I have been cooking meals since Sunday for the freezer and for meals to take to the families staying in hotels in our neighborhood. I wanted something kids would eat and that would taste good. I have made 3 different meals x 2 (for later dates) so 6 total. I have also been making regular dinner meals on top of this so at least 3 meals per night since Sunday. I am a cooking fool! I am going to share the recipe for Garlic Chicken with Bow Tie Pasta. I have ruled this one out for kids as there is a lot of chunky things that I know I wouldn't eat as a kid (green peppers, and diced tomato chunks).
This is what my kitchen looked like gearing up my cooking extravaganza. I had to boil my split chicken breasts and shred the chicken off for all the meals during the week. It was nice to do that all at once on Sunday when I had a little more time.
Garlic Chicken with Bow Tie Pasta-
The ingredients:
1 Tbs. olive oil
2 cups cooked chicken diced (or you can cook it before you start your recipe, check instructions)
1 tsp. salt
1 Tbs. olive oil
2-3 gloves of garlic minced
1/2 cup green onions, sliced
3/4 cup red or orange bell peppers, chopped (I used green as they are always cheaper)
1 can (14.5-oz) diced tomatoes (undrained)
1/2 cup chicken broth
1/2 tsp. crushed red pepper (use less for a milder flavor)
1/2 tsp. cornstarch
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2- 1 lb bow tie pasta, cook as directed on package (depending on how much you love pasta)
1/4 cup fresh cilantro, chopped (may use fresh parsley)
Parmesan cheese, grated
Directions: In a large non-stick skillet, heat 1 tablespoon oil on medium-high heat and saute chicken until done. Sprinkle with salt and remove from skillet. Keep warm. In same skillet, saute garlic in 1 tablespoon olive oil until golden. Add green onions and peppers and cook an additional 2 minutes.
Add tomatoes, broth, red pepper, cornstarch and salt. Heat to boiling then reduce heat and simmer 5 minutes. Remove from heat. Combine chicken, pasta and cilantro. Sprinkle generously with freshly grated Parmesan cheese.
I used the disposable pans since I don't know who is going to eat these.
Combine everything right in your pan.
I put these in the freezer and then will thaw them and reheat them in the oven at 350 for approx 20-30 mins. I might need to add some more liquid depending on if my noodles ate it up.
I mentioned yesterday about a little home project David worked on this weekend. We have a media closet (under the stairs) which is where I would go in the event of a tornado. 1 week ago today the tornado hit our neighborhood and I recall most everyone that they interviewed on the news talked about this little closet under the stairs where they went for safety. It's quite big in there actually and we had this shelving unit in there before, but the problem now was that we had this huge printer and I couldn't move it out of the way.
So David built this custom unit that fits all of our media equipment and our big printer. The key to this is the bottom where the printer is sitting. It is a rolling cart that you can move out of the way.
Here is a closer look as I was starting to pull it out. I ran out of time this morning to move the whole thing, but you get the idea. The cart is also helpful if there is any paper jams in the back so we can access all sides. We still need to sand and stain it to make it pretty.
Speaking of printer, this is our gigantic laser printer. We had one just like this that fit in our office and a few months ago during a lightning storm it killed our printer. We got the old one free from Davids old work when they were moving and didn't want it anymore. We also got all this ink (which is majorly expensive) so we searched online for replacement parts and didn't have much luck. A new printer costs anywhere from $350(refurbished) - $800ish. We knew we didn't just want to give up on fixing/replacing it so we got on craigslist and found one at an office building downtown that they were having a moving type sale at. We called and the lady said that the ink exploded or something and she wanted way too much for it. So we told her to call us if it didn't sell. Well, it didn't sell and it was only $50!! David picked it up and cleaned out the ink issue and we have a brand new laser printer. We are still adjusting the colors and changing out the ink, but we could run a mini-printing press from our closet now. I am in charge of the neighborhood newsletter so this has helped make it much easier to produce. The other major bonus with this printer is that it has a flipper so it can print back and front without you doing anything.
This weekend we spent some time with friends, but we mostly went shopping around, cooking and David did a project (more on this later). It isn't the fun kind of shopping either, although I do find grocery shopping fun. When our power went out because of the tornado activity on Tuesday, we had to throw away most of our food. We went to 3 different stores (Sams, Kroger and Walmart) and spent close to $300. There is also another reason for spending that much. I volunteered to help cook meals for some of the families staying in hotels because they can't go back to their homes for a long while. I start on Wednesday for a Mom and her 5 children. I'll share some of my recipes I tried, some I decided halfway through aren't kid friendly, but I'll save them in my freezer just in case or we'll eat them. Now, I want to share with you the best pizza crust recipe we've found so far.
