Nothing says LOVE like homemade noodles...

I love carbs, sure they want to glue themselves to my midsection, but I love them still...
NOODLES have got to be my #1 favorite carbohydrate. I love pasta.
Sometimes, I find a dish at a restaurant that I like so much I have to learn how to recreate it.
This one was inspired by Bob Evans Chicken and Noodles.

• I started with a whole chicken, cut the legs, wings and thighs off and set them aside.
• Then, I took the carcass with the breasts still attached and cut the breast meat off and put it aside as well. (I wrapped the breast meat up and put it in the fridge for another dish because I have learned to skimp on meats in casseroles and soups...saves money and calories)
• I washed and cut 3 carrots, 3 stalks of celery and one large sweet onion into huge chunks, set aside.
• In a large, hot stock pot (med-hi), add about a 1/4 cup of olive oil and your veggies, legs, thighs and wings, breastless carcass, S + P, a big pinch of rosemary and thyme, 1/2 tsp. each of poultry seasoning and garlic powder, 3 whole bay leaves and 3 crushed garlic cloves. Sautee everything together on medium high heat, letting everything brown up on all sides....this means you have to stir often and keep an eye on it....it will probably take ten minutes.
• After everything is nicely, LIGHTLY browned, add about 2 gallons of water and bring it all up to a rolling boil.  Boil mixture for about 10 more minutes and take off the heat. REMOVE CARCASS AT THIS POINT BEFORE ALL THE TINY BONES START TO FALL APART!
• After its cool enough to handle, remove the veggies, garlic, bay leaves, chicken parts and any other solids from the soup and set aside. 
• Put the broth back on the heat and lightly boil it down, reducing the liquid by about half, then take off the heat and add half a stick off butter.
• Once your chicken pieces are cool enough to hold, pick all the little yummy bits of chicken off the bones and put it back in your broth.
• Bring back to a boil and add your noodles, I have not been able to find the type I was looking for in the store, so I decided to make my own. I wasn't crazy about the results so I am not going to post the recipe, but it was just a standard egg noodle cut thick. 
• Once your noodles are cooked through, taste your broth and adjust your salt and pepper as needed.

How I get $25 restaurant gift certificates for $2-

I am a member of a super fun site called Restaurant.com You can buy discounted gift certificates to 1000's of places...NOT corporate places usually, but I like that better. If you sign up to have regular emails sent to you, they periodically send promotional codes to enter that makes a $25 g.c. only $2!!! There are usually stipulations, but I have saved a ton of money this way AND have found so many cool restaurants along the way that I might never have had the opportunity to try.

Here's a link:
Best Deals and Discounts on the Best Local Restaurants – Save Money on Food with Restaurant.com

Outsmarting my Hubby...

OK- So, really I am not being bad...not exactly. My husband thinks I have too many things that I don't use and has recently mentioned possibly getting rid of said items...Uh, no...I don't think so. He and I have different views on what types of items are "keepers". He would honestly prefer for me to get rid of everything that's not in daily or at least weekly use. Not me. If I use my huge turkey roaster only once a year, I'm keeping it. What about my food dehydrator or ice cream maker? Or my collection of vintage silver platters or my beautiful wooden salad bowl set...I dont necessarily USE these things, but I am certainly NOT getting rid of them. I am in culinary school and plan on doing some private chef/catering and see NO reason to get rid of things I will have a future use for. SO....I needed to come up with a way to keep my stuff. Hmmmmm.... 


Well, he cant complain about me having stuff I dont use if I use them...
So my goal this week is to each day, use one of my kitchen gadgets that dont see much rotation.
AND, I'm going to blog about it for all of you....FUN!


Today I woke up to browning apples. I hate to waste, I tend to make applesauce or apple crisp when my apples start turning, but today I decided to break out my massive food dehydrator. We got it for Christmas 2010 from my Grandma Carole. Thanks, Grandma!


I sliced my apples super thin, cutting off any brown...this is way easier with a very sharp knife. I have J.A. Henckles and ADORE THEM, but they were very expensive. Awesome investment....but I digress.

Then you arrange them in a single layer in your drying trays.

Then stack it all back up together and turn it on, using your manual to decide on the temp...mine says 135 for fruit.

Sometime today we will have healthy apple chips for snacking on, the kids will love them!