Roasted Broccoli

Need an easy, healthy side dish?  Here you go!


You'll need:


1 lb fresh broccoli, cut into florets
2 tbs olive oil
salt and pepper, to taste
1 lemon
soy sauce (just a little bit!!)


Preheat your oven to 400 degrees F.  Line a baking sheet with foil, and consider giving it a good spray with cooking spray.


Toss the broccoli, olive oil, salt, and pepper around in a zip top bag until everything is well coated.  Spread this out on the baking sheet.

Bake for 15 minutes or so, tossing the broccoli around midway through.  Once it's done, squeeze the lemon and pour the smidge of soy sauce over the broccoli.  Toss it all up, and it's time to eat!

This was so simple to prepare, and was excellent.  My only word of caution is to use the soy sauce very sparingly.  Things get overpoweringly salty pretty quickly.  You could always cut way back on the salt that you initially season the broccoli with, or omit it entirely, as well as consider using the low sodium soy sauce if you need to watch your sodium intake.  Enjoy!

Funfetti Cake Dip

Happy Fourth of July, everyone!  Unfortunately, I don't have some patriotic themed recipe for you... but I do have an awesome, sweet dip! 


I saw this dip on the blog Eat Yourself Skinny, and knew that I had to make it. I'm a huge fan of Funfetti cake (see my homemade version of Funfetti cupcakes here!), so this dip was particularly appealing to me. It's very tasty, not so terrible for you, and simple enough to put together that I whipped this up while in my hotel room on vacation. 


You'll need: 


1 box Funfetti cake mix (I used the white cake) 
1 cup Lite Coolwhip 
2 cups plain, non-fat yogurt 


Mix everything up in a bowl until it's all well-combined. Garnish with extra sprinkles, if you desire. Then dig on in! I used graham crackers for dipping, but you could use whatever sounds good to you. I originally had some chocolate animal crackers, too, that I thought would be particularly good with this dip. But I sort of... ate the entire bag before leaving for vacation, and was too lazy to make another trip to the store. Use whatever you'd like, though! Enjoy!! =) 

Big Old Skillet Cookie

While working from home this week, I had a hankering for something sweet so I decided to bake.  Also, quite frankly, I wanted to break up the monotony of working on manuscripts.  So I searched through my bookmarked recipes and came across this one, from the blog The Cherry on Top.  


This recipe seemed perfect, since I wanted cookies, but was feeling a little lazy and didn't necessarily want to spend a lot of time rolling out individual balls of dough.  So if you're craving freshly baked cookies, but are feeling a bit lethargic, give this one a try.

You'll need:


2 cups of all purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) butter, room temperature
1/2 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar
1 large egg
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups chocolate chips (I used a mix of white and semi-sweet chocolate chips)


a cast iron skillet


Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.


In a medium bowl, stir together the flour, baking soda, and salt.  Set aside.  


Meanwhile, cream together the butter and sugars until light and fluffy, for 2-3 minutes.  Add the egg and vanilla extract and mix until well incorporated.


With the mixer on low speed, slowly add the flour mixture until everything is well incorporated.  Mix in the chocolate chips.


Transfer the dough to your cast iron skillet (mine was 12 inches in diameter).  Press to flatten it in an even layer.  Bake until the edges of the cookie are brown and golden, ~40-45 minutes.  Transfer to a wire rack to finish cooling before serving.

Om nom nom nom nom...

Honey, Lemon, & Rosemary Grilled Chicken

Thank you Two Peas and Their Pod for this marinade recipe.  It's perfect for summer grilling.

You'll need:

1/2 cup honey

zest of 1 lemon

2 tbs fresh lemon juice

2 tbs olive oil

1 1/2 tbs fresh rosemary, chopped

1 garlic clove, minced

1/2 tsp kosher salt

1/2 tsp black pepper

4 skinless, boneless, chicken breasts (or some chicken tenders)

Combine all ingredients except for chicken in a medium-sized bowl.  Put the chicken in a zip top bag, then add the marinade.  Mix it all around to ensure that the chicken is well coated.

Put the bag in the refrigerator and let it marinate for at least 30 minutes, and up to overnight.  If you'd like, come back to the bag every so often and mix it up.

Preheat your grill, brush the grates with olive oil, and go to town!  Place the chicken on the grill and discard the marinade.  Grill until cooked through.  Serve warm.

Delicious and healthy!  The only change I'd make to this chicken next time around would be to add more garlic.  A lot more garlic.  But that's just me.  It was really good over a bed of cous cous and roasted tomatoes.  And equally delicious the next day when I turned the leftovers into chicken salad.

