Cheesy Rotel:

Okay this is beyond a doubt one of the easiest dips to make and goes well with any chip. Simply cut up ¼ of a large block of Velveeta Cheese into cubes about the size of a quarter, put these into a microwave safe container with a small, drained, can of Rotel (some prefer chunky salsa instead) and heat on low in the microwave until the cheese is melted. (you’ll have to take it out a few times and stir the mixture to insure even melting). That’s it! As soon as it’s well melted you can start in with the dipping of the chips! Goes well on baked potatoes, fries and even brats or burgers! It’s darn near perfect! ~:?)

Chili Cheese Nacho Dip:

Nachos are wonderful stuff – food of the gods I tell you! food of the gods. An easy and tasty way to put these together is to either use some of your own home made chili or buy a can of the better quality stuff at the store. Cut up a quarter block of Velveeta (as above), add a cup of sharp, shredded, cheddar cheese, the can of chili (or a couple cups of your own stuff) and about a tablespoon of McCormicks chili seasoning (sold in little envelopes at the store), mix together and heat on low in the microwave (stirring occasionally) until the cheese is melted. pour this mixture over the corn chips and top with jalapenos, black olives, onions . . . whatever floats your boat! I make this quite often for our Superbowl parties and my sons both love it.

So there’s a couple good, easy, recipes for chip dips . . . next time I’ll move up to some great meat dishes including something called Brat Boats that I think you’ll love, killer hot wings and finally my Recipe for BBQ ribs that are so good you’ll think you’ve died and gone to heaven. (Actually one of the great theological questions of our time is how can heaven be heaven without BBQ ribs and yet how can people wearing pure white manage to eat ribs without some serious mess!) hmmmmmm.

Anyway – enjoy!

and . . . Be Well

Bill

Anyway – on to the recipe:

2 frozen chicken breasts (thawed)

1 tablespoon crushed garlic

¼ cup olive oil

¼ small onion – diced

½ teaspoon black pepper

1 small pinch rosemary

½ teaspoon ginger

2 stalks celery – chopped

1 medium bag (or 4 cups) egg noodles (the thicker, frozen variety are best)

2 large cans, low-sodium, chicken broth (I prefer Swanson’s)

1 bag frozen mixed veggies of your choice

1 cup chopped baby portabella mushrooms

In a frying pan add oil, garlic and onion and set on medium heat.  Cube chicken breasts into pieces roughly the size of your thumbnail and add to frying pan.  You’ll want to sauté’ the chicken breasts until they just begin to turn a light, golden brown – set frying pan off heat.  In a large stock pot add broth, pepper, ginger, rosemary, celery and noodles and bring to a low, simmering boil; allow them to do so for about 10 minutes stirring occasionally, add entire contents of frying pan (chicken, garlic, onions and left over oil) to broth (be careful not to splash yourself) and add frozen veggies and mushrooms.  Turn down to low heat and allow the mixture to simmer for at least ten minutes.  It’s ready to serve! 

Alternately if you mix all of the ingredients in a crock-pot and allow to cook on low to medium for an hour or so (covered) I think you get a much better end product.

The variation on the ingredients is about endless . .  . I’ve added chopped cabbage before to very good effect.  Frozen veggie mixes come in a wide range and so you can experiment with which ones to use.  I usually prefer those with carrots and corn involved although some of the stir-fry mixes can be really good as well.  Just let your appetite be your guide.

Hope you like this one and don’t be shy to let me know what you found to improve it.

Happy eating! and until next time – Be Well!

Bill

INGREDIENTS:

16 oz pkg. of frozen mixed vegetables or your choice of vegetables

6 oz can of tomato paste

16 oz can of stewed tomatoes

1 medium onion, chopped

3 medium potatoes, diced

1.5 lbs kielbasa, cut into 1/4 inch peices

1 green pepper, diced

Oil or grease your crock pot then combine all your ingredients together into the pot. Add a little water for the soup, I added about 4 cups. And spices to taste, I added ground pepper, garlic seasoning, and Lawry’s seasoning salt. Turn the crock pot on low for 12 hours (don’t forget to close the lid!) and later you’ll be enjoying a simple and hearty meal! Easy clean up too. Afterwards I only had to wash my cutting board, a knife, and the spoon I used to stir it all together! Ya gotta like that!

