Marinated Grilled Chicken Legs

I have to say, I'm on a roll with the new Cooking Light recipes I've been trying. So much so that the husband said we should have Cooking Light Month at our house. I gotta say, I'm not opposed to the idea. Three of the six recipes I still need to post about are CL recipes and were all tasty. I don't remember how I came across this one. I think it was an article on their website about 101 ways to cook chicken or something. Boy #1 LOVES chicken legs, and they were on sale last week, so I thought this would be good. It's pretty funny because he calls them "chicken bones." Let me tell you, it took awhile to figure out what he meant when he was asking for chicken bones.

Marinated Grilled Chicken Legs
Source: Cooking Light website

1 cup fresh orange juice
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
4 teaspoons low-sodium soy sauce
1 tablespoon dry sherry
1 1/2 teaspoons bottled minced garlic
1 1/2 teaspoons balsamic vinegar
1 1/2 teaspoons basil oil
1 teaspoon onion powder
1 teaspoon dark sesame oil
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon hot pepper sauce
8 chicken drumsticks (about 2 1/4 pounds), skinned
Cooking spray
Green onion strips (optional)

Combine the first 11 ingredients in a large zip-top plastic bag. Add chicken to bag; seal. Marinate in refrigerator 2 hours, turning bag occasionally.

Prepare grill.

Remove chicken from bag, reserving marinade. Place reserved marinade in a small saucepan; cook over medium heat 3 minutes. Place chicken on grill coated with cooking spray; grill 30 minutes or until chicken is done, turning and basting occasionally with reserved marinade. Garnish with green onion strips, if desired.

Amount per serving (2 drumsticks)
Calories: 215
Calories from fat: 31%
Fat: 7.5g
Saturated fat: 1.8g
Monounsaturated fat: 2.8g
Polyunsaturated fat: 1.8g
Protein: 30g
Carbohydrate: 4.4g
Fiber: 0.1g
Cholesterol: 97mg
Iron: 1.5mg
Sodium: 339mg
Calcium: 18mg

*****

I figure since the nutritional info was there I might as well include in case anyone else is counting calories like we are.

This chicken was REALLY good. The only thing I left out was the basil oil because I don't have any and didn't really want to buy any for the small amount that is used. Although in hindsight I probably could have just bought some fresh basil and made my own. Oh well. I used sriracha for the hot sauce and was worried I'd added too much, but it wasn't spicy at all. Dodged a bullet there because Boy #1 does not like spicy and would have been very disappointed if he couldn't eat the chicken bones.

We all really liked this. I wished I'd thrown a few more legs into the marinade so I could have had another and/or some leftovers. This will definitely be a go to recipe for chicken bones in the future!

Frosty Fruit Smoothie

We were in desperate need of a new blender. The one we had we had received as a wedding present, and it was one of those smoothie maker ones with the spout on it, but the spout would always get clogged up or it would leak. I was just tired of it. So the boy got me a really nice new blender for my birthday. Isn't he sweet? Then it happened that we were at my friend Jessica's for a breakfast party last week, and she has an orange tree in her backyard that is producing copious amounts of oranges this year. So she gave us a bag to take home. I told the boy we could make smoothies out of some of them, so I went about looking for a recipe. I found this one on RecipeZaar.com, and thought it would be a good one to try, but I changed it up a bit.

Frosty Fruit Smoothie

1 cup orange juice, chilled
1/2 cup nonfat Greek yogurt
1 medium banana, cut into chunks
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup small ice cube or crushed ice

In a blender, combine fruit juice and yogurt; add banana and vanilla. Add ice cubes, Cover and blend until nearly smooth.

*****

I ended up using two bananas and probably slightly more juice and yogurt so I could get two smoothies out of it. The boy and I both really liked these! The original recipe called for milk instead of yogurt, but I liked the idea of the yogurt better. Plus Greek yogurt is so yummy.

The downside of this? Now every day the boy asks if we can make smoothies! Not that it's a bad thing necessarily, just more work for a snack than I usually like to do. :) But we both really liked the smoothies, and I like controling what's in the snacks/treats/drinks we have.

My cool retro juicer. It was my grandma's.


Hello, fresh squeezed orange juice. Thanks Jessica and Dashel for sharing your oranges with us!


Mmmmm...smoothie!!


I don't know why it didn't occur to me to take a picture of everything in the blender. Oops!

Asian Pork Loin

My friend Michele is a very talented photographer. We were supposed to meet up on Tuesday afternoon to take some one year pics of the baby (a month late, but whatever). I was meeting her at 4:00 about half an hour from our house, so I wanted something in the crockpot for dinner since I figured we'd get home around dinner time. I pulled out at Southern Living slow cooker cookbook that I rarely use and flipped through. I had just bought a pork loin roast, so when I saw this recipe I thought it would be a good choice. Plus I had almost all the ingredients on hand.

