Sylvia's Scenario

We've been home from our  summer vacation  now for two weeks and slowly getting back into the groove of a normal routine.  Usually, when we return from a trip, I get real motivated to "clean out" stuff around the house because I seem to see things with a new eye from being gone so long. This time, it was cleaning out the freezer. Who doesn't need to clean out their freezer, I mean, really?!  Needless to say, I found a package of meat I didn't even know what it was until I thawed it out.  I thought they were ham hocks for  ham hocks and lima beans .  (I didn't mark the package - a big no-no when it comes to freezer food.)  But when I thawed it out, they were actually chicken thighs.  Okay.  Lots of things I can make with those so last night for dinner we had this recipe from Hannah Freeze, RD, who has discontinued her business but who's diet plan I still follow.  I've  made this recipe a lot but realized I never posted it, so he...

I got this recipe from the Seattle Times which came from the Washington Post's food writer and registered dietitian, Ellie Krieger.  Her latest book Whole in One:  Complete, Healthy Meals in a Single Pot, Skillet or Sheet Pan was released in 2019.  My favorite meals are the ones that are cooked in one big pot or skillet.  You just set the pot down in the middle of the table and let everyone dig in.  That's how this meal was and it was so good.  Chicken Scarpariello is an American Italian dish and the author adds artichokes to it for a flavorful variation and we all loved it.  I'm not cooking family dinners much anymore since Nick & family moved to Spain, so now when Lauren says she coming over, I try to fix a special meal and last night it was this recipe.   This dish is braised chicken with peppers and sausage.  Artichokes are not traditionally used in the braise, but they fit in beautifully, simmered until tender with all the other ing...

Tonight, I made another  Hannah Freese, RD  recipe and it was so good that I'm immediately posting it.  I think it might be more of an appetizer-type recipe but we ate them for dinner with a salad.  There was no dipping sauce recipe with these chicken nuggets but you could use soy sauce or a chili sauce like we used, as shown below.  The sweet potatoes in this recipe gives them a sweetness that makes them go down very easy because they are so good.   I ended up using white-fleshed sweet potatoes but if you used orange-flesh sweet potatoes then they would be orange colored.  I would like that color, especially for Halloween so I'm putting a Halloween label on this recipe. What a perfect Halloween party appetizer these would be.  I could go into the whole discussion about the difference between sweet potatoes and yams but there are so many different kind of each. Their names are used interchangeably and there are white- and orange-flesh types of bot...

Since we've been home from Hawaii, I've had the urge to cook some of my favorite recipes...plus some.  It always feels good to return from a trip and be able eat the comforts of home again.  The first day home I made my  Pumpkin Bean Chili  which lasted for a couple days.  It tasted so good especially being back in cold weather.  I make this recipe probably twice a month in the winter since it's a favorite.  Then I made a batch of  Clean Cream of Mushroom Soup , another favorite.  That was consumed immediately.  These two recipes were a real switch from all our Hawaiian vacation food, although we are still eating fresh pineapple daily.  I had received a whole new batch of recipes from  Hannah Freese, RD  for the month of February so I decided to make this new recipe from her and we loved it.  It definitely turns boring chicken breasts into an exciting concoction of flavors. I have so many frozen chicken breasts in the...

This is a nice saucy chicken recipe that we had for dinner after a day of rain, sleet and snow.  Yes, it's that time of year.  The suburbs got more snow than we did here in the city which is fine with me.  The grandkids had a very fun time with it. Me?  I like the snow just fine as long as I don't have to drive in it with all the hills around here.  To be perfectly honest, I'm just happy staying warm and toasty inside making Christmas cookies or thinking about the next thing to cook for dinner.  If it's not soup or stew, then it has to be something with lots of sauce.  I got this recipe from  Hannah Freese, RD ; Bruce added a baked potato to his plate that was prefect for soaking up all the sauce because it is so tasty.  I wanted to make this recipe because it included kale.  I'm not much of a kale connoisseur so usually avoid it but it's so full of nutrition (being a "super food")  that I do try to find recipes that I might li...

Fall is in full swing around here including our baseball team going to the post season (gotta love October baseball...Brrrr!)  thus the baseball pumpkin in my photo that my friend brought over.  She and I went to the game Friday night and it just so happened that we won with a walk-off home run in the bottom of the 9th inning with 2 outs by a pinch hitter to secure our place in the playoffs - the first time that has ever happened in Major League history!   We could not believe what we were seeing.  The stadium immediately put up the big blue 'W" for all to see. We knew the Mariners could clinch a Wild Card spot this week but we didn't know what game it would actually happen.  They kept announcing the "magic number" everyday which means how many games they needed to win to secure a spot in the Wild Card.  So, we had plans to go to four games this week so we could be there for the celebration.  I couldn't believe it happened Friday night with my friend. ...

We are having a cold Spring so far this year so we are not barbecuing that much even though we are all eager to get outside and enjoy some warm weather.  It just hasn't arrived yet.  So, here is a Spring-type dish that I've made twice recently and it passed the family taste test.  I've made it for a family dinner when the kids and grandkids came over and they all loved this dinner.  We usually have the grandkids spend one or two nights here over the weekend to give mom and dad a little bit of a break and then everyone comes for dinner on Sunday.  I am always thinking of family meals to prepare and to experiment with on my family.  I served this recipe with a big bowl of fettuccine mixed with the sauce of this recipe because it makes a lot of very tasty sauce.  You will want to lick up every bite of it.  Sometimes I make meals in the crockpot if we are out and about with the grandkids on the weekend, like last weekend when we took them to the Seatt...