Chicken Cacciatore

This dish is one of the dinners which my dad requested quite often. When ever I make this dish it reminds me of dad. It's a tomato base dinner which  goes delicious over white rice. It is a quick dish for those who have limited amounts of time to get supper on the table for the family.

Ingredients: 

1 chicken cut up.

 2  tablespoons olive oil,

 5 tomatoes chopped, 

1 bell pepper yellow , 

red or green.

 1 medium onion chopped. 

6 cloves of garlic chopped, 

1/2 cup green olives, 

1/4 teaspoon salt,

1/4 teaspoon pepper, 

1 teaspoon Italian seasonings.

 2 cups rice, 

3 cups water.

 Place olive oil in pan, fry chicken on medium  hot heat for 20 minutes till browned. Remove from pan set to the side. Use same pan leaving the chicken drippings. Add onions, garlic, bell peppers, cook till soften. Then add tomatoes, italian seasonings, green olives, return chicken to the pan also. Add salt, and pepper. The sauce will start to thicken and melt into the vegatables, and meat. Should take another 10 minutes to cook. Check chicken for doneness before removing from heat.

I use my rice cooker to make the rice, 2 cups of rice to 3 cups of water, add 1/2 teaspoon salt. Press start button. You will have soft fluffy rice in 20 minutes. I like to serve this dish over rice.

Update on Baby Birds

Today is 10 Days later an  update to my baby bird story.  As we were leaving for our Tuesday night meeting we heard a tiny chirping coming from the corner of our porch. Looks like at least one of the baby bird survived.
He couldn't fly very well , and he was staying close to the porch. His little legs were still wobbly.
He was trying hard to be friendly, but I think he was too scared. I got a quick snap shot of him. Is that a cute baby bird or what?

Baby Birds

Several years ago my daughter-in-law Angela had given me a beautiful bird house which she had hand painted her self. I hung it out side by the entrance of the front porch.  Many a Chickadee's  had made this little bird house their roosting sanctuary in the spring.

This morning as I was packing to get ready for my trip to Chicago. 

My husband called me over to look at something . What I saw was this, 3 baby birds squirming on my front porch.floor. They had no feathers, they had big belly's and closed bulgy eyes. Apparently they had fallen out of their nest, or were pushed out.

I did want to rescue these little fellows. I had always heard never to touch a wild animal ,or the mother animal would reject them and let them die. We used a piece of firm card stock, slipped it under each bird one at the time placing them back into the bird house. Then we noticed that there were 2 more baby birds a little further away. Again we slipped the card stock under them also, and put them back into the bird house. We found one more laying on the dirt, it must have missed the porch  falling all the way to the ground, making it a total of 6 baby birds which we rescued.

I am puzzled does any one know why the birds were lying on my porch instead of being cozy in their bird house? Did all 6 birds accidentally fall out of the entrance hole? Did the mother bird toss them out? Was it a strong wind which shook them out? Does anyone out there know? Please I would like to be educated.

We did notice after we placed the baby birds back, the mother bird came back, chirping at us like she was thanking us. My theory is maybe a predatory bird tossed them out. All I know for sure is that the mother bird had no way to pick them up. I hope the baby birds survive, I won't know till I return from my trip. See part 2 to this story baby bird part 2

Painted Canvas Tote Bags

I received a bunch of canvas material from a friend. Looking to do some painting on canvas, I thought I would make some canvas tote bags, with the whimsical type of  decorating that I enjoy doing.




Supplies:
1 1/2 yard canvas, handles,
sewing machine, thread.
Assorted acrylic paints

 I used the same pattern  that I used on the painted child's rocking chair  April 2010 blog. The angel pattern is by Shara Reiner, Angel Thyme Designs. I like her designs because not only are they perfect for beginners, but the designs are versatile. .
 With being  green  conscience being in it's trendy to carry your cloth reusable canvas tote bags.

To make canvas tote cut a 20 by 35 inch square of canvas. Cut a 3 by 2 notch on each side. Refer to the picture. Cut 2 of these one will line the tote, the other will be the outside of the tote.

Fold canvas in half, fold tops over 1 inch. Attach straps with pins. Sew all the way across the top.

Sew sides of tote first. Then  sew the bottom , it will make a wide bottom tote.

Illustrated here.

Here is another design on this tote bag.The out side of the bag is to the left, the inside of the bag (or the lining )is on the right side of the picture. Place the liner tote inside the outer tote. Pin together and sew.

Finished tote.

This finished tote has the Noah's Arc design.