Asian Pork Loin

1 2-pound lean boneless center-cut pork loin roast
3/4 cup orange juice
1/4 cup soy sauce
1 Tbsp grated peeled fresh ginger
1 Tbsp minced fresh garlic
2 tsp crushed red pepper
1 tsp Chinese five spice powder
1/4 tsp salt
2 Tbsp cornstarch
2 Tbsp water

Trim fat from roast. Combine orange juice and next six ingredients in a large zipper top plastic bag. Add pork, seal bag, and marinate in refrigerator 8-24 hours.

Place pork and marinade in slow cooker. Cover with lid; cook on high heat for one hour. Reduce to low heat setting and cook 7 hours.

Remove pork from cooker; let stand 10 minutes before slicing. Pour cooking liquid into a 4-cup glass measuring cup or bowl. Let stand 5 minutes Skim fat from surface of liquid. Combine cornstarch and water in a small bowl; stir until well blended. Add cornstarch mixture to cooking liquid and stir well. Microwave on high 3 minutes or until slightly thick, stirring halfway through cooking time.

Slice pork, serve with sauce.

*****

I was glad I looked at this recipe on Sunday and saw how long it needed to marinate because I would have been mad had I gone to throw everything into the crockpot Tuesdasy morning and saw that. I had some oranges I got from a local produce co-op, and I'm not a real big fan of oranges (except Cuties...I love Cuties!!), so I used them for the juice called for in the recipe. Brilliant, eh. I cut back on the red pepper because the boy doesn't like spicy.

*****

We ended up having to cancel pictures because we had a random thunderstorm in Phoenix yesterday. I know, of all days, right?! But it was still nice to have dinner in the crockpot and not have to worry about it at all. I had even bought Minute Rice so dinner would be ready super fast when we got home. Oh well! Anyway, I don't think this is a keeper. All we could taste was heat, not flavor. I expected the sauce to be sweeter but it was super spicy. Normally I dig some spice in my food, but this was over the top. It was really the sauce that did it, the meat itself wasn't that spicy. I was glad I hadn't put any sauce on the kids' meat. I had mine in the crockpot for six hours on low, and it was pretty dried out. I think with less heat it might be okay, but I don't know if it's worth making again.

Honey Ginger Grilled Mahi Mahi

I hope everyone has had a nice holiday weekend! You may have noticed I haven't had to cook since Thursday--it's been a nice break! Friday night some friends invited us over for dinner which ended up being great because I was REALLY off my game in the kitchen. I offered to take dessert; my friend said I didn't need to but if I wanted to I could. I had just bought a huge box of strawberries at Costco, so I figured I'd do something with strawberries. I found a few good sounding cake recipes but didn't have the right ingredients for frosting. Then I thought chocolate covered strawberries. For the life of me I could not get the chocolate to melt right. I have never had as many problems melting chocolate as I did on Friday. So I gave up on that after wasting an entire bag of chocolate chips. Then I found a recipe for cream stuffed strawberries that sounded fantastic, but the filling was disgusting. The husband actually spit out his sample. It tasted like ass--or at least what I would imagine ass to taste like. It tasted bad, we'll leave it at that. So I threw out those. I checked the blog for dessert ideas and saw a recipe for a strawberry pie I had made quite a long time ago. I remembered seeing a pie crust in the freezer, so I got it out...only to find that it was completely broken and not at all salvageable. Sigh. So I decided to scrap the idea of making a dessert. Then last night we went to my mom's for dinner. It was great; she kept the kids during the day and the husband and I went on a day date to a movie and lunch.

Now it's back to normal. I had originally planned on grilling a whole chicken tonight, but I forgot to get it out of the freezer in time, so I needed a new idea. I had some mahi mahi in the freezer, so I got that out and then checked RecipeZaar.com for a recipe. I wanted to cook them on the grill, so once I added that criteria I had 11 recipes to choose from. This one sounded good and easy--a combination I love!


Honey Ginger Grilled Salmon, Swordfish or Mahi Mahi
Recipe #320129

1/3 cup orange juice
1/3 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup honey
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
1 inch fresh ginger, chopped or 1 teaspoon ground ginger
2 garlic cloves, minced or 1 teaspoon garlic powder
3 green onions, chopped
1 1/2 lbs salmon fillets or mahi mahi or swordfish

Add all ingredients except fish in a large resealable plastic bag and mix well. Add fish and refrigerate to marinate for 15 minutes. Remove salmon from marinade and discard marinade. Grill on a greased grill rack over medium-high heat 5-6 per side for slightly rare salmon or cook until fish flakes easily with a fork.

*****

Some of the reviews suggested marinating the fish for longer than the time specified, so I'll probably let it go just a little longer. I might also use tamari instead of soy sauce. I'm not sure yet what we're going to have with this. I think I saw one last package of Rice A Roni in my pantry I might use up and then steam a vegetable of some sort as well.

*****

This was a really good marinade! I only let it marinate about 30 minutes, and I was glad I did because I think any more would have taken away the fish taste of the mahi mahi. I would use this again on fish or even chicken. We all really liked it! But, I completely forgot to take a picture because I was so excited to eat. Oops!

