and cook until golden brown.
6. Add in the pineapple sauce, onion, and pineapple chunks.
7. Cook for 5 min.
8. The sauce will start to thicken because of the cornstarch from the chicken in the pan.
9. Toss in your broccoli, peas, whatever other veggies you want and turn down on low, cover, so the veggies can steam.

TADA!
We served ours with rice.

Grandpa's Cafe

My grandpa (dad’s dad) owned a cafe since I’d been born and he sold it when I was 12.

I worked at his cafe for a few summers a couple days a week from age 10-12.

He had a VERY cheap special. 2 cakes, 2 eggs, 2 links. (2 Pancakes and 2 sausage links)

I remember one day he was trying to teach me how to read a clock face and apparently I made him so bad by not understanding that he said “You disgust me” and that upset me so much that the next time he asked me to come work I didn’t want to.

I remember this group of 3 came in and the ONLY thing they said to me for their order was “scrambled eggs and water.” I even double checked what they said. So, that’s what I put in for the order. My grandpa asked me if I wasn’t sure they wanted the SPECIAL. And I said “no all they said was ‘scrambled eggs and water’. My grandpa had enough faith in me that that’s all he made them. I took it to their table and these jerk offs gave me a nasty look and asked where their food was. Luckily my grandpa never reprimanded me for it and he fixed their order in less than 10 minutes. They didn’t leave me a tip.

I remember having a tan bowl with my tips. Usually I’d get change which was fine cause I LOVED playing spin the coins. Most people hold the coin up with their left pointer finger then flick the side of the coin with their right finger. I grip both sides of the coin and twist really fast. I’d start a chain of them.

I’d also spend my time adding up the prices on the menu.
My grandpa actually gave me $10 plus all my tips for working a day. :) Some days if it was from 8am to 8pm he’d give me $20!

His cafe was closed from 2-4. Usually we’d take a nap on the  “oh so cold” booths cause the air conditioning was on high and it’d get REALLY cold. Other days if he needed to get something from the store we’d go to dairy queen and get sundaes!

He had a big stereo that had a cd player. If there weren’t a lot of customers he’d let me pick some polka cds from his collection OR I could play one of my 50-60s cds.

I kind of miss my grandpa’s cafe…

General Tso's Chicken!

This stuff is AH-MAZ-ING.


General Tso’s Chicken
Yields 2 servings

• Ingredients:
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 t hoisin sauce
• 3 tablespoons rice wine vinegar
• 2 tablespoons soy sauce
• 2 tablespoons cornstarch
• 1/2c flour
• 1 pound boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into 1-inch cubes
• 1 tablespoon olive oil (I used vegetable oil)
• 1 tablespoon sesame oil
• 6 green onions, chopped, plus more for serving
• 1/2t grated fresh ginger
• 1/2t minced garlic 
• 1c broccoli florets
• 1/2c snow peas
• Crushed red-pepper flakes, optional
• Sesame seeds, optional
• Cooked rice, for serving

Directions: (oh ftw, I MOSTLY eyeballed all this stuff. I tried to guess at how much I put in but it won't hurt if you just eyeball it.)

1.  I marinated the chicken it really adds to the dish and helps it! I diced the chicken, added 1/4t hoisin sauce, 1T rice wine vinegar, 1T soy sauce, 2 dashes of sesame oil, 1/4t fresh grated ginger, 1/4t minced garlic, and 2T brown sugar. I let that sit in the fridge for at least 3 hours. Any amount of extra time you have will help the chicken so it doesn't need to be that long but it's better if it's marinated that long!
2. So then I drain the chicken from the juices and coat the chicken with the flour and cornstarch.
3. I heat up 2T veg oil in a nonstick pan and cook until the chicken is done. Remove from pan.
4. Add 2T veg oil. Saute the scallions and ginger and rest of garlic. Add the broccoli and peas and whatever veggies you want and the crushed red pepper flakes.
5. Add (eyeball) hoisin, rice wine vinegar, soy sauce, sesame oil, and brown sugar.
6. Add the chicken and toss to coat.

Serve with rice!
This isn't very saucy so if you wanted more sauce you can mix the sauce ingredients with 1/2c of water and some cornstarch and then you'll have to let it cook to thicken.

Without counting the marinating time, this took like 15min because I had all the veggies pre-chopped and in the freezer so I just threw them in the pan.

It was so good even Bradley liked it!! :D
You could easily change this up and instead of using the crushed red pepper flakes you can use orange juice and zest to make orange chicken! :)

Dirt Cake

1 block (8oz) cream cheese, softened
2 pkgs vanilla pudding
3c milk
1 tub (8oz) cool whip
1 pkg gummy worms
1 pkg oreos

1. Prepare pudding according to directions but use only the 3c of milk.
2. Using a hand mixer or stand mixer, cream the cream cheese.
3. Add the pudding to the cream cheese and beat until combined.
4. Stir in the cool whip.
5. Put oreos in ziplock baggy and beat the crap out of them until they're crushed.
6. Put 3/4 of oreo mixture in bottom of 9x13 pan.
7. Top with pudding mixture.
8. Sprinkle remaining oreos on top and top with gummy worms.

A few notes about this:

• I also crushed up some animal crackers (because my husband got into the oreos and those were the only ones on hand. You could use the chocolate version of those as well!) and on a positive I can tell people there's dead animals in it too! HA!
• I found some gummy "rocks" on sale, I put those on top as well!
• My mom once couldn't find gummy worms so she used gummy dinosaurs instead!

