Happy 2021! It’s a new year and I know we are all so thankful for that. I didn’t publish any blog posts in 2020. It’s kind of hard to believe, but honestly I was just trying to survive a very trying year as many of us were and not feeling overly inspired to write. I am feeling so much more positive about the new year and with that comes some much needed inspiration! I’m getting back into the swing of things with content creation and I’m excited to share my first recipe of 2021!
My husband and I really fell off the healthy eating train in 2020. I think a lot of us did. We were home more, had more time on our hands and I used that extra time to bake lots of goodies! In the last couple months, we’ve been getting into a much healthier routine. I’ve been working out every day, eating healthier and my husband actually started doing the Keto diet. I personally am not a huge fan of Keto, but I know it works for a lot of people including my husband. So when he started his new diet, I was forced to get really creative in the kitchen and come up with some Keto inspired dishes.
We both love Buffalo chicken and luckily most Buffalo sauce is low in carbs. I’ve also been on a cauliflower kick in the new year. Cauliflower, cauliflower rice, cauliflower mash, the cauliflower list goes on and on and I just can’t get enough cauliflower. So in my head I dreamt up this amazing Keto Buffalo Chicken Cauliflower Casserole. I honestly wasn’t sure how it was going to turn out, but it was GOOD! My husband went back for seconds, so that’s how I know it was a hit. Spicy buffalo chicken combined with a creamy cheese mixture, mixed with cauliflower is my new guilty pleasure that isn’t really all that guilty because it’s relatively healthy. Also, to make things super easy you can use your slow cooker to do a majority of the work and then just throw the mixture into a casserole dish and bake right before serving. I hope you love this recipe as much as I do!
In your slow cooker, add 2 large boneless chicken breasts and pour 1 cup of Buffalo sauce over top of the chicken. Cook on low for 8 hours.
Once cooked, shred chicken in the slow cooker. Add 8 oz of cream cheese, ½ cup of sour cream, 1 cup of shredded cheddar cheese and blue cheese crumbles to taste to the chicken and combine until creamy. It should look like Buffalo chicken dip when you are all done mixing.
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F and grease a 9x13 casserole dish.
Steam cauliflower and drain out any liquid. Add cauliflower to creamy Buffalo chicken mixture and combine.
Pour Buffalo chicken cauliflower mixture into the greased casserole dish and top with remaining cheese. Bake for 30 minutes uncovered at 350 degrees F.
Remove casserole from oven and let it rest for 10 minutes before serving. Serve up with a side salad or veggie.
I cannot believe that December is almost over and 2019 is
almost here! This year has been filled with major milestones and memories that
I will cherish for a lifetime. In 2018, I started a new job, graduated from
grad school and married my best friend.
I also traveled to lots of fun places! I traveled to North Carolina, New York City, visited Walt Disney World for my Bachelorette party, and accompanied Derek on his first international trip to Jamaica for our honeymoon. Although this year was super busy, I challenged myself to find balance and make time for things I love like writing and dancing. I was even fortunate enough to perform in A Charm City Ballet’s production of A Christmas Carol. As 2018 comes to an end, I’m so grateful for all the wonderful blessings the year brought and very hopeful that 2019 will be another great year.
Now that the Christmas festivities have come to an end, I’m
ready for New Year’s celebrations. I always look forward to New Year’s Day.
Christmas is always wonderful, but it’s always busy! New Year’s Day is low key
for us. Typically, I do cook a New Year’s Day meal, but I try to pick simple
dishes since I’m usually still recovering from all the Christmas baking and
cooking.
This year, I’m making these delicious Slow Cooker Southern Green Beans. I made these at Thanksgiving and they were a huge hit. They are inspired by Mission BBQ’s green beans. These are super easy to make and are a perfect side dish for any holiday. They also reheat great in the microwave. For this recipe, I use real bacon bits that you can find in the salad dressing aisle of your grocery store. If you are feeling ambitious, you can cook some bacon ahead of time to use in lieu of the bacon bits. However, as I mentioned before I’m still recovering from Christmas so I’m going the easy route.
Melt two tablespoons of butter on medium-high heat in a skillet.
Finely dice 1 onion and then add the diced onion into the skillet.
Add ½ cup of bacon bits to the onion butter mixture.
Add ¼ tsp of cayenne, ½ tsp onion powder, ½ tsp garlic powder, ½ tsp salt and 1 tsp of pepper to the onion and bacon mixture. Stir together and sauté for 5 minutes until bacon is a deep red color.
Open your cans of green beans and dump them juice and all into your slow cooker. Add the bacon and onion mixture to the slow cooker. Stir together the bacon and onion mixture with the green beans until combined.
