Paula Deen's Spicy Buttermilk Fried Chicken

I found a delicious recipe for fried chicken the other day. I'd never tried making fried chicken before but I figured I could give it a shot.

Spicy Buttermilk Fried Chicken

Makes 4 to 6 servings

1 quart of buttermilk

1 tbsp hot sauce

1 1/2 tsp seasoned salt

1 (4 to 5 pound) whole chicken, cut into 8 pieces

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 tsp garlic salt

1 tsp ground red pepper

1 tsp onion powder

1/2 tsp seasoned salt

Peanut oil for frying

1. In a large bowl, combine buttermilk, hot sauce, and 1 1/2 tsp seasoned salt. Add chicken pieces; cover and refrigerate for at least 8 hours or up to 24 hours. Drain, discarding butter mixture.

2. In a shallow dish, combine flour, garlic salt, red pepper, onion powder, and 1/2 tsp seasoned salt. Dredge chicken in flour mixture, and place on a wire rack. Let stand on wire rack for 15 min.

3. In a large cast-iron skillet, pour oil to a depth of 3 inches; heat to 350 degrees.

4. Fry chicken pieces, in batches, for 12 to 15 minutes per side or until a thermometer inserted in thickest portion registers 165 degrees. Drain on a clean wire rack over paper towels.

For mine.......I used boneless chicken breasts. I also didn't have garlic salt so I just used some minced garlic. Not sure if that mattered or not. When I cooked my chicken in my skillet all the breading came right off. :( I was so mad and I was cussing out Paula Deen. LOL I don't know why this happened. And what seemed like forever but was only really a half hour the chicken was finally done. It tasted good and juicy. It tasted just like fried chicken but without the skin. I was disappointed b/c of the skin coming off and I don't think I'll try to make this again. I don't think it was worth doing all the steps if the skin was all just gonna come off while cooking. At least I tried. I'll stick with oven baked shake n bake. :)

New Things Monday

Featuring.....Pure Silk Almond Milk. We got the unsweetened kind. Laura got this for the Visalis party last week to make samples with and there was some leftover in the fridge so I poured myself a glass. Okay really I just drank out of the carton and finished it off. LOL It's not like I drank it and put it back in the fridge. :P

They also have original, vanilla and chocolate. (I wonder how the chocolate taste)???

Since I tried the unsweetened one, it tastes just like milk with a little taste of almond. It's smooth and creamy. It's really good and I would def buy this again and again.
Another good thing.....almonds are good for your heart so it's a win win. I've heard many people talk about almond milk so I knew I had to try it and I'm really glad I did. I def want to try the chocolate one. I bet it's like drinking a melted Hershey bar with almonds. :) MMMMMM

Project: Cord Carts

Nate and I went out today with our friends Crystal and Eddie. We bowled 2 games at Splitsville and then ate a late lunch/early dinner at Firebirds.

After we got home Nate hung my magnetic board and then we headed to the basement. Nate cleaned the carpets with our carpet cleaner and I worked on the Cord Carts. :) I got this lovely idea from Nate's brother Dan. :)

Here's the picture from last night that I took of the carts and the container full of cords......

First thing first.....I had to de-tangle 95% of the cords. I layed them out on the floor.........

I then started putting some cords in the drawers and made labels.....

Some of the cords Nate had me throw out that he didn't need anymore. I was happy to do that. I still have 3 drawers unlabeled for now. I know I'll find something to fill them up with. One of the drawers I put old cell phones and old chargers in. I know there are more phones laying around somewhere. Once I find them all I'm going to donate them so they can be recycled.

I can't wait to have this project complete. I'm sure cleaning and sorting the office I'll come across some more cords but at least now they have a place. :)

I think the 2 big drawers that are empty are going to be 'canon' drawers for camera stuff. If there is a lot of camera stuff I might have to get a drawer just for canon things. We'll see.

Message Board for the bathroom?

The other day I got an idea to find a cork/magnetic/dry erase board for my bathroom. It is weird to have a msg board in the bathroom? Maybe, but I think it's a great idea. I thought while standing at the sink it would be nice to have the calendar there so I can double check what's going on for the day. And the dry erase board is perfect for when things come to your mind. You can just jot it down. :)

At target we found some boards but the only one I found that I liked was this squared magnetic dry erase board. I figured I didn't really need a cork board. And the cool thing....the board came with 2 magnets and dry erase marker. :) If I remember correctly it was around $8. They had blue, red, magenta and lime green. Nate liked the blue one so I figured it was better than the other colors so blue is what we got.

