Bob Evan’s Frozen Original Biscuits and Gravy

For the past week or so, I’ve been wanting some biscuits and gravy. But I haven’t wanted to open an entire cane of gravy and cook up an entire tray of biscuits just for me. And I haven’t been to a breakfast place that has biscuits and gravy for a few weeks.

So when I spotted this product in the freezer section at Meijers, I was both excited and a little concerned.

Excited because this answered my dilemma, concerned because I didn’t know how well Bob Evan’s biscuits and gravy translated into frozen form.

I was so excited that I had it for breakfast the next day. And…they did a fabulous job!

In the box, there is a microwave bowl of gravy and two biscuits wrapped separately in plastic. After four minutes, I had a bubbling bowl of rich, creamy, flavorful gravy. After an additional minute, I had to fluffy, tender, and flaky biscuits to go with it.

I was really impressed with this. Instead of putting everything on a plate, I tore up the biscuits and plunked them into the gravy to scoop out with a fork. It was soooo good. There were plenty of chunks of sausage throughout the gravy and the biscuits held up, not getting soggy despite their gravy soaking.

There was enough food that someone with my limited appetite wouldn’t be able to finish it. I did make a good dent in it though!

Seafood Pasta and Red Lobster Biscuits

On Tuesday, I talked about an easy and delicious mix up to pasta night. I love pasta and one of the easiest things to do is to cook some spaghetti and add a jar of marinara and some frozen meatballs. But I like to mix it up sometimes (that doesn’t include my obsession with butter chicken).

I’ve been trying to incorporate seafood into my weekly cooking routine at least once or twice. One of my favorites being the more successful attempt that I made at Baked Parmesan Tilapia.

Last week, I decided to make some seafood pasta. I had a can of crab meat in the cabinet and bought a package of SeaPak Shrimp Scampi.

While my fettuccini was boiling, I worked on the shrimp in my frying pan. There are a good number of frozen, raw shrimp in this box, each of them heavily coated in scampi sauce. If you look at the photo above, you’ll see that there is a lot of shrimp in a pool of delicious buttery garlic sauce. All that sauce came off of the shrimp. I didn’t even put oil in the pan.

Just like any other time that you cook shrimp, you have to make sure that you watch it so it doesn’t overcook. The first time I made this, I overcooked the shrimp and they were rather tough. You want to watch for the shrimp to turn pink and curl up.

The shrimp finished up before the noodles so I set the pan aside until said pasta was done. After draining the fettuccini, I put the shrimp, including the sauce, into the pot with the noodles. Then, I put in my can of crab meat followed by a jar of Prego’s lovely Roasted Garlic Parmesan sauce.

If you pay attention to titles, you’re more than likely wondering where the biscuits come into play.

I had purchased this wonderful looking biscuit mix some time ago and figured that seafood pasta night would be the perfect excuse to make it. And they were marvelous…

It was hard to believe how easy it was to recreate Red Lobster‘s famous biscuits in my own kitchen!

The Cheddar Bay Biscuit Mix comes with a packet of biscuit mix and a tiny packet of garlic seasoning. In order to make these, you stir together the biscuit mix, some water, and some shredded cheddar cheese and then plop the dough onto a lined baking sheet. I wound up with 9 biscuits. Then, you mix the seasonings with a lot of melted butter with which to brush on top of the finished biscuits.

I don’t have a brush so that butter got ladled onto the biscuits with a spoon… These were super unhealthy and soooo worth it!

My husband and I devoured our dinners ending with both of us in food comas. The next day, I brought some leftovers to my mom’s and she and Grandma both enjoyed them as well.

The next time I make these biscuits, I think I’ll mix the seasoning packet in with the regular dough and scip the butter laddling process. This will make them at least slightly healthier. Right?

Gnnochi

I love cooking, but that doesn’t mean that I always feel like it when I get home after working all day. So, sometimes (read: a vast majority of the time), I’ll try to throw together something fast and simple. Much of the time, this means using something out of a can or box.

At one point last month, this meant finally trying out the box of Delallo Gnocchi that I had found at the grocery. I’ve had gnocchi before in Olive Garden’s Chicken Gnocchi Veronese and, more recently, at Portobello in Downtown Disney. There, they serve gnocchi with “Nona’s Sunday pork ragu” and it was fabulous!

For those of you who might have never had gnocchi, they’re potato dumplings. I.e. little pasta dumplings of goodness…

I decided to make mine with Prego’s Roasted Garlic Parmesan sauce. Because who doesn’t like cheese and potatoes?

