Sesame Chicken: Bake It Without Shaking It.

A few years back, there was a product called Shake and Bake.  It was the lazy man's way to coat chicken parts for baking in the oven.  It involved pouring the mixture in a bag with wet chicken parts and shaking the bag until the chicken was coated with the crumbs.

Shake N Bake Chicken parts for the oven

Now I ask you, "Is this the way to make good chicken?"  True it is healthier to bake your chicken rather than frying it in oils.

My sister-in-law made a recipe that called for mayonnaise to coat the chicken and a bread crumb mixed with sesame seeds for a shower that she was hosting.  I'm not fond of any chicken except roasted chicken with stuffing, but this recipe for Sesame Chicken was one of the best that I've ever tasted.

Sesame Chicken from the Oven

The breading is moist and flavorful and not dry like you would expect since it was baked on an open sheet pan in the oven.

Sesame Chicken with Broccoli

In this day of thinking heart healthy, this recipe is one that I would recommend for your Sunday dinner menu.

Easy Casserole Dinners

Just being lazy is one reason to make a casserole.  In some recipes it all goes in one bowl and the result is a delicious change to your menu.  When I'm being particularly lazy I buy a pan of macaroni and cheese and then microwave a chicken breast and some broccoli.  When the macaroni is just about done you can add the chicken and broccoli and you have a one dish dinner that is tasty and mostly nutritious.

Mac and Cheese with Broccoli and Chicken

Of course, you can do it the long way and make it all from scratch such as the linked recipe for home-made macaroni and cheese with chicken and broccoli.

Sausage, Apples & Rice Casserole

Another one of my favorite casseroles is Sausage Apples and Rice.  This recipe I made up after eating something similar at a cafeteria where I worked which used Stouffer Recipes.  I served it to my step-children soon after I married my second husband and to this day they are asking me for the recipe.  It's rather easy to make and the secret to it's good flavor is that I boil apple juice to make my rice.  The apples come from the ones I put up for winter usually or I have to microwave a batch while the rice is cooking.  The sausage is usually leftovers from breakfast but you can start by cooking down the sausage from scratch.

Chicken and Stuffing Casserole

I have to admit I got this idea from the side of a box of stuffing mix.  I mix the stuffing with chicken broth, place chicken breasts on top of the dish, cover with foil and bake at 350 degrees until the chicken is cooked through and the stuffing is moist.  You can also add some broccoli to this recipe.

Each of these recipes is easy to make and takes varying cooking times but the result is a fabulous dinner.

Party Food: Fruit Salad Trifle

Is the same old Ambrosia Salad getting old?  Have you gotten stale at making the traditional Fruit Salad for your family picnic?

Grandma's Ambrosia Salad

Grandma made her ambrosia salad before they had canned pineapple and she would cut her own from a fresh pineapple.  She would put the cut up fruit and juices over the marshmallows that she had to snip into pieces and put into the refrigerator.  There were no miniature marshmallows in those days.  The next she made her own whipped cream and folded it into the fruit.  If she had some walnuts she would chop them over the mixture.  With the availability of canned pineapple and miniature marshmallows, I use these to make my ambrosia salad.  If I'm feeling adventurous, I use the colored miniature marshmallows.

The traditional fruit salad combines as many different fruits as you like and my favorites are linked to this article.

I have a new and exciting salad that combines all of the above into a fresh idea that is sure to please even the most picky family members.

You start with a large clear serving bowl only to make this colorful and exciting salad more enticing with it's layers of goodies.

2 loaf size prepared pound cakes, cut in 1 to 2 inch cubes
2 packages (3.4 ounces) instant coconut or vanilla pudding
3 cups cold milk
1 pint heavy cream whipped with a little sugar or 1 container (12 ounces) frozen whipped topping, thawed
4 cups assorted, diced fruits

Directions:
In a large bowl, beat the milk and pudding mixes together until pudding starts to thicken. Fold about 3/4 of the whipped topping into the pudding mixture. In another bowl gently toss fruits together. Layer half of the cake into the bottom pretty clear glass bowl.  Next, spoon half of the pudding mixture on top of the cake. Then, spoon about 1/3 of the fruit on top of the pudding. Then add a layer of your ambrosia salad.  Repeat. Cover trifle, remaining fruit, and whipped cream with plastic and refrigerate at least a few hours before serving. Right before serving spoon remaining whipped cream on top.  You can sprinkle coconut over the top of the mixture but I prefer to leave it off.

This was not originally my recipe but I've added to it to use my own recipes and to come up with a different fruit bowl for our picnics.  Add or subtract what you wish from this rendering but always make sure to include the fruit salad in your summer fun.

