Chicken Freezer Meals

I posted on Facebook recently that I had tackled 40 pounds of chicken and put it all away in the freezer in freezer meals. This is what we will be eating for the next month when I won't want to be standing up and cooking.  Several people wanted the recipes, so here you go . . .

Asian BBQ Chicken

1/4 cup packed brown sugar

1/4 cup soy sauce

2 Tbs lime juice (about 1 lime)

1/4 tsp cayenne pepper

1/4 tsp curry powder

3-4 garlic cloves, minced

1 tsp grated fresh ginger

8 boneless, skinless chicken thighs

Combine everything but the chicken in a small bowl. Whisk to dissolve brown sugar. Reserve a couple of spoonfuls of the marinade in a small bowl and place the rest, with the chicken, in a zip-lock bag. (If your chicken pieces are extra large and you feel like you need a little more marinade, you can always add a bit of water to stretch it.)

Refrigerate for a minimum of 4 hours, but overnight is best. (or place in ziplock and freeze until ready to cook)

Preheat a grill (or an indoor grill pan or broiler). Spray cooking surface with cooking spray and place chicken on it to cook. Cook for 5-10 minutes on each side depending on the thickness.

Web Page: http://www.yourhomebasedmom.com

Caesar Chicken

2 lbs frozen boneless, skinless chicken breasts or tenderloins

2 (16 oz.) bottles Creamy Caesar Salad dressing

2-3 cloves freshly pressed garlic

grated parmesan cheese

optional: lettuce, box of croutons OR cooked pasta

Place frozen chicken into freezer bag; add garlic and one bottle of dressing. Coat chicken well. Squeeze air out of bag and freeze. Chicken will marinate as it defrosts in refrigerator for 24 hours. Remove chicken from bag and place in Stoneware Rectangular Baker. Bake, uncovered, at 400 degrees for 45 minutes (30 minutes for tenderloins). Using Deluxe Cheese Grater, grate cheese and set aside.

SALAD: Slice chicken and serve warm over lettuce, tossed with half of second bottle of dressing, parmesan cheese and croutons. Or serve chicken over cooked pasta and top with grated cheese.

Source: "Power Cooking" Recipe

Cheesy Chicken

2 lbs boneless skinless chicken breasts

2 can cream of chicken soup

1 can cheddar cheese soup

1 garlic clove, crushed

Place chicken breasts in crockpot. Mix the soups together with garlic and pour over chicken. Cover and cook on low 6 to 8 hours, until chicken is tender. (Any leftovers freeze in ziplock bag and just thaw and warm)

Serve over rice or noodles

Servings: 8

Source: http://busycooks.about.com

Chicken in a Pastry

This was the first fancy meal I learned to cook as a teenager at a church meeting.  It quickly became my family's favorite meal.

1/2 cup butter

4 oz cream cheese

1 cup flour, white

4 chicken breast, boneless, skinless

1 egg

2 Tbs butter

2 Tbs flour, white

1 cup chicken broth

1 1/2 tsp dill weed

Blend ½ cup butter and cream cheese. Stir in flour and mix until it leaves the sides of the bowl. Divide into 4 parts, wrap in wax paper and chill at least 1 hour.

Saute chicken breasts in butter for 3 minutes on each side and salt and pepper to taste. Roll chilled pastry thin and wrap chicken. (if freezer for another day place on cookie sheet and freeze.  Then transfer to a ziplock bag and put back in freezer.  When ready to use place on cookie sheet and place in fridge until thawed)

Place on cookie sheet and brush top with beaten egg and 1 teaspoon water. Prick pastry with fork and bake at 425 for 20 minutes.

Dill Sauce -- In a saucepan melt 2 tablespoons butter, add 2 tablespoon flour and stir 2 minutes. Add broth and bring to a boil. Add salt and pepper to taste. Add dill weed. Serve dill sauce over pastry.

Ginger Chicken

1 egg white , beaten lightly

1 1/2 Tbsp cornstarch

1/2 tsp salt

3 boneless skinless chicken breast halves

3 scallions, cut into 1/4-inch pieces

2 Tbsp ginger, finely minced and peeled

2 Tbsp plus 2 tsp sugar

1/2 tsp salt

2 Tbs ketchup

4 tsp white vinegar

4 tsp rice wine vinegar

2 tsp soy sauce

2 tsp cornstarch

2 tsp cool water

In a medium bowl, mix together thoroughly egg white, cornstarch and 1/2 tsp salt.

