The "Easter Bunny" was good to us

Happy Tuesday, everyone! I guess for most people, it's a short work week which is always something to look forward to.

Friday night, I made a crab dip for Randy and I to enjoy while we watched Pittsburgh play. I actually got the recipe from a Yuletide magazine I bought from a student last year. I combined a can of crabmeat with a half cup of mayonnaise, three tablespoons of French dressing, one block of cream cheese, two tablespoons of ketchup and two tablespoons of chopped onion. I threw it in the fridge for a couple hours to thicken up and get all flavorful:

This dip turned out great. Not too thick or too runny and worked great both spread on crackers or as a chip dip. Since I only used a small can of crabmeat, the crab was very subtle; I'd use a bigger can (or two cans) if you really like the taste of crab. We devoured this over the span of a couple days and I will definitely make it again. I'm looking forward to a day when I have a bigger kitchen with more storage space so I can buy some cute little serving dishes/platters for this kind of stuff.

Saturday was mine and Randy's Easter. We're going to be in St.John's for Easter Sunday so we decided to have our own little Easter at home before we leave. We agreed to give each other Easter baskets just for something fun to do. Here's Randy's before he came out to see it:

And of course, I couldn't leave Sebastian out of the mix:

Randy picked up a turkey to cook on Saturday as well which was fantastic because a) I got a break from the kitchen and b) When Randy cooks turkey, he is a perfectionist - meaning he puts a lot of effort into it and makes sure it is exceptionally juicy and delicious.

This is the bird, pre-devourment:

As I usually am when a turkey is cooked, I was in the mood for a hot turkey sandwich. Actually, in the mood is a bit of an understatement. I obsessed about it all day. Randy swore he wouldn't butcher the gravy like he says he did last time (again, I thought it was fine but he was not convinced) and it turned out awesome. I threw in some Mccain spicy fries and had a moment in foodie heaven:

This was the perfect example of a meal that once I ate it, I was a little sad and wished I could go back in time and eat it again. And you better believe I cleaned my plate of every little bit of gravy.

Perhaps to counteract my Saturday food fest, I made a healthy dessert. I bought a cookbook that I mentioned before called "Now Eat This" by Rocco Dispirito which makes over unhealthy comfort foods to be healthier. There was a recipe for black bean brownies in there that I wanted to try. I know, first thought: beans in brownies? Ew. But all the beans do is add volume and fluffiness to the brownies; you don't taste them at all.

After I had a mini heart attack caused by a blender leaking egg whites all over my counter, I mixed up the batter and baked these puppies for half an hour. They came out looking like this:

Despite sucking at all things cutting/slicing, I sliced them the best I could and tossed most of them in a container for freezing:

Each brownie (if you slice them into 12) has only 53 calories and 1.6 grams of fat! They were light and fluffy and not dry at all. My only complaint is that they had too strong of a coffee taste - if I make them again, I'll be sure to use less espresso powder. See the bottom of the page if you are interested in the recipe.

In the interest of making this post less time-consuming, I'm going to save Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday's meals for my next post. I'll leave you with a sequence of pictures documenting Sebastian's obsession with his Easter basket. I don't know if it was the catnip in the basket or if he was just intrigued to have something different in his environment, but he went crazy for his basket!

Shoutouts from thr past few days go to: Cookies and Creme mini chocolate eggs, Whoppers, Plain chips

Black Bean Brownies

Nonstick cooking spray

 1 1/2 cups canned black beans, rinsed and drained

1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

1 tablespoon espresso powder (I would use about half of this next time)

3/4 cup egg whites

2 tablespoons low-cal, low sugar chocolate syrup

2 tablespoons reduced fat sour cream

1 tablespoon melted, unsalted butter

8 tablespoons granulated Splenda

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Spray an 8 x 8 inch glass baking dish with cooking spray.

2. Combine the beans, cocoa powder, espresso powder, and egg whites in a blender. Process until the mixture is smooth, about 2 minutes, scraping down the bowl halfway through.

3. Add the chocolate syrup, sour cream, butter, Splenda, and vanilla. Process until all of the ingredients are combined, about 1 minute.

4. Pour the batter into the dish and smooth the top with a spatula. Bake for 28-30 minutes, turning the dish halfway through the baking time. A toothpick inserted in the centre will come out with soft batter clinging to it.

5. Let the brownies cool completely in the baking dish on a wire rack. Cut into 12 squares and serve.

We have groceries again!

