Fresh Veggie and Chicken Kebabs with 3 Dipping Sauces

This post is part of a social shopper marketing insight campaign with Pollinate Media Group®, Birds Eye®, and Tyson® but all my opinions are my own. #pmedia #FastFreshFilling http://my-disclosur.es/OBsstV

I was worried that after the excitement of a year of preschool, Forrest would be bored during the summer. (The less benevolent version of that statement is that I also worried I'd go insane if he spent all day, every day at home all summer long.) So I signed him up for some activities and classes--swim lessons, karate, a preschool summer day camp. 

The good news is, he isn't bored at all, and he is having a blast this summer.

The bad news is, all these activities are kind of making me crazy.

He has some sort of activity every day of the week, and sometimes he has two classes in a single day. I am told that someday I'll look back at this "two activities a day" schedule and laugh and laugh, and I won't be able to believe that two activities made the day feel busy. But for now, after 5 full years of being at home with little kids 90% of the time, and trying to squeeze in naps and quiet time between trips out to the pool and the karate studio and the playground . . . this summer schedule feels really busy.

We actually had a two-week long run when we couldn't make it to the library for story time. Two weeks without a library visit. If you've spent much time around this blog, you'll know this is serious business. The kids just about lost their minds with excitement when we finally hit the library a few days ago after our lengthy lapse. Forrest actually said, "Oh, yay! The library! I remember this place!"

And I am sorry to say that our dinners have suffered. Even on the days when we're only juggling one or two activities--whether they are classes or trips to the store or playdates at the park with friends--I end up feeling so exhausted by the end of the day that I can hardly stand the idea of making dinner. We had ice cream for dinner a few days ago. No one complained about that, unsurprisingly, but I'm trying not to make it a regular meal.

So today, I'm sharing a quick, easy, healthy dinner that we all enjoyed recently. It was fast enough to whip up easily, even on a night when I didn't have any energy left for meal prep. And as a bonus, I didn't even have to turn on the oven. When it's 100 degrees outside, leaving the oven cold makes my evenings an awful lot happier.

I picked up a handful of fresh vegetables--grape tomatoes, mushrooms, and broccoli--as well as Tyson® Grilled & Ready® Chicken Breast Fillets and Birds Eye Steamfresh® Protein Blends at Walmart while grocery shopping. I prepared 3 chicken breasts in the microwave, and washed and prepped the vegetables. Then I cubed the chicken:

And layered all of the ingredients onto wooden skewers. And since everything is more fun when it's dippable, I mixed up 3 quick dips--they're really fast to prepare, and make a simple dinner seem a lot more exciting.

BBQ Ranch Dip

1/2 cup barbecue sauce
1/2 cup Ranch dressing

Combine in a small bowl and serve.

Honey Mustard Dip
adapted from AllRecipes.com

2 tablespoons dijon mustard

3 tablespoons honey

1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

pinch cayenne pepper

1-2 tablespoons vegetable oil

Combine all ingredients except oil in a small bowl, and mix well to combine. Slowly add the oil while whisking vigorously to incorporate. I used about 1 1/2 tablespoons oil--use more or less to reach desired consistency.

Touchdown Taco Dip

adapted from AllRecipes.com

1 cup sour cream
1/2 cup shredded Cheddar cheese
1 can (4 oz) diced green chiles
1/2 envelope taco seasoning

Combine all ingredients in a small bowl and mix well.

What do you like to make for dinner on busy evenings? I'd love to have a few more dishes in my arsenal for busy nights.

Grandma Brown’s Chinese BBQ Chicken

I’ve got to hand it to Jeff’s family—those folks know how to cook. Every time we travel out to Pennsylvania for a visit, we are greeted by a fridge packed with all the homemade goodies Jeff loved most as a kid. And everything is always amazing. 

So it goes without saying that Grandma Brown’s cookbook, compiled by Jeff’s dad as a Mother’s Day gift a few years ago, is full of wonderful recipes. This dish is among my favorites—I make it often, and I was more than happy to have an excuse to make it yet again when I was invited to come up with a dinner idea that would showcase Success® Jasmine Rice.


I’ve mentioned before that Jeff loves and always requests Asian dishes, so of course I have tried many a version of sweet and sour chicken over the past few years. This recipe from his Grandma Brown is my favorite, far and away.

We all love this dish (even Mr. Picky Pants Forrest, and that is saying something, my friends), and this makes an appearance on our dinner table regularly. Thank you, Grandma Brown—I owe you for this one.

Although there are a few steps involved in making this dinner, I’ve figured out some ways to streamline it so that it’s done within roughly 30-40 minutes (including time in the oven). It used to take me a bit longer to get this meal prepared, but after making it probably a dozen times, I finally got wise and started overlapping some of the steps to speed things up.

