Mom's Fancy Fried Rice

1 Tbsp oil
1 chopped onion
chopped peppers of all colors :)
chopped mushrooms
soya sauce
1 egg
1 box of Dainty Fried rice
1/2 cup water
1 - 2 cups of Minute Rice, depending on how many are eating
1 - 1 1/2 cups of water, depending on how much Minute Rice is used
1 envelope OXO
garlic powder
seasoning salt
cumin

Put the oil in the frying pan. Fry the onions a bit before throwing in the peppers and mushrooms. I don't use whole peppers but just some of each color because we like all the different peppers. Sprinkle with soya sauce. Break egg into frying pan and scramble fry with everything already in there. Open the tin in the Dainty Rice box and pour the rice into the frying pan. Pour in half a cup of water and spice mix in box. Throw in Minute Rice, 1 cup of water and envelope of OXO. Fry while stirring it all together until water is all absorbed. Sprinkle with garlic powder, seasoning salt, cumin, and more soya sauce to taste.

I know it sounds weird to just ignore the directions for both the Dainty Rice and the Minute rice and throw everything together like that in a frying pan but it really works. It's a trick I learned from my mom. It's less work than doing it according to the packages and it also has the extra bonus of dirty less pots. We like the combination of the two different rices and its more economical than using two packs of Dainty rice.

My oldest DS loves this rice. He raves about it every time I make it and says he could eat it all alone with nothing else.

Menu Plan Monday - April 28th

First a review of last week's fare:

The Meaty Chili was a hit, as always. DS ate leftovers with nacho chips one evening for a snack. It was our first time trying the Honey Mustard Grilled Chicken and it was a big hit. The kids raved about it. We'll definitely have it again. Had a slight change of plans Wednesday and ended up having oven fried battered fish and fries. I'm not a lover of fish but I can eat battered fried fish smothered in my mother's famous sauce. DS loves fish and I really cooked it for him. Shake and Bake chicken served with rice was the fare for Thursday. I had planned something else but didn't have the ingredients for it but we all like Shake and Bake so that was okay. We ended up having our BBQ on Friday, but we didn't actually BBQ. I cooked steaks with mushrooms and onions on the grill inside and did baked potatoes in the microwave in this neat little bag my mom gave me last year. Saturday I finally got around to the homemade pizza. I tried out a new recipe for Ranch Chicken Pizza that I came up with inspired by some other recipes. You can read all about it here. We will definitely have it again. I completely forgot about the Homemade mac and Cheese last week so I'll have to try to remember to do it this week.

Now on to possible plans for this week:

Monday - leftover cooked dinner with gravy, thanks to my mil
Tuesday - Honey Baked Chicken II
Wednesday - Homemade Spaghetti
Thursday - stew
Friday - Mac & Cheese
Saturday - pizza

Ranch Chicken Pizza

I use Crystal's pizza crust recipe.

1 boneless, skinless chicken breast
oil
envelope of chicken oxo
seasoning salt
garlic powder
worchestershire sauce
soya sauce
some chopped peppers
1 chopped onion
chopped mushrooms
ranch dressing
mozza cheese

Put a small bit of oil in the frying pan. Chop the chicken breast into small cubes. Throw in frying pan with oil. Sprinkle with oxo, seasoning salt, garlic powder, worchestershire sauce, soya sauce. Fry until the chicken is cooked. A chopped onion can also be fried with it. Because DD doesn't like onion, I cook the onion separate with a little soya sauce.
Spread pizza dough on pizza pan. Spread ranch dressing on top of dough, as much or as little as you want. I used a fair bit because DD loves ranch. Sprinkle cooked chicken and onions on top, I just put the onions on half of it. Sprinkle peppers and mushrooms on top, I only put the mushrooms on half, once again because of DD. I like to use just a small bit of each kind of pepper - green, red, yellow and orange. Top with grated cheese. Cook in 425 oven for about 15 minutes. Yummy!

We tried this for the first time tonight and we loved it! It was partially inspired by this Buffalo Wing Pizza recipe. Knowing how much DD loves ranch dressing I thought it would be worth a try but I didn't like the idea of using chicken nuggets, blue cheese dressing or hot sauce. I went searching for other pizza recipes using ranch dressing and found this Veggie Ranch Pizza recipe. I was impressed with all the positive feedback for the recipe but I didn't like the idea of carrots, broccoli and cauliflower on a pizza. I decided to take what I liked, add what I wanted and make my own recipe. This is what I came up with and it was a big hit! We will definitely have it again.