Cut chicken breasts into 3/4-inch cubes (this is more easily done if the chicken is partially frozen.) Toss chicken in the egg white mixture. Let stand for 20 to 30 minutes.

Place on a small plate or bowl scallions and ginger.

In a medium bowl, mix together sugar, salt, ketchup, vinegars and soy sauce.

In a cup, mix together thoroughly cornstarch and cool water.

Heat a wok or large skillet over high heat until hot. Add 1/2 cup oil. Swirl the oil around the pan until very hot but not smoking. Add the chicken and quickly stir and flip in the oil to separate the pieces. Cook lightly. Remove with a slotted spoon, leaving the oil in the wok. Set aside.

Reheat the wok over high heat. Swirl the remaining oil around the pan (there should be 2 to 3 tablespoons) until it is very hot but not smoking. Add the scallions and ginger. Stir and toss vigorously until slightly brown, about 30 seconds. Add the soy sauce mixture and stir until heated through. Stir the cornstarch mixture, then pour it slowly into the sauce, stirring constantly. Cook, stirring until the mixture is thickened. Return the chicken to the wok. Cook, stirring thoroughly to mix, until heated through.

Remove to a serving dish. Serve immediately. Great with Fried Rice.

Source: The All New All Purpose Joy of Cooking Cookbook

Mexican Chicken

2 lbs frozen boneless, skinless chicken breasts or tenderloins

16 oz jar mild or medium salsa

2-3 cloves freshly pressed garlic

½ cup finely chopped onion

2 ½ oz can sliced black olives, drained

sliced or grated Monterey Jack cheese

Place frozen chicken into freezer bag. Combine remaining ingredients except cheese. Pour sauce into bag and coat chicken well. Squeeze air out of bag and freeze. Chicken will marinate as it defrosts in refrigerator for 24 hours. Remove chicken from bag and place in Stoneware Rectangular Baker. Pour excess sauce from bag over top of chicken. Bake, uncovered, at 400 degrees for 45 minutes (30 minutes for tenderloins). Using Deluxe Cheese Grater, grate cheese onto chicken; bake 10 minutes and serve.

Ranch Style Chicken

4 - 6 Boneless, Skinless Chicken Breasts

1 lb Thick cut bacon

Bacon grease

1/2 cup Honey

1/2 cup Dijon Mustard

Juice of 1/2 Lemon

1/2 tsp Paprika

1 cup Sharp Cheddar Cheese

1/4 cup Canola oil

Mix together honey, Dijon mustard, lemon juice and paprika. Whisk it together until smooth.

Next, rinse the chicken breasts under cool water and pat them dry. Put in zip lock bag and pound breasts so they have uniform thickness.

Next, just add all the chicken to the bowl with the marinade. You’ll want to cover this with plastic wrap and let it marinate in the fridge for at least an hour. (I place the chicken and marinade in zip lock bag and freeze until ready to make)

While the chicken is marinating, go ahead and fry up some bacon. Reserve 1/4 cup of the bacon grease, and go ahead and clean out the skillet. Otherwise, it’ll get too smoky.

When you’re ready to prepare the chicken, preheat the oven to 400° degrees.

Remove the chicken from the fridge and pour off excess marinade into the sink. Heat half of the reserved bacon grease with an equal quantity of Canola Oil in the clean skillet over medium-high to high heat. (We want to sear the chicken, not cook it completely.) When the grease is sufficiently heated, add a batch of chicken to the skillet. Don’t overcrowd the skillet—just 3 pieces is usually enough. Watch the chicken, and when it starts to get brown/black on one side…Flip it to the other side. Cook just until brown/blackish areas appear. Each side should cook for a maximum of 1 to 1 1/2 minutes. Repeat with all the chicken breasts, then set them on a large baking sheet.

