Super-Easy Chicken Manicotti

Prep Time: 15 Mins
Start to Finish: 1 hour 20 Mins
Servings: 7


1 Jar (26 to 30 oz) tomato pasta sauce
3/4 cup water
1 teaspoon garlic salt
1 1/2 lb uncooked chicken breast tenders (no breaded) (14 tenders)
14 uncooked manicotti pasta shells (8 oz)
2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese (8 oz)
chopped fresh basil leaves, if desired

1. Heat oven to 350*F. In medium bowl, mix pasta sauce and water. Spread about one-third of the pasta sauce in ungreased 13x9-inch (3 quart) glass baking dish.

2. Sprinkle garlic salt on chicken. Insert chicken into uncooked manicotti shells, stuffing each end of shell to fill if necessary. Place shells on pasta sauce in baking dish. Pour remaining pasta sauce evenly over shells, covering completely. Cover tightly with foil.

3. Bake about 1 hour or until shells are tender. Sprinkle with cheese. Bake uncovered about 5 minutes or until cheese is melted. Sprinkle with basil.

*Betty Crocker Most requested recipes*

This one tasted better than I thought it would!! Although, it didn't look the same as theirs haha. Mine still had a lot of the sauce in the pan and I didn't buy fresh basil. Oh, and then there's how I asked Devin to add the cheese to it for me while I was cleaning up...and I caught him *too late* putting the fiesta blend cheese that I had bought for some other meal instead of the mozzarella cheese!! haha He hadn't put much on it actually and the only reason why I cared was because I needed it for another meal and wanted my picture to match ;) Also, I soooo did NOT use all 14 shells!! I also only used 2 chicken breasts...I saved the other one for another meal. I didn't find them as easy to put in the shells but once I cut them smaller and stuffed them from each end it worked better. There's not 14 in their picture either so I don't know where that went. The cooking time went by fast, I used the time to clean up and wash my kitchen counters! haha I love not having a big mess to clean up after I'm done eating!

X's and O's,
Brandi Sue

Home-Style Chicken Dinner

Prep Time: 30 Minutes
Start to Finish: 1 Hour 20 Minutes
Servings: 4

2 teaspoons dried basil leaves
1 teaspoon seasoned salt
1 teaspoon garlic pepper blend
2 teaspoons olive or vegetable oil
3 to 3 1/2 lb cut-up broiler fryer chicken, skin removed if desired
6 small unpeeled red potatoes, cut into fourths (2 cups)
2 medium dark-orange sweet potatoes, peeled, cut into 1-inch pieces (3 cups)
1 medium green bell pepper, cut into 1-inch pieces (1 cup)
3 roma (plum) tomatoes, cut into fourths

1. Heat oven to 400*F. Spray 13x9-inch (3 quart) glass baking dish with cooking spray. In large bowl, mix basil, seasoned salt, garlic pepper and oil. Brush about half of the mixture on chicken. Add remaining ingredients to bowl; toss to coat.

2. Place vegetables in baking dish. Place chicken on vegetables. Brush with any remaining oil mixture.

3. Bake uncovered 45 to 50 minutes or until vegetables are tender and juice of chicken is no longer pink when centers of thickest pieces are cut. Serve with pan juices.

*From Betty Crocker Most Requested Recipes

We invited Alex over for dinner for this meal and it turned out pretty good! I didn't get the veggies cooked through as much as I would have liked but it worked out ok. I didn't have garlic pepper blend and so I used garlic powder and coarse pepper like suggested and it worked fine as well! It didn't take a lot of time to put this together and I cleaned up my kitchen mess while I waited and even had left over time to tidy up the rest of the kitchen. So, for you Mom's out there, that means you have time to chase down kids and make them clean up before dinner ;) If any of you try this recipe, let me know what you think!!

X's and O's,
Brandi Sue

Cooking for two

For the last few years, it's been a running joke that once Devin and I get married...he will...starve! They had reason to joke as I never really cooked while we dated haha. When I would cook it was some box meal or I would cook the veggies while he cooked the meat. I enjoyed us both being in the kitchen anyway. As I like to bake, I always joked that we could just live off cookie dough batter instead ;) You're a vegetarian if you don't eat meat so it there a name for people who only eat sweets?!

Bobby, my Father in Law, always came to my rescue by letting me know that his wife didn't always know how to cook ;) She's all gourmet on us now though!! When I lived with her she made me home cooked meals almost every night! Who needs to cook when you're spoiled like that!?! I'm officially an addict now. of fried squash. it's delicious!

So anyway, back to poor starving Devin... My retort was that I could just pick up a cook book and start at page one and work my way through! After we were married I did just that! I was so proud of my first official meal, that I took pictures haha...well you know me and pictures anyway right?! Several successes and pictures later, I thought it would be fun to post them on here, in case anyone else wanted to make the meals. We have really liked all but two of them! *those will not be posted as I didn't take pictures of them haha* Devin likes to tease that he always has to eat his dinners cold because I hold it hostage for pictures first. He is exaggerating...a little. ;)

Here's a picture of the calzones that he and I made with his Mother's help. They were huge!! and oh so YUMMY!!!!

X's and O's,
Brandi Sue