What's Cookin'?

I love making a meal that turns into several meals. My husband is so easy to cook for...he likes most anything...will eat leftovers...and can tolerate what he doesn't like as long as there is ketchup or salsa. With that in mind, I will make a big batch of something...we will eat it for a couple of days and I'll freeze the rest. Two of our favorites are chili or chicken and noodles. 

While in New York, with cookbooks and recipes in storage, this chicken and noodles recipe just seemed to evolve...

I started with a roasted chicken dinner. Selecting a nice, large, roasting hen, I put chunks of onion, along with minced garlic in the bottom of the crockpot, then laid the roasting hen right on top. Then I added 1-15 ounce can of chicken broth (low sodium) and seasoned the chicken with Mrs. Dash Onion and Herb seasoning...cooked until tender...removed chicken to a serving plate, making sure any bones were out of the broth, and added a cornstarch/water mixture to thicken the broth into gravy. The chicken was absolutely tender and delicious. I figured I would get two meals out of that, easy! The next day was gray, damp and cold and I had errands to run. A perfect soup day. So I stopped and picked up noodles...the frozen brand called Reames...thinking I would try my hand at chicken noodle soup, which turned into a thicker chicken and noodle dinner!

Years ago, I used to make my own egg noodles, but found the frozen Reames egg noodles to be closest to homemade. Well, recently, my sister in law told me about the noodles she uses and I cannot remember the brand...shoot! I used them all up in this latest batch of chicken and noodles. I bought them at Kroger. Anyway, they are the best noodles ever! So, these are the stops for my now, famous ;o)...chicken and noodles..

I start with olive oil and minced onion in the pot...let is saute for just a few minutes...

Then...I add some chopped onion...chopped carrots...saute that for a couple of minutes...

While that is cooking, I cut all the rest of the meat off the chicken carcass into small pieces...and add that to the pot...along with the chicken stock saved from roasting the chicken. Since there is not a lot of the original stock left over, and since I always buy low fat/low sodium chicken stock to add to the soup, I think the fat content would not be too much of a worry....unless a person was  on a restricted diet.

After adding a couple large cans of additional chicken stock, I add the noodles. The noodles will make or break your soup! Those flat egg noodles are not too tasty...the frozen ones, again, are closest to homemade. But those ones I found...it's an Amish brand...the taste and consistency is perfect! And voila`...a hearty pot of chicken and noodles! It is delicious! You know, you can follow most any recipe...but I have found that some of the best ones come from parts of what you remember...parts of what is written down...and parts of how you like to tweak things to your own tastes...and boy oh boy, this sure tastes good!

I also found a recipe on Pinterest using avocado and chick peas smashed together...some lime juice...and mayo, to make a sandwich spread. Well, I did that and added fresh minced onion and we love to add creamy horseradish sauce to lots of dishes. Well, that gave it a little bit of a zip! We spread it on those healthy wheat rounds...added some bean spouts...some fresh spinach...and you have a healthy sandwich! And the lime juice helped the avocado keep it's color and not turn dark too quickly.

Along with the cooking, we had our granddaughter's over for two nights. They are both in a play coming up in June and we were helping to take them to practices while their parents were busy. During our down times, we did some cross stitching. I don't do that very often because the holes are too hard to see. I found some special glasses to wear so that I could do this with the girls. We had fun picking out a pattern, getting our supplies together, winding the floss around the floss holders and organizing it all into floss containers...and then we started. Their other grandmother had started them on cross stitch a few years ago, but their opportunity to keep doing it has been about nil. So, I just refreshed them a bit and we spent a morning cross stitching before they had play practice.

Some times, I don't think there are enough hours in a day to do all the different kinds of crafts and things that can be done. I still love knitting the best, but this sure was a fun time with the girls! I look forward to the next time they come...maybe trying out a new recipe, too...