Something so simple....

It's no secret.  

I am not a great cook.  

Not bad, but more like mediocre.  And let's just say last night's dinner was not my finest. We had baked potatoes and a salad and I tried to copy these great baked potatoes we had at my friend Amanda's this past weekend.  Well....I kinda botched 'em.

All you do is coat them in oil and rub on some spice and then bake them in the oven (laid right on the rack) for about 1 hour.  The skins come out nice and crispy and the spices add a nice touch.  I used salt, pepper, garlic powder, oregano, and basil.  Ended up I used a tad too much garlic...oops!  And it sort of burned and got bitter....double ooops!  At least we had sour cream to top them ;)

And the salad?  It was basically lettuce and shredded cheddar.  We do our grocery shopping on Thursday nights you see so this is really all we had.  I dressed mine up with some mandarin oranges and walnuts but my poor hubby isn't really into oranges on his salad.

Needless to say there were several hints from my hubby that dinner was less than stellar.

"How much garlic did you use?"

"Is this all we had for on the salad?"

"Don't we have any croutons at least?"

Let's just say that these comments were not necessarily received well by me.

Now for the good part.  Shortly after dinner while I was cleaning up, my man said 

"thanks for dinner Babe"

Those simple little words totally turned me around.  It showed that even if the meal was not very appetizing, he still appreciated me making it and doing the best I could with whipping up a meal when the cupboards were practically bare.  

Don't you just love when your hubs says something unexpected and totally disarms your cranky funky mood?  I do. 

God bless him!

P.S. Thank goodness it is grocery shopping night tonight!  My kids will be so happy to have something other than water to drink :)

A day in the life....my "go to" meal

As a full-time buyer, mom, business owner, and wife, I need fast meals that my family will like.  Unfortunately, I have 2 picky eaters at home so I often have to prepare
more than one meal.   
I HATE to do this and try very hard not to.
We try to make the kids at least TRY whatever we are having but it is often met with sour faces.  My oldest is a little strange in that he won't eat noodles, not of any kind.   
What kid doesn't like noodles!
My 2 year old likes basically bread and fruit.  He's also just finicky, one day he'll love something and the next he refuses it.  Flat out spits it out....drives me nuts. 

Thankfully I have a few "go to" meals that never fail to make us ALL happy.  I received the "Cheap, Fast, Good" cookbook as a gift and have found several good recipes in there but this one is my favorite.

Bayou Stew

I usually make it in the morning or even the night before.  It just seems to have an extra bit of flavor if it has "sat" a while.

Bayou Stew
from Cheap, Fast, Good!

1 cup long grain rice
2/3 pound skinless boneless chicken breasts
2 tablespoons butter
2 large onions
8 ounces kielbasa sausage
1 medium sized green pepper (about 1 cup chopped)
2 cans (14 oz each) beef broth
2 teaspoons Cajun blend seasoning
2 tablespoons flour

For Rice: Bring 2 cups lightly salted water to boil in a covered saucepan. Add the rice. Stir and reduce heat to low. Cover and simmer until rice is tender, about 20 minutes.
Melt butter in 4 ½ qt Dutch oven over medium heat. Peel onion and finely chop them, adding to the pot as you chop. Cut the chicken into bite size pieces adding them to the pot as you chop. When all the chicken has been added, raise the heat to medium high. Cook stirring until the chicken is almost cooked through, about 4-5 minutes. Meanwhile cut the sausage in half lengthwise, the slice both halves into roughly ¼ in pieces.
Add broth to the pot, raise the heat to high and add the bell pepper, cover the pot and bring the soup to a boil.  Add Cajun seasoning and cook at a moderate boil until the green pepper is tender, about 3 minutes. (Uncover the pot partially if pot begins to boil over.)

In small jar with lid, mix flour with 3 tablespoons cold tap water. Cover jar and shake well until the mixture is combined and the lumps have disappeared. Gradually add the flour mixture to the soup stirring constantly until the soup has thickened slightly. Remove the pan from the heat. Divide the hot cooked rice among four large soup bowls and ladle soup over the rice and serve at once.  Four generous servings.

For more great recipe suggestions and just plain good-reading visit Sprigs of Rosemary.

Happy Eating!!

Also swing by The Busy Budgeting Mama where I am linking up today.