Ingredients-
1 pk dry yeast
1/3 c warm water
1 t sugar
1 c cold water
2 T olive oil
1 T sugar
1/4 t garlic salt
1/2 t salt
1/2 t dry oregano leaves
3- 3 1/2 c flour
Directions-
Sprinkle yeast over warm water and stir in the sugar. Let stand about 5 mins or until its very bubbly. Combine the remaining ingredients and about half the flour. Use your dough hook (kitchenaid Mixer) and beat to a smooth batter. Beat in the yeast mixture and continue to add the rest of the flour. Work it into a ball with your dough hook and when it starts to form the ball you can take it out and hand knead a few times if you'd like. Make sure to use a lot of flour as my dough ball was quite sticky. Place it in a bowl with a little pam or oil with a lid set on top (not tightly closed) or a big ziplock bag sprayed with Pam inside. You can let it sit in a warm sunny spot, or sometimes I turn on the oven and place it on top of the stove/counter area (no direct hot air should touch it though). Once it has doubled in size (approx 30-60mins) punch it down and form your pizza. We have done round pizzas but we decided to place it on a baking sheet in a big square shape. Make sure you grease your pans and put cornmeal down to prevent sticking. Put your toppings on and here is the trick. Let it rise AGAIN in a warm spot for 20 mins. Bake at 450 for 15-20 mins.
We put sausage and black olives on ours.
It came out great and tasted so good. You must give it a try. It makes buying a pizza seem silly.You can also make your dough ahead of time and freeze it, just don't let it rise that second time. Thaw it for 30 mins and continue from there.
I call Molly my Honey Bunny or just Bunny for short. She loves to cuddle with her Daddy more so than me (I think it's because he plays rough with her). This is what happens when I try to steal her love for David. Shes so cute.
I apologize for the long post. You can scroll down to pictures if you'd like. It has been a chaotic Tuesday afternoon, evening, and Wednesday for us. If you aren't in the Georgia area then you might not know what has transpired the last few days. We had a F-2 Tornado go through our subdivision at approx 3:40pm on Tuesday. I got word from our friend Dana who works with someone who was trying to drive down the road outside our entrance. She was explaining where this tornado was and Dana said that she knew we lived in that subdivision. She called me at about 4:15pm to break the news to me. I was suppose to meet her for dinner that night and we had planned to meet at my house before we went to make sure it was okay. This was way before I really knew how bad it was. She said it was just in the beginning so she was sure my house and doggie were fine. Well of course I ran out of work and had my sister checking the traffic and internet for information. I called David who was working 4 hours away and he immediately got in the car to come back home (more on how great he is later). Well I am trying to call all my immediate neighbors that I know to make sure they are okay and that my house and dog are okay. I finally get in touch with them and 1 just thought it was a huge lightning and thunder storm and our power was out. The other neighbor knew what was going on and she was trying to get her kids that were at school for a concert. She had told me that they weren't letting residents drive in and we had to walk from the entrance all the way in. Well we live in the back and its probably a 1.5-2 mile walk and it was POURING down rain. So I sat in 1.5 hours of traffic just on the street before our house and I was in a panic because I needed gas (I NEVER let it get this low and of course it was raining bad that morning and I didn't want to stop). I was trying to get close so I could see if I could get in. I had my neighbor get my spare key and check on the house and Molly. She said she was just fine and so was the house. David wanted me to just meet with Dana and have dinner and wait for him to get there. So we finally made it to the restaurant and basically drank our dinner as we were in shock/panic for a while. We finished up and couldn't wait for David so we headed over and walked through the mud and rain to get to the house. It was PITCH black and surreal as we walked in. It looked like a disaster zone with a million police cars, news crews and red cross type organizations. They were nice to keep asking if we had a place to stay, but not 1 offered us a ride to our house. As I'm walking in to look, I see the 3rd or 4th house in that all you can see is their living room. The room and side of their house is gone. I start panicking that this is way worse than I thought. They allowed roofers from many companies to come in with HUGE tarps and start covering everyones roof that was damaged since it was still pouring out. As we walk by the pool and middle area, it isn't that bad. We can't see much, but by the lack of activity we know that these peoples houses are okay. We've obviously seen too many movies, because all we can think of is Zombie land and when the zombies are going to come out to get us. We then get to the area where the worst damage is. It is just past the street I live on. So we make our way down there and just can't belive what we see. It is unreal to believe that no one was hurt. The house that was leveled and is now destroyed, no one was home thank god. We get to Molly and she is doing great. She eats dinner for me and starts playing with her toys to show off so I know she is okay. We lit candles and I packed our bags to stay with Dana and David for the night. David makes it to us a little while after and we started our journey out. It was still raining but not as bad. We went back the next day to look at all the damage and its nuts. I am blown away though by all the volunteers that were helping. There was the Red Cross giving meals, firewood, and water, home depot, salvation army, a million roofing companies, churches, rescue dogs, GEMA, police, fire, ambulances, and news galore. It's nice to see everyone coming together to help our little community. We finally got power and gas around dinner time yesterday. Life is back to normal for us, but its hard to go outside down the street to see other people and know that things are definitely not normal for them. It's surreal that it happened a few steps away and our little street was one of the only ones that had no damage at all. We knew a few of the affected people personally and they have been given temporary housing and are okay.