Go ahead and throw the pan of chicken into the hot oven for about ten minutes to continue cooking. Then remove the pan from the oven…And lay a couple of bacon slices over each chicken breast. Next, grab some grated sharp cheddar and sprinkle it over the top as generously as you’d like. Just return the pan to the oven for an additional five minutes, or until cheese is melted and bacon is sizzling. Then serve immediately…

Web Page: http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking

Update to Thoughts of the Week

Amazing how a good shower can make you think better.  I'm now ready to work for the day.  But for those who don't know what I was talking about in the last post for securing your dressers and bookshelves to the wall . . . here you go.  I think you can buy them at Home Depot, Lowes, Target, Walmart or any place that has child safety items.  Here is a link I found online and since I borrowed their picture I'll give them the credit.  It is at My Precious Kid.  You just screw them into the wall and on the dresser and then tighten the zip tie.

I also forgot I wanted to mention this incredible recipe I made this week.   Found it in the Martha Stewart Living magazine as the Cookie of the Month.  I think this is the first time I've ever made a recipe from the magazine.  But how could you go wrong with a title of No-Bake Chocolate and Peanut Butter Oatmeal Bars and a picture that looked like THAT.  Hey and if they have Oatmeal in them aren't they healthy?  Luckily I gave away half the pan or I would have eaten them all myself.  My favorite comment on them came from Mike W at Thanksgiving Point.  He told Mark he thought they were against the Word of Wisdom.  I could not find Chocolate Wafers so we bought Oreos and removed the cream and just used the cookies.  I had a few helpers that took care of the cream for me.  Wasn't that nice of them.  Click on the title of the recipe to be directed to the actual recipe.  Warning these are addictive!

Heaven on a Plate

Do you have a family recipe that only your family 'gets'. Well, we do and we got to enjoy it tonight. When I said I needed to take a picture before it was cut Mark made some comment about me having to blog about it. I said I wanted to post the recipe, but you really need a picture to understand what it is supposed to look like. He informed me it would scare people away. Apparently he was scared by the look of it the first time he saw it, but he has gotten over it since he enjoyed it just as much as me tonight.

This recipe came from my adorable Grandma Jesperson. It was forgotten about for many years and I don't remember for sure when it was brought back into my family, but I think my Mom started making it more regularly about 20 years ago. It is an Angel Food Cake that is then frosted with a custard that is mixed with whipping cream. The original recipe used real whipping cream, but my Mom discovered Cool Whip holds up much better and makes it much easier to make.

The cake usually shows its face around birthday celebrations. Especially my brother, Brent's. It is a little time intensive, so it is mostly for special occasions. My sister, Kim (welcome to the blogging world finally), is up from Arizona and her birthday is on Tuesday. Mine follows five days after that so tonight was the official joint celebration dinner. As a child it always bothered me to celebrate our party together, but that was because Kim always had more friends than me so she got more presents. I've matured a little since than and can handle combining the event.

In our family it is referred to as "Custard Cake" I'm sure ages ago someone came up with the recipe after making an angle food cake from scratch and wanted to do something with all those egg yolks. But with how easy cake mixes are these days we now just waste all the egg whites.

So you start by making an angel food cake (from a mix). Mom swears the two packet mixes taste better than the easier one packet mixes. When you cool the cake it has to hang upside down. Now the most important step comes next. You must remove the crusty top of the cake before removing it from the pan. The best way to do this is to pick at it a little at a time while it is cooling and enjoy the top. I'm sure the finished cake would not taste as good if you did not sample it at first! Then you make the following Custard Frosting and frost the cake with it.

Custard Frosting
9 egg yolks
1½ cup sugar
¼ tsp salt
2¼ cup milk
2 Tbsp gelatin
3 Tbsp cold water
6 Tbsp boiling water
3 tsp vanilla
1 - 8oz Cool Whip, thawed

In the top of a double boiler, beat the egg yolks and add sugar and salt. Scold milk and slowly stir it into the egg yolk mixture. Cook this mixture over boiling water in double boiler, stirring constantly until the custard lightly coats a spoon (about 4 minutes) DO NOT COOK LONGER, as this will cause the custard to curdle. Remove from heat. Soak gelatin in cold water for 5 minutes. Add boiling water and mix to dissolve gelatin. May have to set container into hot water to get to dissolve completely. Add to custard.

