I don’t love cooking. Yet there is a very large part of me that wants to be amazing in the kitchen, cooking and baking delicious things for my family. During quarantine last year, I learned more and gained confidence. It was actually kind of an awesome year in that respect. While I still don’t get too excited to make supper, and while I don’t make extravagant things often/ever, I don’t dream cooking or preparing food the way I used to! Win for me, and win for the people I feed!! Hahaha!
I mentioned yesterday that I was determined to make the day great, and part of that was supper and a movie after the kids went to bed. I prepped food on and off throughout the day, and I have to show you guys how it came together!
Firstly, I made a knock off of Outback’s Alice Spring Chicken. Its a very indulgent entree, with chicken breasts slathered in homemade honey mustard, with bacon, mushrooms, and cheese.
I can’t say I’ve had the original recipe, but I cannot even fathom it being better than this dish! Even Brady, who is anti-mushrooms, loves it! This time around specifically, I assured him I was happy to accommodate him and leave the mushrooms off of his pieces, but he insisted he’d have them, and enjoy them.
A couple of tricks, friends. Fry bacon in advance, not too crispy. Then sauté the chicken with some of the leftover bacon grease. I slice the chicken breasts in half the super skinny way and it all goes SO much smoother. I never used to precook everything but it is SO much easier to give everything a little fry first. Not the mushrooms, though. They cook great in the baking process. Lastly, I double the sauce part of the recipe because its a great sauce for other things we’ll talk about shortly.
Then I made broccoli salad. This is a favourite for everyone over here. To the point where the kids were ticked that there wasn’t any for them this time, hahaha!!
I had a bag of broccoli from Costco that was half frozen, and I was then neglected it in my fridge because it made me feel bummed, but I decided to grow up and not waste the entire bag. I chopped it up and added my homemade dressing to it. Then I added the yummies. In this case, I added craisins and bacon bits. We recently bought the far grosser brand of bacon bits and they were pure fat. Like, couldn’t even break down when you chewed them. So because todays food wasn’t enough steps, I fried the bacon bits. They are WAY better now! For the record, I always add sunflower seeds to this salad as well, but I’m learning its only me who likes them, so I opted not to this time.
The last piece of the meal was potatoes! I decided on wedges this time around, for ease, and also because the kids don’t love them so we don’t have them very often. I simply tossed the wedges in onion salt, cayenne, salt and pepper, and a big ole scoop of minced garlic. I didn’t add oil, because the last time I roasted diced potatoes, I left the oil out and they tasted SO much better! It was almost like the oil made all the spices and garlic roll right off the potatoes. Does that make sense?? Anyway, there isn’t really a worst case scenario in this case. Potato wedges dunked in honey mustard is pretty close to ideal no matter the level of soft or crisp.
I didn’t take an after picture because, in the moment, I was SO discouraged. The potato wedges looked gross and overdone and just so so bad. But I will confirm they actually turned out pretty perfectly.
All in all, folks, the meal was DELICIOUS!!!
It was a decent amount of prep and fuss but my goodness, it was so worth the effort! I’m not sure I’m ready to put this level of effort into food only to have the kids turn around and hate it, but the more I cook, the more I feel capable of pushing through those insecurities and trying it out! I find they are SO much happier to eat food they’ve helped make 😉 So there’s also that.