Mine was filled with many enjoyable fall activities. As mentioned in my last post, we went on a "haunted" hayride, enjoyed a nice scenic fall walk with the pugs and made a nice healthy dinner for two on the Thanksgiving Monday.
The pugs had fun on their walk and even posed for couple of photos:
The view was just breathtaking where we were. It made me remember why I love fall so much and why I must stop to enjoy the scenery a little more often.
After our walk, I went right back into my kitchen to make us this delightful meal:
Slow Roasted Crock pot Chicken
Garlic Ginger Butternut Squash
Raspberry and Goat Cheese Spinach Salad
Steamed Broccoli
Looks amazing doesn't it? It was such an easy meal to make too, and one that made the hubby go back for seconds. That's a home run in my opinion. I impressed myself as it was the first time in awhile I didn't work off of a recipe. Sometimes its fun to wing it!
Slow Roasted Crock pot Chicken
Ingredients:
1 whole chicken
2 small onions
3 cloves of garlic
1 tbsp Italian spices
1 tbsp cayenne pepper
1 tbsp kosher salt
Cut up onions and garlic roughly and place in bottom of crock pot. Rub down chicken with the spice mixture and place in the crock pot on top of the onions and garlic. Cook on low for 6-8 hours or until the internal temperature is at 85 degrees.
Optional: Transfer contents of slow cooker into a roasting pan and broil in the oven for 10 minutes to crisp the skin.
Seriously, best.. chicken.. ever!
Garlic Ginger Butternut Squash
I think this is going to be a holiday staple in our home. It had a nice blend of sweet & sour and was a nice substitute for the normal potatoes.
Ingredients:
1 butternut squash - peeled and cubed
4 cloves diced garlic
2 tbsp margarine
2 tsp ground ginger
1/4 cup of raisins
1 cups of water
1 tsp all-spice
1 tbsp kosher salt
Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Grease large kitchenware dish with margarine. Have a pug watch you place all ingredients in dish. Place in oven and cook for 1 hour. Finish off with 2 minutes on broil to crisp up squash.
Lastly, the salad was a quick mixture of these items:
Spinach
Chopped strawberries
Dried cranberries
Sliced red onion
Crumbled goat cheese
Almond pieces
Raspberry dressing
It was a nice compliment to the meal, and is one salad my husband just loves.
Since it was a holiday we paired the meal with one fabulous wine; Flat Rock 2009 Unplugged Chardonnay. It was a crisp, dry chard that really paired well with the spice of the chicken.
I hope these recipes inspire you to try something new for your next holiday or big Sunday meal. They were simple and only required a few ingredients. Most importantly they were big on taste and low in calories compared to your typical holiday meal.
This weekend I hope to get some baking done. Daniel has been wanting some bran muffins, so I want to come up with a low calorie hearty muffin for him. This week I continue with my marathon taper and will be doing an easy 16 km run on Saturday.
Have a great day!
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