You’ll start out by coating the chicken in egg, then dredging in a flour mixture and pan frying them to give a light crispiness. The chicken finishes up in the oven, so don’t worry about cooking them all the way through on the stovetop . . . just enough to give them that crispy bite.


While the chicken is frying, get the sauce mixed up right in the baking pan--no need to get a separate bowl dirty. This sauce is so irresistible—I could honestly just drink it straight.



Once the chicken has that perfectly crispy coating, add it to the dish with the sauce and stick it in the oven, then get the rice going. This was my first time making boil-in-bag rice—I used Success® Jasmine Rice, and I was really impressed. It was delicious, and so quick and easy to make.

I’ve always used regular white rice with this recipe, but the jasmine rice really stepped it up. It is so fragrant and silky and rich, and absolutely kicked this dinner up a notch. And I loved that it was pre-portioned (no measuring!) and required almost no work to make—stick in water, set timer, 10 minutes later have perfectly-cooked rice with almost no cleanup.



Halfway through the bake time, you’ll pull the chicken out and spoon some of that delicious sauce over it, then return it to the oven to finish up. Since the rice was so quick to prepare, I even had time to wash the dishes while the chicken finished baking.



\When the chicken is cooked through, serve it over the hot rice and enjoy!


Chinese BBQ Chickenadapted from Grandma Brown’s cookbook

3 chicken breasts, cut into roughly 2-inch chunks
1 tablespoon oil
2 eggs, beaten
1/4 cup flour
1/4 cup cornstarch
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
a few cranks of fresh black pepper
1/4 cup water
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup vinegar
4 tablespoons ketchup
1 tablespoon soy sauce
2 bags (comes to 3 cups, cooked) Success® Jasmine Rice


Preheat the oven to 350 degrees, and pour the oil into large skillet over medium-high heat.

Place the beaten eggs in a small dish. In a separate small dish, whisk together the flour, cornstarch, garlic powder, salt, and pepper. Dip the chicken pieces into the beaten eggs, then dredge in the flour mixture.

When the oil is hot, add the chicken to the skillet and cook for a few minutes on each side, just long enough to brown the outsides (the chicken does not need to be cooked through at this point—it will finish cooking in the oven, so just fry it long enough to get the outsides crispy).

In a baking dish (I used a 9 x 9” glass pan), combine the water, sugar, vinegar, ketchup, and soy sauce. When the chicken is browned, place it on top of the sauce mixture and put in the oven for 16-20 minutes, taking it out halfway through to spoon the sauce up over the chicken and returning to the oven until no longer pink in the center.

Cook the rice by placing 2 bags in a pot of water over medium-high heat. Bring to a boil; boil 8-10 minutes, then remove bags from water and cut them open to pour the rice into a bowl.

Serve chicken and sauce over hot rice; if desired, top with chopped green onions and sesame seeds.


Do you have a favorite Asian recipe to make at home? I’m always open to suggestions!
This is a sponsored post written by me on behalf of Success® Rice.

Crisp Chicken Salad with Apple and Basil

I definitely would not call myself a fancy cook . . . although I love trying out new recipes and experimenting with flavors, I'm not a very creative or talented chef. But I love testing out new dishes, making little changes, and pretending nothing happened if it turns out poorly.

This, however, was a success! I saw this tasty-looking chicken salad recipe at Real Simple and thought it looked delicious. I made a few little tweaks and mmmmmmmm . . . this recipe is definitely worth repeating! I love light, crisp, fruity meals for the summertime, and this one is definitely a keeper. 

One tip, though--you have to use fresh basil. Have to. This is not a drill. I know, it's kind of pricey, but don't even bother making this if you're going to replace the fresh basil with the dried stuff . . . it just wouldn't be worth it. Put that ice cream back in the freezer at the grocery store and spend your $4 on fresh basil instead. You'll be so glad you did!

Crisp Chicken Salad with Apple and Basil

(You can find the original recipe from Real Simple here, but come on, don't you trust me?)

Ingredients:

4 chicken breasts

1/4 cup lime juice

1 Tbsp. rice vinegar

1/3 cup mayonnaise 

2 Tbsp. light brown sugar

4 scallions, thinly sliced

1 Granny Smith apple, diced

1/3 cup chopped pecans

1/3 cup thinly sliced fresh basil 

1 tsp. salt

1/2 tsp. pepper

Directions:

Boil the chicken in lightly salted water until fully cooked, then place in a bowl of ice water while you prepare the remaining ingredients.

In a large bowl, combine lime juice, vinegar, mayo, and sugar; add scallions, apples, and pecans. Shred or dice the chicken and add it to the apple mixture along with the basil, salt, and pepper. 

Toss and enjoy!

I'll be sharing this recipe at Tea Rose Home, House of Hepworths, Fingerprints on the Fridge, and the Shabby Nest!