Let's start with the photos. Here is a video I found on youtube of someone in the beginning of the neighborhood who came outside with a video camera right after it happened. It is so eery to me. It is quiet, dark, but the rain stopped temporarily. You can see the first cops arrive on the scene and every ones reaction.
As we were driving the next day I started snapping photos.
This house is the one where you can now see directly into their living room. She ran into the closet that we all have under our stairwell for safety.
As we kept driving you can see all the huge tarps that they used to cover peoples houses.
This is the part of the major damage, just beyond that last house you can see. The news crew and police had it taped off so you can't drive down there.
Here is the view as we went walking down the road.
It is absolutely insane to see someones house basically inside out. There was also a small miracle here as well. There was a dog that was missing from this house and they could not find it the day before. The family returned the next day to try to find the dog. They got there and started hearing her whimpering. They had workers help lift a bedroom wall and out came the dog! She was happy and looked just fine!
This house was across the street from the one that was leveled. The mom and 2 kids were home and fine when this happened.
More damage
They even had helicopters landing in our pool parking lot! I want to take the time to thank everyone who called, texted, sent me message during all of this. My sister and family were great to keep me informed even though my Mom was freaking out and telling me to move home the whole time. Thanks to Davids parents for feeding us dinner and letting us spend the day there yesterday. I also want to thank Dana who was great and kept me informed, had dinner with me, went with me to my house in the rain (and tripped on the way back injuring her hand!) let us stay with them that night and took us to breakfast. And last but not least, my loving husband who drove hours to come make sure I was okay and help me get through all this. I couldn't ask for a better husband. The last video is just from the helicopter to show you an aerial view. Sorry about the advertisements.
Now that Thanksgiving is over, its time to gear up for Christmas! We wasted no time this weekend and got all of our decorations up in 1 day (Sunday), nothing like waiting till the last day of the weekend.
Our gigantic Christmas tree, I have a tree skirt that I have down now but I was waiting to vacuum again and must have already taken the picture. The colors do not show up well with my camera and apparently I didn't turn the lights on it on. It has lime green, red, purple and blue ornaments on the tree (not orange, I swear). We used to do a blue and silver tree theme (blue lights and all) but I wanted nothing to do with it this year. I will have to stock up on stuff for next year after Christmas.
Our stairwell and hanging ornaments
I also opened 1 box up that was new stuff that I got marked down from last years end of Christmas sale. That is always exciting for me because I never remember what I bought. I bought this lovely table cloth and used set our dining room table up. It needs to be ironed, sorry Mom. I love how the decor came out. The table cloth has snowflakes on the corner, which I seem to have not backed up enough to capture for you. You can imagine them I'm sure.
We received this nativity scene from Rita B (one of David's moms friends) with such a sweet note about using it for our first Christmas as a married couple and she also gave us the table setting that you see on the dining room table (minus the new table cloth). I think of her every time we get it out.
Our mantle. I hate our stockings since I no longer want a blue theme, but they will do for now. Our TV also blocks most of the presents so we did our best to display them all (you can rearrange all of them). We got this at Sams club at an after Christmas sale last year or the year before. So fun. We are going to start hanging up Christmas cards and photos that line the tv area. We got our first card last week, thanks to Bob and Jen. It is adorable!!
We celebrated Thanksgiving Day with Lunch at the Sugar Hill Diner with Amber and Bob, had our annual tradition of Chinese food dinner with his mom, dad, sister and her friend, and spent time with Dana and David for the late night. I wish I took pictures of each of these events, but I did not. We had a full day of fun, family and friends. I also did some baking of the turkey that you already saw.
As David was slicing the turkey you saw and of course you know who was sitting right next to his feet.
Our turkey was so juicy and wonderful.
I made sweet potato casserole for our day after thanksgiving celebration
and also Apple Pumpkin bread, which is always a favorite. I made a mandarin orange jello as well, but I must not have taken a picture.
On Friday it was time for our real thanksgiving celebration. We went over to Davids sister Gina's house. Look at all the great table settings.
Here is the whole gang. I think we had around 20 people.
Individual family shots. First up Darrin (his brother) Stacey, Ashley, Austin, Annslee. Can you tell that Uncle David has rubbed off on Austin.
Mary and Kaleb
Gina, Mark, Adam, Kathleen, Ian
Kim, Scott, Jake, Josh(working).
Me and David
The siblings with his parents. We had a great celebration and I'm so thankful to have a wonderful in-law family to spend gatherings with.