It's been five days since my last post and normally, I'm not this tardy. I actually worked four out of five days this week so I haven't gotten around to blogging. Randy and I got groceries on Thursday so early this week was pretty slim pickin's in the recipe and meal department.

Sunday I decided to make some salmon as I had some leftover in the freezer. I didn't have a recipe on hand so I figured I'd just jazz it up with some spices. After googling a few things, I settled on a mixture of paprika, salt and pepper, and thyme. I baked it for about twenty-five minutes and served it with some chicken country rice (Sidekicks) and some sliced carrots.

This meal was gross. The carrots and rice were fine, but the seasoning, despite how thick it was, did nothing to add any flavour to the salmon and the salmon dried out very easily. It just tasted too dry and too fishy and I only ate about half my salmon before throwing it in the garbage.

We had some leftover moose sausages in the freezer that a student of Randy's sold him back in the fall. So on Monday for supper, we decided to do an oldie but a goodie: breakfast for supper. Randy fried up the sausages with some onion and a lot of Frank's Red Hot Sauce. I made some scrambled eggs and we had some toast with a loaf of whole wheat bread from Wanda's Bake Shop. Wanda's Bake Shop is this cute little bakery at the end of our street in Grand Falls that sells all kinds of bread and rolls, pies, and cookies. The owners are the most delightful people and they're always super friendly whenever I go in. We try and buy our whole wheat bread there when we can because it always tastes deliciously fresh and additive-free.

Notice how I globbed on the cheese whiz? Cheez whiz is my love. The only thing that could have made this meal better is if I had had some bacon and toutons as well. But then I might have exploded in a fit of culinary fullness glee so I was more than happy to settle for this.

On Tuesday, I made chicken spaghetti and homemade garlic bread. I had a jar of marinara sauce in the fridge so I fried some sliced chicken in a little olive oil and salt and pepper, combined it with the marinara sauce and some mushrooms to make my sauce. I piled this on top of some whole-wheat spaghetti and got to work on some homemade garlic bread. I buttered two slices of bread, sprinkled a little garlic powder on them, then covered them in bacon and shredded marble cheese.

Considering our pantry and fridge were pretty bare at this point, this meal was actually pretty delicious! Especially the garlic bread. Yum! I could have easily eaten two or three more slices of this.

Wednesday was the first game of the playoffs for Randy so he was in the mood to order a pizza. There are three real places to order take-out pizza here: Greco, Doninni's, and Lefty's. I have never really enjoyed Greco; it's too expensive and too doughy. Doninni's is half decent but I always find it to be really greasy. Lefty's is the perfect mix of take-out pizza: cheap, tasty, and not too greasy. We swung by Lefty's and picked up a medium pizza with cheese, bacon, green peppers, onions, and mushrooms.

Since this is Randy's new wardrobe until the Penguins get knocked out of the playoffs:

we settled in with our pizza and a beer and watched the first game. Well, that's sort of a lie. I started watching some of it and then snuck off to the other TV to catch America's Next Top Model (don't hate).

Thursday was a rush meal - I had to sub and when I got home, we went out and got groceries (yay, groceries!) and at 6:30, I had to meet a friend for a jewelry party. There was a slice of leftover pizza left so I had that along with some bacon carbonara pasta.

Yes, I know it's bland, but forgive me, I had no time and no groceries! Today, I got back into the recipe groove and made a cheeseburger casserole. The recipe comes from a cookbook my mom gave me when I went to university entitled "Where's Mom When I Need Here?". Most of the recipes are pretty simple and include a lot of easily accesible ingredients (no panda bamboo shoots or other ridiculous items). I fried up 1/2 pound of ground beef with a diced onion in a frying pan until the meat was brown and the onion semi-transluscent. I then added a can of tomato sauce and some salt and pepper, frying uncovered for about five minutes. When that was done, I set it aside, boiled about two cups of macaroni (possibly a bit more) and mixed together in a bowl: one tbsp dried parsley, 1 cup sour cream, 1/2 cup cottage cheese, and 1/2 cup cooked, diced carrots. I then folded in the cooked macaroni. In a greased casserole dish, I combined one layer of meat mixture, one layer of sour cream mixture, and then repeated the layers. I added about 3/4 of a cup of shredded cheese on top and baked at 350 for 30 minutes. It came out looking like this:

And a better shot of the inside:

I served mine with a homemade dinner roll and washed it down with some diet A&W root beer:

Yum! This is pretty tasty. It looks kinda like slop but on a Friday when you are in the mood for something slightly junky (that isn't fast food), this is a great meal to make. Easy, tasty, and quick. Perfect!

