So I had these peaches...

I thought about what to do with some peaches on the counter here at home, and I came up with this sweet dessert. You will never guess what MYSTERY addition is in this dish. :)

What you will need:

2 ripe peaches

2 cans Pillsbury Crescent Rolls

2 sticks of butter

1 and a half cups of Sugar

1 Teaspoon Vanilla

Powder sugar

1 can of Mountain dew (yep!)

Cinnamon

(I also used a Cinnamon Sugar grinder)

So this is really easy. 

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. 

Butter a 9x13 pan. Peel your peaches (potato peelers work great!) and pit them. Next cut each peach   Into 8 slices each (16 total). 

Next open up your Pillsbury crescent rolls, 

place a peach in a single crescent roll, 

sprinkle the cinnamon sugar on the peach 

and roll it up. 

Continue for all peach slices. Place each one in the buttered pan. They are going to be close and touching. 

Next your going to melt the two sticks of butter in a bowl and add the sugar stir. Next add the vanilla and mix again. 

Then pour over the crescent rolls. 

 Pour the can of Mountain Dew around the edges of the pan.  (You can see that I have a whole 20 oz bottle- but I measured out 12 ounces) 

Next I sprinkled some powdered sugar and cinnamon on the tops of the mixture.

Stick it in the oven for 40 minutes. 

It was amazingly good.

As soon as you take your dish out you will see liquid at the bottom the of the pan. I promise it's okay and won't taste bad! It will be soaked up as soon as it starts to cool. 

ENJOY!

Meatballs. Yeah commence happy dance

Okay so apparently, I do more cooking than anything. I realized I should probably give away one of my favorite SECRETS...Cooking secrets that is. I'm talking about Meatballs. Homemade, hands messy, a part of your soul, and a whole lot of love poured into each little ball you hand form. These babies are moist, and they taste amazing. I have REFERENCES.


What Cha Need:

1 lb ground beef. (I dont care what percentage...but I use lean ground beef)
garlic powder
salt and pepper
1 egg
3/4 cups of water
3/4 cups fancy cheese (I used asiago, romano, & parmesan combined)
1/2 cup bread crumbs (I use these A LOT don't I?)
and a honkin' bowl.


Now you see all the ingredients up there? Exactly as they are listed LAYER...See that....I SAID LAYER everything. NO MIXING, no combining early. LLLAAAYYYYEEERRRRRRR. Don't question me on my madness.
This means you put the meat on the bottom, then the garlic powder right on top (now some people in my family are sensitive to garlic so use your best judgement on how much to use), then salt and pepper on top (same use your best judgement rule) and so on and so forth.

Here we are in order

Now when everything is sitting pretty on top of one another in the order listed wash your hands.


Then take off any jewelry that means anything to you that is on your hands. I would hate for meat or crumbs or cheese to get stuck in a diamond, or a crevice you cant clean on your wedding ring or something. See i did it...

This is the part when i usually heat up my pasta sauce for spaghetti and meatballs.

Mixing time!
Now this is fun for the kids to get in on too.

SQUISH SQUISH SQUISH mix that with your hands. Feel the icky gooey, and mush it all together. I would say do this for about 3-4 minutes.

once everything is mixed and loving one another in that bowl you will need to form little balls about the size of a golf ball maybe a bit bigger, depending on how big you want them. I then place them all in the sauce as its heating up and i cover it. 

Occasionally i will come by and jostle the pan, but be careful not to rough them up too much for they might break apart and you end up with just a "meat sauce".

After about 5-7 minutes on one side in the sauce I turn mine GENTLY over. Recover pan. Again these babies are fragile. Another 5 minutes and i would normally take one lucky pup out of the pan and cut it in half to make sure its cooked through. And i sample too...NO big deal. Usually at this moment i revel in my awesomeness because my mouth just went to some sort of sicilian heaven. MMMM

You are welcome! Now you make!

Homemade chicken tenders

Now this ladies and gentleman is my recipe for some homemade chicken tenders. I'm talking breading them and frying them yourselves. ALL THAT JAZZ. 

You will need:

1lb boneless chicken tenderloins (or breasts just cut in strips) 

3 cups canola oil

2 large eggs

1/3 cup milk

Salt and pepper

2 cups flour

1 cup progresso bread crumbs (I used garlic&herb)

1 tbls cayenne pepper 

1/2 tbls garlic powder

1/2 tbls parsley 

The process!!

-Wisk together in a bowl the eggs, milk and some salt and pepper.

-On a plate I pour the flour And then use my finger to create a volcano to pour the garlic, parsley, cayenne and top it off with the progresso breadcrumbs. I used my hands to mix those together. Get them nice and incorporated. ITS A BREADING PARTY! 

-Now I use my Paula Deen skillet to use for the frying, mind you I have a deep fryer, (actually it's my father in laws) but it smokes a lot and makes the house smell so I opted for pan frying these babies with my overhead fan blasted. Now for the people like me who don't have an oil/food thermometer I just put my burner on medium and allowed my oil to heat up for a bit. Pretty much by the time it takes you to bread all the tenders your oil should be good and hot. So pour the 3 cups of canola oil in there and turn your burner to medium.

Let's bread these things

Take a tenderloin piece and coat it with the egg and milk mixture. Then place it in the flour/breadcrumbs mixture and coat evenly. THEN> put that tenderloin back in the egg and coat, then back into the breadcrumbs for a second visit!! So we are going to DOUBLE COAT all the tenders. Set them aside.

-Now a way to make sure the oil is hot enough for frying is (while your fingers are coated in breadcrumbs and egg) shake your hand over the oil allowing some tiny pieces of breading to fall into the oil. They will instantly start to sizzle if it's been long enough. 

-I placed about 3-4 tenders in my pan at a time. Too many will lower the oil temp and increase cooking time and might dry out the chicken. So 3 was the majority unless they were tiny end pieces. 

-I cooked each for about 2 minutes on each side until golden brown. If you are paranoid like me the first couple batches I was taking a tender out (the thickest one) and cutting it at its thickest point to see if it was cooked all the way through. It was for the record. I just am scared to accidentally feed my son undercooked meat and causing food poisoning. So if you want to do that too I do not blame you at all!! 

-After the chicken is nice and cooked I placed them onto a plate covered with a paper towel to soak up the excess oil. 

This is what mine looked like after they were all done. 

I am that weirdo that when I am given extra dipping sauces at like those fast food chains I save those suckers for times like these. My husband makes fun of me but WHO CARES! I paired mine with some honey mustard and zesty dipping sauce. Mmmmmm. 

I hope yours turn out wonderful! 

Homemade chocolate chip muffins

• CHOCOLATE CHIP muffins
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 egg
• 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
• 3/4 cup milk
• 1/3 cup vegetable oil
• 1 cup miniature semisweet chocolate chips

Instructions: preheat: 400 degrees     makes 12 muffins

1. Combine first four ingredients (flour, salt, baking powder, sugar) in a large mixing bowl. mix

2. Combine the next four ingredients (vanilla, egg, oil, milk) in another bowl. mix

3. Combine solids and liquid and mix well. 

4. Add chocolate chips and Fold into batter. 

5. Spray with grease/PAM or line muffin tin pan and fill each spot 3/4 full. 

6. Bake 16 minutes in a conventional oven at 400 Degrees.

7. After cooking time allow few minutes to cool. AND ENJOY!!!