Nate hung it up for me when we got home. I added my coumadin chart and our calendar. I can't wait to start using it daily. :)

The Big Basement Clean up 2011

When Nate is looking for something he moves things all around and makes a mess. A big mess. I was free this weekend for the first time in a long time and decided to tackle the basement. The first thing I did was pick up loose items and then I did some filing. I hadn't filed since March. I also filled up a whole trash bag full of old papers that I didn't need to keep anymore. Then I took a break. But I finally went back down and finished up. :)

BEFORE:

AFTER:

Look....you can see the carpet. YEY! :)

The containers were put in the storage closet. I had Billy help me with this. I can't lift those containers by myself.

OFFICE AREA

BEFORE:

AFTER:

Obviously, the office area still has a lot of work that needs to be done. The good thing was that I got a lot of things up off the floor. I also sold 3 computer monitors on Craigslist so those are gone.

THE DESK:

The desk is full of stuff. Mostly some computer towers with no hard drives, a monitor, pictures, some CDs and a broken printer. I need Nate to tell me what is trash, donate or sell.

OTHER END:

CLEAN :) We're thinking of setting up a work out area over by the DVD's. I have a medicine ball, a big workout ball, and yoga mat. Nate has a jump rope, and he wants to get a punching bag. So, I think that side will be a gym area. I'll bring a radio down so I have something to listen to when I'm doing crunches. :)

PROJECT:

I got these carts a while back. I got the idea from Nate's brother Dan. Dan put cords in the drawers and labeled them. I thought it was genius so I need to C-O-P-Y. :)

I found the container we have that's full of cords and stuck it next to the carts. I need Nate to tell me what's what so I can put the cords in their designated drawers and label them. Maybe that's something I can do tomorrow? :)

These containers are lined up along the wall. Most of these items are things I have listed on Craigslist. In the blue container are misc things that I'm unsure what to do with.

Here are some more containers. Again some of these items are listed on Craigslist and waiting to be sold. I also have some milk bottles and blue glass in the purple container that I'm trying to decide what to do with. I might pull out my favorites and then Clist the rest. We'll see.

I feel good about what I accomplished. It will be nice to get the office finished so it can be used as an office. Nate can use the big desk for his photo projects and his Body by Vi stuff. Tomorrow Nate is planning on cleaning the carpets with our carpet cleaner. They def need to be cleaned so I hope Nate can do that tomorrow while I work on the cart project for the cords. :)

Fat-Free Glazed Lemon Cupcakes

The other day when Laura was here we decided to make something together so we could blog it. :) We wanted to keep it healthy and simple so I found this recipe for fat-free glazed lemon cupcakes.

Ingredients

Cake:
1 cup sugar
3/4 cup applesauce
1/3 cup egg whites (whites of 2 eggs)
1/3 cup skim milk
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice (juice of 1 lemon)
2 teaspoons lemon extract
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 2/3 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt

Glaze:
1 cup confectioners sugar
3 tablespoons lemonade
few drops yellow food coloring (optional)

Directions

Preheat oven to 350° and line cupcake pan with liners. Combine first seven cake ingredients in medium bowl. Combine remaining four cake ingredients in smaller bowl and slowly mix into first bowl until smooth.

Pour batter into cupcake cups until about 3/4 full. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes or until cake tester comes out clean. Meanwhile, combine glaze ingredients in a small bowl.

Allow cupcakes to cool completely. Glaze by turning each cupcake upside down and dipping top in glaze. Allow excess to drip off, flip back over and allow glaze to set.

Laura said they kind of taste like a halls lemon lozenge and she was exactly right. I wasn't a fan of the glaze. I liked the cupcakes better with out the glaze. Nate enjoyed them. He ate his without the glaze too. :) Will I make these again? Probably not. :(

New Things Monday

Little late on this posting today but I was pretty busy and now finally have a few min to get this done. There's no way I can skip my 'New things Monday'. :) Today's feature is Body by Vi. It's this new shake craze. You replace 2 meals with this shake and eat a normal dinner. (or replace whatever meal) My husband and our friend Laura is doing this challenge. So far Laura has loss 20 pounds and my Nate has loss 16 pounds. I tried this shake. It smells and tastes just like cake batter. It's so cool that you can add this mix to all sorts different things. Whatever you feel like making with different fruits or juices you can add it. It's soooo much better than all those other diet shakes out there. Of course, no one but yourself can decide when you're ready to lose weight but I think this shake plan is great. If you'd like to sign up my hubby has his own page for you.

