Ranch Chicken Tenderloin Bites - Crockpot Style

Two days ago, I removed a package of chicken breasts from the storage freezer. Apparently at that point, I had some huge idea that I was going to assume the reigns of the household and prepare some glorious meal in the crockpot that would leave me as the champion of the household.

Now, let us revisit the beginning of the first sentence..."two days ago." 

Yup, that is right, we are now two days into the chicken that has assumed a place on a plate inside of the fridge. Now I know that time is of the utmost importance and that I need to find something to do with said chicken, but what? We've done the crockpot chicken and stuffing, which ended up as a sloppy mess not only in my crockpot, but with the unamused children, so what else was there to do?

I am all about easy. I hate doing extra work, prep work, or anything of the sort. You really need to get me in a great mood to whip out and prepare some elegant meal. Plus, I wasn't about to jump into my car and go down to the grocery store either. It's cold and I hate unloading groceries into my trunk and then bringing them up the stairs only to have to put them away in their appropriate spaces. So instead, I raided the cabinets for things to throw in the crockpot.

THE CHOSEN ONES
So, what did I end up choosing you ask (or maybe you didn't, but whatever, I will tell you anyway).

• 3lb bag of Tyson all natural chicken breast tenderloin (they are more like little pieces rather than full breast pieces)
• Container of sour cream (the large one, not sure of ounces, sorry)
• Small container of cream cheese with chives
• Two packet of Hidden Valley ranch dips (the kind that you make yourself, the powder)

PREPARATIONS
It's really easy...obviously you are going to set up your crockpot and place your thawed chicken at the bottom (you could use frozen chicken, but I would suggest adjusting cooking time accordingly). I then placed half of my large container of sour cream over the chicken. After I spooned that out over it, I spread it out covering the chicken. I then scooped out 3/4 of my small container of cream cheese with chives and then spread that over the chicken as well. Finally, I sprinkled the two packets of ranch dressing powder over the chicken.

I set my crock pot on high for 4 hours and let it do its job. I checked it at about 3 hours in, and it was perfectly cooked, so for the remaining hour, I set my crockpot over to the warming feature. I do have a newer, digital crockpot that is one of the top picks from Cooks Country, so I would recommend that you check yours sometime during the cooking process. Also, my chicken was smaller pieces (almost chicken strip-like), so if you are using normal sized chicken breasts, you may find yourself cooking it for the entire time! 


THE VERDICT
Delicious! So maybe the kids didn't think so, although Lexi thought it was fantastic and had three helpings of it. The chicken was perfectly cooked & tender. The "sauce" was perfect and had the best taste. I will absolutely be making this again and if the kids don't like it, then oh well, too bad for them! See, I'm not into the catering to what the kids want and making sure the food is exactly what they like, otherwise we'd be eating pizza, pizza rolls, hot dogs, hamburgers, chips, and other assorted junk food.

 

Bacon & Egg Toast Cups

So apparently, it is required for you to feed your children when they are hungry and quite frankly I was tired of the cereal binge that seems to occur in this house. I decided that I probably should assume some type of motherly duties and feed the children, which always can go one of two ways...good or bad. Trying to recollect how well it went last time, I decided to make these bacon, egg, and toast cups for the children, as last time they were gobbled up and there was nothing left for me to consume...(oh the the fruits of my labor). I also was unable to get any pictures of said goodies because my camera was dead.

So I decided to do another trial of these goodies for breakfast. My result...this:

I'm not sure if I was more pleased with the outcome of the food or the picture... But alas, it was quite simple to make and I took the wonderful recipe that came from The Noshery, and adapted it to my own the kids' likings. Plus, I haven't quite seen any pictures of scrambled eggs being used, so I thought it would be nice for everyone trying to figure out what it would look like & if it would work.

So first thing first...my ingredients:

• Muffin pan
• A glass (that you drink out of)
• Basting brush
• Pam cooking spray
• Bread (I needed 12 slices)
• Maple Syrup
• Cheddar jack shredded cheese
• Eggs (I used 8 eggs)
• Oscar Meyer Real Bacon Pieces (not the bits)

Dinner With a Smile

I hate to cook. I hate everything about it. I have no real reason for my disdain for cooking, I just don't like it. But every once in a while I do it, mostly out of necessity, but nothing amazing or that involves a lot of work. Once again, I don't get the tingles when I do it.

Maybe it's because the kids always piss and moan about what I am making, someone has to complain, even though they have never tried something ever in their life, they "don't like" whatever it is that they see. It's tedious & I hate it. If I ever acted like that when I was little and my mom made dinner, all holy hell would break loose and I would end up starving. I never got "catered to" in regard to food... but that there is a whole other story, post, whatever.

