Ranch Chicken

6 chicken breasts
½ cup ranch dressing
1 cup Italian breadcrumbs
½ cup grated parmesan cheese (freshly or packaged shredded)
1 t. sage
salt and pepper to taste

Marinade chicken in ranch overnight. Preheat oven to 450. Combine breadcrumbs, cheese, sage, salt, and pepper. Coat breasts in breading and place in 9×13 pan. Cook the chicken at 400 for 20 minutes and check for doneness.

Yield: Six Servings 

Serve with mashed potatoes & a garden salad.

Flipping a whole chicken is awkward, but worth the effort. You can also substitute the whole chicken with chicken parts, if you prefer.

 Slow Cooker Lemon Chicken

1 (3#) broiler-fryer chicken
1 tsp dried oregano
½ teaspoon dried rosemary
3 garlic cloves, minced
2 tablespoons butter
¼ cup chicken broth (or sherry wine if it is in your pantry)
¼ cup lemon juice
salt & pepper

Wash chicken; pat dry; season chicken generously with salt and pepper; sprinkle half of oregano, rosemary and garlic inside cavity of chicken; melt butter in frying pan and brown chicken; transfer to slow cooker or crockpot; sprinkle with remaining oregano, rosemary and garlic; add sherry to frying pan and stir to loosen brown bits; pour into slow cooker. Cover, cook on LOW (200 degrees) for 7 hours; add lemon juice and cook 1 more hour (total of 8); transfer chicken to cutting board; skim fat from juices and serve over chicken.

Yield: Four servings

Serve with rice & baby peas.

Crock Hot Dogs

8 hot dogs (about one pound)

Put the hot dogs in the slow cooker. Cover and cook on HIGH until hot & slightly browned around edges, 1.5-2 hours. Remove with metal tongs and serve hot, in buns, with the fixings.

Serve with chips or pretzels.

This is a HUGE hit in our house. I guarantee once you try this recipe, you will never want tilapia any other way. My son calls this, “Fish With Sprinkles.” I just call it delicious! Enjoy!

Herb Baked Tilapia (or “Fish with Sprinkles”)

4 (4 to 6 ounce) tilapia fillets
1/3 cup Parmesan cheese
1/4 cup low-fat mayonnaise
1/4 cup dry bread crumbs (I prefer the Italian breadcrumbs & I skip the dried seasonings)
1 tsp dried basil
1 tsp dried oregano
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper

Heat oven to 400 degrees. Place tilapia on nonstick foil. In a small bowl, combine cheese and mayonnaise. Spread evenly over fish. In another bowl, combine bread crumbs, basil, oregano, salt and pepper.Sprinkle over fish. Coat fish lightly with cooking spray. Bake 10 minutes or until fish flakes easily with fork.

Serve with steamed broccoli and rice.

Roasted Chicken (Serves 4)

1 whole chicken – approximately three pounds

Wash chicken inside & out (removing anything inside). Sprinkle seasoning of your choice on the chicken (Lawry’s, Mrs. Dash, salt, or pepper). Next put three balls of aluminum foil in the bottom of the slow cooker (this creates a rack so the chicken doesn’t soak in its own juices). Place the chicken in, breast side down, and cook on low for six to eight hours.

Pair this dinner with a side of mashed potatoes and steamed broccoli.

Amy’s Notes: Adjust the cooking time according to your slow cooker. I do not put this chicken in until 1:00 and it is ready by 5:00 on low. The newer slow cookers seem to cook quicker so adjust your times accordingly.

This dish is for ziti noodles, but you can substitute with any short noodle. Macaroni is always available at Aldi and penne is available as a special purchase some weeks. Whatever pasta you do end up using, make sure to undercook the noodles so that it doesn’t become mushy when it is baked.