Enjoy! See ya latter,

Russ

Thought I’d fire off a quick post on a great new site that’s come to my attention – Dinner at Dad’s.  Almost a month ago the blog’s author, David, left a comment on my introduction page asking if I’d have a look at his site.  Well between work, the holidays and a forgetful mind I didn’t manage to do so until this weekend.  Very much my loss. 

As most of our regular readers are aware Russ and I try to provide a recipe now and then on simple to make but good to eat dishes.  Having been divorced for quite some time we’ve both had to learn how to cook or starve (and believe me Russ and I are FAR, FAR, FAR from starvation!!)

Dinner at Dad’s is a great site; the author’s posts are fun to read and give a real personal quality to what could have been a pretty dry topic.  He discusses the typical day to day drama of being a single man raising kiddos (teenage daughters lord bless his soul!).  Along with these David includes some great recipes!

Needless to say I included the site in our links section and heartily suggest taking a look at what he has to offer. 

If anyone else has a site they’d like for Russ or I to review on a topic pertaining to the life and times of divorced “dudes” please let us know and we’d be happy to oblige.

Until next time – Be Well!

Bill

My broccoli soup recipe only takes about 20 mins., and makes about a gallon which freezes well.  It has:

 ¾ C. chopped onions m/l

4 T. butter

6 C. Chicken broth

8 oz. angel hair spag ( I break them up into smaller pieces)

Pkg of frozen chopped broccoli

1 lb. Velveeta (cut into small pieces)

4 – 6 C. milk

Salt and pepper

1 or 2 Tablespoons Worcestershire sauce

 Sauté the onions in the butter, add the broth and bring to boil.  Add spag and boil 4 mins.  Add the broc and boil 3 more mins.  Take down to simmer and add milk, then cheese.  Simmer until cheese melts.  Add salt, pepper and Worcestershire to taste. 

 Good and easy comfort food.   

ENJOY!

and Be Well!

Bill

Pizza is also possibly the PERFECT food for divorced dudes like us.  Not only can you order one delivered and eat a couple days off of it for a reasonable price . . . you can also make one yourself without a lot of fuss; AND you can even be healthy in doing so!

OK, first of all, a confession.  In my natural state I am a pizza-holic!  And none of these wimpy veggie pizzas either!  Nawwww gimme a pepperoni, mushroom and black olive pizza with extra cheese (and I MEAN EXTRA!!).  I want a pizza that a grown man can barely manage to lift outta the oven!  Kapeesh?   

BUT . . . I am also capable of rationality and while it’s fine to satisfy my craving for an UBER-Pizza now and again . . . on a normal basis I need to dial it back a few notches.

SO – when I want a good – HEALTHY – and fairly inexpensive pizza I often make it at home!  Here’s what I do –

First buy one of those pre-made pizza crusts at the store –

I either buy the Ragu or Chef Boy-R-Dee  pizza sauce or I use spaghetti sauce for a change of pace. You can also forego the tomato sauce and just rub the crust down with some olive oil and crushed garlic – very good!

Toppings – whatever appeals to you although if you are trying to watch your weight you might steer clear of pepperoni or sausage.  I actually kinda like some cut up chicken, fresh mushrooms, green peppers, onion, black olives and zucchini.  I don’t pre-cook the veggies but just put them on the pizza raw as it gives you better flavor in the end.

Cover everything in shredded mozzarella or Italian mixed cheese  and then bake on 375 until the cheese is all melted and starting to brown . . .  mmmmm-mmmm good scoff!

Makes a great meal just for yourself or if your cooking for your kids as well – what kid doesn’t like pizza?!  With the pre-made crusts you can also just prepare several ingredients and then let your kids make their own!  VERY popular with my kids when they were young and pretty much guaranteed they’ll eat good ~:?).  And what doesn’t get eaten makes great leftovers for lunch or even breakfast the next day (cold pizza and coffee is one of my favorite breakfasts!)