The thing is, I made dinner and it was fan-freaking-tastic. Of course it was based off of a picture that I saw on Pinterest. Go figure right? It looked good and when Richie & I sat there trying to decide what we were going to have for dinner, we decided to just go to the store and find something.

And that is when the picture pinned onto my virtual pin board popped into my head.

It was pretty darn good. Although, once I got home I realized that I didn't have all of the ingredients that we needed, so we had to improvise. Oh, I also hope that you aren't expecting pictures because I didn't take any. I wasn't quite in the mood to infect my camera with raw meat and let whatever gunk there was develop into some crazy infectious disease that would more than likely turn into some crazy pandemic.

This picture, not mine of course, is what dinner was supposed to look like:

My recipe was modified from Sunshine & Bones

But this is what I did & my recipe re-over

1 package of 6 sub rolls
1 1/4 cup bread crumbs
2 small shallots minced
1/2 can of diced tomatoes (I used the zesty chilli kind)
1/2 cup whole or lowfat milk
6 tablespoons ketchup (hot & spicy)
Regular ketchup
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
1 large egg, lightly beaten
Garlic salt and pepper (eye balled)
Steakhouse seasoning grinder (eyeballed)
1 1/2 pounds ground beef
shredded cheddar cheese
cheddar jack cheese


Step One:
Preheat the oven to 450 degrees.

Step Two:
I took the bread I bought and halved them. The bread was actually pretty soft, so that wasn't much of a problem. I then lined my large cookie sheet with tin foil and placed each of the halves down on it. After it was halved and on the cookie sheet, I popped them into the oven for 5 minutes.

Step Three:
While the bread was toasting, I took a bowl and mixed in the meat, an egg, bread crumbs, the minced shallots, milk, ketchup, Worcestershire sauce, diced zesty chilli flavored tomatoes, salt & pepper, and seasonings, and kneaded it all together. Richie made the comment that it looked like we were making meatloaf. I never made meatloaf before, so apparently that is what it is like.

Step Four:
I took the scoop that I purchased for making cake balls, and I scooped out the meat mixture onto the bread, end to end. I then popped it back into the oven and cooked it for 22 minutes (or until the meat reaches a temperature of 160 degrees, which is roughly around 20-25 minutes).


Step Five:
After I took them out of the oven, I took regular ketchup and squirted some on each of the sandwiches. I then topped it with my cheese. Throw it back in the oven for 4 minutes, and viola, dinner is served.


The kids loved it and the bread will be really toasty and hard, but where the meat is sitting on it, you can scoop out the soft bread and eat it with the meat topping. Yumm-O.

And also, you do not have to pre-cook the meat before adding it. Mine cooked perfectly. The hot & spicy ketchup & the diced tomatoes did not make any difference in terms of heat, but when you get a bite with the tomatoes, it was fantastic!


Like I said, the heathens children ate it all and I even got "this is the best meal I ever ate", and coming from them, that is rare.

Cake Ball Improvement

Well, I cannot say that I have completely scored in regard to this cake ball making nonsense, however I can proudly boast that my second go-around wasn't as terrible as the first one. I mean after all, I used sprinkles this time, chocolate sprinkles. So boo-yah, in your face cake balls.

This time I used my Babycakes cake pop maker because I am way too lazy for that handmade, cook the cake, crumble it, freeze in, mix some frosting into it, and then use that scoop that I swear does not work properly, and then dip it. Yes, I am lazy & I have not the time nor the patience to sit there and do all of that.

So whatever. Don't roll your eyes because we have all been in that spot at one time or another, for me it just happens a lot more frequently because I don't find myself getting all giddy, shooting rainbows and sparkles out of my butt over some crafty nonsense that ends up somehow ending up in a huge mess that I will have to eventually clean up.

But none of that is the point. I made some cake balls, frosted them (or whatever you call it) and added some sprinkles for the last few. That right there is crafty. 

However, when I do something, I like to do it perfectly. I don't half-ass things and now my new obsession is going to entail making those cake balls look p.e.r.f.e.c.t. You know, just like the ones that you see doing some Google search or browsing through Pinterest. I even Googled "how do you coat cake balls perfectly" and I have yet to find an answer. There's always Wikipedia.

Right now my balls are in the freezer though. I had one ball turn out as a phallic object rich served as a more amusement for me than for Richie. I tried to photograph it, but it was shy.