Easy Oven Roasted Potatoes

Easy , quick side dish. Oven roasted potatoes. If your a potato fan you will enjoy this one. I serve these oven roasted potatoes with dinner, or for breakfast with eggs and bacon.. The outside texture is crispy, the inside is tender. The herbs make it savory.

Ingredients: 

5 medium potatoes peeled, and rinsed.

1/4 cup olive oil,

salt to taste,
black pepper to taste,
  fresh rosemary about 2 sprigs,
1/4 teaspoon paprika
 2 tablespoons Parmesan cheese,
 in the absence of fresh herbs, substitute Italian seasonings.

Peel and cut potatoes into 1/2 inch cubes, rinse well,make sure you dry potatoes thoroughly .

Add olive oil over potatoes, mix to coat all the potatoes.

Add the rest of ingredients, salt, black pepper, fresh rosemary(or substitute Italian seasoning 1 teaspoon if you don't have fresh herbs)

place on a metal cookie sheet. one layer deep, on high rack in oven.

Preheat oven to 450 degrees bake 15 minutes turn potatoes over add the cheese at this time, bake another 15 minutes. The potatoes should be crispy on the outside, while tender when squeezed..

Easy Peach Cobbler

 One fine summer day I whispered " Oh Lord it would be so nice to have peaches." To my surprise God heard me. We have lived in this home since  2002. We live in the Smokey Mountain area, which is not conducive to peach trees
. Being that our garden was located in our front yard, we had several obstacles we had to go through. One of them was this big tree which we had to duck under to get to our garden. Come to find out it was my miracle peach tree.
Tall, healthy, and fully loaded with peaches. Amazing that after living here for 8 years, we had not noticed the peaches before.
 I have several recipes that I will share with you. This one is a very easy one. It has few ingredients. The texture is crispy, and tender, yummy served with vanilla ice cream warm.

Ingredients:

1 cup flour all purpose
1 cup sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 cup evaporated milk
1 stick real butter
1 can peach pie filling or home made peach filling I will give you recipe for that.

For peach filling homemade style, peel peaches by heating up large pot of water. Have large bowl with ice water waiting. Drop peaches no more than 3 at a time to boiling water for

 1 minute. Remove peaches plunge into ice water bath for several minutes. Peel, and cut . Place in medium sauce pan with 1/4 cup sugar, and 2 tablespoons corn starch. Bring to a boil, it will thicken to a pudding consistency set aside for cobbler recipe.

In large bowl mix by hand with large wooden spoon flour, milk, sugar, baking powder,

and salt.

In

a small bowl melt stick of butter in microwave oven. Pour into 13x9 baking pan.

The

order of this is important. Next pour batter on top of melted butter in a back, and forth pattern. Do not mix butter, and batter together.

Next dot peach pie filling randomly on top of batter and butter. Remember do not mix

Should resemble this. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Bake for 30 minutes or till lightly browned. Enjoy while warm with vanilla ice cream on top.

Here is my tree, as you can see my peaches are starting to grow it is early in the season.

Chicken Flautas or Chicken Tacos

Our family has this controversy whether this recipe is tacos or flautas. We have always called them tacos, but I guess in the restaurant you would order flautas .
 This is another one of those quick easy recipes. The texture is crispy, light, and delicious . I serve them with sour cream, and Franks Red Hot Cayenne Sauce. Yummy see if you can eat just one.

Ingredients.

3 White chicken breasts skinless boneless
2 carrots diced
2 garlic cloves
2 soft chicken bouillon
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 medium onion chopped
1/2 cup orzo pasta, or rice
4 cups water
corn tortilla
oil
serve with sour cream and Franks Red Hot Cayenne Sauce


Place chicken, carrots, garlic, bouillon, onions, salt, and 4 cups of water into a large pot with cover. Poach chicken on medium low heat with vegetables for 30 minutes.

After chicken breasts are cook allow to cool.  With 2 forks pull apart meat. Season with salt, and pepper. Add some of the chopped onions to this mixture.

In the mean time put about 5 tortilla in a zip lock bag to heat in microwave oven for 40 secs. The tortillas will be manageable soft, and very hot. This will allow you to be able to roll the tortilla up with out them splitting on you.

Take a bit of the chicken mixture lay it at one corner and roll it up.

I like to roll them all up before I start to frying. Add toothpicks on the sides to hold them together. Place frying pan with 4 tablespoon of oil heat to moderate hot temperature.  Fry till golden brown, turning over with tongs.

Save 1 cup of chicken pieces, to add to the soup. Add the 1/2 cup of pasta, or rice boil for 25 minutes more till pasta cooks. Now you have chicken soup to go with the tacos. Two for the price of one. Enjoy!