What's Cookin' - Saucy Chicken Orzo

We love cooking shows, especially the challenges. If you've ever watched "Chopped" that airs on Tuesday night, you know they give the competing chefs a mystery box of ingredients to work with. Hubby keeps saying that we should have mystery box nights where we just pull a variety of ingredients out of the pantry and refrigerator and cook it all up. Last night, I decided to try it.

I had four small half chicken breasts to start with and I just started grabbing stuff. I had a package of cremini mushrooms and a shallot in the fridge that needed to be used so I chopped and sautéed them in a hot skillet with the last of a jar of minced garlic in water. (This is my favorite new thing. I always buy fresh garlic, but YD's BF cooked for us one night and brought this jar of minced garlic, then left it here. I have been using it more and more often because it not only tastes great, but it's so easy!) I am a huge fan of creminis and shallots - they produce such a wonderfully rich, earthy flavor together. Chopped the chicken breasts into chunks and threw them in the skillet, too.

Digging around in the pantry I found half of a 16 oz. package of orzo, which is tiny pasta that looks kind of like rice. I started that boiling. Also in the pantry, there was a 12 oz. jar of Heinz Homestyle Mushroom Gravy ... okay, that sounds good.

I wanted another vegetable besides the mushrooms, so I grabbed what was left of a bag of frozen corn out of the freezer and dumped that in the skillet. Then, the jar of mushroom gravy. Hubby walked into the house about this time and said it smelled great!

After I drained the orzo in a strainer, I mixed it into the skillet with everything else. We had bread and butter with it and, I have to say, considering I made it up as I went along just using up stuff that needed to be used, it was very good.

I read an article not too long ago about a family who, once a year for an entire month, does not spend any money except on perishables like milk and fresh vegetables. They clean out their pantry right down to the spices, using everything up. I think this is a great idea! And it's amazing what you find in the back of your cupboards that you didn't know (or remember) you had.

So, just for fun, try mystery box night ... and let us know what creative meal you come up with!

The After Christmas Haze

At 6:04 this morning I'm snuggled into a comforter on the family room love seat with both Miles and Louie wrapped into the folds, just tips of noses showing. And I'm reading *so happily* the new "Mason-Dixon Knitting Outside the Lines" that Youngest Daughter got me for Christmas.

Hubby:  What are you doing up so early?

Me:  Well, I got up ... and there I was ... up.

Hubby:  That was profound.

Me:  I know -- I should probably talk more.

Hubby:  Just not outside the house.

It's nice to read something with big pages and type I can see easily. I am dealing with eye strain right now. Hubby got me a Sprint Moment touch phone with a slide out keyboard. We've discussed it for a good 5 months -- when he began testing the water to see if I'd want one. I opened it Christmas morning, plugged it in to charge, and we took the Granddaughter to see "Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel." That was a lot of fun. Many, many tiny kids and lots of noise off-screen. Everything is funnier when you speed it up to a helium-sucking level.

Anyway, once we got home, I started playing with the new phone. Just getting the touch part down took me a while. Since then I have run the battery out 4 times, which was a blessing so my eyes could rest while it charged.

The Mason-Dixon book is wonderful. Whenever I read anything by those gals, Kay and Ann, I feel like I'm visiting with girlfriends. Here are a couple of excerpts from the book:

Page 35: Tip from Leafy Reticule pattern ... Why do I have to change the position of the marker in round 15?

The Short Answer: We don't know why; just do it, or there will be trouble.

Ha!

And from Page 73: Tip from Baby Dotty blanket pattern ... Make up little songs. Fair Isle is all about rhythm: 2 2 3 1 2 can be sung to the tune of "Row, Row, Row Your Boat." If you're a Prince fan, "I would die 4 u" also works.

Double Ha!

A couple of funny things happened over the holiday. When we went to bed around 1:00 a.m. Christmas Eve, I was so tired I actually forgot about the stockings. This has never happened before. Hubby said, "Hey, don't we have to do the stockings?" And we raced back down the hallway past the 13-year-old Granddaughter's room (she spent the night at our house which was so awesome) and filled the stockings.

A few hours later, she comes into our room in the dark and says, "Merry Christmas, Nana!" I looked at the clock ... 4:27. I said, "No, not yet. Go back to bed."

Then she comes back again a little later, this time on Bampa's side of the bed (smart girl), wakes him up and crawls into bed between us. This is nice. She has done this since she was a baby ... crawled into bed with us and we lay there and talk. Now I know she is past the stage of believing in Santa, but she still gets a kick out of pretending to and, of course, so do we. So we're laying there talking in the dark and she says, "Did you remember to put out cookies and milk for Santa?" And I'm thinking, "Oh, crap!" So I say, "Of course we did. I'm going to start the oven to warm it up for the Caramel Pull Aparts," and I race to the kitchen and choke down half a cookie and slurp some milk and run into the living room with the crummy plate and glass to leave them out. I just hoped she didn't touch the glass because the milk was still cold.

And I get back in bed and we're still talking and she says, "Do you think Santa remembered to put dog bones in the puppies' stockings?" And it's, "Son of a ..." and I leap back out of bed and say I'm going to check on breakfast. Hubby says, "Should we just get up?" and I practically yell, "No!" And I run to the laundry room to get chew bones and then to the living room to put them in the dogs' stockings. I was exhausted before we ever got up!

Something else we thought was funny ... we hosted a small Christmas Eve family dinner at our house. We served Honeybaked Ham, parmesan mashed potatoes, cranberry-dried cherry chutney, pinto beans, fresh baked rolls, Hawaiian salad and chocolate bundt cake with chocolate frosting. Of course, we had a ton of food and ate the same thing on Christmas Day for lunch and dinner.

Then the day after Christmas, hubby's brother called and said they had a lot of food left from their open house and would we come for dinner. Hubby says, "Thank God, we don't have to eat ham and potatoes and beans again," and off we go to BIL's house. And guess what? They served ham and potato casserole, Boston baked beans and chocolate cupcakes. So we virtually ate the same meal again. We laughed all the way home!