World's Easiest Grilled Chicken

We make this quite regularly and I've shared it with some of you, so I thought I'd put it out for the world. I can't remember exactly how or when we came up with this, but it's so easy and so good. You will need:

* Frozen chicken (we use tenderloins)
* Italian dressing (Fry's 99 cent one rocks)
* Lemon pepper seasoning

About 3 hours before you want to eat, place the chicken in a large Tupperware and cover with hot water for 1 hour. Discard the water (safely, I don't want to hear about any salmonella) and cover the chicken with the dressing for 2 hours. Preheat your grill, throw them chickies on there and coat both sides lightly with the seasoning while grilling.

It's tender because of the dressing and flavorful because of the seasoning. We feel somewhat healthy when we eat this, though we usually have Broccoli Au Gratin with it loaded with butter and oil. Oh well.

Jordan's House

I think Jordan, Dad and Dustin secretly got together this morning before I got there and decided I should work all day on things that were up high. I started out sanding the ceiling, then refilling holes in the ceiling, then removing nails and staples from the underside of the roof, then scraping and brushing the underside of the roof. Thank goodness for the jacuzzi.

Finley's 3rd Birthday

We all had a lot of fun at Finley's party Monday, especially Miss Fin herself. Thanks you to all who showed up and partied with us, sorry there wasn't more pulled pork (next time I'll put Dustin in charge of it).

See the pics!

Pei Wei's Kung Pao Chicken

A while ago I found a Kung Pao sauce at Lee Lee made by Wei Chuan and made up a batch of chicken. To my surprise and delight it tasted almost exactly like Pei Wei's KPC. I loved it. So I thought I'd share.
The directions are on the back of the bottle but let me give you a few quick hints. Kung Pao chicken is usually a spicy dish but I love the way Pei Wei does it with the peanuts, so my version is not spicy (plus I always have to keep the girls in mind). I won't put any exact measurements here since the size of your dish will vary depending on how many people you are planning on feeding, but generally you should have equal amounts chicken, veggies and rice. Plus, I think it's good to just get in the kitchen and experiment to get a better feel for cooking in general. You will need:

* Wei Chuan Kung Pao sauce
* chicken, cut into bite sized pieces
* peanut oil
* corn starch, mixed 1:1 with water
* pinch of salt
* carrots, sliced
* snap peas, whole
* dry roasted peanuts, unsalted
* brown rice, cooked

It's a good idea to get your brown rice going first, it takes a while to cook (2-3 times longer than white rice). While that's cooking, chop your carrots and chicken and mix your corn starch with water. Let the chicken rest in the corn starch mix while you heat up a few tablespoons of peanut oil in a wok/pan (if you use a pan use a deeper one that will have room for the chicken and veggies all together) over medium-high heat. When the oil is hot (this should only take a few minutes) add the chicken and stir-fry it until the outside of the chicken is white but it doesn't look done yet. Cover the top with Kung Pao sauce (for my family of 5 eaters I use about half the bottle). Stir-fry it for another minute or so, then add your carrots and snap peas. Stir-fry for another couple of minutes, enough to cover everything in the sauce with extra on the bottom for the rice (feel free to dump some more on if there isn't any extra).
Serve over brown rice and top with the peanuts. For extra wonderful flavor, eat with chopsticks. It does something to the food, I swear.

Let me know what you thought if you try it.

So Many Words

A while ago I wrote a script called "So Many Words" (read the script or visit the discussion board at SimplyScripts) that was filmed by Ripe Media Films. I am very proud of the end product, I think Rodolfo and the crew did a wonderful job. Have a look.

Here I am

I'm just looking for better days, the kind that never come my way.

Some people will get that. This is my first post in what is sure to be a whirlwind existence for the James = James blog. Why that title, you may ask? I have no idea, it just came out. I have some thoughts I would like to share about life, food, movies, etc. and the blog is where those thoughts will be presented. It also gives me an opportunity to harness my HTML and CSS skills since I recently began doing some freelance web design.

Comments are welcome, questions are encouraged, insults are admired and links are accepted.