Yummy Chicken and Great Deals!

Friday night I decided to venture into new territory and try a new chicken recipe that I saw Idn Garten prepare on the Food Network. It came out great, but my roasting pan is in the trash can! For some reason all the non-stick coating peeled off! So here is the recipe!

Lemon and Garlic Roast Chicken
Copyright, 2004, Ina Garten, All Rights Reserved
Show:
Barefoot Contessa
Episode:
Chicken Story
This recipe is available for a limited time only. Why?

1 (5 to 6-pound) roasting chicken

Kosher salt

Freshly ground black pepper 1

large bunch fresh thyme

4 lemons

3 heads garlic, cut in 1/2 crosswise

2 tablespoons butter, melted

1/2 pound sliced bacon

1 cup white wine

1/2 cup chicken stock

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.

Remove the chicken giblets. Rinse the chicken inside and out. Remove any excess fat and leftover pinfeathers and pat the outside dry. Place the chicken in a large roasting pan. Liberally salt and pepper the inside of the chicken. Stuff the cavity with the thyme, reserving enough thyme to garnish the chicken dish, 1 lemon, halved, and 2 halves of the garlic. Brush the outside of the chicken with the butter and sprinkle again with salt and pepper. Tie the legs together with kitchen string and tuck the wing tips under the body of the chicken. Cut 2 of the lemons in quarters and scatter the quarters and remaining garlic around the chicken. Lay the bacon slices over the chicken to cover.
Roast the chicken for 1 hour. Remove the bacon slices from the top of the chicken and set aside. Continue roasting the chicken for an additional 1/2 hour, or until the juices run clear when you cut between a leg and thigh. Remove to a platter and cover with aluminum foil while you prepare the gravy.
Remove all but 2 tablespoons of the fat from the bottom of the pan. Add the wine and chicken stock and bring it to a boil. Reduce the heat, and simmer for 5 minutes, or until reduced by half.
Slice the chicken on a platter. Garnish the chicken platter with the bacon slices, roasted garlic, reserved thyme and 1 lemon, sliced. Serve with the gravy.

I was not able to make the gravy due to my pan issues, but I doubled the bacon and it was amazing with the extra pork fat!!

So the great deal of the weekend....I use my chicken roaster a lot and was having a major panic attack as to what I would be roasting my chickens in....so my mom said that Kohl's was having a great sale with extra clearance on the clearance prices so we braved the rain and found a great deal!! I was able to purchase a Kitchen Aid Roaster that was marked $59.99 for $17!!! It is so nice and I am so excited to roast my next chicken! The picture at the top of this post is my proud new purchase! Why is it the chicken roaster that makes me so happy these days.......

Hope everyone has a great rest of their weekend!!

Thanks for the Day....... President's!!

Brandon and I decided that with Monday a holiday we needed to get out of dodge for the day. We have been working on the house so much that sometimes it is hard to remember to take time for us.

So thanks to the Presidents we jumped in the car, which I loaded with snacks and a dog named Ralf and hit the road. We had no idea where we were going and we weren't going to decided till we hit the road and we ended up going north and heading over to Half Moon Bay. We ended up going on more of a drive and less of a picnic or adventure because it was so cold and foggy, but we finally found a beach that would allow dogs on a leash on the beach and we had the best time.

I was so happy when we saw this sign and there was even parking available!



So we spent some time at the Point Pigeon State Beach. Ralf wasn't allowed on the State Beach near the Lighthouse, but he was allowed on the bigger beach!!!



Ralf had never felt sad on his feet....and well he loved it and I had the best time watching Brandon play with him on the beach. They went running down the beach to get some energy out oafter a long drive to find a beach that was dog friendly and had parking.


Ralf was so excited to see people (everyone is his friend) and have sand and rocks and water and all the things he gets busted for playing in at home!



This is Ralf smelling a hole that Brandon had dug. We wanted to see if he would dig in the sand, but being a true Jack Russell he just wanted to investigate everything!

So that is a snap shot of our little family outing. It was so fun. It was great to get away...to a place that cells didn't ring and play a little! How funny how our little dog is our first "child"!!

Have a great week everyone!

Valentine's Day as Husband and Wife.....

It is so wonderful to be married and be able to spend our first Vanetine's Day as husband and wife in our home. We decided to not go out to diiner. We both wanted steak and we are a little picky about how it is cooked, so I have had two Filet Mignon in the freezer and we decided that tonight was the special night to BBQ the. So Brandon cooked the steaks and the Asparagus and I made his FAVORITE red potatoes in the over. I set the table, I really wanted to use our wedding china, so I dug it out, found a few broken place settings which I need to return over the weekend, Bed, Bath and Beyond is awesome when it comes to returning and this is what our table looked like!!