New Things Monday

Strawberry/ Lemon Sparkling water from target. Sorry pic is small. It's all I could find. :) This stuff is GOOD! :)

Oven hot dogs

For dinner tonight I was inspired by this blog. (sorry my pic sucks...my lens is broke on my awesome camera)

Hot dogs (turkey dogs)

buns (I used whole grain)

shredded cheese

small onion (cut up)

chili (I used hormel no beans)

mustard (just on Nates)

You spread mustard on bun. Add some onion. Add you hot dog and then top your dog off with chili, onion and cheese. Place them on cookie sheet or in a deep dish to bake. Bake on 350 degrees for 10 to 15 min.

We liked them! i think next time I will cook up the chili and onion together in the skillet. And I would cook the hot dogs in the microwave. Then pile everything in the buns. But that's just me.

I would def make these again. :)

Fun Sunday

My friend, Crystal had a birthday Friday. Kristen and I planned a little birthday gathering for her. Kristen made some really cute invites and sent them out to the gang.

My star-gazer lillies population have increased. They look beautiful.

I found out that Crystal likes these so I figured I would clip one for the birthday girl. :)

Kristen made reservations for a place none of us have been too. We wanted to do something fun and different instead of going to Applebees or Red Robin. We had our lunch at The Riverboat on the Potomac. It's in Colonial Beach (river).

Front entrance. Once inside you are in Maryland, which is cool. The have gambling at the Riverboat some of which is illegal in Virginia so a way to get around it, build your place on the water so it's considered legal I guess. LOL

Our table all set up and waiting for us. It was cute and we could sit and look at the water and people watch while enjoying our lunch. For appetizers we got crab dip, hush puppies, mozzarella sticks, and chicken wings. I think most of us got house salads before our main dish. I got the flat iron steak. I got it well done and it was perfectly cooked. No pink, and not burned. YEY! I got a baked potato for my side with just butter and the plate had a mixed veggies. (carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, and green beans mixed together). Sharon and Joe got prime rib. It was huge!! I've never seen a steak that big. Crystal got a parmesan breaded flounder. The flounder was really big. Everyone's eyes got real big when her plate was set in front of her. LOL Eddie got salmon. Dave and Nate both got baked stuffed flounder and Kristen got the triple decker potomac club. Whew....it was A LOT OF FOOD. And it was all good. No complaints! :)

Cute view from the balcony.

Some pelicans. :)

We all had a great time. For dessert, I made strawberry (box mix) cupcakes. And instead of icing I made French Cream (which I learned to make at my Strawberry class) to go on top. It was good. It tasted like a little strawberry shortcake. :) (no pics of them)

We also discussed going to the Melting Pot in December for Kristen's birthday. Some of us girls haven't been there and it sounds like an awesome place to go to.

Another nice Sunday with awesome friends! :)

For the french cream:

4 cups of diced strawberries

1/2 cup sugar

1 stick of butter (I used unsalted; softened)

1 8 oz pkg of cream cheese (softened)

1 pint of heavy cream (you mix to whip cream texture)

Mix butter and cream cheese. Add in sugar and mix. Then mix in your strawberries.

In another bowl, mix your heavy cream on the highest setting. Don't worry it won't spill or spray out. Keep mixing until you get peaks. You'll know when it's ready. Now you have whip cream. :)

Fold in the whipped cream and refrigerate for an hour. You can use it as a dip or add it to cake or whatever you'd like. :)

Cheese Steaks

For dinner tonight I decided to make some Cheese Steaks.......

I had some thinly sliced meat from Wegmans. It was 6 slices. I baked it in the oven with pepper, w sauce and some water. Once it was done I let it rest for 10 min. Then I cut up into pieces.

I also cut up a small onion. In a skillet on medium heat I added some olive oil and added the onion. Then I browned the onion pieces.

After the onions were browned I added the meat. I added black pepper, some parsley flakes, w sauce, some minced garlic and a little bit of season all.

I then cut up some provolone cheese and added to skillet. Once cheese is melted it's done.

Add to a sub roll. You can add mayo and sliced provolone cheese on your roll if you'd like. :)

Flowers :)

I have lots of daisy bushes and some stargazer lilly plants in my front flower bed. The daisies are slowly popping here and there. I think there are 8 daisy bushes in total. Only a few daisies have come up on a few of the bushes. I love it when the bushes are full of daisies but it will probably be another week or two before they are covered in daisies. But today two of my stargazer lillies have popped. They are a pretty pink. :)

Lillies :)

A daisy :)

New Things Monday

I know I already talked about this in my blog posting from the weekend but I needed to talk about it again. We (Kristen, Dave and me) tried the tru blood drink. It's blood orange flavored and it's really good. It's kinda like an orange soda. :)

If there is something NEW that you tried and liked and would like me to try it to feature it please feel free to let me know. I'm up to trying NEW things. :)

Busy but FUN weekend.....