Not-So-Typical Baked Macaroni and Cheese

Just like my last post, this one has been sitting around as a draft since April 1st.  Eesh.  Fortunately, after posting this one, I'm all caught up and can start whipping up some brand new posts.  I found this recipe on a new-to-me blog, A Duck's Oven.

You'll need:

12 oz mini penne pasta (or whatever pasta you're into)

1 1/2 cups sharp cheddar cheese, shredded

1 tbs green onion, chopped

1/2 tsp ground mustard

1/2 tsp garlic powder

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp ground black pepper

1 cup light sour cream

1 cup cottage cheese

1/2 cup milk

1/4 cup butter, melted

1/4 cup Panko bread crumbs

1/4 tsp paprika

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.  Cook pasta according to package directions.

Once the pasta is done, drain and return it to the pot it was cooked in.  While it's still hot, mix in the shredded cheese.

Combine the ground mustard, garlic powder, salt and pepper in a small bowl.

Add the sour cream, cottage cheese, and milk to the pasta and mix thoroughly.  Add the spice mixture and green onions and mix until combined.

Lightly grease a 9x13 inch pan and spread the mac n cheese into the dish.  

Combine the melted butter, bread crumbs, and paprika and sprinkle evenly over the top.  Bake for 30 minutes until it's bubbly, and the bread crumbs have browned.  If the bread crumbs aren't browned enough for your liking, broil it for 30 seconds or so.  Top with additional green onions and serve.

This is really good as is, but could only be improved by the addition of, say... bacon?  Or broccoli?  Whatever you'd like.  Enjoy!

Panko Crusted Stuffed Chicken Breasts

Wow, this recipe has been sitting around as a draft for like 2 months.  Why it took me this long to blog about it, I'm not sure.  It was really good!  I came across this recipe on the blog For the Love of Cooking.


You'll need:


1 cup of ricotta cheese
small handful of baby spinach, roughly chopped
small handful of grape or cherry tomatoes, chopped
2 tbs Parmesan cheese
1 tbs fresh basil, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
salt and pepper, to taste
2 chicken breasts
Panko bread crumbs
2 tsp olive oil


Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.


Combine the ricotta cheese, spinach, tomatoes, Parmesan, basil, garlic, salt and pepper in a bowl, set aside.


Take the chicken breasts and cut a long horizontal slit along the center of the thin long edge of each chicken breast.  Don't cut the whole way through, though.  Fill the cavity with the cheese mixture.  Season each side of the chicken with more salt and pepper.  Dip the chicken in the Panko bread crumbs until both side is evenly coated.  Carefully seal up the open slits in the chicken with toothpicks.

Heat the olive oil in an oven proof skillet on the stove over medium high heat.  Once the pan heats up, put the chicken in the pan for 3-4 minutes or until the chicken is golden brown.  

A little messy...

Flip it over and put the skillet in the oven.  Cook for an additional 2o minutes, or until the chicken is cooked through.

Let the chicken rest for 5 minutes before digging in.  Enjoy!  Also, if you happen to use colored toothpicks, like I did, don't be alarmed when some of the color ends up transferring to the chicken.  It's harmless. =)

Crispy Chocolate Chip Cookies

Hi everyone!  It feels so good to be posting on a more regular basis again.  Now that I passed my oral exams and am officially a doctoral candidate, my schedule is freed up considerably.  I'll be finishing up some side projects that were put on the back burner, and of course, doing a lot more blogging and gardening and whatnot.  Oo and reading for fun!  


Anyway, yesterday was my birthday (the big 2-5, woo woo)!  And since I didn't bake myself a cake or anything, I figured I should at least post a recipe for something sweet.


I made these cookies sometime last month when I was stressing over writing my dissertation proposal.  Baking is therapeutic for me, remember?  Anyway, I know that everyone has at least one recipe for chocolate chip cookies.  Why would you need yet another?  Well, these are a little different, thanks to the addition of Panko bread crumbs, and totally worth a try.


I found this recipe on the blog Newly Wife.


You'll need:


2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 cups unsalted butter, melted
1 cup brown sugar, packed
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 tbs vanilla extract
1 egg, plus 1 egg yolk
1 cup Panko bread crumbs
2 cups chocolate chips


Preheat your oven to 325 degrees F.  Line the cookie sheets with parchment paper.


Sift the flour, baking soda, and salt together.  Set aside.


Cream together the melted butter and sugars until well blended.  Beat in the vanilla, egg, and egg yolk.  Next, mix in the flour mixture little by little until everything is just blended.  Stir in the Panko bread crumbs and chocolate chips.


Drop cookie dough onto the prepared cookie sheets.  Bake for 15-17 minutes until the edges are lightly toasted.

Crispy and delicious!  They were a huge hit with the research group I work with.  If you're hungry for some chocolate chip cookies with a twist, please give these a try!