Meal Planning Monday

Here's what we're having this week:

Monday: homemade meatballs subs, chips, veggies
Tuesday: Tilapia in parchment paper, rice, veggies
Wednesday: out to eat with our supper club at Babe's
Thursday: cheeseburgers with turkey bacon, fruit
Friday: Beatles Rock Band/basketball watching party with our small group!
Saturday breakfast: Eggs, bacon and cinnamon toast
Saturday lunch: helping my sister and brother-in-law move (closer to us!)
Saturday dinner: taco soup, cornbread
Sunday breakfast: cereal
Sunday lunch: grilled cheese sandwiches and soup
Sunday dinner: out to eat for a family birthday at Hard 8

Hope you all have a great week!

King Ranch Chicken

I'm surprised I haven't posted about this already - its one of our favorite chicken dishes! I just made it tonight with a little twist, so I'll tell you about two variations.

Ingredients:
1 can cream of chicken soup
1 can cream of mushroom soup
1 can Rotel
1.5 cups chicken broth
12 tortillas, cut into quarters (pizza cutter works great for this!)
1/2 to 1 onion, chopped (amount to taste)
3 cups cooked, chopped chicken
1-2 cups shredded cheese (amount to taste)

To do:
-Mix soups, Rotel and chicken broth in large saucepan (a skillet might be too small, I use this piece and it works great).
-Add chicken and onion and cook for 10 minutes, covered.
-Spray a 9x13 or other baking dish with nonstick cooking spray.
-Layer tortillas, 1/3 of soup mixture and 1/3 cheese. Repeat layers 2 more times.
-Bake at 350 for 35 minutes.

Please, no comments on our lack of vegetables. I'm pretty sure Rotel counts. :)

Tips:
-I sometimes use 2 cream of chicken soups rather than 1 mushroom/1 chicken. I had one batch of King Ranch turn out very mushroom-y which was not too good (but no prob if you like mushrooms!)
-Tonight, I substituted crushed tortilla chips for the tortillas, and barely noticed a difference.
-This reheats GREAT! Almost better than the first time, which, if you know me well, is a big claim for me to make. I'm usually anti-leftovers :)

Let me know if you try it and like it!

Cinnamon Rolls

Recently, I was in San Diego visiting my sister and her adorable kids while my brother-in-law was on a trip. We decided to make the Pioneer Woman's cinnamon rolls, which was a two person job for sure (especially since there was also a 2 year old 'helper' and a 6 month old 'observer'). These cinnamon rolls were absolutely divine, but time consuming and far from healthy! :)

Yesterday afternoon, I decided I would try Money Saving Mom's Bread Machine cinnamon rolls, since I knew that the bread machine would make it much speedier. We served them to our small group this morning, and they definitely got a thumbs up all the way around! This is definitely a recipe I will be making again, as the product was great and the work minimal. One recipe's worth made two full cake pans and one loaf pan...I think it was 14 rolls? I doubled the filling as the recipe suggested. Next time, I might do 1 1/2 rather than 2 times the filling just to make it a tad healthier! Overall, these seemed like a fairly good recipe, health wise (as healthy as you could make a cinnamon roll!). Next time, I'll try subbing applesauce for the oil and possibly half wheat flour. You should definitely try these! If you don't have a bread machine, I believe there is some discussion on how to make them without one in the comments section.

Photo credit Moneysavingmom.com

Valentine's Day update...a little late

Well, its been a month since Valentine's day, so I'm a little behind on my blogging! Life has been crazy. Our power went out Valentine's weekend, so my big plans to create a great multi-course meal went out the window. Monday night, I did end up making Pioneer Woman's Penne a la Betsy.

It was, of course, fabulous! I was sad our original plans fell through, but to be honest we probably didn't need the remaining 8-9 slices of a peanut butter chocolate cake around the house :) (that was my planned dessert)

Hope you all had a great Valentine's day, and a great March too! Since its almost over, that is.