Cinnamon Apple Pork and Sweet Potatoes

My kids (and hubby) love their sweets.  This is a dinner that to them tasted like dessert but I felt fine about it because there was plenty of fruit and veggies in every bite.  Ladybug decided that forks should be optional during this meal because she was able to shovel in the goodness with her hands better.

Ingredients:

Pork chops

1 c (or one juice box) apple juice

2 Tablespoons cinnamon

1/4 c honey

2-3 sweet potatoes

2 apples

1. Night before (or right when you get home) put pork chops, apple juice, honey, and cinnamon in a large ziplock bag to marinate the meat. Cooking/Meal planning tip:  Even if I haven't meal planned, I like to know what I am making for dinner by the night before.  That way I can make sure any meat needed is thawed and ingredients are on hand.
2. Peel and cube sweet potatoes (~1/2 inch cubes are perfect)
3. Cook the sweet potatoes with some coconut oil or olive oil for about 10 minutes, stirring frequently.
4. Preheat the grill.
5. While sweet potatoes are cooking, cube the apples (I leave the peel on)
6. Once the sweet potatoes are starting to soften, add the apples and a little more oil. 
7. Put the meat on the grill, keeping the marinade.

   

   Reserved marinade

8. Pour the marinade into the sweet potatoes and apples and cover.
9. Flip the meat when it is no longer sticking to the grill (about 4 minutes)
10. Pull the meat off the grill when again, it is no longer sticking to it and let it rest while the apples and sweet potatoes finish cooking.                                                                                                        

When you cook with booze, which should be often...

If you've taken a look at my recipes, a lot of them include deglazing with wine or beer.  Is this just an excuse to open up a bottle of something on a weeknight?  Well, maybe.  But really the goal is to deepen the flavor of whatever I'm cooking, which brings me to this cooking tip:

Never, EVER,  cook with booze you wouldn't enjoy drinking.  

Seriously.  Never.  If they sell it as "cooking wine" in a grocery store DO NOT cook with it.  Ever.  If you have a can of Natty Light in the fridge that's been there forever DO NOT put it in your food.

Why?  If you don't like the flavor of it enough to drink it, you won't like the flavor it adds to your food.

A lot of the cooking wine I've tasted honestly tastes nothing like wine at all so it doesn't have the same effect as adding a glug of chardonnay.  

Here's my rule:  If you like it and genuinely enjoy drinking it, then it is good enough for your food.  It doesn't have to be expensive.  If you wouldn't drink it, don't let it touch your food.

There you have it.  Now crack open a bottle of something and deglaze a pan with it.  And pour yourself a glass while you're at it.

Go To Taco Meat

This is the recipe for my Go To Taco Meat that I seriously make almost every week.  Beast looks at my weekly menu more on that later for it each week and will ask if it isn't there when I'm making it next.  This recipe makes plenty for dinner and next day lunches too.  And the kids have no idea how many veggies they are eating.   

Ingredients:

1 lb. ground beef or ground turkey
1 onion, chopped
1 cup carrots, chopped
1 red pepper, chopped

1 can fire roasted diced tomatoes

1 can diced green chiles

1 can black beans

1 box Spanish rice

1 box hard taco shells

1 packet taco seasoning

Beer for deglazing the pan (pretty much anything will work as long as it isn't too fruity)

Cheddar cheese for topping

Other possible additions:

Chopped zucchini
Chopped fresh spinach

Other possible toppings:

Sour cream 

Lettuce

Diced fresh tomatoes

Directions:

• Put on a Sesame Street episode for the kids.  
• Open a beer and take a swig.  You have to make sure the bottle is good before using it in a recipe.  Seriously.  
• Put on your favorite Pandora mix.  I recommend "Ed Sheeran Radio" or "Today's Indie Radio."
• Brown meat.
• While meat is cooking, chop onion, red pepper, and carrots.

• Once meat is browned, drain if there is a pourable amount of fat.
• Add carrots and cook about 5 minutes. 

• Cook the Spanish rice as directed on the box.  Add the diced tomatoes can once the water is boiling.
• Add other vegetables and cook about 5 minutes (until onions are tender).

• Add the packet of taco seasoning to the meat.
• If at any time the bottom of the pans starts to get crusty technical term deglaze the pan with a glug of beer.  Once the beer is in, scrape the bottom of the pan to get all the good stuff off flavor off the bottom. 
• Cook the meat until the carrots are tender.
• Add the can of green chiles.
• Drain and rinse the can of black beans.  Add it to the meat.  This might sound strange but I do this for a couple of reasons: 1) My kids won't eat beans if I serve them on the side but they will eat them in the meat.  2) This makes 1 pound of meat go a long way since the beans act as a cheap additional protein and filler.

• Serve the tacos topped with cheese and any other toppings you like and a side of rice.

• Watch your children eat veggies they have no idea about.  Evil cackle quietly to yourself.

So there you have it.  This is not anything fancy but it goes over really well with my family and tastes great for lunch the next day.  It is also really flexible and you can make it different depending on what you have on hand.

Hope it works for you too!

Make your grilled chicken better

I don't know about you, but when I first started cooking grilling chicken was one thing I could not figure out.  I'd throw a chicken breast on the grill.  Flip it.  Pull it off.  Result: Half was already dry and gross.  Half had pink in the middle.

The problem: chicken breasts don't come in a uniform thickness.  You can easily have a chicken breast that is 2 inches thick on one side and 1/2 inch thick on the other.  There is no way to cook that completely without overdoing one half.

My solution: Beat it.  I put the chicken breasts I plan to grill in a large plastic bag with whatever marinade I am planning on (barbecue sauce, lemon and olive oil, etc).  Get out my metal ladle, put the bag on the floor and go at it until the chicken is a uniform thickness.  The kids can even help.

At this point, my kids know what I am up to when I start walking over to our rug with a bag of chicken and a metal spoon.  They run and get their ladles and join in the fun.

This time I was using Bryant's BBQ sauce.  A favorite for KC natives.

I focus on the large ends of the chicken breasts and work to get them even (or much closer to even) with the other half.

The result:  Easily grilled chicken.  I preheat my grill on high, place the chicken on the grill, and then turn the grill down to medium.  I flip the chicken once it has released from the grill (you shouldn't have to pry it off), which is usually about 5 minutes.  Around 4-5 minutes on the other side and you have tender, moist chicken that is done all the way through.

Bonus: The kids say they "helped cook" the chicken.  And my kids always eat things even better when they've helped make it.  This is an easy and safe way for them to help cook chicken without getting completely gross or making a total mess.

Happy cooking!