Portabella mushroom burgers

Made portabella mushroom burgers last night. Both myself and my oldest daughter love them and quite frankly they taste better than a regular hamburger.
I started of by whisking the following ingredients in a bowl:

• 1/4 c. balsamic vinegar (use a good quality one)
• 2 tbs. olive oil
• 2 tbs. minced garlic
• 1/2 tsp dried basil and oregano
• cayenne pepper, salt, and pepper to taste

I remove the stems and the gills from the caps of 4 medium to large portabella mushrooms and placed them in the marinade. I toss to coat completely and let sit at room temperature for 10-15 minutes. While mushrooms are marinating, I toast hamburger buns with garlic Parmesan butter (softened butter, minced garlic, grated parmesan, pepper, and dried basil) and set aside until ready to plate.

Toasted parmesan garlic buns

I usually grill my mushrooms on my George Forman grill, but this time I broiled them in my toaster oven (love that thing). I placed the mushrooms on the rack gill side down and cooked for approx. 10-15 mins., turning once halfway through cooking and basting with marinade.
         **make sure to line the pan with foil to catch drips and make clean up easy.

Marinated and ready to cook

Once the mushrooms are cooked I topped with provolone cheese and let melt (I topped mine with goat cheese). Dress the sandwich just as you would a regular hamburger; i.e onion, tomato, lettuce, aioli, etc.

Cooked mushrooms topped with provolone and goat cheese

That's one good lookin "burger"!

honey barbecue chicken tenders and potatoes

I love when I feed my babies and they say "momma, you threw down on that food!" Tonight was one of those nights. My oldest wanted honey bbq chicken for dinner and to make it a meal I added fries. I started by marinating my chicken for approx. 2 hours in the fridge.

chicken marinating in milk w/lemon juice, minced garlic, cayenne, black pepper, onion powder, and hot sauce

 For the coating I mixed chicken fry and crushed saltine crackers to give it more crunch and texture. Sometimes I use crushed croutons, it depends on what I'm fixing. I also season my breading with some of the same seasonings used in the marinade, with the addition of Old Bay.

my favorite brand of chicken fry

After breading, I let the chicken rest for a few minutes before shallow frying so the crust doesn't come off while cooking. Once the chicken has been cooked and drained I toss it in the honey bbq sauce and voila!

potatoes tossed in olive oil and seasoned, then baked in a 350 degree oven for 30 mins.

Chicken and goat cheese pizza

I made pizza the other night and although it wasn't as fancy as other pizzas that I have made in the past, it was still pretty darn good. I used Trader Joe's pizza dough and rolled it out and pre baked it in a 350 degree oven for about 5-10 minutes. In the meantime I seasoned my boneless skinless chicken breast with salt, pepper, cayenne, garlic powder, and onion powder; then sauteed them in approx. 2 tbs. olive oil.
After 10 minutes, I removed the pizza crust and let it cool for a couple of minutes. Once cool, I top with pizza sauce, mozzarella cheese, chicken that's been diced, goat cheese and pepperoni & hot banana peppers on one half. I top that with more mozzarella and bake for an additional 5-10 minutes or until cheese is melted and bubbly.

Before I put the rest of the cheese on

After. The left side is just chicken and goat cheese, the right side has the pepperoni and banana peppers.