Chicken Fajita's

Quick, easy and delicious!!  One of the secrets is baking your chicken.  Sprinkle a lined baking sheet with chili powder and garlic powder.  Lay your chicken slices on the pan and sprinkle again with garlic and chili powder.  Bake at 350 for 30 - 40 min.  Enough time to cook your veggies and your chicken should still be juicy!

While your chicken is baking start heating your oil and butter on the stove top.  Add chopped onions till brown.

 Add your squash and red peppers and any other veggies you might want and saute till tender.  To add a little sauce I add a tablespoon of honey, garlic powder and a pinch of salt.

We usually eat this just chicken and veggies and sometimes lettuce and beans because it takes so much time to make tortillas. But for those of you who can't have fajitas without the tortilla I will be posting my tortilla recipe soon so watch for it. If you just don't have the time you can use Food For Life tortillas also but they seem kind of chewy to me.  Enjoy!

Chicken Fingers

Life here has gotten so busy so I needed to find some quick and simple dinners.  Well I stumbled upon a great site that could make some of your lives easier.  It is Onceamonthmom.com  She plans your monthly meals so you can cook on long day then have freezer meals all month long.  She has a gluten and dairy free recipe list.  I have loved some of her recipes and today I am going to share one. (you will be seeing recipes from her on here quite a bit during the crazy holidays cause I simply don't have time myself!)  I changed her corn flakes to frosted flakes because that is what I could find.

Chicken Fingers

1 Box of gluten free frosted flakes
1/2 cup frozen Orange Juice
1 1/2 lb boneless skinless chicken breast, cut into strips

4 chopped garlic cloves

2 large eggs

2/3 cup shredded unsweetened coconut

2 tb sugar

1 tsp molasses ( or substitute the sugar for brown sugar)

1 tb olive oil

2 tb butter

I love the EnviroKids Organic brand.  Not to expensive and limited ingredients.  You can get it at HEB

It a ziploc bag add the orange juice and garlic. After you cut your chicken into the size of strips you want, add them to the bag.  Let this marinate for at least 2 hours.  I usually do this the night before so it has all night and the next day to absorb the yummy orange flavor!  Then in a small dish you want to beat your eggs.  On another plate add your frosted flakes, coconut, olive oil, butter and sugars.  Crunch up and mix well.

Pull your chicken from the orange juice mixture, dip it in the eggs, then cover it with the frosted flake mixture.  Lay them flat and bake at 400 for about 12 minutes.

These were awsome!!  My husband and kids loved them.  What I thought would be two meals, turned out to be one. 

Broccoli Chicken Pesto

This is a pasta the is full of Veggies and your kids won't know.  You could have fun with this and use it for St. Patrick's day!

2 boneless skinless chicken breasts

1 Small can of Tomato sauce

2 heads of Broccoli

2 Red Bell peppers

Handful of fresh Basil

6 garlic Cloves

Tinkyada Pasta  

Start your pasta by following the directions on the package.  Unlike most GF Pastas, this one doesn't get mushy easily so don't me stingy on the water and boiling. 

Steam your broccoli heads until they are falling apart.  You want them very soft so they are easy to blend up.  

 While the broccoli is steaming dice up two chicken breasts.  You want them bite size peices.

 

Then brown them in a pan until cooked through.

Dice up your Basil and garlic

 

You are then going to put your tomato sauce, blended broccoli, basil and garlic all in a pot.  Heat it all together to blend the flavors.  You  can add salt to taste at this point.  

 

Once it is well heated add in your chicken.  Mix it all with your pasta and your kids are getting fun green pasta sauce!

 It might not look gourmet but have fun with it!!

Stir Fry on the Fly

This is the easiest stir fry ever.  Actually I am not sure it is really stir fry but I didn't know what else to call it.  We call it Taco Fry because that is what it tastes like.  It is a great throw together dinner recipe.  I use my favorite Jimmy Dean Natural Sausage, Broccoslaw, 1 can of no salt diced tomatoes and sometimes some yellow squash.  You brown the sausage then add all ingredients in a pot and heat up. 

 

It might not look great but it tastes great! And it is full of Veggies.

I LOVE MEATLOAF!!

And I love it even more that I don't have to put my hands in the meat to squish it all together.  This is an excellent meatloaf recipe because you don't have to add much seasoning to get a lot of it.  The secret is in the type of meat you use.  Ground turkey and Jimmie Dean All Natural Sausage.

 

I use the entire package of both of these to make my loaf.  You can just plop them right in you KitchenAid bowl along with 1 cup of milk ( I use Almond milk because we don't do dairy in our house either.  I like that I can get the milk unsweetened also), 1 egg, 1 onion or equivalent of dried onion.  Usually your dried onion packaging will tell you the equivalent.  I used dried onions tonight because of the lack of time or laziness to chop my onion.  1 tsp salt, 1 tsp sage (can be omitted and it still tastes great), 1/2 cup katsup.

Now to make it gluten free you use Gluten Free Oatmeal.  I buy Bob's because it is what is easiest to find at my grocery store.  Oatmeal itself is gluten free but is severely cross contaminated in the rolling process so you want to make sure it is labeled as so.  I only used 1 cup tonight and thought the meatloaf turned out a little soft.  I would recommend using at least 1 1/2 cups of oatmeal with this.  It depends on how you like your meatloaf though so experiment with it and see.  

The last ingredient is the worchestershire sauce.  I don't buy my sauce but make a concoction that is similar in recipes.  I know that there is a GF version but I have yet to find one.  I haven't looked to hard though.  If you know of one leave a comment so others can try it.  So instead I use 1/2 tsp of Apple Cider Vinegar, 1/4 tsp of Balsamic vinegar, 1tbl cane sugar, 1/2 tbl molasses.  The ketsup that was added ealier was also needed to help make this sauce.  I have used this in many recipes that call for worchestershire sauce and have had sucess.

Once everything is in, turn on the KitchenAid!  Pre-heat the oven to 350.  All ingredients will fit into a regular bread pan. 

Bake for 90 minutes.  As I said mine came out a little soft and I thought it needed more oatmeal.  You can kind of see it this picture of the cooked loaf. 

  

There just seemed to be to much juice in the pan.  The flavoring is absorbed by the oatmeal and this loaf was lacking that.  I don't get to make this very often because my husband refuses to eat meatloaf.  I have to make it when he is gone or I get to buy in dinner out, with out me! 

 

Good when served with steamed yams!