Easy Garlic Chicken

Gotta love yummy recipes that have less than 5 ingredients and are super easy! We tried this one for dinner tonight, and it was a winner in everyone's eyes. Nice and flavorful and a little bit sweet - yummy!

Ingredients

• 4 boneless skinless chicken breasts
• 4 garlic cloves, minced (For added ease, use the jars of pre-minced or chopped garlic - 1 tsp. equals one clove of garlic.)
• 4 tablespoons brown sugar
• 3 teaspoons olive oil

Directions

Preheat oven to 500°F and lightly grease a casserole dish. That is not a typo.  500, really. In a small sauté pan, sauté garlic with the oil until tender. Remove from heat and stir in brown sugar. Place chicken breasts in a prepared baking dish and cover with the garlic and brown sugar mixture. Add salt and pepper to taste. Bake uncovered for 15-30 minutes. Goes great with rice or potatoes.

Carrot Cake Sandwich Cookies - YUM!

I had a carrot cake mix in my pantry that was going to expire this week, so I decided to try some experimenting with it. I ended up making some cookies that my whole family really loved! If you are a carrot cake fan, then these cookies are for you! We'll want to make these again, so I wanted to write down the recipe before I forgot it:

Cookie:

• 1 (18.25-ounce) package of carrot cake mix
• 1/3 cup vegetable oil
• 2 large eggs
• 1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
• 1 cup chopped nuts (optional - we did some with and some without nuts - both ways were yummy!)
• 1/2 cup shredded coconut flakes (optional - I made some with the coconut for Gerald, who LOVES coconut. They actually turned out really good!)
  

Preheat oven to 350 F degrees. Line cookie sheets with parchment paper for best results. If you don't have parchment paper, just spray your cookie sheets with nonstick cooking spray. In a large bowl beat the dry cake mix, oil, eggs, and pumpkin pie spice with an electric mixer on medium speed until well-blended and smooth, 1 to 2 minutes. Stir in the remaining additions you are using with a wooden spoon, just until combined. Drop the dough by teaspoonfuls 2 inches apart onto prepared cookie sheets. Flatten the cookie dough balls slightly with the back of a fork or the bottom of a glass. Bake for 10 minutes, or just until the edges are set but the centers are still soft. Remove from the oven and cool the cookies on the cookie sheet for few more minutes and then transfer the cookies to a wire rack to cool completely.

Cinnamon Cream Cheese Frosting:

• 1/4 c. butter, softened
• 6 oz. cream cheese, softened
• 1 c. powdered sugar
• 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp. vanilla

Cream the butter and cream cheese together until light and fluffy. Beat in powdered sugar until smooth. Stir in the cinnamon and vanilla.

When the cookies are cooled, put a generous amount of the cinnamon cream cheese frosting on the flat side of one cookie and then stick another cookie on to make a cookie sandwich - like homemade oreos. Enjoy! YUM!

Egg & Bacon Breakfast Sandwiches

For Gerald's birthday breakfast this year, I wanted to make him egg and bacon sandwiches. I cooked the eggs in a muffin tin, as shown in this picture - it made it very easy for me to do enough for everyone all at once!

To cook eggs like this just lightly spray the muffin tin, crack one egg into each muffin cup and then bake in the oven on 350 for 15-20 min.

Because I was making bacon and egg sandwiches, I cooked the bacon in the oven at the same time, as I showed in the previous post. Since they do ask for slightly different oven temperatures, I just started the oven at 350 degrees, stuck the bacon in first, then prepared the eggs and put them in as soon as they were ready. I cooked the eggs and bacon together for 10 minutes and then increased the temperature to 375. I took the eggs out after about 5 more minutes and the bacon followed 5 minutes after that. I toasted and buttered the English muffins while these were in the oven. The eggs came out the perfect size for English muffin sandwiches, and these were definitely the easiest and fastest egg and bacon breakfast sandwiches I have ever made! The only thing I will do differently next time is slightly scramble the eggs in the muffin tin before baking, because Katelee doesn't like having a big chunk of cooked yoke in the middle of her egg. Gerald and I don't mind it, though, but scrambling slightly before cooking would be an easy fix to that problem, I think.

When everything is done, just throw an egg, a couple halves of bacon, ketchup and any other toppings you want on an English muffin and enjoy!

I love ideas that make my life easier! :)

Source: macheesmo.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

How to Cook Bacon

Tried this idea off of pinterest, and it worked wonderfully! I'll never make bacon any other way again, I'm pretty sure! Thought I'd share it on here:

Source: marthastewart.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

Cook bacon in the oven. Cover cookie sheet with tinfoil first. I made sure the tinfoil went up the sides a bit, as well, to avoid getting the pan dirty at all. Cook for 375 for about 20 min. Then all the bacon is done at the same time, meanwhile you are free to make the rest of breakfast. Also, clean up was SO MUCH EASIER than it is when I fry bacon - I just picked up the whole piece of tinfoil and threw it away - awesome!