Chicken Parmesan Casserole & Homemade Garlic Bread

Mhmm, mhmm, mhmm! 

That describes this dinner perfectly!

 


Chicken Parmesan Casserole

Ingredients:

• chicken breasts
• marinara sauce
• olive oil
• one clove of garlic, minced
• parmesan cheese
• mozzarella cheese
• croutons, crushed

Directions:

1. A dollop or so of oil olive poured into pan to coat the bottom. Toss in minced garlic clove and put in chicken breasts.
2. Cover chicken breasts with as much marinara sauce as you deem necessary.
3. Spread parmesan and mozzarella cheese over marinara sauce. 
4. Pour crushed croutons over cheese.
5. Spread more parmesan and mozzarella cheese over croutons.
6. Bake on 400°F for one hour and ten minutes, roughly for frozen chicken breasts. Cook for less time if using fresh chicken.

I used 2 8 oz. bags of mozzarella and 2 6 oz. bags of parmesan for this recipe. You can use less if you'd like. We're a cheese family, so the cheesier the better.

This was absolutely delicious and so, so simple! I will definitely be making this again - it was a hit!

Homemade Garlic Bread

Ingredients:

• Fresh baked bread
• butter
• clove of garlic, chopped
• dill weed

Directions:

1. Slice bread. For ten slices, I used 4 tbsp of melted butter and mixed in the chopped gloves of garlic.
2. Spread butter and garlic mixture onto both sides of bread.
3. Sprinkle dill weed on both sides of bread.
4. Bake on 400º for about 20 minutes or a little less, depending on how crunchy you like your garlic bread.

This was an incredibly simple dinner and I am so happy with the way it turned out. I was a bit worried, because I was cooking for someone who's favorite meal is chicken parmesan. This one was a hit with him, so you can be sure that it'll be a hit with anyone!

Enjoy!

What's for dinner?

If you read my post yesterday you know that I'm going to be doing weekly meals from scratch. If you want to find out what brought this you can read all about that here. 

So, for the first of many dinners I made homemade sirloin steaks with a gravy sauce and optional kaiser bun with a side of fresh, steamed broccoli and a tropical fruit salad. For dessert, I made homemade apple and cinnamon muffins. Everything was delicious and pleased my dinner guests. ;)

If you're interested in trying these recipes as well they'll be posted down below along with photos of the food.

Main Course:

Homemade Salisbury Steaks
Serve 6-7

Ingredients: 

• 2 yellow onions (optional)
• 3-4 pounds of ground beef
• Kaiser buns, Texas toast, or ciabatta loaf (optional)
• salt and pepper

Directions:

1. Season beef to taste with salt and pepper, then shape into 8 patties. I also used an all-purpose season on both sides of the patty. I cooked mine on the grill or you could cook them in a skillet. Cook to liking.
2. I also grilled the onions on the grill as well as steamed some in a foil basket.
3. Remove patties and onions from grill, serve on kaiser bun or not. It's optional and tastes good both ways. I served mine with a beef gravy on top and it complimented the salisbury steaks perfectly.

Tropical Fruit Salad

Serves 6-7

Ingredients:

• 2 ripe mangoes
• 2 small cans of mandarin oranges
• 1 pineapple (grapefruit can be substituted if preferred)
• 1 lime (lime rind and lime juice)
• shredded coconut

Directions:

1. Chunk the mangoes and pineapple. Combine those in a bowl with the mandarin oranges. You can include in the mandarin juice if you wish,  I did. Mix.
2. Grate the lime to get the lime rind in the bowl with the fruit. Then, squeeze the lime to get the juice. Mix.
3. Coconut can be added now or when served to individual liking.

Dessert:

Apple & Cinnamon Muffins

Makes 2 dozen

Ingredients:

• 2 1/3 cup white all-purpose flour
• 3 tsp baking powder
• pinch of salt
• 2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 2 apples (peeled, cored, and finely chopped)
• 1 cup milk
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 8 tbsp butter, melted

Topping:

• brown sugar 
• ground cinnamon

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400°F. Line muffin pan with paper cups.
2. Whisk flour, baking powder, salt and cinnamon in a large bowl. Stir in sugar and chopped apples. In a separate bowl, mix together the milk, eggs and butter. Then, gently fold the wet ingredients into the dry.
3. Place the batter into the paper cups. 
4. To make the topping take a few lumps of brown sugar and mix it with about a tsp of ground cinnamon. More of less of both can be added depending on taste and how much topping you want on your muffins.
5. Sprinkle the topping on the muffins and then bake them in the oven for 20-25 minutes or until they are golden and have risen. 
6. These can be served warm or cold and are delicious both ways.

Come back next week and see what's cooking!

Adult Life

I graduated from college. Now what? Well, now I play the game where you send your resume and applications to employers and you wait for an answer. It's not a very fun game, but I hear a lot of people are playing it so that must mean something right? ;)
Anyway, in the meantime while I wait to become an official, official adult by getting a permanent job I decided to do something else to make myself feel like a grown up. I've decided to cook one meal & dessert once a week from scratch. If you know me you know I'm not a cooker, at all, so this is huge. It'll make me feel productive and teach me life lessons that I can use forever - double score!
I'll start tomorrow and I plan to post photos of the foods I make along with the recipes so you can follow me on this exciting life journey I'm taking and maybe make some of the recipes too, if you want.
It'll be fun and hopefully tasty. So, stay tuned to this blog because this is where the deliciousness will be posted weekly.

Oh, fun fact: to celebrate my graduation I bought myself a bunny. She's adorable and does those adorable little nose twitches that rabbits do. 

Sydney, rabbit extraordinaire