...bacon wrapped teriyaki chicken... pg. 117

you can find this recipe HERE
Oh. MY. GOSH. These are to die for! Really. You need to make these. Like yesterday. They were pretty easy to make. My bacon was a little on the thick side, and they say not to use thick bacon. But mine turned out great.

So I'm usually not a fan of things wrapped in bacon. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE bacon. But I HATE soggy, or undercooked bacon. I'm truly a bacon snob. So I was really nervous making these, for the fact that the bacon wouldn't crisp up. I guess I should mention that I baked these in the oven. Our propane was out the day I made these, otherwise i would have used the grill... anyway.... Lets go back to the marinating... I was little hesitant in marinating pineapple. That sounds really gross. I did it anyways.

The recipe says to heat the oven to 400 and cook for 20 minutes. Well after about 15 minutes, the bacon wasn't crisping. So I turned it up to 425 and cooked it an extra 5 minutes. So 25 minutes total. They were PERFECT! perfectly cooked, bacon was perfectly crisp. They were just so good! The thing I didn't like was the pineapple. That was not my favorite. If I hadn't marinated it, it would have been fine. But as it marinates, it sucks up all the sauce, and it was just not good. Maybe someone else would like it. But Jeff and i didn't care too much for the pineapple.

Ohhhh I wish I could make these again tonight! yummmm.

...teriyaki sauce... pg. 46

you can find this recipe HERE

This was really fast, really easy, and I can not believe I've never made my own teriyaki sauce before! Maybe I thought you'd use too many weird ingredients that I never have on hand. Well my friends, let me tell you, I had every single thing to make this. And it got me so annoyed that it was so easy. So I will be making this from now on, instead of paying a fortune (well maybe not a fortune, but maybe like 4 bucks) for store bought sauce!

My only question for those who have made this before... did yours thicken?? In the recipe it says after adding the cornstarch mixture, it will thicken up. Mine didn't at all. it was very runny. Still delicious, just curious...

...lime-cilantro rice with pineapple... pg. 204

you can find this recipe HERE
So I hesitated even posting this one, because I messed up on it. I didn't really like it, but because i messed up on it, I wanted to try it again and give it one more try before I never make it again! :)

As you can see in the heading, it calls for LIME. Well stupid me, thought I had lime juice before I began. I did not. I had LEMON. NOT the same. :( But I was already almost done making it when I realized this. So this was just not good. We still ate it, but I couldn't really get around the pineapple in my rice. I just found that a little strange. So I'll let you know after the next time I make it, if I like it!

...baked creamy chicken taquitos... pg 108

you can find this recipe HERE

I have truly been in a funk lately. I have not been the best "homemaker" these days. Nothing ever sounds good while looking through a cook book, and even walking around the store... I just wander around, and end up buying the most random stuff that most definitely does not equal something to make for dinner! So last Sunday night I told Jeff that he had to pick two things out of the cookbook for me to make this week. This being one of them! Don't really know why it took me this long to make these. They are AMAZING. And they were SOOO easy to throw together (once the chicken was cooked and shredded). Surprisingly, I had every ingredient for this, except the pepper jack cheese and fresh cilantro. You could just use Cheddar cheese, but the pepper jack just added an extra kick, which was nice. It wasn't spicy though... my son LOVED them. And he's pretty picky.

My medium sized cookie scooper worked perfectly!

Ummm, did I mention how delicious these are?!? My sister, Allison was over the night I made these, and she loved them too! I paired it with the caramelized green beans. The beans turned out so much better this time then they did last time. I told my husband that the next time we have to take appetizers somewhere, these bad boys are coming with us!

...creamy tomato soup... pg.96

you can find this recipe HERE

I don't like tomatoes. Never have. However, I love salsa, spaghetti sauce, etc. In fact, the other day I was telling my mom I was making this for dinner and she told me that when she was pregnant with either myself, or my older brother, she made homemade tomato soup all the time. She made it so much that she eventually hated it. So I'm kinda thinking that she was pregnant with me. That's the only reason I can think of why a normal person, like myself, would hate tomatoes! :)

I used to work as a bookkeeper for Safeway. and they have a really yummy Tomato Bisque soup that I ate frequently. Loved it. Well when I was pregnant with Cohen, there was a co-worker eating that particular soup. The smell of it made me gag. Like, really gag, several times. Ever since then, probably 4 1/2 years, I haven't been able to eat tomato soup. So I thought it had been long enough, because i was craving a toasted cheese sandwich. And what else goes with a toasted cheese sandwich? NOTHING.

This soup is REALLY good. Sooooooo flavorful. Creamy and tasty.

The only problem, after eating about half the bowl... the thoughts and tastes and smells came back from 4 1/2 years ago... and I couldn't finish the rest of my soup. :(

So for the rest of you tomato soup lovers, you MUST make this soup!

...french bread, hoagies, and sandwich rolls... pg. 32

you can find this recipe HERE

I've actually made this recipe about 100 times. It's the recipe used for the cheesy garlic bread swirls. but I've never made it into actual french bread, or hoagies. I had some left over meatballs, and thought, "Huh, maybe I could make meatball sandwiches". Well my friends, that's exactly what I did.

the loaf on the left is very large. I knew we couldn't eat that many loaves in one sitting. So I made a bigger one to freeze for later use. :)

I have never made meatball subs, nor do I usually order them places. In fact, now that I think about it, I don't think I've ever had one. These were really good! The bread was very tasty, good texture. I would definitely use this recipe again for future bread uses.

...creamy cilantry-lime ranch dressing... pg.85

you can find this recipe HERE

This is a wonderful pair with sweet pork. I'm not sure what else it would be good on.

Nothing really to say about this one. It's really easy to throw together. And it tastes great! Much like Cafe Rio/Costa Vida.