Corn Casserole

Ground beef
envelope onion soup mix
garlic powder
pepper
12 oz tin of corn
mashed potatoes

Put ground beef in frying pan. Sprinkle with onion soup mix, garlic powder and pepper. Stir and cook til browned.

For mashed potatoes you can either peel and boil some potatoes and mash with butter or you can use a box of mashed potatoes. The last time I made it I used a box of Betty Crocker butter and herbs mashed potatoes. I used both envelopes in the package. We really, really liked it with this.

Pour the meat into the bottom of casserole dish. Pour corn on top of beef layer. Put mashed potato on top of corn. Put in 350 degree oven for about half an hour.

This is a favorite in our house.

Menu Plan Monday - April 21, 2008

First a review of last weeks plans:

The Slow Cooker Pot Roast was a hit. We will have it again. I love whole meal recipes for the crock pot that mean you don't have to mess up any more pots. :)
Corn Casserole is always a hit in our family. Its fast and easy. I have to remember to post the recipe here soon.
Lasagne is another one that is a favorite here. DD is the only one that's not real fond of it, but I make up to her for that by serving caesar salad, which she loves, with it.
Instead of chicken and rice I decided to make use of the fajita kits that DH had bought by mistake when I sent him to the store for taco kits a litte while back. It's the first time I had the fajita kit. It was okay, but we'd just as soon have our own version without the kit.
We didn't get to the burgers and fries last week. We ended up going out of town.

Okay, on to plans for this week!

Monday - Meaty Chili
Tuesday - Honey Mustard Grilled Chicken
Wednesday - Homemade Pizza - using Crystal's recipe for pizza crust that I found a while ago. It is great! I had given up making homemade pizza because I couldn't get the crust right, but she has me making homemade pizza again, and loving it. ;)
Thursday - Chicken and rice
Friday - Homemade Macaroni and Cheese
Saturday - BBQ

Meaty Chili

1 onion
some red, green, yellow, orange and green pepper
ground beef
fresh mushrooms
a couple of envelopes of beef OXO
seasoned salt
garlic powder
pepper
soya sauce
28 oz tin of diced tomatoes
28 oz tin of kidney beans
12 oz peaches and cream corn
8 oz tin of tomato paste
1 cup ketchup
worchestershire sauce
2 tbsp chili powder

I lightly grease my frying pan and put it on to warm while I chop up the onion, mushrooms and peppers. I just use a small section of each kind of pepper, not whole peppers. I throw all this into the frying pan with the minced meat and sprinkle with oxo envelopes, seasoned salt, pepper, garlic powder, and soya sauce. I cook this until the beef is nice and brown.

Meanwhile, in a big pot I throw in the diced tomatoes and then I mash them, because we don't like big chunks of tomato in it. Once the tomatoes are mashed I throw in the kidney beans, corn, tomato paste, ketchup, chili powder and a sprinkle of worchestershire sauce. Then I stir it all together.

When the meat is well browned I drain it and then throw it into the big pot with the tomato mixture. I often then sprinkle some more garlic powder, seasoned salt and pepper and maybe even more chili powder to taste. I leave this on the stove simmering for about half an hour or so.

***This is my personal adapation of a recipe from Company's Coming Lunches, a recipe book well worth buying. There are lots of wonderful recipes in there.

A New Plan

I started this blog as a place for my family to share recipes, but nobody seems interested in doing that so I'm changing my plans. This is now going to be where I share my recipes.

I recently started participating in a Menu Plan Monday blog meme started by The Organizing Junkie. She invites people to post their menu plans for the week on their blogs on Monday and then post to the Mr. Linky for that week on her blog saying that you've done so. It's fun to check out different people's recipes and get some new ideas to try.

I've decided to use this blog to post the recipes for some of the things I post in my menu plans. I will still try to remember to include tags in the recipes so that the tags ca serve as an kind of index in finding recipes. I think I will also start posting my menu plans here rather than on my other blog.

I'd love to hear from you if you decide to try one of my recipes, or if you have a suggestion of a recipe for me to try.