Menu Monday

This week I am in town all week again - yay! Below are the recipes that we will be trying out this week.

Sunday: Sausage and cheese calzones

Monday: Pot roast with mashed potatoes and roasted carrots. For the roasted carrots, I cut carrots and place them on a sheet pan with olive oil, salt, and pepper. I usually roast them on 425 for about 15 - 20 minutes depending upon how thick the slices are.

Tuesday: Chicken cutlets with pecan sauce and steamed broccoli

Wednesday: Pastitsio I have made this recipe over and over. If you like lamb, this is a great dish. The flavor combinations are a bit different, but we love it.

Thursday: Slow cooker turkey chili

I hope you all have a nice week!

Happy Birthday, A!

photo from MarthaStewart.com

Today is my sister's birthday! A, I hope that you have a great day filled with all of your favorite things! I love you!

New Year's Eve Dinner

This year for NYE we decided to have a low key night and just invite some friends over and enjoy being at home. Neither Thomas or I are really into going out, so we were just as happy to stay at home. I made dinner and then we played wii and hung out with our friends. We toasted 2011 and then we all called it a night. The perfect way to ring in 2011 if you ask me!

I made mainly Pioneer Woman recipes and dinner was great. Really easy and everyone loved it. In fact, my friends duplicated the menu a few weeks later.

First Course: French Onion Soup

This was so, so good! Since NYE I have made this several times. It's easy and tastes really good. Be sure that you get very crusty French bread and definitely spring for gruyere. I think that Swiss would pass in a rush, but gruyere is just so delicious!

Main Course: Filet au poivre, mushrooms, and green beans with shallot butter sauce.

The filet au poivre was delicious. I cannot think of any changes that should be made to this recipe. It was decadent and the flavors were wonderful. The mushrooms I have made several times before and I love them. For the green beans, I used haricot verts, steamed them and then mixed them with sauteed shallots and butter. It was quick and easy.

This entire meal is something that I would absolutely make again for a special occasion. It was relatively easy and our friends loved it.

I hope you all have a great Sunday!

2010 - Some of my favorite recipes

Well... as much as I love Ina Garten and Martha Stewart, most of my favorite recipes from 2010 were from the Pioneer Woman. Good thing I wasn't on a diet! Ha ha! Listed below are some of my favorite recipes.

The Pioneer Woman's Beef with Snow Peas: This is hands down, amazing! The only changes that I make to this dish are that I use less cornstarch and I usually substitute broccoli for the snow peas. For a really quick dinner I will use steamfresh broccoli florets from the freezer section. I steam them in the microwave and then add them at the end. I serve this with jasmine rice.

Bourbon BBQ Baby Back Ribs: This recipe is from Southern Living and is now my favorite way to make ribs. They are tender and very, very easy to make! You can also substitute another sauce for the homemade Bourbon BBQ sauce.

Pot Roast: This is a recipe that I put together which I absolutely love. I usually serve this with mashed potatoes and some kind of roasted vegetable - carrots, asparagus, etc. Just toss the vegetables with olive oil, salt, and pepper, and cook in a 425 degree oven for 10-15 minutes.

Favorite Pimiento Cheese: I love, love, love pimiento cheese. It's good on french bread rounds, sandwiches, celery, etc. This recipe was from Southern Living and I made a few tweaks to their published recipe.

Scallops Provencal: This recipe is from Ina Garten, the queen of simple, beautiful food. This dish is very easy to make and delicious. I like to serve this with brown rice and roasted vegetable. This is also a great recipe to make for company because it is quick and easy but it still looks very nice.

Spaghetti and Meatballs: This is Pioneer Woman's recipe and I have made this time and time again. It's very flavorful and relatively easy to make.

Bon appetit!

New Year's Resolutions

I am not normally big on New Year's Resolutions. I think that sometimes they are a bit grandiose, and I don't want to set myself up for failure at the beginning of the year. There are always things that I aim to work towards, or things that I aim to do, but I try to set goals that are reasonable.



Every year I say that this is the year that I am going to read the bible from cover to cover. I have said this every single year for ages. I have decided that this is the year. I downloaded this bible from Barnes and Noble for my ipad. It splits the bible into sections that you read each day for the year. So far (I know, it's only day four!) I am on track and up to date.

Besides cooking, one of my other favorite hobbies is reading. In the past few years, I have only been reading about two to three books per year. That's much less than I like to read! One of my goals is to read more in 2011. There are several new books that I want to read, which I will post later. I don't know that I will have time to read as much as I used to, but I want to devote more time to reading than I did in 2010.

I also want to make an effort to create a bit more work life balance. I love my job and enjoy what I do, but this past year was tough. There was a lot going on and I found myself often making sacrifices in order to accomplish things at work. While I definitely want to keep my performance up at work, I also want to learn that it is okay to just shut down and leave sometimes. I am a perfectionist and like everything to be in order, but I hope to make a better effort this year to put myself first every so often.

What are your resolutions?