The Kitchen Whisperer

Get out of that same ol’ recipe rut and try one of these delicious and easy recipes this week! This week I highly recommend making the Thai Chicken Lettuce Wraps and the – Caramel Infused Apple Cheddar Chicken Burgers!

Happy Sunday TKW Family! How’s your week been?  The past couple of weeks ours has been rather relaxing. Sometimes you have to just shut off the world and take a breath. We (all) work so super hard that often we lose track of ourselves and our needs. We push ourselves to (and through) our limits just to meet a deadline or get something done. Or maybe that’s just the norm for some. Only knowing full speed or level 10 high at a constant rate. However, at some point you’re going to burn out or worse.

We forget to look after us or put our needs last. That’s kind of what we have been doing. Well, not so much me as I can’t do much, but rather Mr. Fantabulous. About 2 weeks ago, after our sister in law passed away, Mr. Fantabulous’ brother called us and asked us to go on a last minute trip to Ocean City, Maryland for a couple of days to just get away. His heart had been broken with the loss of his wife and he needed to get away from their house just for a few days.

So us, and the Fantabulous in-laws, headed up to Ocean City for a couple of days. Overall the trip was really nice as anytime I can spend with the Fantabulous family is a blessing. I truly am blessed to have married into such a great family. Have you ever been to OC? This was a first for me. See growing up we couldn’t afford vacations like that. Our vacation was maybe a weekend trip to Sea World in Ohio for the day and then we’d all cram in a single crappy motel. I always always got the rollaway bed.

Let’s get our deliciousness on!

Get your deliciousness on with this one pan meal! Sheet Pan Smoked Kielbasa, potatoes and green beans make up a delicious dinner in no time plus it’s perfect for weekly meal prep…or when you only want to wash one dish!

So with my really being limited to what I can and cannot do in the kitchen, I have to rely on Mr. Fantabulous to do most of the cooking. And since I’m 1-armed if you will he’s also the one that has to do the dishes. Sure we have a brand new dishwasher but we rarely use it. I know, we’re weird. Since he’s bearing the brunt of all of the house work, yard work and construction stuff I try to keep dinner easy as possible while delicious.

When we were at the store he spied fresh green beans. Now this man loves these things. I mean he’ll eat them raw. Now I like many vegetables raw, green beans are not one of them. Growing up he would have loved being in my parents garden with me as one of my jobs was to pick the beans. And having 41 acres, we grew A LOT of beans. Now when I make green beans I tend to go to one of my all time favorite Green Beans recipe – Grown Up Green Beans. It takes all of the elements of that Thanksgiving green bean casserole but makes it all fancy schmancy. And no canned soup. Yes, it’s ok in a pinch but please, make homemade!

Anyway, there was no way I could ask Mr. Fantabulous to make that as, while it’s not hard or complicated, he’s still not a huge fan of cooking. Eating yes; cooking no. lol While we were shopping I picked up some potatoes and kielbasa just because those are quick and easy meals. And that’s when it hit me – Sheet Pan dinner.

Sheet pan dinners are super easy and delicious!

This week on Tuesday’s Tip with The Kitchen Whisperer I’m letting the TKW Family share their best kitchen wisdom to help us all become better cooks and bakers.

Kitchen wisdom. Those family secrets, tips, and tricks that have been passed down through generations is what we’re talking about today. Maybe grandma said “keep the bacon grease in a jar in your fridge for amazing fried potatoes” or maybe you found a killer trick on how to slice cherry tomatoes on Pinterest. Somehow, some way folks came to know of these great tips and today they are sharing their kitchen wisdom with the world.

I posted on Facebook about a week ago asking for folks to share their best kitchen wisdom. I love doing posts like these as it honestly helps me become a better chef. I’m humble enough to admit that I don’t know everything and take the approach that there is always, ALWAYS something to learn albeit in the kitchen or in life.

The response was overwhelming and I absolutely LOVED reading your responses. Some stuff I knew but there were somethings where I was like “Really? Oh cool!”. But what I loved more than anything was the interaction between the TKW Family members. It’s so awesome to see friendships bloom off of a single post. It warms my heart that the TKW Family is so loving and truly treats each other as a family member.
Have a tip to share? Comment in the post!

Get out of that same ol’ recipe rut and try one of these delicious and easy recipes this week! This week I highly recommend making the 15 Minute Creamy Lemon Pepper Parmesan Pasta with Langostino and the Thai Peanut Shrimp Summer Rolls!

Happy Sunday TKW Family!  How are things in your world? So guess who just realized that Labor day is only a couple of weeks away? Yeah, this girlie. Dear God, my entire summer…wasted on this stupid shoulder surgery. Well okay it wasn’t wasted as it definitely needed done but my entire summer was spent stuck in a recliner, going to PT or to the doctors. Ugh…

So tell me about your summer!  Did you go away?  Where do?  What’s the BEST THING YOU DID THIS SUMMER? Let me live vicariously through you. Actually my summer wasn’t that bad, aside from the pain, it was pretty good. I got to spend so much time with Mr. Fantabulous that it just made us even closer (if that’s even possible). But it was nice, you know?

Tell me about your summer!

These cookies started out as just a simple chocolate chip cookie but ended up being one of the best loaded chewy chocolate chip cookie I’ve ever had!

So this cookie literally just happened. It didn’t start off this way but dear lord I’m so happy that it ended the way it did! Since I’m not really able to cook or bake yet we hadn’t really had too many desserts that took actual baking or prep work. A lot of the stuff we’ve been having were either no bake or super, super simple. While Mr. Fantabulous is my main chef right now, he’s also still not a huge fan of cooking. Oh he loves the end game where he gets to dig in but the whole “what do you mean I have to cook this too???” is still too ‘new’ to him. Perhaps he thought food just magically appeared and that there wasn’t any prep time to it.

But damn it… I wanted cookies. So while he was out cutting the grass I got the ingredients out…one by one. Thankfully he had the mixer out on the counter for me. Now I was going to make just regular chocolate chip cookies as those are his favorite but I was just craving a more chewy cookie, like an oatmeal raisin. Now the rest… yeah it kinda just happened.

So here’s the thing, I decided I wanted oats in my cookie but I didn’t want to have to chill my dough overnight to soften. That’s when I recalled the ‘milk oats’ trick my Grandma used in her meatloaf. See she used oats in her meatloaf instead of bread. This allowed for a more moister meatloaf. But in order to get it moist, you had to soak the oats in milk. So I figured why not try and incorporate that method into a cookie?

You’re going to want a eat these all yourself but please, please share!