It really was beautiful if I do say so myself. And then I made my plate of food and had to take a picture of it because I never wanted to forget his meal. It was AMAZING. I think it was the best BBQ I have ever had and well it was just awesome!!

We used our wedding china that was a gift from so many people, our silverware that Aunt Debbie and Uncle Bob gave us as well as the my husbands favorite wedding gift, the steak knives in the beautiful wood box from Adrienne and Adam. My husband loves his bbq steak. Even the serving pieces were wedding gifts from Brandon's bestman Aaron and his wife. It was a table for two that was filled with love from so many wonderful people in our lives!

To the end of the day I have come. Brandon is in bed asleep. He is getting up at 4:45 am so he is going to bed REALLY early for us and I stay up and watch TV, but Happy Valentine's Day to all of you and I hope everyone was as blessed as us this year!

Our little piece of trouble

This is my little piece of trouble! He didn't eat anything major today, just enjoyed checking a nosel for the garden hose, but man it is like watching a toddler! His hair is OUT OF CONTROL! I am not getting it cut until the 17th of March, the day after his first birthday. Brandon doesn't want me to cut it, he thinks it looks cute, but I feel like I have a "child" that looks like rag muffin! This is what our little guy likes to do after we have dinner. Sit on his Daddy's lap. It is so funny! He is loves his Daddy so much. It is so darn cute how much a little dog can love his daddy and how much his daddy loves him!
Well this is me and my baby. I am so attached to this little 12.5 pound dog!!!! It really is unconditional love. No matter what has happened during the day I walk through the door and Ralf is SO happy to see me. It just takes a bad day and turns it into a wonderful day!!!!
And this is Ralf's addiction. His soccer ball! Thanks to Jeffrey, our neighbor for the donation and for all the hours of play with Ralf and his beloved ball.
Hope you all have enjoyed a little look into our lives with Ralf. Our evenings after dinner are spent with playing with the dog and laughing so darn hard!!

My little splurge

Here is my little splurge......I really wanted a new table for my Foyer. We had money from Christmas that we hadn't used, so my wonderful husband told me to go and find something I liked and get it. I think I have issues because I have such a hard making decisions! But, I found this wonderful table for under $200 at Cost Plus World Market. I am so jazzzed! I really like my table. I think it will look even better once we remodel the entry and the living room. So excited over such a little thing!!!

Perfect Days

There are very few perfect days! Last week seemed like a week of Mondays and the weekend was so busy that I was exhausted and REALLY cranky. But, some how Monday of this week was PERFECT! I slept in till 8 am which is my new Monday thing! The gardner comes to do the laws and I can't leave for work until he is done so I can put Ralph in the yard. I was able to get the entire house picked up and organized before I headed to the office.

Once I completed my work for the day, I headed to Sand City and purchased my new foyer table. I love it. I have to take some pictures, so I will post those later! But, when I cam home from that my husband was just about to move my washing machine from the kitchen to it's new home in the garage....next to the dryer where it should be! This has been a long time in the making!




Old home of the washing machine



New home! We are going to sheet rock the garage soon!



If that wasn't enough, Brandon made dinner and then gave Ralf a bath.

Ralf is so funny after a bath. It gives us hours of entertainement!


So Monday was a success! I am blessed to have Brandon as a husband. He is so handy too!

Tuesday has started off great as well. Today, Jeffrey our neighbor is staying with me at home and I have dedided to work from here for the next two days! He had an emergency appendectomy and isn't ready to go back to school, but his mom and dad needed to head back to work, so I volunteered to watch him.

Jeffrey is one of Ralf's FAVORITE people in the WHOLE world! So they are hanging out on the couch and I am working, oh I guess I should get back to that work thing!

Crazy times....

Sorry it has been so long since I posted anything, it just seems like my life gets crazier by the day. Things are busy as ever, but not much to report.

I am busy with work, church, fair and friends! My best friend in the whole wide world, A is moving on Saturday. Only 2 hours away, but I am so going to miss our spur of the moment lunch trips to El Migs! I helped with her baby shower on the 26th on Januray and had so much fun watching her just light up as she was so blessed by so many friends.

I enjoyed a quiet birthday on the 28th, turning 28 years old. Brandon gave me everything I asked for...a 4 ft long folding table and a kitchen utility cart! Sometimes it is just the simple things in life! But, January came to a close with little other excitment, but really cold weather and big PG&E bills!

February is here and we are finally enjoying some sunshine. I am looking forward to Valentines Day! Brandon and I are staying at home and having a little BBQ, but we are going to breakout a couple sets of our wedding china for the first time to celebrate our love!!

One other thing, I joined Curves! I am just in love with working out there! It is 30 minutes and it really is a great workout as long as you put all you have behind it!

Off to work I guess.....I have been doing laundry all morning and just working from the laptop, maybe I should actually go to the office!

Sorry for the boring posts of late, but we are just enjoying married life at home together!!