Best Meatloaf Ever!

My dad and mom need a little help every now and then when it comes to cleaning around the house and cooking. They do what they can at their age, but us girls don't mind helping out at all. Dad and I were talking about their upcoming meal that I would be taking them. I have to be careful with them because they really don't like some foods that my family is use to making during the week. For instance, we love Italian, Mexican meals with lots of tomato and wide variety of flavors. Dad had some frozen ground beef, so I mentioned a meatloaf. My dad's lite up saying that he had not had a meatloaf in a very long time. Alrighty then! Here we go! The only meatloaf I've ever made, which was many many moons ago, was from a box that Doug brought home one day.

I go to my faithful Pinterest and the title to this recipe caught my eye.  It said "Best Ever Meatloaf."  It sounds so simple and delicious, but different from what I've ever had.  I was so moist and delicious!

Meatloaf

• 2 pounds ground beef
• 1 cup crushed Ritz crackers
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1 cup milk
• 1/2 cup ketchup
• 1/3 cup onion, finely chopped
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
• 3/4 cup ketchup
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 1/4 cup apricot preserves
• 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Coat a 5x9 loaf pan with cooking spray and set aside. In a large bowl, combine the ground beef, crackers, egg, milk, ½ cup ketchup, onion, salt, pepper and garlic powder. Mix together with your hands until thoroughly combined.
2. Pour the mixture into the prepared pan and spread evenly. Place the pan on a rimmed baking sheet and bake in the preheated oven for 1 ½ hours. 
3. In a small bowl, combine ¾ cup ketchup, brown sugar, apricot preserves and Worcestershire sauce. Mix well. Spread half of the mixture evenly over the meatloaf halfway through baking. Reserve the remainder of the sauce for dipping/topping. Let meatloaf sit for 15 minutes before slicing and serving.

I put the last remaining sauce on top of the loaf the last 30 minutes of baking.  Because I used the ground beef that was my dad and mom's, it did make greasy.  I would recommend ground chuck, lean beef or ground turkey.

I prepare this the night before, it was so simple and easy to prepare.

Happy Baking!! 

 

Tortilla Bowls with Mango Chicken Salad

We wanted to try something different, getting tired of the same old, same old. What do I do? Look through my bookmarked recipes in Pinterest.

I LOVE Chicken Salad and I'm so glad that I bookmarked this recipe because it was

 AWESOME!

There is a party in your mouth when you incorporate all of these wonderful flavors. So let's get to it.


Mango Chicken Salad

4 cups cubed or shredded cooked chicken (I used chicken tenderloin because it is easier to prepare and cook)
1 peeled and diced mango
1 peeled and diced avocado (how to make sure your avocado is ready - the avocado should be firm to the touch, not soft or mushy the color should be a dark green. )
1 tablespoon lime juice
1/2 red bell pepper (you can use more, if you love bell pepper.  I can't eat too much or I will regret it)
1/4 cup of chopped fresh cilantro (if you are not big on cilantro, like me, you can use less.  You want just enough for a nice mild flavor)
1 cup shredded lettuce
1/2 teaspoon salt

Combine all the ingredients above in a big serving bowl.  Make sure your chicken is cooled.  The recipe called for 1/2 cup of red onion, but I'm not a big red onion fan, so you can add or omit.  You can't mess up a chicken salad.

The recipe recommends a homemade vinaigrette, but I chose using the following:
1/3 cup Lite Ranch Dressing
Sprinkle Ground Cumin seasoning

Add the dressing to the salad and toss gently until coated.  You may want to add a little more ranch dressing, if you have more chicken then suggested.  It's up to you, but you don't want it to over take the taste of the other flavors.  If you want to try the vinaigrette, well here's the recipe.

Vinaigrette 
1 Tablespoon wine vinegar
1 Tablespoon fresh lime juice
1 Tablespoon fresh orange juice
1 Tablespoon honey
1/3 cup Canola oil

Mix together and toss gently in the salad.

Now, you need bowls to put your salad in.  This was so much fun to make and delicious!

Bowls
4 flour tortillas (I used the small 8"-10" rounds)
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
sprinkle salt (the recipe called for 1/2 teaspoon, but it seemed like it was too much per tortilla.  I would suggest a generous sprinkle of salt instead.)
Olive oil for brushing

Heat the oven to 400 F degrees.  Brush oil on tortillas.
Sprinkle cumin and salt evenly over oiled sides of tortillas.  Press tortillas, seasoned side up, in muffin tins (making into bowls) and place in oven for 5-7 minutes or until semi crispy.

You are ready to have a fiesta.  I honestly don't believe you'll have any salad left over, once you find out how delicious it is.  For some reason, you do have some left over for tomorrow, just note that your avocado will turn a little dark.  It will still be okay to eat, it just won't look very appetizing.  If you need step by step tutorial CLICK HERE!

Your mouth thanks you!


 

Happy New Year 2015!

Hope you all had a wonderful 2014 and looking forward to a FaBuLoUs 2015!

Doug and I want to do a little weight maintenance. I found a 30 day Plank Challenge schedule. We started it today. I've got a couple of girlfriends that are interested in doing it with us. We are still going to the gym. Honestly, gyms do me no good because I'm starving as soon as I leave the weight room. Ugh! I did stock up on Craving Blocker milkshakes. Treadmill, you will not defeat me this year! HAHA!

We had a wonderful and memorable Christmas break. Of course, we have a our family traditions that we do every year. For instance, kids sleeping under the Christmas tree; driving around looking for Christmas lights; making a gingerbread house; making Christmas cookies; making Christmas ornaments; and having family night, watching Christmas movies.

