Grilling: The Adventure Begins

We live in an apartment building, so having an amazing grill is a little impractical. But we all love to grill so recently Ty decided that we had to get one, even if it was just a little one. So we went to Wal-Mart, picked out a little $35 propane grill and grabbed some hamburger and hot dog fixings!

Here's the grill Ty picked out, complete with accessories!



Ty made potato packets to go with our hamburgers and hot dogs. Delicious seasoned potatoes, onions and green peppers wrapped in tin-foil and cooked on the grill. They were really tasty!





I made hamburgers and grabbed the hot dogs, and then we headed outside!



Here's Ty, just grilling away!







Yes, they were just as delicious as they look!



Our grilling adventure was a major success! You'll be seeing a lot more of the grill throughout the summer months.

Thai Red Curry

We had a seasoning packet for Thai Red Curry in our cabinet for months and months. I found it a couple of weeks ago and thought it looked pretty awesome. I don't know why we waited so long to make it!

Here are the chicken and vegetables cooking together.



You were supposed to add coconut milk to the packet to make a sauce for the curry. I forgot to buy coconut milk so I used what I had on hand, which just so happened to be vanilla soy milk. It turned out just as tasty.







We served the Thai Red Curry over basmati rice. It was great and if we buy this again we won't wait so long before making it!

Proper English Cottage Pie

Cottage Pie was one of my favorite things I ate when I went to the United Kingdom in 2004. When AllRecipes.com sent me the recipe for Proper English Cottage Pie as a recipe-of-the-day awhile back I was excited to make it!

We made it a couple of days after Easter and because we still had leftover Colcannon I used that in place of plain mashed potatoes for the topping. It was great. The fried cabbage in the Colcannon really added something to the flavor.

Here I'm cooking the carrots and onions together.



Here it is right before going into the oven.



Here's the finished product, which was a savory, comfort food wonder! So delicious!!



Try it for yourself! It's guaranteed to please! Here's the recipe: Proper English Cottage Pie.

Easter Dinner

This year for Easter dinner I decided to cook my first whole chicken. I found a really great recipe on AllRecipes.com called Juicy Roasted Chicken. The ingredients were simple and the recipes had great reviews. One woman said she used this recipe for a chicken she submitted in a chicken contest and she won the blue ribbon. It sounded so wonderful we just had to try it!

Here's the before picture...



...and after.



The chicken turned out amazing! It was juicy, delicious and just fell apart! It was a big hit, and easy to make, so we'll be having it again. Here's the recipe if you want to try it for yourself: Juicy Roasted Chicken

For a side dish we made green bean casserole, which is a holiday favorite in our family. Even though I make sure to make a lot of it, it's always the first thing to go. It's delicious!

Here are the green beans cooking with the tasty maple bacon:



And here's the green bean casserole before I sprinkled on the crunchy onions and popped it into the oven.



Jacob had been pretty disappointed when I didn't make Colcannon for St. Patrick's Day, so I decided to make Colcannon instead of plain mashed potatoes for Easter dinner.

Here's the complete meal. It was delicious!