It all started yesterday. I met Kristen (surprising her with some Paul's Bakery donuts, Tru Blood drink for us to try and some Wylers Light Grape) at her house. The plan was to go to Jamestown. It's about an hour from Kristen's place.

We stopped off at Williamsburg Pottery Factory Outlets. Let me just be honest.....this outlet center was POOP. It was like a big warehouse full of kitchen type things but the merchandise looks like they've been sitting in bins or on the shelves for 6+ years. I saw on the internets that a store called Oneida was in here. My silverware is from Oneida and I thought it would be cool to get some more forks and spoons. Kristen asked the cashier about the store and she told us Oneida left back in 2008. And after looking around for 2 min I see why they left. Way to go internets! Time to update your site! UGH! We left immediately laughing the whole way out.

We finally got to Jamestown. YEY! We paid our admission and saw a quick movie.

A hut that the Indians lived in.

Items hanging inside the hut.

Some handmade baskets and such.

There were 3 ships parked at the dock. We only went into the 1st one. They are really small inside.

On the ship......This was the Captain's room. Such a tiny space. I love the ticking fabric used for the pillow.

One of the cabins on the ship was for the cook. Inside his room was the stove. I'm sure when that stove is cooking it's hot in there.

This guy was just burning some wood.

The fence for the English Settlers to keep the Indians out.

Outside one of the houses there were little gardens and I thought this was cute.

I loved the ticking stuffed with straw. Old Order Amish use ticking fabrics stuffed with straw as there mattresses as well. :)

House
Tobacco hanging to dry in a house.

Door handle at a house.

Door handle in the church.

Church
A boy showing us some food he prepared.

A rooster walking around.

We finally finished with Jamestown. And then we went to find a place to eat for a late lunch. (of course we stopped at Victoria's Secret and I stocked up on some soaps and sprays. I use Love spell. It's my FAVORITE! :)

We stopped at Center Street Grill for lunch. Decent prices.

We both got the Philly Roll. It was Philly steak, onions and cheese in an egg roll. And a cheese sauce for dipping.

And we got a caesar salad. I also got a side of fries. :) It was good.

For dessert Kristen took me around the corner to Sweet Frog. I'm in LOVE!!!!!!

You grab a bowl and fill with your choice of yogurt. I got Cookies n' cream, Peanut Butter, Cake Batter, Chocolate, Vanilla and Strawberry. I needed to try them all to see what I liked most. The best part.....NO FAT! :)

Then there's a toppings bar. Fruits, candy, cereal, hot fudge....what ever you want....it's there. I put a few rainbow sprinkles b/c I wanted to taste the yogurts to see what I liked best without candy or fruit taking away flavor. I def want to go again (and lucky for me...my town is getting one). Next time I'm getting just chocolate and peanut butter yogurt. MMMMM it will taste amazing! :) Once you load up your bowl you go to the cashier, put on a scale and you pay 39 cents an ounce. I paid $4 for mine. :D

So cute! :)

Then................well it was time for me to finally see the Yankee Candle flagship store. It's a huge store and I can't believe I've never been there.

Jar candles....

Jelly donut....but doesn't really smell like it. Kinda flower smelling instead of jelly.

More candles...

One of my favs! Smells like a orange creamsicle. MMMMMMMMMMMM I got a small votive of this candle.

Bins of votives and tart candles. :)

Cute candle with a teddy bear.

The store also had other stores within it. A Vera Bradley section with tons of Vera Bags! :)

VERA!
I like this pattern. :) I still have my purple punch Vera bag and I use it everyday. :)

Finally at 8pm, Kristen and me made it to the movies. We saw Bridesmaids.....soooooooooooooo funny! Glad we were able to see it. So many laughs.

When we got back to K's we (Kristen, Dave and me) tried the tru blood drink. It was like a blood orange soda. It was good.

On SUNDAY......................Nate and I picked up Sharon and Joe and we saw Hangover 2.

Then we ate dinner at Red Robin. We chatted about the movie among a ton of other things. Somehow we got on the topic of Sharon working at Disney World. Sharon told us about her Disney World job and Nate and I determined we will never let our kids go there. Sharon needs to write a book with all the scary stories. *shivers*

What a awesome busy but totally fun weekend! :) Loved every minute of it! :)