Cook on low for 4 hours.
Recipe Notes
The longer you cook, the more flavor your green beans will have. However, everything is cooked before you add it to the slow cooker, so feel free to decrease the cook time if you are in a pinch.
Happy Fall! I am so thrilled that Fall is officially here! I love everything about this time of year, the beautiful fall foliage, the cooler temps and the anticipation of the holidays that are quickly approaching. Also, I love October because almost all of my family member’s birthdays are in October, including mine. And as fate had it, my husband’s birthday is conveniently October 1st and mine is just three days later on October 4th. It’s safe to say that we will never forget each other’s birthdays.
Now that cooler temperatures have arrived, I’ve been resurfacing some of my Fall and Winter soup recipes. Soup is always one of my go-to weeknight dinners because it is typically pretty low maintenance. It’s always nice to throw into a slow cooker in the morning and come home to a piping hot pot of soup. Soup is such a comforting food and perfect for this time of year.
I’m kicking off the Fall season with this delicious Mexican inspired soup recipe, Chicken Verde and White Bean Soup. I love Mexican food. We probably eat it at least once a week, so I have a nice arsenal of Mexican inspired recipes that I like to rotate through. This soup is perfect to serve if you are hosting guests for football game day. It’s also an easy recipe to throw into the slow cooker in the morning and come home to after a long day of work. Packed with flavor and a little heat, this soup will surely spice up your day!
Slice 1 fresh jalapeno in half length wise, remove the seeds, dice finely and then set aside. If you aren’t a huge fan of spicy food, feel free to use half of the jalapeno in the soup or omit this ingredient completely.
Cut 1 lime in half and set aside.
Place 2 boneless chicken breasts in the slow cooker.
To the slow cooker, add 1 can of green chiles, 1 can of navy beans, 1 cup of frozen white sweet corn, ½ cup of salsa verde, 1 packet of taco seasoning, fresh jalapeno to taste, squeeze in the juice of 1 lime and finally pour in the container of chicken stock over top all of your ingredients.
Stir the ingredients together, cover with the lid and set the slow cooker to “low” for 8 hours.
After cooking for 8 hours, remove the chicken breasts from the slow cooker, shred the chicken and return the chicken back into the soup once completely shredded.
Recipe Notes
This soup is great on its own, but it’s also great to top with shredded cheese, cilantro, crushed up tortilla chips and you can even squeeze in some extra lime juice.
I don’t know about you, but I’m so ready for spring. We had some nasty snow and ice over the weekend, which made me super anxious for warm weather and sunshine. Although, I really should not complain. My youngest brother attends college in Dekalb, Illinois and has practically been ice skating across campus to his classes. Winters are brutal in Illinois compared to Maryland. I guess I will just have to embrace this cold weather for the next couple of weeks and hunker down at home with some warm comfort foods.
One of my favorite recipes for a cold winter day is pot roast. I love pot roast because it’s such a simple dish, but is so hearty and filling. There are so many variations of pot roast, but this recipe is my all-time favorite. I cook my pot roast in the slow cooker, which makes it a perfect weekday recipe. Many slow cooker roast recipes require that you brown the roast in a skillet prior to slow cooking, but I omit this step and just dump all of my ingredients directly in the slow cooker. Less dishes, less mess and less stress. This pot roast is cooked in a thick, savory gravy that pairs perfectly with mashed potatoes. If you don’t feel like making mashed potatoes, you can just cut up potatoes and throw them right in the slow cooker along with your roast. Easy peasy!
In a bowl, mix together 1 cup of beef stock, 1 cup of water, 1 ranch dressing dry seasoning packet, 1 Italian dressing dry seasoning packet and 1 brown gravy dry seasoning packet.
Place 2 cups of baby carrots and the sliced onions in the bottom of the slow cooker. Feel free to add any other vegetables, such as potatoes or celery. Place the roast on top of the veggies and then pour the liquid mixture over top of the roast. Sprinkle the roast with salt and pepper to taste, and place one bay leaf into the liquid mixture. Cover and cook the roast for 8 hours on low.
Remove the bay leaf and set the roast aside on a plate. Mix 1 tsp of corn starch with 2 table spoons of cold water in a small bowl. Stir the corn starch and water mixture directly into the slow cooker, mixing with the broth and veggies. This will help to thicken the gravy. Add the roast back to the slow cooker and cook on high for 30 minutes to 1 hour until the gravy has thickened.
Slice the roast and serve over mashed potatoes or with a nice piece of crusty bread.
