Praise for the Blog!

Would a quick intro be appropriate? I'm Melanie McClanahan, sister-in-law to Kamille. My hubby, Chris, and I live in Phoenix with our four daughters: Haley-8, Rachel-6, Caitlin-4, and Marley-2. I love to cook, and more importantly, I love to eat!

Okay, I'm not posting any new recipes right now, I just wanted to share pics of the recipes I tried this week. I've been in a menu slump lately, and Monday morning I was dreading trying to figure out what to cook this week. Then I remembered this blog, and it was like a little ray of sunshine :) I pulled off four recipes to try and really enjoyed them all. Here's what I made: (and don't mind my sloppy presentation pictures, it was always an afterthought while I had five hungry people waiting on me).

The first recipe I made was the Winger's Chicken Fingers. I couldn't find any actual chicken fingers at the store, I ended up using some battered chicken something-or-others. They were so good! My husband loved them. I'm thinking of trying this recipe using grilled chicken strips, to shave off a few calories. I paired it with cornbread, celery sticks, and bleu cheese dressing.
Next up was the Pork Chops & Rice. This was great because it was so simple! My six-year-old had seconds on the pork, yay! I made candied carrots to go with it (also a hit).

Wednesday night I made the Chicken Parmigiana. It was simple to make and was delicious. I was surprised how tender the chicken turned out, 'cause I used the last few pieces from a bag of frozen chicken that's been in the freezer for a while. I served it with boiled potatoes with garlic and dill. You'll notice the empty spot on my plate - I thought I had another can of green beans in the cupboard, apparently not.

Thursday night was Cafe Rio Pork night. Oh. My. Gosh! My husband said, "This is probably the best meal you've ever made" - and we've been married over ten years. He was literally speechless. He would open his mouth to say something about it, and just kind of look around. The rice was incredible. I love black beans, but have never really cooked with them - I was excited to finally have a recipe that I could use for them. And the pork, well, let's just say that these are some leftovers that will not be found at the back of the fridge in a month.

My ward has had a cooking group off and on for the last several years. In it's hay day, there was some pretty darn good stuff. So I got out my stacks of recipes and went through them yesterday. I pulled out 20 or so that I want to try. So hopefully I'll be able to post some new recipes here shortly! Thanks to everyone for sharing!