Wednesday Wisdom

Wednesday Wisdom

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Freezer

As I've mentioned my mom has been great about bringing me food for the freezer and we had the lasagna last week and it was delish and enough for two meals.  However I want to be able to cook and put things in their as well.   I do love to cook and this weekend I figured was the weekend since it was a 3 day weekend and we basically had no big plans.  I should be able to divide my time enough between resting and doing a little cooking.

G was golfing this morning so after I got up I headed to the kitchen with my iPad and my Pinterest pins on freezer meals and set out to get some things done.

I was able to make two things before I was too tired.   As I sit here doing this post I hope I didn't overdo.  You would think after 33 weeks that I would learn that I just don't have the energy I'm used to but I forget that.  Oh well I can just rest the remainder of the day.  Sigh.......

Here's what now sits in my freezer!

This was the easy one - just throw together some sauce and place it over the chicken and freeze to throw in the crock pot later

Its called Honey Sesame Chicken and the recipe came from here
I screwed up and only got 2 chicken breast for this so I just made a note on the bag to add two more before I cooked it in the slower but here's the recipe

Ingredients:
4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts (thighs would be fine too)
Salt and pepper
1 cup honey
1/2 cup soy sauce
1/2 cup diced onion
1/4 cup ketchup
2 tablespoons vegetable oil (could also use olive oil or canola oil)
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes (optional - doesn't really add heat, just adds more flavor)
4 teaspoons cornstarch dissolved in 6 Tablespoons water
Sesame seeds

Directions for Freezing: 
Season both sides of chicken with lightly with salt and pepper, put into labeled gallon sized bag. In a small bowl, combine honey, soy sauce, onion, ketchup, oil, garlic and pepper flakes. Pour over chicken.

On empty gallong bag write: Cook on low for 3-4 hours or on high 1 1/2 – 2 1/2 hours, or just until chicken is cooked through. Remove chicken from crock pot, leave sauce. Dissolve 4 teaspoons of cornstarch in 6 tablespoons of water and pour into crock pot. Stir to combine with sauce. Replace lid and cook sauce on high for ten more minutes or until slightly thickened. Cut chicken into bite size pieces, then return to pot and toss with sauce before serving. Sprinkle with sesame seeds and serve over rice or noodles.

I also made this.  Martha calls it Baked Penne with Chicken and Sun-dried tomatoes but I made some adjustments noted below.  It as great and I have 3 meals in the freezer!

Ingredients

• 6 tablespoons butter, plus more for baking dishes
• Coarse salt and ground pepper
• 1 pound penne rigate
• 1 teaspoon olive oil
• 2 boneless, skinless chicken breast halves (8 ounces each), halved horizontally
• 1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour (spooned and leveled)
• 4 garlic cloves, minced
• 6 cups whole milk
• 10 ounces white mushrooms, trimmed and thinly sliced
• 1/2 cup oil-packed sun-dried tomatoes, drained and thinly sliced - (didn't use this - not sure G would like that)
• 1 1/2 cups shredded provolone (6 ounces)
• 1 cup finely grated Parmesan (4 ounces) (totally forgot about this as well)

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 400 (Didn't do this as I'm going to freeze it). Butter two shallow 2-quart baking dishes (greased 3 9x9 foil pans for the freezer). In a large pot of boiling salted water, cook pasta 3 minutes short of al dente; drain pasta, and return to pot.
2. In a large nonstick skillet, heat oil over medium-high. Season chicken with salt and pepper; cook until opaque throughout, 3 to 5 minutes per side. Halve each piece lengthwise, then thinly slice crosswise.  (I used by big dutch over for this - no need to dirty another pan)
3. In a 5-quart Dutch oven or heavy pot, melt butter over medium. Add flour and garlic; cook, whisking, 1 minute. While whisking, gradually add milk; bring to a simmer, whisking frequently. Add mushrooms and tomatoes (did not use these); cook 1 minute. Off heat, gradually stir in provolone and 1/2 cup Parmesan.
4. Add chicken and pasta to pot; season with salt and pepper. Divide pasta mixture between baking dishes; sprinkle each with cup Parmesan.
5. Bake, uncovered, until top is golden and bubbling, about 25 minutes. Let stand 5 minutes before serving.  (Wrapped them and wrote the instruction on the top of the pans and put them in the freezer!)