Baked Sweet and Sour Chicken Repost

I'm back on the diet wagon so I've been going through my collection of healthier recipes. This is one that I posted when I first started blogging without a picture. So, with the addition of a few veggies I am going to repost the recipe WITH a picture. Don't let the long ingredient list scare you off, most of things I found in my pantry as staples.

Baked Sweet and Sour  Chicken

POINTS® Value: 6

5 servings

Serve with rice; count NI for rice separately.

Ingredients:
1 pound(s) uncooked boneless, skinless chicken breast
1/8 tsp table salt
1/8 tsp black pepper
1/3 cup(s) pineapple juice
2 cup(s) canned pineapple, packed in juice
1 medium green pepper(s)
1 cup carrots
1 can water chestnuts
1/2 cup(s) Ocean Spray Jellied Cranberry Sauce
2 tbsp cornstarch
2 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp unpacked brown sugar
2 tbsp frozen orange juice concentrate
2 tbsp water
2 tbsp rice vinegar
1/4 tsp ground ginger

Instructions:
1. Preheat oven to 350. Sprinkle chicken lightly with salt and pepper. In a large skillet heat 1 T oil over med high heat. Add chicken and cook about 2 min on each side or until brown. Transfer chicken to a 2 quart baking dish.

2. Drain pineapple well reserving 1/3 c juice. Spoon pineapple chunks evenly over chicken in dish; set aside.

3. For sauce in a med saucepan whisk together the reserved juice, cranberry sauce, cornstarch, brown sugar, vinegar, orange juice concentrate, water, soy sauce and ginger. Cook and stir over medium heat until thickened and bubbly.

4. Pour over chicken and pineapple in dish. Bake, covered, for 25 min. Uncover and add pepper strips, stirring gently to coat with sauce. Bake, uncovered, about 5 min more or until chicken is no longer pink.

Per serving. 368 cal, 6 g fat, 82 mg chol., 589 mg. sodium, 41 g carb, 2 g fiber

Bri and I saw this recipe on the Recipe Girl website and decided that we needed to give them a whirl. She wasn't super impressed with the amount of peanuts, both the actual nuts and the peanut flavor from all the peanut butter and has decided that she would rather have Scotcharoos. I thought that they were pretty good but if I do them again I will put a caramel layer on top of the cookie, sub toasted almonds for the peanuts and use less chocolate on the top layer with a light sprinkle of sea salt. These are super rich, you will get more than the 30 pieces indicated in the original recipe.

CANDY BAR- COOKIE BAR
www.RecipeGirl.com

Cookie Layer:
1 cup (packed) brown sugar
2/3 cup butter
¼ cup corn syrup
¼ cup creamy peanut butter
1 tsp. vanilla extract
3 ½ cups quick-cooking rolled oats

Candy Bar Layer:
2 cups semisweet chocolate chips (12 ounces)
1 cup peanut butter chips
2/3 cup creamy peanut butter
½ cup chopped peanuts\

Topping:
½ cup semisweet chocolate chips
½ cup peanut butter chips
1/3 cup chopped peanuts

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Line 13×9-inch pan with foil; spray foil with nonstick spray.

2. In a medium saucepan, stir brown sugar, butter and corn syrup over medium heat until combined. Remove from heat and stir in peanut butter and vanilla; stir until smooth.

3. Place oats in a very large bowl. Pour brown sugar mixture over oats; stir to combine. Press oat mixture onto the bottom of prepared pan.

4. Bake 10 to 12 minutes, until golden. Don’t overbake (you don’t want it to brown) or it will be on the crunchy side. Let the cookie layer cool for about 15 minutes on a wire rack.

5. In the same saucepan, stir chips and peanut butter over low heat until melted and smooth.

6. Sprinkle ½ cup of chopped peanuts over the baked cookie layer. Pour chocolate over the peanuts; spread to make an even layer. Sprinkle chocolate and peanut butter chips and peanuts over the top; press lightly into the chocolate layer.

7. Refrigerate until firm; cut into squares.
Yield: About 30 pieces

Mom's Lasagne

My mom is a GREAT cook. She's made it her mission in life to fatten us all up one meal at a time, and she's good at it. One of her favorite meals that I've integrated into my own family menu is lasagne. I haven't fiddled with the recipe much at all because it is so good as is. Other than adding a few more spices and using only Italian sausage this is Mom's recipe and it's so yummy. I often make it in 2's so that I can either freeze one or take it to a neighbor for dinner. Even when you get distracted and let the cheese crisp too much it's still awesome. Eat until you are sick awesome.

Mom's Lasagne

1 lb ground beef
1/2 lb Italian sausage
2 8 oz cans tomato sauce
2 cans diced tomatoes or 1 quart if you are lucky enough to have bottled from your garden
handful dried minced onion
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
1/2 tsp onion salt
1 1/2 T basil
1 1/2 T oregano
1 T parsley flakes
1 tsp red pepper flakes
1 bay leaf
1 carton cottage cheese
2 tsp parsley
1 egg
parmesan cheese
Mozarella cheese
8 lasagne noodles cooked

Brown meat with onion. Drain off grease. Add spices. Simmer, uncovered 40-50 min or until sauce is fairly thick.

Mix cottage cheese, egg and 2 tsp parsley together. Assemble in the following order.

Small amount meat sauce
Noodles
1/2 Meat sauce
Cottage cheese misture
Parmesan cheese
Mozarella cheese
Noodles
Remaining sauce
Mozarella
Parmesan

Bake covered at 350 degrees for 30 min. Remove foil and continue baking another 20 minutes or until cheese is melted and bubbly. If you prefer the cheese browned skip the foil.

Let stand 10 minutes before serving.

Sugar Cookie Bars

My mom and my sister make the best sugar cookies in the world. They have figured out just how thick to roll them out and how long to bake them so that they aren't mushy or too crunchy. In all my 42 years I haven't been able to master sugar cookies. Maybe my mom taught Julie during a super secret class one day while I was sitting in my room for being mouthy.... At any rate, due to my missing that day during cookie class I can honestly say that I can count on one hand the number of times I have made sugar cookies since I got married. Then, I discovered Granny B's and Lofthouse. Why would I keep trying to make my own mediocre cookies when I could buy them and they are so good??

Jeff invited some of his friends for dinner yesterday and because I was so focused on getting the ribs etc ready I completely forgot something for dessert. Enter the sugar cookie bar...all the goodness of a sugar cookie with NONE of the hassle! Woohoo!

The texture of this cookie is very similar to a Granny B's Pink Cookie. Very rich and yummy. I didn't have any cream cheese in the fridge so the frosting is just regular frosting but it was a good balance of frosting to cookie. I ate way more than my share. *sigh* So.Good.

Sugar Cookie Bars
Servings: 32

1 c. butter, softened
2 c. sugar
4 large eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract (the good stuff)
5 c. flour
1 tsp salt (slightly less if using salted butter)
1/2 tsp baking soda

In mixer cream butter and sugar until fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, mixing after each egg. Mix in vanilla.

In a separate bowl mix together flour, salt and soda. Add to wet mixture and mix just until combined. Spread on a greased baking sheet. (I sprayed my hands with PAM and pressed it out with my fingers)

Bake at 375 15-20 min or until light golden brown or until a toothpick comes out clean.

Frost with your favorite frosting!