It's a cute dessert that people of all ages enjoy. This was the cake I have wanted for my birthday for probably 16 out of my 19 (almost 20) years and I still love it! Oh! And since I'm making this for Easter I make throw on some egg shaped gummy/candy things too!
Hope you like it!

Italian Polenta Porridge & Chicken Sausage

1c corn meal
3c water
1 1/2c crushed tomatoes
2 chicken sausage links, cut up in bite sized pieces (Mine were precooked.)
Pepper (black and white) & salt (I used garlic salt) to taste
Mozzarella cheese

1. Bring the 3c water to a boil.
2. Slowly pour in corn meal while whisking constantly.
3. Add salt and pepper.
4. Cook for 10min.
5. Add crushed tomatoes.
6. Let cook until cornmeal is soft I probably left mine for 15min.
7. Add chicken sausage.
8. Cook another 5min to let sausage heat thru.
9. Check seasonings.

*****Put into a bowl and top with shredded mozzarella cheese.

It was really pretty good!! I added some cream cheese later to make it a little more rich. If you don't want this as "soupy" just add another 1/2-3/4c polenta. This recipe will make about 4c polenta. If you want more for this dish I suggest cooking up a chicken breast and serving with it, that'd be pretty good.

:)

*****EDIT: Just now realized that if you do not want this like porridge, you can cool it for 45min or so and then reheat in the oven or in microwave and it will be a bit more thick! :)

Hashbrown Casserole!

1# Hashbrowns, frozen

1 1/2c Sour cream

2 cans Cream of chicken soup

2 bags (2c each) of shredded cojack cheese

1 small, minced White onion

1# Italian bulk sausage

1# ground beef

Lawrey's salt

Pepper

1. Cook the Italian sausage then drain.
2. In the same pan cook the hamburger and onion, making sure to season with Lawrey's, pepper, and I added garlic powder. Drain.
3. Mix all ingredients except 1c of cheese  together in a big bowl.
4. Check seasonings!
5. Transfer to a VERY WELL greased 9x13 pan.
6. Preheat oven to 350F.
7. Put hashbrown mix in 9x13pan, top with remaining cheese.
8. Cook for 1hr.

I decided to cook this in a Crockpot so, my mommy told me to cook it on high for 1 hour, then on low for 3-4hrs.  If you do a double batch like my mom usually does (but she doesn't use the meat) she cooks it for 1 hour on high then 6hrs on low. However after making it, it really doesn't take that long to cook and Brad thinks it'd be better cooked in the oven. He did like it but the hashbrowns were a little too "mushy" but it had good flavor. So that's a plus. Also, you can add any meat you like! Ham or bacon would be really good in this too! We also served this with greenbeans on the side cause I demanded it even tho Brad said we didn't need them. :D

Hope you like it!

Crumb Topped Apple Bars

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour 
• 1 stick Salted butter (if don't have on hand, just buy butter and add 1t salt)
• 4  tablespoons cold water  (only add one tablespoon at a time: may need more or less than suggested!)
• 2/3 cup sugar
• 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 12  tart cooking apples (such as Rome Beauty or Granny Smith), peeled, cored, and cut into 1/4-inch-thick slices (5 cups)
• 1/2c fresh pineapple (can used canned pineapple tidbits or crushed, but drain juice)

Directions

1. For dough: In a large bowl, Using a pastry blender, cut in shortening into 1 1/4c flour until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Sprinkle 1 tablespoon of the cold water over part of the flour mixture; gently toss with a fork. Push moistened dough to side of bowl. Repeat, using 1 tablespoon cold water at a time, until all of the flour mixture is moistened. Using your fingers, gently knead the dough just until a ball forms.

2. Preheat oven to 375F.

3. Press dough into a greased 11x7" pan (this is all I had on hand! If you have a 9x13 pan use that but may need to increase dough recipe!)

In an extra-large bowl, combine sugar, the 1/3 cup flour, the cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg; add apples and pineapple. Toss lightly until apples are coated. Spoon apple mixture into dough-lined pan; spread evenly. Sprinkle with Crumb Topping (pan will be full).

4. Bake for 40 to 45 minutes or until apples are tender. If necessary to prevent overbrowning, cover top with foil for the last 5 to 10 minutes of baking. Cool slightly in pan on a wire rack.

5. Serve warm or cool completely. Cut into rectangles.

Crumb Topping

Start to Finish: 30 mins

Ingredients

• 1 cup quick-cooking rolled oats
• 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
• 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
• 3T softened butter

Directions

I had some leftover juice (probably 1/3c)  from the apples (I didn't drain the water good enough!) so I used up the leftover juice in the crumb topping!

Mix all ingredients together, crumble on top of apple mix.

Had a few mix ups in this one just because I didn't want to fart around with "old" recipe, so I changed/altered it. I also didn't really measure anything , just eyeballed it. So, if it doesn't turn out, that's ok, I imagine it will still taste good!  While I was peeling all the apples I put them in a bowl of water with a little lemon juice to keep them from browning. Well, I didn't get quite all the water drained so the bars came out a tiny bit soggy but still delicious! Oh, btw I just got a huge bag of granny smith apples at the store, used 12 and had 6 leftover so I peeled and sliced those too, put them in a Ziploc baggy, labeled contents and amount and dated it and put in freezer for some other time!

GOOD LUCK! HAHA!