Bacon Stuffed Roasted Chicken

It's been a while, I know. But I've been busy with this PhD business and #SmilingBaby. But I was inspired by some split chicken breasts and bacon. So loves, here it is. It was pretty good.

Ingredients
5 cloves garlic
1/2 lb bacon, chopped
1 Tbs coconut oil
3 Tbs fresh thyme
2 Tbs fresh sage
2 split chicken breasts

This is pretty simple. Mix all these ingredients. Loosen the skin from the chicken breasts and stuff with bacon mixture. I baked it at 350 for about 45 minutes with potatoes and carrots, rubbed the chicken with grape seed oil, and added salt and paprika to taste on the skin.

French Toast Breakfast Casserole

I made french toast earlier this week using cinnamon and raisin bread. It was good that I didn't want to waste the left overs. I decided to incorporate french toast in a breakfast casserole this morning. It was so good.

Ingredients

6 pieces of cinnamon raisin french toast

1 lb browned mild sausage

6 eggs

1/2 cup shredded cheese

1 onion, diced

1 yellow pepper

1 cup nonfat milk

Preheat oven to 350. Lay the pieces of french toast on a greased 9 x 13 inch pan. Mix eggs, sausage, onion,pepper, and milk. Pour over french toast and add shredded cheese. Bake for  30 min. 

Bacon Wrapped Asparagus

Did you know today was National Bacon Day? Here's a tasty bacon treat that is super easy to make.

Bacon Wrapped Asparagus

Preheat oven to 400. Spread about 1 cup of light brown sugar on a plate. Pat one side of bacon on the brown sugar. Roll the asparagus and bake until crisp, about 30 minutes.

Garlic & Eggplant Dip

I made a garlic and eggplant dip for a small gathering I'm having tomorrow and could have sworn I had the recipe on here. But since I don't and since friends are asking for the recipe, here it is. I've made so many variations of this, but here is this one.

Garlic and Eggplant Dip

Ingredients
1 large eggplant
5 cloves of garlic, chopped
1/2 grape seed oil
1 tbs of ground mustard

Preheat your oven to 350. Cut the eggplant into quarters. Stab with a fork. Lightly coat the eggplant with oil and roast for about an hour or until it's super soft. After it cools, remove the skin from the eggplant, and cut into big chunks. In your blender, blend the eggplant oil, mustard seed, and garlic.

Now, I have made variations of this. I normally use EVOO, but I had grape seed oil on hand. I've also added two hard boiled egg yolks to the mix. Sometimes, I'll add a splash of lemon juice. If I want it more creamy, I add about 1/4 cup light mayo and 1/4 tsp mustard.

It's great with crackers and veggie. Enjoy!

Cornmeal BBQ Breakfast Sausage Patties

It's a mouthful, but I was doing some reading for my ORG711 class for my doctoral program at #UOPX when I had an idea for breakfast sausage. My "ideas" come to me at weird times. And of course it happens when I'm studying. So I tried. it.

You'll need...

1 lb mild pork sausage

1 small onion--works better finely chopped

1 egg

1/4 cup honey BBQ--I use Sweet Baby Ray's

1/2 cup corn meal

2 TBS maple syrup

Mix, make patties, and fry. 

BBQ Bacon Meat Loaf

I was playing with stuffed mushroom recipe and had extra meat left over. So I made a meat loaf.

Ingredients
1 lb spicy sausage
1/2 lb bacon, chopped and fried
1 medium onion, chopped
6 garlic gloves, minced
1/2 cup ketchup
1/2 BBQ sauce (I use Sweet Baby Ray's)
1 egg
1 cup bread crumbs

Fry bacon until crisp. Add onions and garlic and saute. Let bacon cool and mix with the rest of the ingredients leaving 1/4 cup ketchup and 1/4 BBQ sauce for topping.  Bake at 350 for 1 hour.

This is by no means healthy, but the bacon is really good. The BBQ sauce and sausage give it an extra kick.

Vegetarian Sarmale

My friend Jamie and her boyfriend came to Atlanta for a visit and I just had to make them something Romanian to snack on. I instantly knew that I wanted to make sarmale, but they're vegetarian. So I made vegetarian sarmale. Here's what I did.

3 grated carrots

1 large onion finely chopped
1 cup finely chopped kalamata olives
1 lb finely chopped mushrooms
1 cup uncooked rice
V8 or vegetable juice
1 cup lemon juice
3 tbs dill
1 tbs vegeta
1 jar grape leaves
1/4 cup olive oil

All the ingredients together with the exception of grape leaves, vegetable juice, and lemon juice. Put the grape leaf in one palm and scoop about 2 tbs of the mixture and roll  into the grape leaf. Place in a crock pot. Repeat until you use all the of them mixture. Add the bottle of vegetable juice and lemon juice. Cook on low for 6 hours.