Classic Baked Ziti (Serves Eight)

1 pound short pasta (ziti, penne, or elbow macaroni)

1 jar of plain spaghetti sauce

1 cup low-sodium chicken broth

1 pound ground turkey

1 teaspoon Italian seasoning

1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

2 cups mozzarella cheese, shredded

1 cup grated Parmesan cheese

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Bring water to a boil in a large pot. Brown the ground turkey in a skillet. Sprinkle with salt, pepper, garlic powder and Italian seasonings. Drain fat from turkey. Dump in the jar of spaghetti sauce and 1 cup of chicken broth. Allow this to simmer while you cook the noodles. Cook noodles until al dente (make sure there is still a good bite to the noodle). Stir one cup of sauce into the drained noodles. Add 1/2 cup of sauce to the bottom of a 9×13″ dish and then pour in 1/2 of the noodles. Top these noodles with half the cheese. Repeat these steps with the remainder of the ingredients. Bake for twenty minutes covered and then remove foil and bake another ten minutes.

Serve with Texas Toast.

St

Balsamic Chicken Drumettes (Serves Four)

1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/8 cup soy sauce
1 bag of chicken drumsticks (in frozen section)

Combine above ingredients in a plastic bag. Shake until dissolved. Add chicken and throw in fridge for two hours to twenty-four hours. Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Place chicken on a foil lined pan. Bake thirty to thirty five minutes. Cook marinade in a saucepan. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat to a simmer and cook for fifteen minutes. Reserve. Brush marinade on the chicken and serve.

I served these with Microwave Taters.

This dish was included in the Iron Chef Moms Challenge. Please visit today’s post to get the scoop on the contest. Don’t forget to visit Meredith’s blog too!

Meatloaf Muffins
Yields Four Servings

1 pound ground turkey (purchased in the frozen section)
1/3 cup breadcrumbs (the Italian variety work well or fresh breadcrumbs)
1/3 cup parmesan cheese
1 egg
1 (8 ounce) can tomato sauce
¼ teaspoon garlic powder

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Mix all the ingredients together in a bowl, but only use about ¼ of the tomato sauce in the meat mixture. Press the meat into the muffin cups (you should be able to get eight out of this amount of meat). Top with a dollop of tomato sauce on each one. Cook for 30-35 minutes. Serve two per person.

This was served with freshly steamed broccoli and mashed potatoes (we like the butter-flavored variety).

This dish was included in the Iron Chef Moms Challenge. Please visit today’s post to get the scoop on the contest. Don’t forget to visit Meredith’s entry too!

Caesar Chicken Pasta Salad

1 pound chicken (about three small breasts)

½ pound penne pasta (This ingredient is available this week at Aldi. If it isn’t at your store, you can substitute with elbow macaroni)

1 romaine heart, chopped

½ pint cherry or grape tomatoes

1/3 cup Caesar dressing

A sprinkle of Parmesan cheese on top

Bake chicken breasts as directed on package on a cookie sheet. While the chicken is baking, chop the romaine heart and halve the tomatoes. Cook pasta until al dente, as directed on package. Drain and rinse pasta with cold water. Dice the cooked chicken and put this in a bowl. Toss in pasta, tomatoes, lettuce, and the dressing. Mix until all the ingredients are incorporated. This can be served with a little sprinkle of Parmesan cheese.

Amy’s Notes- Because I wanted plenty of food for leftovers, I actually cooked the entire box of pasta and kept all the other ingredients the same. This stretched the dish further and we have enough for four more lunches. Additional dressing can be added to leftovers to keep pasta from tasting dried out. Basically, for forty more cents you can feed another four people! That makes this a great dish to entertain with!

Note- Serve this dish with a side of Microwave Taters. These two dishes were featured today in day two of the Iron Chef Moms Challenge. To view today’s results, be sure to visit the entry!

Parmesan Chicken
Yields Four Servings

4 drumsticks (the Aldi’s bag contains five drumsticks, but there will still be plenty of coating)
3/4 cup Parmesan cheese (in the dairy section, not in the shaker)
1 egg
1/4 cup breadcrumbs (I make my own and store them in the freezer)

In a shallow bowl, mix together cheese and breadcrumbs. In a separate bowl, beat egg until lemon colored. Dip chicken in egg, coating well. Roll in cheese. Bake at 400 degrees for 45-60 minutes.

Amy’s Notes: I removed the skin on the chicken drumsticks. Simply slip your fingers under the skin and pull to remove. I then proceeded with the coating. My drumsticks took 50 minutes to bake.