Fried Chicken

Alright, since today is the ONLY day this week that I don't have a photo shoot I guess I can make a post.
My favorite dinner growing up was fried chicken and mashed potatoes. Although, I have NEVER made it before! I'm so glad I called my mom and asked what I was supposed to do or else I would have just tossed the chicken in vegetable oil without any flour!

She was busy, so I didn't have time to ask her what else to do or how much oil to use. First I thought I didn't have enough and poured more in. Then I thought I had too much and eventually dumped some out! It probably would have been easier making it on the stove since the middle of my frying pan bumps up and all the oil surrounds the sides. I think I got it to work out okay though.

It didn't taste as good as I remember my mom's being. Maybe she added something special to it... like love or some other tasty spices. But there's the finished platter...

Finally a colorful dinner!... Sort of :)

BUSY busy

I'm not too sure how often I'll be able to update my blog this week. Starting today at 4 I have a VERY very busy week ahead of me with my photography. I have SEVEN shoots this week! This must be a record for me. I'm sure I'll be worn out come Sunday.
Saturday I did a shoot just for fun of Ian and his friends. Ian even let me model and took some portraits of me! It was totally fun and I'm so proud of him for doing so well behind the camera :)
Here's some photos of the three guys I photographed....

I had so much fun and glad I was able to finally shoot for myself instead of a client. I find I get more artistic if I'm able to shoot for myself because I'm thinking about my needs and wants instead of the clients. So... if I shoot for myself more often I'm hoping my skills get better and my clients photos will turn out even more fantastic!
You can swing by my photo blog because I'm sure I'll be posting there a WHOLE BUNCH this week :)

Crispy Parmesan Chicken & Roasted Potato Medley

Since I've been slacking in the cooking department this week I decided to go all out... and by all out I mean make TWO new things for dinner :)
This is what I made....

AND...

The Roasted Potato Medley calls for "sweet potatoes" so I went to the store and bought a "sweet potato". Come to find out, mine wasn't orange. They totally used a yam. *shakes fist* Don't label it a "sweet potato" if it's a "yam". Geeeze. So now I'm missing some color in my potatoes. Plus... I used red potatoes instead of Yukon Gold potatoes, but guess what.. those aren't red when you peal them.. they're yellow. I've been fooled TWICE today! As for the chicken.. somewhere underneath all those crumbs IS chicken! hah

Now back to the potatoes again....I put Kyle in charge of the potatoes while I worked on the chicken. When it asked him to "drizzle" the potatoes with olive oil he decided they should go for a SWIM! Midway through cooking the potatoes I had to drain all of the oil out because they weren't cooking! Haha.. I should have taken a picture of them swimming.. but sadly I didn't. Here's how they look cooked though!

And my beautiful cooked chicken..

I cooked them both in the oven at the same time. It says to cook the chicken at a higher temperature than the potatoes, but for a shorter period of time. So I put them in longer at the same temp. as the potatoes. They turned out PERFECT!

You must try this.. it's fantastic :)

Neon Trees thanks Wendy G.

I have nothing else to post about.. so you should head over to my photo blog and read my new post about Neon Trees new album and how MY name is in the credits :)

Cajun Chicken & Baked Potatoes

I didn't really plan anything for dinner yesterday. I was so busy playing around on the computer setting up a Facebook Fan Page for Alissa's Boutique 5 o'clock crept up a lot quicker than usual. I have a bag of potatoes that need to be used before they start sprouting, so I decided on baking some potatoes for the FIRST time!

 I poked them with a fork quite a few times, brushed them with butter and wrapped them up in foil. I put them in the oven for 45 minutes at 400' and they came out a little crunchy still. Oh well. Ate it anyway. While that was baking I made some Cajun chicken.

Put some butter, salt, pepper and cheese on my potato... and here's my pretty dinner platter..

Peanut Butter Fingers

I got another recipe in Relief Society yesterday.. this time a dessert! Here's how you make it..

Every 2nd Sunday we head to Ian's parents for dinner. I really wanted to make this to bring for dessert and tried making it at the last minute. I would have been done before we needed to leave, but I soon realized that I cannot multitask. Sarah (Kyle's fiance) was here visiting and we were chatting it up in the kitchen. For some reason I can't bake and talk at the same time!

 That's everything mixed together... then I baked it...

I didn't have time for it to cool before I frosted it, but I'm going to assume it doesn't matter.

And here's my yummy little fingers!

They are SO good I had them for breakfast this morning! I know.. super healthy right? Well it has instant oats in it... so I figure it's close enough to a breakfast food!! hah

things on my mind...

We paid $100 at the ER and now we have a bill for $100. I do believe that $200 is a lot to pay for a baby I never got. Luckily we have insurance.. or else it would have been over $3,000 for my miscarriage. I find that quite ridiculous. Anyone else agree?

Moving on from that... I'm in a total funk right now. Can't sleep at night, completely worn out from doing nothing, losing my passion for things, and I totally and utterly can't stand the hair on my head. I know Ian wants me to have long hair but I hate it. It's dry, brittle, full of split ends and is just a pain to deal with each morning. I think I might just go chop it off. I'm not meant to have long hair. I used to cut my hair every time I was depressed... which lead to me shaving my head quite a few years ago.
I've done some CRAZY things to my hair over the years.. lets take a look.

Prior to this first hair cut I've had a mohawk, shaved head with bangs, mullet and a rat tail. I will admit, my family is happy that stage of my life is over with.

And I'm even missing some styles in between! CRAZY. Right now I'm loving the cut of the 4th photo and 5th to last.
What I might do instead.... combine these two..

Western Potato Rounds & BBQ Chicken

I went out and bought a bag a potatoes with hopes of learning to do new things with this yummy carb! I found a recipe for Western Potato Rounds and here's how they turned out...

