Random Thoughts...Food, Firearms, and Fun

This is a sponsored post written by me on behalf of Overnight Reputation for IZEA . All opinions are 100% mine. A few years ago, I was given the opportunity to spend a weekend in Los Angeles. I arrived on Friday morning, and returned home on Sunday evening! Talk about a crazy weekend, and oh, the jet lag!!! I drove the employees at the hotel crazy, because I wanted to know why, at 3 AM, the internet wasn't working! Then, by 7 PM, I was ready for bed! Even with those issues, I loved my stay! Sunshine, warm weather, gorgeous skies, and gorgeous views! When I travel, I sometimes have a tough time not having every second of every day planned out in advance. I want to do touristy things, but I also realize that the "locals" know far more about the good places to eat (the ones that stay in business because their food is amazing, not just because the tourists frequent it), the neat sights to see, etc. This is where Justin Sather enters the picture ( http://www.justinsath...

Tiffany and I headed to Dream Dinners early on Saturday, for our July meal prep experience. We arrived a few minutes late, but it wasn't a big deal, since this time, we knew exactly what we needed to do. We divided up our cooking instruction cards, and jumped into preparing the meals. I did customize my first meal, which was the "Chicago Style Choice Cut Chicken with Red Skin Potatoes." I added a bit extra to the sauce, as when I cook it, I'll simply add extra chicken breasts for extra leftovers. I had a few small issues with some of the meals this month. One was that for the pork burritos, I ended up with extra burrito filling, as if I filled them with the quantity they specified, I couldn't get them to roll without the filling leaking out of the shell. The other issue with it was that the shells tore a bit a few times. The third issue involved the Ziploc bags for most of the meals. I had multiple quart bags tear above the zipper. Nothing major though. When I...

I spent yesterday afternoon transporting two dogs on their journey to new homes. Both were very sweet, but a bit timid. As such, when I got home, I didn't want to put much effort into dinner, and didn't want to go to the baseball game. Mac and I went to the grocery store to pick up fruits and veggies for a few days, and once we got back, I cooked the Steak Salsa Verde from Dream Dinners. The Steak Salsa Verde was an impulse buy when I was there preparing my extra servings of Mango Chutney Chicken. It sounded good, in part because Mac loves green chile. It was one of their Chef Touched entrees, where it's already prepared, minus the cooking, and you just grab it from their freezer. I used our George Foreman Grill, and cooking was an adventure. Apparently, other than the fridge and the stove, we have 2 circuits in our kitchen. The microwave is on one, and the toaster and toaster oven are on the other. I plugged in the grill on the same circuit as the microwave, and then, ...

My next visit to Dream Dinners is tomorrow morning. My selections are: Santa Fe Shredded Pork Burritos Kentucky Pork Chops Boston's Chicken Carbonara Chicago Style Choice Cut Chicken with Red Skin Potatoes St. Louis Smokehouse Ribs Mesa Grilled Pork Roast I've asked Mac to work with me to select dinners for the next week, between what we still have in the freezer and these meals. Our menu options, in addition to the above, for next week are: White Chicken Lasagna Cheese Ravioli, Kielbasa Peppers and Onions Rigatoni w/Sausage and Kale Hungarian Goulash Chicken Teriyaki I'm guessing that he won't want the Chicken Teriyaki, since we just had that a few weeks ago. I'm trying to only serve 1 meal with pasta each week, because while he was in Saudi Arabia, he consumed a lot of pasta. I did suggest that we try the ravioli, since that's a crock pot meal, and my week looks like it may be a bit crazy. We're eating out on Monday (baseball game),...

I prepared the Outlaw Chicken Sliders from Dream Dinners on Tuesday. We had a baseball game that night, so we needed something quick, especially since I'd been dealing with my car issues. Mac was out cutting the grass when I got home, and I told him that I'd get dinner started. In my rush to prepare dinner, so we could make it to the game, I forgot to prepare any of the veggies I had for dinner. Oops! The Outlaw Chicken Sliders were very easy to prepare. The biggest delay was in waiting for the oven to preheat. To prepare them, you simply preheat the oven to 400, spritz a cookie sheet with non-stick cooking spray, place the chicken patties on the cookie sheet, and bake for 15 minutes. While those are baking you slice the rolls, wrap them in foil, and bake them for 5-10 minutes. Once you pull the chicken patties out of the oven, you place a slice of Swiss cheese on each patty, and then place on a bun, topping with french fried onions and their spicy mayo spread. They don...

