In the Kitchen

Wait. That’s NOT chicken???

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So uneventful. Yesterday was my 1,000th post on spiffykerms.com. I only noticed this morning. Congrats to me!!

New Years Eve I had Chinese food.

I was craving Chinese food for a good year and then finally we had it. We meant to go on my Birthday back in May but plans fell through for one reason or another.

Nothing was really labeled and I mean it probably didn’t need to be. Chicken balls were clearly chicken balls, rice was rice. You know, the usual. I dug opened the beef stir fry and closed the lid as I’m not a huge fan of beef. I opened the next one and it seemed to be chicken. I mean what else would there be? I guess pork.

But this chicken looked like popcorn chicken and was stretched out a bit (note: the photo above sort of looked like the thing I ate. Except ours had more sauce on it and looked “wetter” if that’s a term). It even had a nice flavor — even resembled chicken, and I ate just two small pieces. Usually I’d eat more. This time I refrained, mainly because I thought it was overly cooked since it was chewy.

I never thought anything about it. Until last week my Boyfriend and I were at the grocery store and I thought of the New Years Eve Chinese food take out dinner we ate. I began to talk about how much I loved the Chinese food. Except for one part. I reminded him of the beef stir fry, then asked him about the “chicken stir fry”.

Scott told me  “The only chicken we had with Chinese food was chicken balls.“

My reply: No no. That’s not right. Remember the popcorn chicken all stretched out that tasted rubbery?

Scott: That was calamari

Me: What the heck is that?

Scott: Squid.

I nearly vomited right on the grocery store floor in the frozen food aisle. My stomach turned so quick – it’s never happened to me like that before. I can’t believe I felt that sick just thinking of what I had eaten. Just a few days prior we went with the same group to a sushi restaurant. The boyf and I went out to eat before hand as we knew the group of them were ordering sushi. We don’t like sushi.

I wasn’t ready to handle the news that I ate calamari. I ate it without thinking. Now I know why that CHICKEN was rubbery. It wasn’t freaking chicken at all.

This happened all in a matter of seconds at the grocery store, and Scott kept talking about calamari, squid, etc. I was all “stopit stopittt” because I literally felt sick to my stomach, knowing what I had eaten.

I could barely type this entry out.

Gross.

WELL! No need for diet pills, all I have to think about is calamari…

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Guest Post, In the Kitchen, Photos

Guest Post #3: Julie from Peanut Butter Fingers

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Hello Nancy fans! My name is Julie and I blog about my life, food and fitness over at Peanut Butter Fingers.


I created my blog in September 2009 to share my love of creating delicious but healthy recipes with family and friends. I love to write and experiment in the kitchen, so blogging was a great way to do both!

Sometimes my experiments in the kitchen are complete failures. But sometimes I get it right.

Today I’m going to share perhaps the most delicious cookie recipe I’ve ever created. It came about when my husband said he wanted “a treat” at 10 p.m. on a Saturday night. (Yes, we’re a super-cool couple that stays home and makes cookies on weekend nights.)


I was in the baking mood, as always, and meandered into the kitchen and pulled out key ingredients for any tasty cookie… flour, sugar and butter.


Then I looked through our cabinets and grabbed oats and wheat germ and started to feel inspired.

The result of my random creation was fantastic.

I present to you, oatmeal wheat germ cookies!

Ingredients:

  • ½ c. butter, softened (1 stick)
  • 1 c. powdered sugar
  • ½ c. sugar
  • 1 egg
  • ½ tsp. vanilla
  • ½ tsp. salt
  • ½ tsp. baking soda
  • 1 ¼ c. flour
  • 1 ¼ c. old fashioned oats
  • ½ c. wheat germ

Directions

  • Preheat oven to 350 degrees
  • Mix butter and sugars in a bowl until fully combined
  • Gradually mix egg and vanilla into sugar mixture
  • In a separate bowl, stir together flour, salt and baking soda
  • Gradually mix flour mixture into sugar and egg mixture
  • Once the flour and sugar mixture are fully combined, mix in oats and wheat germ
  • Place tablespoons full of dough on a cookie sheet sprayed with cooking spray and bake for 10 minutes or until edges are slightly browned
  • Let cool and enjoy!

I hope you enjoy these cookies as much as we did!

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In the Kitchen, Photos

Pesto recipe from the brother

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I’ve been experimenting a bit in the kitchen with other people’s recipes and even updated my recipe page once again due to the fact that these were keepers in my books, and tasted awesome enough to make again.

For instance. The other night for dinner, I was feeling like making my Brother’s “Pesto”. Is it still called Pesto if it’s made from spinach rather than basil? Not sure I’m a huge fan of basil. Either way, I liked it — but I wasn’t fond of the crunchiness from the slivered almonds I used. My boyf on the other hand was pleased with it. Next time, I’m using a mortar and pestle.

Close up of the tasty action.

The pesto itself was pretty darn awesome and I couldn’t even describe it because the flavors in my mouth were twinkling with delight. You’ll just have to make it for yourselves. 

The chicken was so juicy. I rarely and I mean rarely cook chicken in the oven because hello “Mister George Forman” grill himself takes half the time. I forgot how good a chicken can be in the oven. I kinda like it. Especially because I didn’t have to keep checking on it like I do on the grill.

Anyhoodle, off I go!

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