Breakfast Braid

I love breakfast.  During the weekdays I usually drink a shake or eat a granola bar on my drive to work but on the weekends, I love breakfast.  If you want to win my love over just cook me something with bacon (the real kind only!) or spicy pork sausage smothered in gooey cheese.

In my family, we like to celebrate our favorite holidays with a big breakfast and bloody marys.  That is just how the Dixons roll.  I also love to get together with friends for a nice breakfast and typically I make some sort of egg casserole.  A recipe is never involved, it usually is just whatever I have in my freezer but it always includes bacon or spicy pork sausage and cheese.

I found this recipe on Cooking Light but I was feeling indulgent so there was nothing "light" about my version.  As I usually do when making breakfast I pulled out the ingredients that I had on hand and wanted to use: spicy pork sausage, green peppers, jalapeno pepper, onion, garlic, pepper jack cheese, sharp cheddar cheese, pizza dough and of course eggs.  The possibilities are really endless so just select the foods you would want in your dream omelet.

First I cooked the pork sausage with peppers, onions and garlic in a nonstick skillet on medium.  Once the sausage was cooked I added a couple eggs and continue to mix it up until it was all cooked through.

On a cookie sheet I laid out the pizza dough where it formed a rectangle.  I placed the filling in the middle of the dough so that there was about a 3" border of dough and topped it with the cheese.  Using my kitchen scissors I cut 2-inch-long diagonal cuts about 1 inch apart on the long sides of the dough.

Starting with the top and bottom of the rectangle dough folded in, I then "braided" the dough by alternating strips over the filling.  Make sure you have sealed it all up so it cannot leak out.  Brush the top with an egg white. Bake at 425° for 15 minutes or until golden brown. Let stand 5 minutes.

Didn't it turn out pretty?  This will now replace my egg casserole as my go-to breakfast dish for celebrations.

White Chicken Chili

There are a few things going at my house that make it difficult to find recipes. One, we are starting a serious new budget.  Two, we have come to accept our "happy pounds" but we don't want to gain more so we are trying eat leaner.  Three, most recipes I find for lean meals are spicy (which I love!) but the pilot's esophagus does not.  Four, with a baby around we do not have much down time to plan, shop, prep, cook or clean so I want easy to make meals.  With all of those requirements, I am on a quest to find cheap, lean meals that are not spicy and are easy to make.  Got all that?

Luckily, after much debate over how spicy I can make the meal we found the perfect solution: White Chicken Chili.  The key to the flavoring is the Salsa Verde which is actually a mild flavor. 

Ingredients:

• 4 boneless skinless chicken breasts
• 2 cans of Northern Beans ($0.
• 1 can of corn ($0.49, Aldi)
• 1 jar of Salsa Verde ($1.49, Aldi)
• 2 garlic cloves, chopped (in house)
• 2 stalks of celery, chopped (in house)
• 1 tsp of cumin (in house)

First you take one of the cans of beans and blend it in either a food processor or blender.  This will add a thicker texture to your chili.

Then I place all of the ingredients into the crockpot EXCEPT the chicken and mix it all up with a spoon.  After that I drop in the chicken and set on LOW for 6 hours.

After 6 hours I remove the chicken and shred it with two forks.  The chicken should be super tender and moist, making it super easy to shred.  Here is where I pulled out some chicken to feed the baby.

Return the shredded chicken to the crockpot and cook on LOW for another hour.  After that, remove the lid and let it sit there for about 10 minutes to help thicken up the liquid. 

Pour into a bowl and top with your favorite chili toppings such as sour cream, cheese, avocados, Fritos, etc.  Okay, so it starts off lean but it can also become lethal.  Either way it is delicious.  Oh and more importantly it is cheap, lean, not too spicy and easy to make.  Enjoy!

Sorry - Lost Photos

I want to apologize for the messed up (lack thereof!) photos on my blog.  Apparently when I deleted the photos that were public on my Google+ account, the internet trolls deleted the photos from the blog.  Did you know this could happen?  I didn't.  Even my dog Milo is surprised, look at him.

I will do my best to go through all of my posts and reload the photos over the next week.  It really stinks that this is the first post I write in months.  There are so many projects and recipes I was planning on posting soon.  I swear.  Once this is fixed I will post something pleasant for you to read.  Oh, and you will get to meet my daughter who is hiding in the background of this photo.  For now just know that she is awesome.

Sorry for the inconvenience!!!