Not sure what I am making tomorrow yet, however I did make a crab dip for Randy and I to enjoy with some drinks and hockey tonight. Go Pittsburgh!

Shoutouts from the past few days go to: mini quiches, peanut butter balls, homemade ice cream sandwiches, and carrot cake.

Here's Sebastian loving his Christmas outfit:

I am, in fact, alive.

So I am back after a bit of a blogging hiatus. I had intended to make a post on Wednesday, but came down with a pretty bad case of nausea/severe headaches/overall malaise on Wednesday and pretty much just stayed in bed for two days. I'm not really sure where it came from ( I hardly ever get sick) but I have my suspicions. There was a plastic sandwich container lid left on our oven with the oven turned on. Needless to say, I grabbed it as soon as I noticed but by that time, some of the plastic had already melted onto the stovetop burner. I turned the burner on high to burn off the remaining plastic, but didn't bother to open a window. Shortly afterwards, I started developing a pretty stong headache which led to everything I mentioned above. It left me feeling pretty blah for two days straight so I have stayed away from the computer. Except of course to google 'smelling burning plastic'. NEVER google medical related things. There is so much conflicting information, you don't know what is right and what isn't, and all it does is leave you even more paranoid in the end.

Moving on, the grocery situation in the Power/Smith residence is bleak once again (getting groceries this week) so it's been experimentation use up all leftover food week. Tuesday, I heated up some Jillian Michael's black bean chilli for myself and Randy. When I made it, I made an extra batch to freeze for those times when you just don't want to cook or you don't have a very inspiring fridge and pantry.

I love the colours! So tasty and so good for you too. All that red nonsense is the Frank's Red Hot (Xtra Hot) sauce I doused mine in.

I spent all day Wednesday in bed (and for once, was thankful I didn't get any calls for subbing) and was in no mood to cook. Even the thought of popping a slice of toast in the toaster seemed like too much effort. I recruited Randy to pick us up some Mary Brown's and we ate it in bed. I only have two very blurry pictures that I will save you the pain of viewing - I was hungry and sick and cranky and in no mood to photograph my food. I ate a Big Mary with medium taters (which I found to be reallllllly salty) and a butt load of Apple Juice.

Thursday I was feeling a little better and managed to haul my butt out of bed to make some sweet and sour meatballs. I combined a little over a pound of extra lean ground beef with about a cup of breadcrumbs, one beaten egg, 1/2 cup milk and a bit of salt and pepper. I fried this up in a skillet until they were browned but not fully cooked:

I put all these in a casserole dish while I made the sweet and sour sauce. I combined a cup of ketchup, 1/2 cup water, 3 tablespoons of brown sugar, and four tablespoons each of worcestershire sauce and vinegar. I brought it to a boil and then poured over the meatballs.

I put these bad boys in a 325 degree oven for an hour. Seems like a long time considering they are already half cooked, but I found this to be the perfect time because it lets the meatballs soak up lots of the sauce and makes them more moist in the end.

I made some brown rice and served these on top of it:

These were great! Very filling and I even had enough leftover to have for lunch for me and Randy the next day.

Friday, Randy had offered to take me out for supper. We were both working that day and neither one of us was in the mood to go to a fancier place and wanted to have a pint of beer with our meal, which in Grand Falls leaves you with two options: Don Cherry's or Jungle Jim's. He let me pick and I opted for Jungle Jim's because it had been awhile since I was there. I am really not a big fan of Jungle Jim's. The menu is huge and overwhelming and I usually find that no matter what I order, it all tastes pretty much the same. But I was in the mood for brick in your guts type food so I figured it would be the right place for that. We got there and ordered a pint of Coor's each while we perused the menu. The mug came frosted and the beer was so cold and delicious (and well-deserved after my day subbing in a Skilled Trades class, I might add!). I decided to order the Safari Wrap with fries and Randy ordered a Cajun Chicken Salad. My wrap and fries came to me like this:

It was okay. The wrap had chicken, bacon, cheese, lettuc and mayo in it. I was starving and in the mood for junk so this was pretty  much what I had in mine. Ordinarily though, I probably wouldn't order it. A little boring, and a little bland, but it was good for what I was in the mood for.

This is an off-centre (good photography skills, Babe! lol) picture of Randy's salad:

I asked Randy to give his two cents and all he said was it was "fine". So when I asked him to elaborate, he said "the lettuce was lettucey, the sauce was saucy, and the chicken was underflavored. It didn't have enough Cajun seasoning".