Put in 9 x 13 pan and set in freezer for 10 minutes then stir. Put back in freezer and let stand for 5 minutes repeating until mixture starts to set. Remove from freezer and fold in Cool Whip. If runny then put back in freezer for 5 minutes. Put small amount on cake plate then place Angel Food Cake on top then frost Angel Food Cake with mixture. If extra then put in hole of Angel Food Cake. Place in fridge and let set up about 30 minutes.

I hope your family enjoys this as much as we do.

If pumpkin is a veggie, does that make this healthy?

Mark has a pot luck tomorrow at work, so a dish was requested. Of course I forgot about it (even though it was on the calendar) until about 6:30 pm tonight. My focus today was Activity Days and Thursday just seemed so far off earlier in the week.


And may I say Activity Days was awesome today. I had a cute gal in our ward, Erin, that teaches sign language at a high school come and talk to the girls. Erin is amazing and has also started a non profit organization called Signs of Hope International. So we talked about the 7th Article of Faith and believing in the gift of tongues. Then Erin talked to the girls about sign language and her organization and showed a DVD of the cute kids in Africa that they help. Then the girls learned the alphabet in sign and signed their names and a few other signs. It was awesome. Thanks so much for sharing your amazing talents Erin!


Okay, back to the original point of this post. After deliberating over several recipes to make we finally landed on Pumpkin Bars. Mark fell in love with the ones at the Thanksgiving Point Bakery a few years back. He finally managed to get his hands on the recipe. They only make them during the Fall, so we thought it would be funny if he brought a bakery recipe to the work pot luck! Hopefully they will be as good as theirs. So I thought I would share the recipe. I'm adding my cream cheese frosting since we prefer it to the one that came with the original recipe.


Pumpkin Bars from Thanksgiving Point
Recipe By : Pillsbury
2 cups flour
2 cups sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon cloves
1 cup oil
2 cups pumpkin
4 eggs

Preheat oven 350 degrees. Prepare 15x10 pan (large sheet) Blend all bar ingredients and mix at low speed for 2 minutes. Pour into pan and bake 25-30 minutes. Cool.



Cream Cheese Frosting

8 oz cream cheese
1/2 cup butter
1 lb powdered sugar
1 Tbsp vanilla (can you ever add too much vanilla?)

Cream butter and cream cheese together until fluffy. Add powdered sugar and vanilla; mix on low until sugar is combined and then mix on high until fluffy.


Spread Frosting over cooled bars. Store in refrigerator.


These are so good. And I always have the struggle because the small can of pumpkin is too little but the big can of pumpkin is too much, you end up with 1 cup of extra pumpkin. So tonight I made one and a half recipes and will send the big one to work and we can enjoy the small one here. I wasn't going to include a picture because mine aren't frosted yet, but Google Images are amazing and I found one that looks just like mine, thanks!

Cookbook Software

What started out as a way to get rid of all my recipe clutter turned into a Christmas project in 1998. I was tired of all the loose recipes flying around my recipe cupboard and started typing them up. Ten years ago our family budget was really tight so I decided to make a recipe book for my Mom and Sisters that year for gifts. They loved it and even my In-Laws loved it even though it was mostly recipes from my family since we had only been married 2 years. I created the cookbook using WordPerfect. It was a lot of manual work, but I knew the software well enough I was able to make it do what I wanted it to do.

For the last couple of years I've been wanting to update that cookbook. My copy is trashed and my recipe clutter has increased ten fold! (Mark would say 100 fold) I've searched for basic software to make the cookbook but have never found any I like. All the ones I found were too complex or I had to have that company publish it and then you have to order 1000 copies.

This last week I think I finally found my solution! Once again I did a Google Search and this time found a fairly new company called The Cookbook People. It will allow me to cut and paste the recipes I already have typed up and add to those recipes. I can then print it at home and take it to the local copier to copy and bind. And the software is only $29.95. I even e-mailed them with a few questions and they not only replied, the developer called me to discuss my ideas. Made me feel important!

I'm now waiting until their next software release comes out in the next couple of weeks before I purchase it. But I thought I'd throw this out into cyberspace and see if someone knows of another software I should be looking at? Does anyone have experience in printing your own basic cookbooks? I don't want fancy hard bound stuff, just a basic family cookbook of tried and true recipes. But I want the software to categorize the recipes and put them alphabetically with at least a Table of Contents.