OK – I better stop writing here . . . all this talk about pizza is starting to really make me hungry for an uber-pizza-of-the-gods and there’s that darn ad for ordering pizzas they put up in our sidebar . . . if I don’t stop now I may give in to temptation!

Have a great weekend and Be Well!!

Bill

I like Chinese food and, while I am by no means a Chinese chef (nor do I play one on TV) I can get around a wok. Sometimes I use a cookbook,  other times I just throw caution to the wind and start cooking what has been stewing in my mind. Such was the case yesterday.

I had baked some fish in soy sauce the day before and felt inspired to use it in my cooking that day. So I cleaned up some bok choy, broccoli, scallions,  and a green pepper and chopped them up with a half a white onion. I threw two packages of Ramen noodles into a microwave cooking pot I use for noodles with some water and put it in the microwave for 6 minutes. After chopping the noodles I put them all in a big mixing bowl and added soy sauce and oyster sauce and mixed it all together.

I put my wok on my stove, put a little oil in the bottom, and started the gas, let it get hot a moment, then tossed in my vegetables. Stirring them occasionally. When the noodles came out, I drained them and added the fish and seasoning powder to them. Then I removed the vegetables from the wok into a mixing bowl and put the noodle mixture into the wok. I also added some frozen precooked shrimp. Again stirring occasionally. After as few minutes I added the vegetables back in and stirred it all together.

After a few minutes of stirring and cooking together, I pulled it all out and put it into another bowl, whipped out the wok, added water to it, placed my bamboo steamer into it and proceeded to steam some buns. I admit they were frozen buns I had bought at a local Asian market! Hey, I haven’t learned to make those yet, ok? Besides this is supposed to be quick and easy, right? Oh yeah, I put a layer of wax paper under the buns so they wouldn’t stick to the bamboo steamer. Just had to keep an eye on it and add more water from time to time as the buns steam.

All in all, with very little effort I had a good tasting home cooked Chinese meal.  Here is the end result, what do you think?

Russ

Baked Chicken Breast W/ Mixed Veggies:

Most stores sell boneless, skinless frozen chicken breasts for about 7 – 8 dollars a bag which contains enough meat for three or four meals.  Put one or two of these breasts on a cookie sheet or other baking dish (grease the pan first with a spay oil like PAM – I like the olive oil spray).  sprinkle on your favorite seasoning (BBQ rub, Italian, Caribbean Jerk . . . just watch the salt content) I usually spray them lightly with the olive oil spray since it helps to keep the meat juicy and holds the seasoning on better.  Bake at about 350 for 15 – 20 minutes or until done.  I like to buy the frozen veggies since they taste better than canned.  Fresh are better especially if you steam them but that takes quite a lot more time so I’m going with frozen here.  Just measure the amount of veggies you want, nuke ‘em in the microwave (better steamed but again I’m going for time here as well) and there you go – a good, filling, dinner that is relatively low in fat and doesn’t take long to cook.

Chicken-N-Rice:

This is a recipe for the rice cooker that I reviewed a while back ( http://dudesndivorce.com/2009/06/27/review-of-the-black-decker-rc3406-rice-cooker-and-two-easy-recipes/ ) Once again start out with one of the frozen chicken breasts mentioned above.  Thaw it out completely in the microwave and cut it up into cubes about the size of  one die from a pair of dice.  Nuke those so that they are almost done  (about a minute or so in most microwaves). Put the water and rice in your rice cooker as you normally would for one serving but add about an extra half cup of water.  Throw in a cup of frozen mixed veggies (whatever kind sounds good to you) add the chicken and set the cooker to cooking!  When it’s done – your done and ready to eat.  (this is a meal that is easy to take to work for lunch also).