While Randy paid the bill, I meandered into the bookstore adjacent to Jungle Jim's and found a 10 dollar legal write your own will booklet. I'm pretty intrigued and will probably go back and buy it. I don't think it's a full-on "this is where my possessions will go" will package (as I'm fairly certain you need a lawyer for that) but it is a booklet where you can let your thoughts on life support for yourself and whatnot be made, legally binding. I know it may seem a little morbid for a 25 year old, healthy woman to be thinking about this, but I think it's important! The last thing I would want is my family to have me on life support as a vegetable, unable to move on with their lives. So if I ain't pullin' out of it, I want something that can tell my family to pull the plug.

Earlier in the week, I had watched an episode of Rachael Ray where she made a grilled chicken and bacon macaroni and cheese and I could not get my mind off of it. I decided to make it yesterday, minus a few ingredients that I didn't have. I won't post the whole recipe, but you can find it by clicking on this link:

http://www.rachaelray.com/recipe.php?recipe_id=3868

Holy crap, was this good. My alterations to this were:
- No chicken stock (didn't have any on hand)
- Marble and pecorino-romano cheese instead of gruyere and sharp white cheddar cheese
- 1/2 a red onion instead of one whole onion

This recipe was so good! I wouldn't recommend doing what I did and using too much Pecorino-Romano cheese  - it is a little salty and in high quantities, can overwhelm the food. Still, it tasted pretty damn good.

This is me grating the cheese for it:

I won't post any more prep photos because I'm not including the recipe. But check out the creaminess:

Yum. Served with a dinner roll, of  course. And...

Yay, leftovers!

That's about all for this entry. I haven't changed the poll yet because of a lack of interest; I may get around to doing it later but we shall see. A snack that I have been loving lately is two Breaktime chocolate chips cookies with a  tablespoon of light frozen coolwhip between. Two cookies only has 70 calories and the cool whip is low in calories as well. Voila! Homemade (light) ice cream sandwich.

Shoutouts from the past six days go to: homemade ice cream sandwiches, fat cheesies, and justifying bites of cheese that are "too small for the grater"

Sebastian passed out from too much tube

Peanut Butter and Chocolate: The Perfect Marriage

As I mentioned earlier, Randy gave me a break from cooking on Saturday and baked a chicken. When he brought up the idea of having hot chicken sandwiches, I jumped on board. Food smothered in gravy? Yes please!

Like I said before, when it comes to cooking in our house, Randy handles the basics and recipe-less meals while I take care of recipe experimentation. He cooked his chicken and filled our kitchen with a yummy, warm mix of chickeny smells while I chilled out on the couch with a glass of wine and some Ricky Gervais Show (best. show. ever.).

We're making a concerted effort to try different types of wines - I don't like red at all (there's something about the smell that just irks me) so we're trying to buy more variations of white wine from different countries and whatnot. I prefer Sauvignon Blanc and this weekend, we picked up a bottle of Monkey Bay - a reasonably priced (13 bucks a bottle) New Zealand wine:

I really liked this wine. It was fruity but not overpowering. Yum!

Meanwhile, Randy was in the kitchen cursing on the gravy (turns out he accidentally put in too much gravy browning and turned it black) and being the perfectionist he is when he cooks, he opted to dump it, despite my cries of protest. Knowing how bad I was jonesin' for some gravy, he had another go at it, using chicken broth. He paired it with some boiled potatoes and carrots, all of which I drowned in gravy:

Randy insists the whole meal was a bust and that his gravy was the shits, but I really enjoyed this! If you look closely, you may be able to see some chicken in my delicious gravy soup.

This is him preparing the chicken, prior to his gravy frustrations:

Yesterday, I wanted to make some turkey burgers as we had some ground turkey left in the freezer. I have a lot of problems with some turkey burger recipes I have come across so far - turkey burgers have a reputation for being somewhat bland and dry and the recipes I have found so far do not do much to fight that reputation.

Until I found a recipe for Spicy Turkey Burgers online and the turkey burger was born again.

Seriously, try this recipe:
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Spicy-Turkey-Burgers-109795

I got it from epicurious.com and it is the most succulent, delicious, NOT dry in the least, yummy yummy turkey burger recipe.

I won't post the recipe in its entirety as you can easily click on the link but I will make note of a few substitutions I made. I used medium instead of mild salsa, a regular onion instead of a shallot, no cilantro, and three tablespoons of oil instead of four. Also, I added an egg (there is none in the recipe) as an extra binder and about three handfuls of breadcrumbs (without these, I found the burgers to be too wet).

