Cowboy Spaghetti

I recently realized I have many obsessions - gum, chewing ice, the nest, the knot, reading the news, gum, diet dr pepper, grammar, my cats (especially Greta), parking my car in the same spot at work every day, 9:27, Food Network Channel, gum...you get the idea. So who really needs another obsession? Well, me apparently!

I heard about this new obsession from another obession - the nest. It's a web site/blog called The Pioneer Woman. PW is a woman in Oklahoma that gave up her "high heels for tractor wheels" when she married a rancher. I think one reason I love her so much is because I can somewhat relate - being a city girl that married into a farming family. Another reason is that she has a food section and I love looking at new recipes (add that to the obsession list too...).

I've cooked several of her recipes already (of course adapting using quick cooking methods - who has time to make their own chicken stock???) and this is my favorite so far. She calls it chicken spaghetti but for some reason I keep calling it cowboy spaghetti (maybe its all the cowboys on the ranch she talks about). So cowboy spaghetti it will be!

Click here to see the original recipe.

Here is my version...

Cowboy Spaghetti

Ingredients:

1 lb of chicken (cut into bite sized pieces)

10 oz of spaghetti (I used whole wheat)

2 cans of cream of mushroom soup

1/2 onion

1 green pepper

4 oz of pimentos

mushrooms

1-2 cups of chicken stock

2 cups of cheese

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375. Season and cook chicken (I use an electric skill and season with italian seasoning). Add in onion, green pepper and mushrooms and cook through. Meanwhile, break spaghetti in thirds or half (PW says to do thirds but I get lazy sometimes...) and cook according to directions. Once chicken mixture is cooked, add pimentos and cans of mushroom soup. Stir together. Add enough chicken stock to thin out sauce to your desired consistency (I'd say I use about a cup). Add cooked spaghetti to mixture and some of the cheese. Mix together and dump into a prepared (that means spray with pam!) baking dish. Top with remainder of cheese. Bake in the oven for 25-30 minutes (until cheese is melted and bubbly).

Now grab your fork and chow down on this yumminess. Best part? This makes a lot so you have leftovers. In fact, I'm off to go heat up a bowl of leftover cowboy spaghetti for dinner tonight!

P.S. - sorry about the date stamp in the photos - I don't know how it got turned on and didn't realize it until I'd already stuffed my face with this fabulous meal.

Pistachio Pork Chops

Meet my new love.

I recently fell in love with (and maybe slightly obsessed with...) - goat cheese! I'd had it before, but for some reason it recently just stuck with me and I started buying it a lot more and now I'm hooked. Chavrie is the yummiest - goat's milk cheese - it's a little lighter and more of a spread than regular goat cheese. It is great in recipes or just on its own (with crackers, english muffins, anything in my pantry...). But I love all the different varieties of goat cheese they have in the grocery store these days.

Last weekend I was watching my favorite weekend morning TV - Food Network in the Kitchen - and Robin Miller was showing yet another way to dress up chicken. I took her concept and adapted it for what I had in the kitchen and came up with this:

Pistachio Pork Chops
5 WW points for a 3 oz pork chop

4 boneless pork chops (or chicken)
1 tbsp of honey mustard (I didn't have this so I mixed equal parts dijon and honey)
4 tbsp of goat cheese
1/4 cup of crushed nuts (I used pistachio but think any nut would be good - especially pecan or macadamia)
Salt and pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Season pork chops with salt and pepper. Spread mustard on each chop then goat cheese on each chop. Press nuts into cheese so it sets in - cover cheese as much as possible. Place on baking sheet and cook in oven for about 10 minutes until it is no longer pink inside (the chops cook fast because they arent very thick and are boneless - chicken will take a little longer).


NOTE: I'm not a huge fan of mustard so I think next time I won't use as much because I felt like it overpowered the cheese. But it was very yummy and I can't wait to try this again with different mixtures of goat cheese and nuts.