Kitchen Creations: Steak Bites & Sides

I'm going to give you guys the entire dinner recipe today. Because some days I feel like I belong on the food network. 

I bought stew meat because it was on sale. But let's be honest here, it is literally cut up steak.  So I threw the stew meat in the crock pot (that's what it's made for!) and made a delicious, tender steak dinner.  

With the stew meat, I seasoned it to taste, added butter, and put it in the crock pot for two hours. I did one hour on high and one hour on low, because those are our only two settings.  I imagine you can just do two hours on medium.  This made the meat tender, pink, and juicy just like we like it. Obviously, if you like your steak well-done you'll have to cook it longer. 

I paired our meal with unsweetened applesauce. I warmed up my applesauce for a minute in the microwave and sprinkled cinnamon on top. My husband ate his plain and cold, like his soul. (Ha, I found that funny!) Seriously, y'all applesauce is a very versatile side dish, especially without the added sugar. It's slightly sweet, but not too sweet and it genuinely compliments most of our meals that aren't chicken or pizza. I love having it with dinner! 

Balancing out our applesauce we had no-bake baked potatoes. This idea came from my husband's awesome cousin! We boil the potatoes for 30 minutes (or until you stick it with a fork and it'a soft in the middle) and then microwave them for 5 minutes. The inside is perfect and soft, and the microwave gives the outside a slight crunch and makes it so easy to peel (if you don't eat the outside). It's quicker than a regular baked potato and just as good! 

And there you have it: Medium steak bites, baked potato, and cinnamon applesauce. From your wannabe bootleg food blogger of the day, Kayla. Enjoy! 

Kitchen Creations: Fried Whisky BBQ Nuggets

Usually, I use Sweet Baby Rays BBQ sauce. It's my husbands favorite, but I decided to try a different sauce this week- just to switch things up. Because of my husbands love for straight liquor (unlike me), Jack Daniel's Barbeque sauce caught my eye and I thought he would love it. (It was also like 15 cents cheaper than Sweet Baby Ray's.) 

Despite insisting that he's tried and hated the barbeque sauce, I decided to use it anyway....on chicken, fried chicken. Because you can fry with Barbeque sauce, right? And because we always eat chicken; it's versatile and delicious. So it's always on-hand. Here's how I made my Fried Whiskey BBQ Nuggets. 

I didn't take any pictures, so you're going to have to pay attention. It's only like a 2, 3 step process.  I soaked 1 pound of nuggets (cut up tenders) in half a bottle of  Jack Daniels Barbeque Sauce- Master Blend, 1/4 cup of water, 5 tablespoons of honey, 1 tablespoon of malt vinegar, and seasonings of choice for 45 minutes, you can always soak them longer. My seasonings of choice were garlic powder, salt-free seasoning, parsley, pepper, and onion powder. 

Then I threw it in the fryer with the oil at the halfway mark. The oil rises every time you drop a batch, I'm guessing because of the sauce

I separated them into three batches, fried them 5-10 minutes each, and let them drain for a few minutes on a paper towel.  

Because of my sheer laziness and eagerness to take a bath, we just ate nuggets for dinner.  It took an hour to prep and cook them, but it was super simple.  And these fried nuggets were pretty awesome. You could taste a hint of everything: honey, BBQ, whisky flavour, even the garlic and pepper. It was mild yet flavorful, and not at all messy. I answered my own question last night: yes, you can fry with barbeque sauce.