I don't have a fancy "garnisher" to make the potatoes look all crinkle cut, but who cares. It doesn't make them taste any better! I also didn't have green onions so I just used some left over red peppers. OMG it was sooo tasty :) Here's how they looked before they went in for the last 3 minutes...

I also used Jennie-O turkey bacon instead of normal bacon. I like to eat semi healthy around here! ;) I must admit they look a little more pretty before you melt the cheese, but it sure was good!

And my finished product...

VERY delish! I highly recommend it!

Florentine Chicken Ring

Tonight's dinner is pretty similar to the Chicken and Broccoli ring I've made before... except this one has spinach! I have NEVER cooked with spinach before. YAY for another first timer!! :)

I didn't use the nutmeg.....I'm not even sure what nutmeg is.

 

  

Ooooh it's so prettttty

 

I also made fruit salad. My mom used to make it all the time when I lived at home. I LOVE that stuff. That and banana cream pie! Ooooh yum! It's just canned fruit cocktail, bananas and cool whip. When we lived in Sugarland, Texas and I was 6 I would pretend I was an orphan and was only fed cool whip (although I acted as if it was something awful). I liked to curl up on the couch pretending it was some scary orphanage and would finish off the cool whip container with my finger :) hehe silly kids.

 

Anyway.. this was super yummy! I think I enjoyed it more than the Chicken and Broccoli Ring.

Hamburger Corn Casserole with a side of tears

Today in Relief Society another recipe was passed around.. Hamburger Corn Casserole. I've noticed I've been cooking A LOT with hamburger meat lately. Good thing though, it's been in our freezer forever and now I've finally used it all up! Anyway.. it sounded odd, but I went with it. My first REAL casserole dish :)

EDITS: Like I've mentioned before, our hamburger meat is in zip lock bags, so I'm not sure how many lbs is in each bag! I didn't have canned corn, so I used frozen and had to measure out 12 oz. I also didn't have egg noodles, but I had left over bow tie noodles that I used instead! I'm assuming that because of these changes a 2 quart casserole dish SOO didn't fit all of this. I poured the first half in the dish and it would have spilled over if I added in the noodles. It totally fit perfectly in a 4 quart dish though! hah

 

There's my pretty dish sitting next to some flat corn bread that didn't feel like rising (not homemade. I had a roommate that put actual corn in her homemade corn bread. It REALLY weirded me out. Everyone else seemed to love it though.. or maybe they were just being nice). But anyway, it could have something to do with the fact that it expired in 06! haha...tasted fine though.

 

 

While I was cleaning up and doing some dishes my disposal made a horrible grumbling noise. Come to find out my poor tsp went for a dive in the danger zone. RIP little fella. You'll be missed :(

So back to church... while Ian and I were in Sunday School there was THE CUTEST little baby girl wearing the cutest little tutu church outfit I'd ever seen! Her socks even looked like ballet slippers that laced up her legs. Her Grandparents had her sitting on the floor and I kept smiling at her and she'd get excited and fall over. After a while my smile turned into tears. I tried to hold them back but they just came streaming from my face. Ian had a look of complete confusion on his face when he saw my tears. I had to run out of the class and into the bathroom to compose myself. I've been getting pretty depressed again. This process isn't easy.... and neither is a month long period. No wonder I'm so emotional.

Sloppy Joe VS Manwich

Yes, I could make my life so much easier than it already is by buying a can of manwich....but no. I refuse. I will make it from scratch by mixing....
1 lb hamburger
(I think I mixed more..not sure though. Ours is frozen in zip lock baggies)
1/4 cup ketchup
1/4 cup bbq sauce
2 tbs mustard
8 oz can tomato sauce
4 tsp brown sugar
1/2 tsp garlic salt
plus salt, pepper and onion to the taste.

 

It was a heck of a lot messier than I remember. I don't think I've eaten one since high school! My bun was so soft it totally fell apart and I had to eat it with a fork! HA. yummmm

It made enough for 6. I made them for lunch so Ian and I both had one, he took two for his dinner tonight and Kyle just had his! :) Success! Although now Kyle doesn't have lunch for tomorrow! hah... wait. I guess Ian doesn't have lunch for tomorrow either. Doh!

Stuffed Pizza

Pizza again?! Yeah I know..... I'm running low on ingredients and I'm too lazy to go to the store! But anyway.. this is what I made tonight. I was looking through a cook book and found something similar to this.. although I didn't have the million things it wanted, so I just went with it and came up with my own idea.

It asked for pizza dough.. didn't have it. So I used two 8 packs of croissants and laid them out like so and laid some in the center. Then I pressed it all flat and put on my toppings which consisted of sauce mixed with Parmesan cheese and garlic salt. Then I added on 3 different types of cheese (mozzarella, cheddar and Parmesan) and some sliced tomatoes. Then I folded it up!

The original recipe said to bake it at 420 for 15 minutes. I soon found out that was not a good idea. The outside started looking burnt when I took it out....

 

It sure looked pretty! But it was still doughy in the center. So I set it for 375 and kept an eye on it. I think it finally turned out okay.. although real dough might have made it taste more like a pizza! Oh.. and peperoni would have been yummy too :) hahah

Now I'm already ready for bed. It's been a LOONG week/weekend. On Thursday I photographed the Boy Scouts of America 100th Anniversary Gala. I was there for about 5 hours with 2 cameras hanging from my neck... one with a giant zoom and one with a more normal, yet still heavy lens. I'm still sore! Saturday we took Atkins family photos. Kyle helped me out some so I could be in some shots! hah Then Sunday I photographed some amazing engagements in an orchard that I still need to post on my photo blog. I LOVE them. But now I'm pooped... I mean I've been pooped. Ughh..soooooooo tired.