Cheesy Potatoes Made into a Frittata

This was Bill's version of my Cheesy Potato recipe.  He had been taking pieces of the cheesy potatoes I made and mixing it into his morning omelette.  So, what does he do?  He goes out and buys what he thinks should go into this dish and makes his own.  My son was a fanatic when it came to cheese and eggs.  He loved anything made with these two ingredients.

For those who don't know this is an omelette style recipe or Frittata rather than a quiche.  Quiche is when you pour your mixture over a bottom crust and it is an open face pie style.  Quiche is a fancy pie with no upper crust.

Cheesy Potato Omelette

  It's hard to believe that this great guy is no longer here changing my recipes.  I told him what I put into mine and he went out and changed it up by replacing the cream of chicken soup with a can of cream of mushroom soup.  He didn't use any sour cream.  Instead he scrambled a dozen eggs which he did not put into the potato mixture but poured over the top of the prepared potatoes.

Then, to top off his style of cooking, he chopped up a tomato and sprinkled it over the egg mixture.  Into the oven it went and the above casserole is what came out.  To be honest, I was not sure I would like it with the eggs spread over the top and with the tomato bits.  I finally tried it and I have to admit it has it's own flavor.  I still want to try this recipe with the O'Brien style mixture with green pepper and onions but now I have to wait for another occasion that we need a side dish for the meal.  I have found I like working with fresh chives now so that may be the replacement for onions in my next attempt.  We have enjoyed the flavor of cheesy potatoes enough for this year.  We will have to wait for another day when I decide to make something homey like meatloaf.

So for another day, we have given you a choice for your cheesy potato dish.  Again, you can't go wrong when you add to or take away from a recipe, you just have use the "try it -- you'll like it" method.

Coke or Pepsi?

When I was growing up, our household got a delivery of a case of little green bottles of coca cola about once a month from the local beer distributor.  My brother and I were not permitted to drink it except on special occasions such as holidays.  I now know that my grandfather purchased it for my mother's favorite drink, rum and coke.

little green coca cola bottles

My mother wasn't a boozer but as my father put it, she was a cheap date drinking draft beer until they got married.  I'm sure if you did the math a case of coke would not last an entire month.  As I said my father, would allow us children a drink of ginger ale or root beer but we were not as fortunate as our friends next door who were fed coca cola and pretzels when they had the trots or some other such ailment.

Mr. Fehrman at the soda fountain

When we were old enough to walk down street to the commercial district to Fehrmann's Pharmacy that had a soda fountain and he served coca cola products.  It was there that I learned to mix coca cola with a squirt of cherry or vanilla flavoring from the fountain to get a different taste.  My friend liked chocolate in hers but I never did like that one.  We spent many happy hours at that soda fountain in our teenage years.

When I married my husband was a Pepsi drinker.  He relished his Pepsi over Coke but would switch if it weren't available.  I on the other hand have been known to drink ice water at any restaurant that only offered Pepsi products.

As a member of the house committee for our local club, we had Coke products on the gun system, but we did purchase cans of Pepsi for those members who preferred the other.  I have been to clubs that only use one or the other and I find that does not serve your membership well because there are strong preferences between cola drinkers.

Whatever your preference, I'm sure you have stories to tell from your childhood about the different brands of soda that were and are still available.  In the root beer line there were Hires and Dad's.  In our house we preferred Dad's.  There is no ginger ale that can compare with Canada Dry and is the one that we were fed as children for feverish ailments.

In any case, which is your preference in the cola line?  Coke or Pepsi!

Planters In The Works

A few years ago, I had my box planters and hanging planters well on the way by this time.  Then I scrapped everything from previous years and started over.  I  moved my box planters from the front porch to the railing on the side deck for a different look.  I did this mostly because my front porch railings need to be scraped and painted.  To date that has not happened.  My original intention was to hang some hanging planters on the front porch that gets very little sun.

All of my plans have gone awry again this year.  I  again moved my box planters and the one is sitting over a wild flower that just wont die and detracts from the rest of my entrance garden.  I would like to go back to the red, white and blue theme this year.

I've been thinking about going back to ivy geraniums for the hanging planters since those seem to do so well in the past.

I saw some mandevilla that I particularly like at the local store.

My biggest problem this year is getting time to work on the plants.  Besides that the box planters now catch bird seed so that my rock garden doesn't get overrun with weeds.  I think I'm going to start all over again and decide on a different look for the porch.

Next week I'm going to be selecting my plants and we will get a view of what happens to the planters next week.  I'm determined to have them all done by Memorial Day in honor of my oldest son who gave me the original planter and my youngest son who was in the Navy.  I can't plant at his grave at The National Cemetery of the Alleghenies but I can put out a nice garden at the home they once owned when I put Old Glory out for the season of Memorial Day in May to Veterans Day in November.