Last night, as we were leaving the baseball game, my car sounded horrible, like it had a bad bearing. We drove it home, and I did a bit of research this morning. It sounds like I have a bad bearing in the a/c compressor. To avoid potential problems like overheating and such, they'll probably need to replace the a/c compressor. The car is in the shop, and I'm waiting to hear from them as to if it is the a/c compressor, or if they were able to find something else. Grumble, grumble, grr... The only good news is that if they can't fix it today, we have a few days leeway, since Mac is on vacation this week. I'm now at work, without a vehicle, and he's at home, with his car. If necessary, he'll pick me up tonight, and then we'll run an errand or two, and then head to the baseball game, postponing our Outlaw Chicken Sliders as dinner.

Mac will be home all next week, relaxing and doing a few minor home repair projects. He'll be replacing the woodwork around a few doors and taking care of the lawn. That means that dinner next week, if it just needs to be baked, can be ready when I get home from work, or shortly after that. Dinner on Monday will be hot dogs at the baseball game, since it's dollar dog night. Tuesday, I think I'm going to suggest that we try Summertime Pasta with Chicken. I think Wednesday, we'll do the Outlaw Chicken Sliders, and Thursday, I'll cook the Mexican Beef w/Corn Dumplings. The pasta can just be baked in the oven, so it's very simple. The Outlaw Chicken Sliders are pretty easy as well, but the Mexican Beef is a bit more challenging, because it involves cooking the dumplings. I'll try to post photos of the meals. For the pasta, I'll try to post photos of it both in the pan and on a plate. For the Dream Dinners that require only baking in a pan, when you pre...

This week has been very busy, and I've not cooked at all! Well, I take that back. I have cooked, just not for us. Monday night, we had a baseball game. Tuesday, we had a mystery shop and checked out a house we wanted to see. Yesterday, I cooked lunch for my Toastmasters meeting today. That meant that dinner last night was pizza. Tonight, I'm cooking the Chicken Yakitori that has been in the fridge, thawed, since last week. I offered to cook lunch for Toastmasters. It's my last Toastmasters meeting, as I'm resigning as of June 30. We're having a celebration of the club's achievements throughout the last year, so we're having cake for dessert. Lunch is: meat lasagna, veggie lasagna, and chicken and spinach lasagna. I prepared all of them in crock pots last night, and a friend who is also in Toastmasters, was going to bring them to the meeting today, after cooking them this morning. Oh, we also have Caesar salad as well. Mac and I were supposed to have choc...

Yesterday's dinner was Pulled Pork BBQ Sandwiches. Mac was in charge of cooking this dinner. He took a half day from work, since we were going to the Pirates vs. Orioles game last night. Since he was home early, he started the meal while I was on my way home. We had a few issues with this meal, and because we were in a hurry, I failed to take photos of if. Issue 1:  The pulled pork took longer to heat than what the directions said, to the point that I became impatient, and simply turned the burner up quite a bit. :-) Issue 2: Mac was not happy with the directions to toast the rolls, as they read, "Toast rolls under broiler, open side up, until golden brown," but failed to give a suggested amount of time. To correct this problem, I used a trick I learned as a child, from my mother. I scraped the burned areas off with a butter knife. :-) Issue 3: The pulled pork wasn't anything different from the pre-cooked pulled pork that you can buy at grocery stores, like ...

Of course, I can't seem to relax tonight. I have to head into work early tomorrow morning, because I have a ton of stuff due this week, including a placemat that requires using InDesign to edit. That's a bit of a challenge since I've not used it much, but I'll knock it out first thing tomorrow morning. Mac is asleep, as are the dogs, and of course, I can't relax enough to sleep! Geno just sighed and stretched out a bit more. He's now touching my foot. So cute! I'm watching Madagascar 2: Escape 2 Africa . I've not seen it before, and it's over in 10 minutes. Seems cute enough, even if I didn't see the beginning of it. Since the movie is now over, I'm watching the Cincy-Detroit game. I'm hoping Detroit can rally back. Although, since Cincy just hit  a home run, I'm guessing that won't happen. I'm thinking I may finally be close to heading to bed, so perhaps I won't see the end of the game. I can hope anyway!

Mac and I selected our Dream Dinners for the week. We're eating at the game tomorrow night, since it's Dollar Dog Night. I figured that we'll start with dinners for Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Friday night, we're dining out with several other couples. Well, we're grilling out at a friend's house. Dinner for the week: Tuesday--Mango Chutney Chicken Wednesday--Chicken Yakitori Thursday--Pork BBQ Sandwiches Friday--standard cookout food Mac is going to prepare Thursday's meal, so we'll see how that goes. The Chicken Yakitori was my free Chef's Touched entree. I wasn't given much time to browse or read instructions or ingredients, so we'll see how it tastes.