Chicken Fried Steak from The Pioneer Woman

I love Ree Drummond! If you haven't heard about her then I assume you live under a rock with no access to the Internet or to the Food Network!

Ree Drummond is THE PIONEER WOMAN! Ree Drummond started a little old blog several years ago called The Pioneer Woman Cooks! She took that little cooking blog from a small blog to a huge blog, one of the most popular to several cookbooks and her own show on the Food Network!

What I love about Ree is that she posts step by step photos of the process of each recipe, making it super simple to follow along. Today I decided to make her Chicken Fried Steak recipe. See...my mom she loves Chicken Fried Steak. There are very few things that my mom loves, very few. She is a very picky eater.

I noticed that whenever we eat at a restaurant she will order the Chicken Friend Steak, or the County Fried Steak or the Cowboy Steak, by any name it is simply a Chicken Fried Steak. A steak breaded and fried like you would do chicken (mom hates chicken by the way).

So I knew that someday I had to make mom homemade Chicken Fried Steak! Today was that day!

So I poured myself a glass of Wine because sometimes I like to cook with wine...sometimes I even add it to the food I'm cooking, today was not that day!

Then I followed her recipe, step by step! I salted and peppered the cubed steak which had already been tenderized. I beat eggs with milk. I seasoned the flour with salt, pepper, cayenne pepper and then more black pepper, lots of black pepper!

Taking the steak I dipped it into the milky-egg mixture, then the seasoned flour then back into the egg and then back into the seasoned flour and then set them aside while I did all the rest. Then I added the oil to the pan, waited for it to become adequately hot and then added the steak. Cooked 7 minutes on each side and Voila!

Mom joined me in the kitchen by making the mashed potatoes. She makes the best mashed potatoes! I don't know what she does to them but everyone that has had them will tell you that they are the best!

Since mashed potatoes are filled with Carbs, I decided I would make some yummy green beans instead, fried in bacon grease with some diced garlic and then just to be fancy I added some slivered almonds! Wine makes me so creative!

Sometimes you drive home and you think how exhausted you are but then you just pour yourself a glass of wine, invite Ree Drummond into your kitchen and magic just happens!

I'll never eat canned green beans again and The Kiss of Death!

Do you eat canned green beans?

I have to admit that I've eaten canned green beans my whole life.

I didn't know any better.

I remember once going to Panda Express and having an order of their Chicken Green Beans and the green beans were what caught my fancy. They were so good and crispy.

Recently my co-worker has at times brought some green beans she makes to work and I've loved them. Today I finally had to ask her how she makes them and she was very gracious and told me exactly how.

So I made them and they were divine! As God is my witness I will never eat canned green beans again!

It's so amazingly easy that I just don't understand why I've never just cooked my own green beans before! Just buy fresh green beans, trim the ends and wash them off well. Then take about two tablespoons of bacon grease and warm it up in the pan, add the green beans, a bit of salt and pepper (next time I'm going to add fresh grated garlic). Saute them in the pan for 3 to 4 minutes over medium heat, then cover them and cook for another 3 to 4 minutes, then turn off the heat and let them sit covered in the pan for 15 to 20 minutes.

That's it!

Here's what you end up with. Don't you love the color?

Made for a delicious low-carb dinner when I set them right next to some rotisserie chicken. Yum!

So I am trying...trying so hard to stick to a low-carb WOE (way of eating). And really it's very simple and easy and I'm never hungry...but then my mom brings home the KISS OF DEATH!

Fudge Marshmallow Cookies!!! My absolute favorite kind of cookie ever! I didn't even know they still made these! I can remember eating these as a kid and I loved the marshmallowy center and the crisp cookie underneath all wrapped with chocolate! But I will not succomb...be gone ye evil cookie! (Made mom take them to her room!)

What's your favorite way of cooking green beans? Now that I'm hooked on them I'd like to see what ya'll are doing with them!


 

Good Eats Tonight!

OMG, OMG, OMG! I made the best meal ever tonight for dinner. Now I know that by the standards of all those wonderful cooks on the blogs I love to read; my dinner tonight would be like a frozen tv dinner, but for me...wow, it was exquisite!

The sad thing is I didn't take any pictures. It's really hard to take pictures because the only time I have time to cook is around 6pm and there isn't good light in my kitchen. But anyway, I made my normal baked chicken, that wasn't a big deal because I knew how good that was already, mmmmm. I just bake boneless, skinless breast of chicken that has been seasoned with Lawry's seasoning salt, onion powder and garlic powder on both sides, for one hour at 350 degrees. After baking I let it sit in their little foil house, oh yeah, I wrap them all in foil so they are covered and just bake them and let simmer in their own little juices! Once they cool off enough to handle I cut them and shred them up a bit into bite size pieces.

The great part was the potatoes I made. They're from a recipe from Rachael Ray that I watched while I was home recuperating. I actually wrote a post on it already on August 28th. A video is also posted. So you take baby red potatoes, cut them in half, drizzle them with EVOO, salt and pepper them and then lovely caress and massage them and bake them in an oven at 400 degrees for about 30 minutes. OMG, they are heavenly, I could eat a whole bag of them, but actually I got full after 3 of them.

I also tried the green beans roasted this way but found I didn't like them much. I may have to search for another recipe for the ones I have left. I want them to taste like the ones Panda Express serves. Those are crunchy and nutty tasting.

And I also tried making the apple sauce, but I didn't have McIntosh apples, I only had some Red Delicious and they were kind of old and soft so that's why I don't think they got mushy, but they were still really good. Had a nice bite to them and since I didn't have any brown sugar, I just used regular sugar and cinnamon and plain old apple juice, about a cup to the 3 apples I used. I just simmered them for as long as it took to bake the chicken and it was really good. I would love to put them on vanilla ice cream.

So now I'm a happy duckie and since my kitchen is all clean and my fav show HOUSE is over. I'm gonna go wash my face and brush my teethies and read a bit before bed.