Dinner Tonight!

I LOVE Cafe Rio and I know many of my friends enjoy this obsession as well. Unfortunately most of my immediate family members do not enjoy Mexican cooking. I love Mexican. I grew up in Southern Calif and had Grandparents that lived in South America on multiple occasions. We used to have enchiladas for the extended Family Christmas dinner. Tonight I put together several recipes I'd collected thanks to one of my hosts, an Enrichment dinner and the web to make our own version of the great Pork Barbacoa Salad. I was shocked when almost everyone at the dinner table enjoyed it (it is hard to please Ashley). Let me share the recipes with you!

Pork Barbacoa
4 lb pork roast (I used a 6 lb roast and you could easily get a bigger one. I put part in the freezer for another night)
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 tsp cumin
1-2 Tbsp molasses
2 1/2 cans tomato sauce
1 to 1 1/2 C brown sugar
2 C Dr Pepper
1/4 tsp salt
pepper to taste
Cut fat off pork. Place pork in crock pot. Mix ingredients and pour over pork. Simmer in crock pot until meat pulls apart easily. (6-8 hours) Remove meat from crock pot, shred, skim fat off juice and mix back together and let simmer another hour to let flavors blend.

Cilantro Ranch
1 packet TRADITIONAL Hidden Valley Ranch mix (not BUTTERMILK)
1 c. mayonnaise
1 c. buttermilk
2 tomatillos, remove husk, diced
1/2 bunch of fresh cilantro
1 clove garlic
juice of 1 lime
1 jalapeno (if you like it spicy keep the seeds in it, if you like it mild, just remove the seeds)
Mix all ingredients together in the blender then refrigerate for at least 2 hours.

Cilantro Lime Rice
1 c. uncooked rice
1 tsp. butter or margarine
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tsp. freshly squeezed lime juice
1 can (15 oz) chicken broth
1 cup water
1 Tbsp. freshly squeezed lime juice
2 tsp. sugar
3 tablespoons fresh chopped cilantro
In a saucepan combine rice, butter, garlic, 1 tsp. lime, chicken broth and water. Bring to a boil. Cover and cook on low 15-20 minutes, until rice is tender. Remove from heat. In a small bowl combine lime juice, sugar and cilantro. Pour over hot cooked rice and mix in as you fluff the rice.

I only had sticky rice on hand so I just cooked it about 10 minutes longer.

I also bought the flour tortillas from Costco that you cook at home. I have made flour tortillas from scratch many times, but these ones from Costco are almost as good and save a TON of time. And we had guacamole from Costco in the freezer, they never put enough of it on at Cafe Rio! We had some romaine lettuce, cheese, sour cream and chips to add to everything above.

Everyone loved that they could put what they liked on their tortillas and I loved the whole thing! Enjoy!

Let them eat Cake!

I've become obsessed with this chocolate cake. My cousin posted on her blog this picture and story of the amazing cake she made. Then her sister, Eden, raved about it on her blog. Eden even came over to my house and described the cake in great detail. When they FINALLY posted the recipe I was dying to try it out. Of course between trying to get my kids ready to go stay at relatives and getting us ready to leave town there was no time to make it.

A lass, I broke down Thursday night and made it. I could not imagine waiting almost two weeks by the time we returned to try it out. This really is the richest, dense, moistest chocolate cake I've ever had. Thank you Sam! It is so rich you can only eat a very small sliver at a time. But I have enjoyed every bite I have had.

Eden can't say enough about the frosting. And it is a great frosting recipe. But I really think you need to try my Debbi Field's chocolate frosting recipe. Once you see how much butter is involved you'll understand this is the creamiest chocolate frosting ever.

22 Tbsp unsalted butter, softened
4 1/2 cups sifted powdered sugar
1 cup sifted unsweetened cocoa powder
1 Tbsp pure vanilla extract
1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons milk

Cream butter until fluffy, add remaining ingredients and combine well. This is the full recipe. I always cut it in half for a 9 x 13 cake.

When we return from Florida we will have to make the cake again and try this recipe and see what you think!