Burger ingredients chilling out

I plopped everything in a bowl and got to work making the patties. The patties, even with the addition of the breadcrumbs, will still be fairly wet feeling. Resist the temptation to add more breadcrumbs as you run the risk of drying them out, and they are too good to be ruined!

Yummy turkey burger patties

The recipe advises you to let them sit for about three minutes per side before flipping them,  but make it more like five minutes. Otherwise, they will crumble (I found out the hard way, but managed to bring the burger I ruined back to life. Phew!)

When my burgers were done, I placed them on a thinful hamburger bun  (I like this way better than regular hamburger buns...they focus on the meat and not on a double dose of bread!) and topped with a bit of salsa.

You really don't need any other condiments or burger dressings on these babies. The flavour in the burgers is more than enough.

To go with these, I decided to make some hashbrown casserole. I combined one cup of cream of mushroom soup, 1 cup of cheddar cheese, 1/2 tub of sour cream, 2 tbsp mayo, and 1 tbsp mustard and swirled it around in a large bowl.

Looks disgusting, eh? Once I mixed this all up, I added a bag of hashbrowns and folded them in:

I then baked it in the oven at 350 for 45 minutes. Note: 45 minutes is not long enough! I had already taken it out, dished it up with the burgers, only to find out some of the hashbrowns in the middle were still cold :( Good thing the burgers were so great. I ate mine (as it was already on my plate and I didn't really give a crap) but put the rest of the casserole in the oven for another 15-20 minutes.
Today is...you guessed it. Leftovers! But I promise the casserole is fully cooked now (I really hate when I fail at cooking).

Shoutouts from the past two days go to: Peanut Butter M&M's:

Whenever Randy goes to the store, I always ask him to bring me back a surprise and this time, he brought me this delicious treat. Peanut butter and chocolate are really the best combination. I like sucking the candy off the peanut butter center and then eating that separate. Yum!

Before I put an end to this entry, there's one little food-related annoyance of mine that I need to vent about:

Food Pushers.

I hate you. Seriously, I do not understand people who cannot take no for an answer. I am someone who doesn't like to eat a large lunch. I find that if I do, not only does it make me dopey, lazy, and sleepy but it also often sets me up to overeat for the remainder of the day. So generally, I keep it light with a sandwich and a piece of fruit or something similar in size. I have been in social and other situations where there is a big meal being served for lunch, or a big rich snack (when I might have already just eaten) and people will go, "Hey Kathryn, have some of this." Sometimes I will oblige, but other times, (like in the case of a large lunch), I will politely decline. At this point, I believe, the conversation is over. But for food pushers, it is an excuse to say things like "Oh come on, have some!"

(Again). "No thanks."

"Seriously, you should have something to eat. There's lots here!"

This is the point of the conversation when I want to scream and cry "Leave me alone!" but I again have to decline. Why, food pushers, why? Why can't you take no for an answer? Sometimes people just don't want to eat. If we're not 85 pounds and emaciated, take it as a sign that yes, we do eat, but we are just not in the mood for a meal right now. Please and thank you :)

Here's Sebastian chilling out with his buddy, the snowman:

McDonald's - Breakfast of Champions

Votes on the poll this week are few and far between. Which leads me to believe either no one watches food shows, no one is reading my blog, or my choice for a poll topic is not interesting enough. If it's the first, why the heck not? Food shows are boss. It's incredibly relaxing to watch someone cook on TV (I think so anyway) and it's a good way to find inspiration for your own meals (Note to self: Make those Pizza pretzels you saw on Rachael Ray AGES ago). If it's the second, well, can't blame anyone there, I guess. This blog is moreso for me to alleviate boredom and pay homage to my true love: food (sorry Randy). But if people ar in fact reading this, then I'm stoked because it's nice to know the hard work I put into each post is being appreciated. And well, if it's the third, sorry my topic sucked. More of you  need to get blogs so I can get some feedback and ideas!

Moving on!

Thursday I had it in mind to be experimental with groceries left on hand. Turns out I had some sour cream that was about to go bad the next day. Since I hate to waste food, I scanned the recesses of my mind to think of what I could make with it. I remembered a recipe for Hungarian Pork Chops that was in one of my Weight Watchers cookbooks and turns out, I had everything I needed. The recipe is called 'Hungarian Style Pork Chops with Sour Crean Sauce' and serves four. You'll need:

4 boneless pork chops
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
3/4 cup reduced sodium chicken broth
1 (10 oz) bag spinach
2 tablespoons paprika
2 tablespoons fat-free sour cream

First, place the pork chops between sheets of wax paper. Pound to 1/4 inch thickness:

This picture actually does little to show my fury of fist pounding the chops. The landlords probably thought I was nailing something to the wall...

