Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Orange Cashew Chicken Stir-Fry

This was a super easy recipe. I used fresh (not frozen) stir-fry vegetables from Trader Joes. They have them all cut up and packaged for you, it's so easy! (find them in the section with the lettuce and veggies). I also used Trader Joes stir fry sauce but you could substitute any brand stir fry sauce, or hoisin sauce is also great. Enjoy!

1 lb. chicken breast, cut up in chunks
1 bag of fresh stir fry veggies from Trader Joes (Or you could do all the work yourself and cut up broccoli, snow peas, peppers, bok choy, napa cabbage, carrots, etc.)
1/2 cup (estimate) orange juice
1/2 cup (estimate) Trader Joes stir fry sauce
Cashew pieces (I don't know how much I put in, just put as much as you like)
Jasmine rice cooked

Brown chicken breast in skillet with a little bit of olive oil. When almost done cooking, add stir fry veggies. Sautee together until chicken is cooked through (just a few minutes). Add orange juice and continue sauteeing the veggies until they are cooked all the way through. Add the stir fry sauce the last couple of minutes. Continue cooking until all heated through and veggies and chicken are cooked completely. Add cashews and stir together. Serve over cooked jasmine rice.

Thursday, April 22, 2010

Pizza Poppers

These pizza poppers are so easy and so delicious!
You just have to roll out your refrigerated pizza dough, put on any toppings that you want, fold them up, bake them, and enjoy them!
You can use whatever toppings you would like. I did one dish with just cheese and then one with cheese, pineapple, green peppers and turkey pepperoni.)
Pizza Poppers Recipe:
(I got these from OurBestBites and they call them Stuffed Pizza Rolls.)

Stuffed Pizza Rolls

1 roll refrigerated pizza dough
marinara/pizza sauce
2T grated Parmesan cheese
1 T olive oil or melted butter
1/2 t garlic powder
1 t dried Italian seasoning
mozzerella cheese, diced or grated
Pizza toppings of your choice: ie, ham and pineapple, pepperoni slices, sausage, etc.

*You can use regular pizza dough, or thin crust.

Preheat oven to heat specified on pizza dough package. Usually it's 400 degrees. If you make your own dough, 400 is usually a good heat as well.

Unroll your pizza dough onto a lightly floured surface. Pat or roll the dough so it's about 12" by 8". You're going to want to cut it into 24 squares, so just eyeball it if you need to. Use a pizza cutter to slice the dough into 24 squares

Place cheese and desired toppings on each square. (Note that you're not putting the marinara sauce on the dough- it's for dipping after) Just eyeball how much. You just need to be able to enclose the toppings in the dough so keep that in mind.

When all of your dough squares have cheese and toppings on them, carefully lift up each square and wrap the dough around the toppings. Pinch to make sure each ball is sealed shut and then place them seam side down in a lightly sprayed pie pan (or similar sized dish).

Brush the tops of the dough balls with olive oil or melted butter (I've used both and there's not much difference in result) and then sprinkle with the garlic and Italian seasoning and top with Parmesan cheese.

Cook them in the oven for about 15-20 minutes or until golden brown on top. Keep an eye on them! Doughs vary, so I'd check them after even 10 minutes.

Serve warm with warmed marinara sauce on the side for dipping.

Ricotta Cookies

Ricotta Cookies

1 lbs. butter room temperature
2 cups sugar
3 eggs
1 lbs. Ricotta cheese
2 tsp. vanilla
4 cups flour
1 tsp. baking soda
sprinkles

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Cream butter and sugar until fluffy. Add eggs, Ricotta, vanilla and mix. Add flour and soda. Place small dough balls on baking sheet and sprinkle the tops with sprinkles. Bake at 350 for 8 minutes.

*I thought these cookies were delicious. They tasted like little cakes. I would not put sprinkles on them though. I thought that sounded weird and so I only put them on a few batches and I definitely preferred them without sprinkles. Also, this recipe makes A TON of cookies. So unless you need a lot of cookies then I would definitely halve the recipe. I think next time I make them I will put a little lemon zest in the batter.