Pastor Ryan's Spicy Orange Garlic Shrimp

We used to eat shrimp all the time. Then the husband found out his cholesterol was high, and in researching good and bad foods for high cholesterol I found out that shrimp are REALLY REALLY high in cholesterol. So we stopped eating it. Oh how I miss it!! I love shrimp so much. I have some good shrimp recipes I've missed making as well--especially my Shrimp Creole. Well, a grocery store in my area had raw shrimp (my preferred way to buy them) on sale this past week for $2.99 a pound. $2.99 a pound!!! I couldn't resist at that price. I bought four pounds. I may have gone a little overboard, but I already have plans for each pound that I bought.

I'd been really wanting to try this recipe from the Pioneer Woman website, but since we weren't eating shrimp I didn't think it was in the cards for me. Not anymore!!! Jen B. made it and really liked it, and now I'm so excited we're going to have it too!

(So, I was going to take the easy way out and copy the recipe from Jen's blog, but when I looked it up I saw she took the easier way out and just did a link to the recipe on the PW website. I think I'll be a super copycat and do the same thing!)

Pastor Ryan's Spicy Orange Garlic Shrimp

I'm going to make some brown rice to go with it and steam some broccoli. Should be a yummy dinner!!

Cranberry Nut Bread

I've had a hankering to make some kind of quick bread ever since Jen A. brought me an awesome thank you gift for hosting her baby shower--a Le Creuset loaf pan!! Don't I have the most awesome friends ever?! It was entirely too generous of her, but I'm so excited to own it. I had two bags of cranberries in the freezer that I bought around Thanksgiving when they were super cheap. I didn't know why I bought them, I just felt I should since they were cheap. Jen B. was telling me recently that she's been turning to RecipeZaar.com instead of allrecipes.com, so I figured I'd check there for some kind of cranberry bread recipe. This one got good reviews, so I went with it.

Cranberry Nut Bread
2 cups flour
1 cup sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 cup butter
1 egg
3/4 cup orange juice
1 tablespoon grated orange rind
1 1/2 cups fresh cranberries
1/2 cup chopped walnuts

1. In large bowl, combine dry ingredients.
2. Cut in butter until crumbly.
3. Beat egg, juice and rind; add to dry ingredients.
4. Mix just until blended.
5. Add cranberries and walnuts.
6. Spoon into greased and floured loaf pan.
7. Bake at 350* for 65 minutes, until pick comes out clean.

*****

I happened to notice there was a cranberry bread recipe on the bag of cranberries that was almost identical to this one, only it called for oil instead of butter. That would have been easier--I hate cutting in butter. It's in the oven now, I'm excited to see how it turns out.

And I think I'm done baking for quite awhile now!

*****

The bread is yummy. I've had two pieces to test it and make sure it's okay. I used pecans instead of walnuts because those are what I had on hand. I think something is weird with my oven because I had to bake this for at least 80 minutes, if not longer. The coffee cake took longer as well too. Hmmm. Good thing I'm not baking any time soon. ;)

Floating Island Punch

Last one! I guess all these posts today make up for the fact that tomorrow I don't have to make dinner. We're going to my aunt's for my cousin's birthday dinner, and my grandma is making chicken and noodles. Yum!

This punch was served at my baby shower back in October and my friend Danielle's shower in November. I think Jen found the recipe for it on allrecipes.com. Jen A. requested it specifically, and who am I to turn down a pregnant woman's request? I know better than that! ;) Just kidding, I would have chosen this one anyway because it's just so darn tasty.

Floating Island Punch

Ingredients:
2 cups water
2 cups white sugar
1 (12 fluid ounce) can frozen lemonade concentrate
1 (12 fluid ounce) can frozen orange juice concentrate
1 pint orange sherbet
1 liter ginger ale
1 liter carbonated water
1 (4 ounce) jar maraschino cherries
1 orange, sliced in rounds
4 cups ice

Directions:
Bring water to a boil. Add the sugar and boil until it becomes a syrup. Let cool.

In a punch bowl combine lemonade, orange juice, ginger ale, and carbonated water. Mix in the sugar syrup. Add ice and sherbet. Just before serving add cherries and cherry juice and float orange slices on top.

*****

Believe it or not, this was my first time making a simple syrup. I didn't read the directions first and poured the sugar in the saucepan then added water and turned on the burner. It turned out fine. And it really was super simple. I let it boil for 5-7 minutes or so. I couldn't remember what size maraschino cherries the recipe called for when I was grocery shopping, so the jar I got was 16 ounces. Jen B. was helping me make it this morning and dumped the whole thing in, so ours might have been a tad bit sweeter than it usually is. But it was still good. Also, I didn't put the ice in the punchbowl--I had it in an ice bucket because I didn't want the punch to get watered down as the ice melted. Plus I figured the sherbet would keep it cold, and everything else had come straight out of the fridge.