I have to say that this year was probably one of the most stress-free Christmases I've ever had. I'm blaming the common cold that I've had the blessing of catching back in the month of September and still have it to this day. There are days when I think I'm feeling better and then the next day, BAM. I'm visiting my beloved doctor again. Yay! I haven't had the getty up and go this Christmas. I didn't cook that much and Katie didn't get her cinnamon scented cut-out Christmas ornaments to put on the tree this year either. Maybe next time. I did string popcorn and cranberries as garland this year. Pretty, but I miss the construction paper chain. We'll have to go back to it this year. Basically, if something didn't get made or done. Oh well. I think I will have to continue this concept from here on out. It is so much easier just to say "I didn't do that this year." Solved.

The children and I found some fun new ways to enjoy the break. This year, I thought it would be fun for the kids to put on their PJs, I packed some fresh baked chocolate chip cookies along with a drink. As we drove around looking at Christmas lights, we listened to Christmas music, ate cookies and drank our favorite drink. When we got home, we got hot chocolate to drink before bedtime. On Christmas morning, in order to open up your present, you had to answer my Christmas trivia questions correctly. The kids really liked it. I was surprised how much they liked it, so I think we'll mark it down to use again in Christmas future. It was fun! Last year, I bought the kids some small gifts and hid them in the Christmas tree. Katie really liked that game on Christmas morning. I read on someone's blog where they have a flash light gift party. If we had a Christmas Eve party, I think the flash light gift would be fun to play.

I did find time to make a few special gifts for some family, friends and the kids' teacher gifts. It's nothing spectacular, but fun.

These were made for my kids' teachers - "I 'Whisk' You a Merry 'Kiss'mas & a Happy New Year!"
I found this on Pinterest one year and thought it was cute.  I just purchased whisks and filled it with Hershey's Kisses, put it in a clear bag and tied it off with ribbon.  Our teachers seemed to like them. 

I purchased some pretty canning jars and filled them full of my Christmas Chex Mix.  Below, is my recipe: 

Christmas Chex Mix

Ingredients: 

3 C Rice Chex Cereal

3 C Corn Chex Cereal

1 C Honey Roasted Peanuts

1 C small Pretzel Twists

12 oz. Vanilla Almond Bark 

12 oz. M & Ms (your favorite flavor)

Instructions: 

In a large bowl, combine chex cereal, pretzels and peanuts. 

Melt the chocolate in the microwave (90 seconds on high and intervals of 15 seconds each additional time until melted). 

Add the chocolate to the chex mix and gently stir to coat. 

Spread the mix out onto parchment paper into a single layer.  Add M & Ms on top.  

After an hour of cool, break up the mix into pieces.  Store in an air tight container. 

Christmas Potpourri

I've been wanting to make this stove top potpourri for a couple of years, but would forget about it until it was too late.  This year, I made sure to make a few bags of potpourri to give away for a little "Thinking of You" type Christmas gifts.  The recipe is below: 

Ingredients: 

1/2 C fresh cranberries

1 orange

4 cinnamon sticks (broken in half)

1 Tbsp whole cloves

1/8 tsp ground nutmeg

Make guests simmering instruction tags

Instructions: 

Place all ingredients into a clear bag and hold securely with a rubber band.  Decorate with simmering instructions and pretty ribbon.  

Below is an example of our gift tag. 

 

In case you can't read the tag very well.  See below:

Directions: 

Slice orange.  Put all ingredients in a small pot and place on stove top or use a crockpot; add 2-3 cups of water; simmer over low heat for as long as desired.  Add more water, if it gets low.  

For our Christmas parties, I tried to make Pinwheel sugar cookies.  What a joke!!  I made 2 batches of this cookie and ended up renaming them "Grinchy Christmas Cookies".  It didn't matter if my cookie dough was nice and chilled (hard) or soft.  Every time, I jelly rolled the two colored dough and put it in the fridge, it would want to settle flat.  Making the dough more oval than round.  Ugh!  I re-rolled the dough to make it round, which made the cookie look more whimsical than round and pinwheel shape.  Thus, the name change.  LOL!  You've got to laugh about it.  The cookies were still tasty.  My children LOVED them, no matter what they looked like.  Doug requested a batch of "Reeses Peanut Butter No Bake Bars".  Do you remember getting these as school, before the "healthy food" aka "no taste food"?  The layer of solid chocolate on top of peanut butter mixture bar.  Oh, they were so good.  Well, I think I brought some people back to their school years, when I opened the lid to my peanut butter bars.  Below is the recipe: 

Reese's Peanut Butter No-Bake Bars

Ingredients: 

1 C salted butter (melted)

2 C Keebler Graham Cracker Crumbs

1/4 C Brown Sugar

1 3/4 C Powdered Sugar

1 C Peanut Butter

1/2 tsp. Vanilla Extract

1 (11 oz.) bag milk chocolate chips 

Instructions: 

Combine all ingredients, except chocolate chips in a medium bowl.  With help from your trusty mixer, mix until the mixture is smooth and creamy.  

Pour peanut butter mixture into a 9x13" casserole dish.  

Melt chocolate chips in the microwave (at 50% power) for 1-2 minutes.  Stir chocolate and pour over the peanut butter mixture.  Spread chocolate with a spatula.  To even out chocolate, tap dish on the counter.  

Refrigerate bars for an hour.  Cut while bars are still cool.  Enjoy! 

I'll keep these recipes listed under my recipe link for future reference.  

What will the year 2015 hold for us?  I know, we are awaiting another family wedding this year.  My youngest nephew got engaged to a wonderful, patient and beautiful young lady.  They decided to wed in the month of September this year.  I am so happy for them and wish them all the best on this blessed adventure together.  I hope your 2015 will be a blessing for you and others around you.  God loves you and so do I!