Salsa Chicken and Rice

Here is the recipe:

1 1/2 Cups uncooked white rice
3 Cups water
4 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
2 Cups shredded Montery Jack Cheese
2 Cups shredded Cheddar Cheese
2 cans Condensed Cream of Chicken Soup
2 cans Rotel (drained) or 1 1/2 cups Mild Salsa

Added Ingredients....
Tastefully Simple Seasoned Salt
Tastefully Simple Onion Onion
A few Tablespoons of butter


I was preparing this for 3 families at once, so I had quiet the production line.


Cook 1 1/2 cups rice in the 3 cups of water. While the rice is cooking I add a few Tablespoons of butter and a Tablespoon or two of Tastefully Simple Onion Onion. Lightly grease a 9x13 baking dish and add rice.


Rinse your chicken then cut up into thin strips or bite size pieces. Add Olive oil or cooking oil to a large pan and cook your chicken. I add Tastefully Simple Seasoned Salt to my chicken while it is cooking. After the chicken is finished cooking put on top of the rice.


I then added the cream of chicken soup. Normally I would combine the cream of chicken soup and Rotel together but my bowl wasn't large enough since I was preparing 3 dishes.


Add the Rotel and Salsa. Since I was making more then one dish I bought one of those large cans of Rotel plus a small one. When I got home I realized that wasn't enough, so I just added a little bit of salsa to it as well.


I forgot to take a picture of it topped with cheese before going into the oven. I like to shred my cheese from the blocks. It doesn't add that much time to the preparation and you don't have that powdery stuff on the cheese either. Bake at 350 degrees for 30-40 minutes or until bubbly.

Enjoy!

Zesty Cracked Peppercorn Chicken

Tonight for dinner I cooked Zesty Cracked Peppercorn Chicken, Broccoli with cheese and oven baked french fries.

The recipe for the Zesty Cracked Peppercorn Chicken is as follows:

Amazing Zesty Peppercorn Chicken Nuggets
Submitted by Jami Jann (SC)

Ingredients
3 Tbsp. melted butter
5 Tbsp. Zesty Cracked Peppercorn Sauce
1 1/2 lbs. chicken breast, cut into 1-inch cubes
2 sleeves butter-flavored crackers, crushed
1/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese

Directions
Combine first 2 ingredients in small bowl; mix well. Coat chicken in this mixture. Combine crackers and cheese in a large resealable bag. Place 4-6 chicken nuggets in resealable bag and shake in bag until well coated. Place chicken on a greased baking sheet and bake at 400° for 7-9 minutes or until cooked through. Makes 6-8 servings.

I decided to use some Garlic & Herb crackers and liked how it turned out.


This is the ingredients that you need. Since I didn't use the plain butter-flavored crackers, they didn't come in sleeves. So, I just eyeballed it and I had plenty.


I like to use a meat mallet to crush the crackers with.


That looks pretty good now.


Zesty Cracked Peppercorn Sauce with the melted butter. Love the smell of this stuff!


The chicken hanging out in the sauce/butter mixture.


All ready to go in the oven


Nice and golden brown and ready to be eaten. :) This was my first time making these and they were very tasty!

How I like to do Cheesesteak sandwiches

First chop up some onions. I love this Pampered Chef knife. It stays so sharp. I need to get some more of them.


I then added some Olive Oil to the pan along with the onion, some Tastefully Simple Garlic Pepper Seasoning and Seasoned Salt


STEAK*EZE, my new friend! This is the best stuff I have used for cheese steak. It is so much easier then preparing the meat yourself and taste a lot better then some of those other brands. I love this stuff. It comes in a frozen block that looks like a large patty. You can put it directly in your pan, frozen. Let it cook for a little while on one side then turn it. You then can start separating the meat and it comes apart super easily. It came from the freezer section in one of those big wholesale clubs.


Onions are done now. I like for them to be soft.


I added a few splashes of Teriyaki sauce to the beef after it was done cooking.


I added the steak, onions and then the cheese. I used 2 slices of Swiss on each hoagie. I just used what I had. Provolone is also really good on it. I stuck it in the toaster oven until the cheese melted. I was then going to add just a little bit of mayonnaise but put the top on before I got the mayo on. It didn't need it anyway.


I also had a garden salad with it. The cherry tomatoes and cucumbers even came from my garden.

Hungry yet? :)

Linking up over at....

Homemade Tomato Spaghetti Sauce

This is the second time this Summer I have made this sauce. I could eat it at least once a week though. I love it! I posted about it previously here but I decided to take a few pictures this time.