Sprinkle the chops with the garlic powder, salt, and pepper:

Spray a large nonstick skillet with nonstick spray and set over medium-high heat. Add the pork chops and cook until browned and cooked through, about 2 minutes on each side (I actually found it to be more like 4 mins on each side).

Transfer to a platter and keep warm. Add the broth to the skillet, scraping up any browned bits from the bottom of the pan. Add the spinach; reduce the heat  and simmer, covered, 1-2 minutes. Remove the skillet from the heat; stir in the paprika and sour cream.

Spoon the spinach and sauce over and around the chops. Each serving (1 pork chop and 1 cup sauce with spinach) has 224 calories and 9 grams of fat. For side dishes, I made mashed potatoes and used the leftover sour cream in them instead of butter or milk. I also did up a small pot of brown rice.

This is a quick and easy meal that doesn't use too many ingredients. It's not a huge favorite of mine but I like it enough for those times when you don't want to spend too long preparing a meal but want to eat something fairly healthy.

Yesterday, I decided to be experimental and try my hand at making a chicken bacon ranch pizza. I made a whole wheat crust using the a recipe from grouprecipes.com. I won't bother posting the recipe as you can find it youself by clicking on the link here:  http://www.grouprecipes.com/15952/whole-wheat-pizza-dough.html

These next few pictures document the process of me making the dough:









Yeast chillin' out and activating

This is my big dough ball prior to rising

I will say this about the above crust recipe: Unless you like realllllly thick pizza, take about 1/3 of the dough away from the ball (once it has completed all the rising time) and toss it (unless you are making more than one pizza)/ Makes for a thinner, less doughy pizza.

Next, I started preparing the bacon to fry. Check out this picture: Randy was supposed to get a picture of me taking out the bacon but instead got a candid action shot: look where my eyes are looking.

Bad kitty. Although I can't blame him for going for the bacon - he has good taste. Lucky for me, Sebastian did not succeed at getting any bacon and I threw it a frying pan to fry in all its bacony goodness.

Look at that. Is there anything more beautiful?

While the bacon was frying, I thinly sliced two chicken breasts, seasoned them with a little oregano, and fried them in a seperate frying pan with some olive oil.

I flattened out the crust on a greaed pizza pan and, with the ball of dough I removed, it was the perfect thickness:

I used a bottle of Ranch dressing as a substitute for pizza sauce. It's tempting to pile on a lot of this stuff but if you are using a fat-free or low fat version, don't go overboard. Once the pizza cooks, these watered down versions tend to run a little over the dough. Next time I make this, I will either use less ranch dressing or use a full-fat dressing.

Next, I added the crumbled and sliced bacon (blot the grease off really well so your pizza isn't too greasy), some spinach with the stems removed, and the sliced chicken. I covered it with a mixture of cheddar and pecorino-romano cheese.

I then cooked it in the oven at 400 degrees for about 20 minutes. And:

Pizza heaven. This was delicious! I had two giant pieces and could probably have devoured the entire thing. Randy really enjoyed it as well. Om nom nom.

This morning I woke up and after drinking a few beer last night was really in the mood for some McDonald's breakfast. Since I was going to be doing P90X later that morning, I knew I didn't want anything too greasy. The last time I tried doing P90X after having an Egg McMuffin, I nearly died. So Randy offered to trek out (thanks babe!) for some McD's for me. I got a medium coffee (so much better than Tim Horton's coffee) and a fruit and yogurt parfait. They've made the fruit and yogurt parfaits a lot smaller which is probably a good thing because healthy or not, I'm sure the old ones were caloriefests. It came with a little packet of granola (only 25 calories in a pack) and was a great "I don't want to make anything but I don't want any crap either" breakfast.

It also tasted a lot better than Tim Horton's parfaits. The berries actually seemed fresh, not frozen. Yum!

Today the chef is getting a welcome break from cooking - Randy has a chicken in the oven and is making some gravy to have a hot chicken sandwich. Tomorrow I'm thinking of making homemade turkey burgers and fries. We shall see!

Shoutouts from the past two days go to: Ketchup chips, watermelon jolly ranchers, and homemade peanut butter balls.

Here's Sebastian saying "Get that damn camera out of my face":