Grilled Hamburger w/ Corn on the Cob:

No – this isn’t a cruel joke!   Just have to make some adjustments.  First you have to buy the really lean hamburger (90/10 or better) this is a lot more expensive but the overall cost of the meal isn’t bad.  Now lean hamburger isn’t quite a flavorful as the fattier stuff so before you patt it into pattys you need to mix in some seasonings (I mentioned some above) and maybe some A1 Sauce.  Grill as you normally would and dress your bun with condiments that are lower in fat (i.e. no mayo or cheese) a slice of tomato, dill pickle, mustard, ketchup are all fine.  Now on to the corn.  The trick here is to find young, tender ears of the super-sweet varieties.  Boil them as you normally would (I know – not very quick – but easy!)  When they are done eat them withOUT the butter and tons of salt that you might normally use.  I know, I know – shocking suggestion!  It is an adjustment that your taste buds take some time to adjust to, but what you may find is that with a good ear of corn you actually get MORE flavor  without all the butter and salt – you can actually taste the corn.  Try it and you might be pleasantly surprised.  I realize this entry isn’t real quick to prepare but I thought it was good to mention and since you don’t have all the pans to wash it can save enough time on cleanup to make the overall meal fairly reasonable on time requirements.

Sub Sandwich:

A sub is pretty easy and quick to build and very easy to take to lunch or on the go.  If you use lean meats, hold off on the cheese (or if you have to use cheese use white cheese such as mozzarella) and mayo or salad dressing you should be able to build a respectable Dagwood that won’t choke your arteries with fat.  For those of you watching your carbs they make a flatbread (I think it’s called Flat-Out) that is very low in carbs AND fat – and a wrap isn’t too different than a sub. The danger with these of course is that you want to eat them with chips and chips are loaded with fat.  Look at maybe pretzels, nuts or grapes instead of the chips.  No real recipe here as every man knows at an instinctual and genetic level how to build an uber-sandwich – just the above guidelines to make it a bit healthier.  As far as expense this is one where the cost per sandwich isn’t too bad and if you are taking them to work rather than eating out you are going to be saving a lot of money in the long run.

OK – well there are a few meals that shouldn’t break the bank, are relatively quick and easy to make and are low in fat.  As I mentioned above the salt and carbs are another matter but that is up to you to decide how you want to approach your dieting.  Hope you found something of help and good luck on the diet!

Be Well

Bill

Enter the Rice Cooker!  I’ve had two or three cookers now over the years and this little number – the Black & Decker RC3406 – is hands down the best deal for the money.  I’ve owned it for two years now and probably average at least one batch of rice a week . . . all without problems.  It’s a small cooker intended for one to two people which makes it just the right size for the single divorced “dude”.  The construction is good for the price and you just can’t beat the convenience.  Just throw in your ingredients, push the switch and walk away!  When the rice is done the cooker automatically switches over to the warming function.  The only suggestion I would make is if you are cooking whole grain brown rice you might want to double the water amount as it tends to slightly scorch it otherwise.  As with any appliance you have to learn the idiosyncrasies of your individual unit and adjust accordingly.

I bought mine at Wal-Mart a couple years ago for about $20, I’ve seen them at yard sales and such for as little as $5 – but unsure of working condition.  If you do buy one used make sure the cord is in decent shape and that the teflon coating of the pot isn’t scratched badly.  Amazon sells them new starting at 17.97 and have used ones starting at 15.00 (you can link to them from our site using the search bar on the right).  I imagine Target or other retailers may have them as well.  Now for those recipes!

These are simple side dishes that can be cooked entirely in your rice cooker.  There are many such variations available and even entire recipe books available for rice cooker meals!

Southwestern Beans N Rice:

2 cups whole grain brown rice or Jasmine rice

5 cups water

2 cups Southwestern Blend frozen veggies

teaspoon of butter

(if you like spicy food add some hot peppers to taste)

Put all ingredients in rice cooker, push down button to “cook”

Walk away until unit goes to “warm” setting.

Eat! (you should get two to three meals from this)

(This can be a full meal with the simple addition of a cup or two of chopped ham.  I imagine cooked sausage would be good as well although I’ve never tried it)

Asparagus and Mixed Veggies with Rice:

2 cups whole grain brown rice or jasmine rice

5 cups water

2 cups frozen veggies with asparagus

Put all ingredients in rice cooker, push down button to “cook”

Walk away until unit goes to “warm” setting.

Eat! (you should get two meals from this)

This is great side dish with baked chicken!

So there you are men – a basic review on a rice cooker that I feel is a good bargain for the money and a couple fairly healthy recipes that you can use in your cooker once you buy it.

Hope you enjoy and as always . . . Be Well!

Bill