I added enough Olive Oil to cover the bottom of a large pan. I then added a medium onion diced. I let the onion cook until it begins to become soft. I then added about a Tablespoon of Garlic Garlic, and as many tomatoes, diced as you wish. You can use canned tomatoes if you don't have fresh and if you don't have Garlic Garlic you can also add a lot of fresh garlic. This dish is full of garlic and tomatoes! That is what I love about my Tastefully Simple products. They make cooking that much easier!


After your tomatoes have been simmering for a while it will look like this. To the tomatoes I add a couple of Tablespoons of Tastefully Simple Italian Garlic Bread Seasoning. It was a seasoning that was available in the past Fall/Winter catalog and will be available again this Fall/Winter. Again, if you don't have this you can add some Italian herbs. I also add a couple of Tablespoons of sugar, about a Tablespoon of salt and fresh ground pepper. My measurements are not exact, just use to your liking.


As my sauce was cooking I grilled some chicken to top this with. My husband doesn't like pasta without some type of meat on it. The last time I cooked it I didn't add any meat and he said it smelled good but didn't even try it. The chicken here was 2 very large chicken breast. Some people like to use a meat mallet to thin out their chicken. I do this sometimes but usually I just use a knife to cut it in half if it is a thick breast. I then cut it into smaller pieces as you can see. The chicken cooks much faster then just putting a huge breast on the grill. When I have large chicken breast I almost always cut it up into smaller pieces like this. Before grilling the chicken I seasoned it with Tastefully Simple Seasoned Salt , Garlic Pepper Seasoning, and Balsamic and Basil Dipping Oil. The Balsamic and Basil Dipping Oil is delish on chicken!


Here is the final dish with the chicken cut into smaller pieces. Although this was served over spaghetti, I like to serve it over angel hair pasta then top with some shredded Parmesan cheese.

I'm sharing this over at:

Dinner tonight

This morning I took my kids to a Children's day camp at a church where they attended Vacation Bible School. I'm hoping maybe we could do something like this at our church in the future. It is only one day a week for the month of July from 9:00-11:30. We didn't get there this morning until after 9:30. For some reason I was thinking it started at 11:00. The kids seemed to have a good time though.

I have dinner in the slow cooker ready to be served tonight. I also made some for a friend who just had surgery. I love slow cooker recipes because you just put it in there and walk away. Easy peasey. I also made some bread which is already ready. Both of these are Tastefully Simple recipes.

Creamy Artichoke Chicken
Submitted by Rosemary (MN) HQ Resident Chef

Ingredients
1 packet Artichoke & Spinach Warm Dip Mix
8 oz. cream cheese, cubed
1 1/2 lbs. boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cubed
1/2 cup chicken broth
4 oz. shredded Swiss cheese
Prepared baked potatoes, pasta or rice

Directions
Combine first 4 ingredients in a greased slow cooker. Cover, cook on low for 3-4 hours. During last 30 minutes of cooking, stir in Swiss cheese. Serve over hot baked potatoes, pasta or rice. Makes about 6 servings.

Simply Herb Bread with Herb Butter Spread
Submitted by Kimberly Wright (CO) Ingredients
Bountiful Beer Bread Mix^®
1 Tbsp. Garlic Garlic™
1 Tbsp. Onion Onion™
1 Tbsp. Spinach & Herb Dip Mix
12 oz. beer
4 Tbsp. butter, melted
5 Tbsp. butter, softened
1 Tbsp. Garlic Garlic™
1 Tbsp. Spinach & Herb Dip Mix

Directions
Combine the first 4 ingredients together. Add the mixture to the beer in a large bowl. Mix as directed on package. Pour dough into greased 9 x 5 loaf pan. Pour the 4 tablespoons of melted butter on top. Bake at 375° for 50-55 minutes until loaf is golden brown and pulls away from sides. Remove from pan and cool on rack for 30 minutes before slicing. Makes about 14 servings.

Herb Butter Spread:

In a small bowl, combine the last 3 ingredients; chill. Serve on warm bread.

4th of July Chocolate Dipped Strawberries

Isn't she a beauty? :)

A few days ago I posted about some cute chocolate dipped strawberries. I just had to try these out for myself.


I have everything ready. The strawberries patted dry, the white chocolate melted and the blue sprinkles. Don't you love the container the sprinkles are in. Ha!


I melted almost a cup of white chocolate, but didn't use all of it. I used between a pound and a pound and a half of strawberries.


These are some of the others before they went in the refrigerator.

Now to go enjoy them my daughter and I cannot wait. Hubby isn't home. Hopefully we will save some for him. :)

Ok, I'm back and we had several. Then I decided it would be nice to give a few to others. So, I printed a few tags from here on Executive Homemaker . I just used those little craft scissors to give it the border then I used a star punch.



Clear plastic bags would have been cuter but I didn't have any so I used what I had.