And, remember when I said this was easy? All this meal required was boiling the gnocchi, draining them, and then pouring the sauce into the pot.

It was beautiful.

I decided to put parmesan on top of mine–because I’m a cheese fiend. Also, there was some pepperoni in the fridge so I sprinkled some of those on my plate as well.

See? Isn’t it lovely?

The one thing that made me sad about this dish is that there wasn’t quite enough food for both of us. I think that one box would be enough for two people with normal size appetites. But if one, or both of you, has a bigger appetite (like my husband), you might not have enough food to leave both of you feeling full.

I love this because it has great flavor and texture, it’s simple to make, and a great variation on pasta night.

Pillsbury Pizza Crust

A while ago, one of my friends at work told me about Pillsbury’s pizza crust, so I had to try it. Their pizza crusts can be found with their biscuits and crescent rolls and comes in Artisan, Classic, and Thin. I went with classic.

Besides my can of dough (and one extra in case it didn’t make enough food), I bought some mozzarella cheese, pepperoni, and pizza sauce. We own a pizza pan, but I decided to use a cookie sheet and make a rectangular pizza instead.

The dough came out of the can easily and spread out with minimal stretching. It did tear a little bit but I was able to push the dough back together.

Then, per the directions, I prebaked the dough. When it came out, I put some sauce and cheese on it and then had Kevin cover it in pepperoni. Then it made a return trip to the oven.

As you can see in the above picture, some of the outer edges got a little overdone. But the center pieces were lovely!

The dough was soft and chewy with a slightly sweet taste that complimented our chosen toppings. Look at that army of pepperoni…

Pillsbury has some awesome products and this is one that I would highly recommend! Just make sure that you watch it while it bakes, especially towards the end–you want a golden brown crust. Not a dark brown, rather crunchy crust. I think I’ll make some mini pizzas with the brownie pan that my mom got me with the other can that I have.

 

Butter Chicken

In my mission to eat healthier, I’m trying to have my husband and I eat more meals at home, which pretty much means that I’ll be cooking. He doesn’t cook. I don’t know about you, but when I get home from work, I don’t feel like making something that will take a ton of effort.

If you share in this thought process, you’ll love Passage Food’s Butter Chicken Simmer Sauce packet because it is super easy.

In 2013, Mom took me to Disney world to celebrate my graduation from college. On this trip, we discovered one of my most favorite Disney restaurants–Sanaa. This restaurant is at Disney’s Animal Kingdom Lodge, which means that you get to see some pretty amazing animals outside the windows while eating your meal. The food is a mixture of African and Indian inspired cuisine with everything from Tandoori Lamb to a Grilled New York Stip steak. There’s something for everyone here.

Besides starting out with the Indian-Style Bread Service–which is phenomenal, by the way–we both picked the Slow-Cooked in Gravy, Simple and Well-seasoned-Dinner. You get to pick from two different rices and a variety of meats. We both had the basmati rice, butter chicken, and something else. I can’t remember what the other meat was, but I’m pretty sure Mom got the beef short ribs and I got some sort of fish. But when Kevin and I went on our honeymoon last year, we both picked double doses of butter chicken. Mom and I had raved about it so much that he had decided to get whatever I was having.

The butter chicken at Sanaa is made of tender cooked chicken in a pool melt in your mouth delicious sauce. I have cravings for this stuff! In the picture below, from the left, is butter chicken, basmati rice, and some sort of shrimp. (If you follow the link attached to the picture, you can learn about dining with an animal specialist.

So, when I saw Passage Food’s packet of butter chicken wonderfulness at Meijers, I had to try it. As you can probably tell, I have some high standards for butter chicken. And this packet did not disappoint.

While it isn’t exactly the same thing that you can find at Sanaa, I didn’t expect it to. I don’t have fairy dust in my kitchen. Or it could be that I don’t add the optional cream…either way, it’s delicious!

All you do is chop up about a pound of chicken and then sear it in a pan with some olive oil before pouring the beautiful sauce all over it and stirring it to make sure the chicken is all coated. Then, cover the pan and let the chicken cook all the way.

We enjoy our chicken with jasmine rice brought to you by Success Boil-in-Bag. It’s super easy because you cook it in the microwave and it’s a great way to absorb all that wonderful sauce.

This is also something that my husband enjoys. We’ve actually had it two weeks in a row now and he asked me to get lots of chicken and butter sauce packets when I asked him what kind of groceries he wanted this week. Remember how I said you use a pound of chicken? Well, I also make two bags of jasmine rice (there’s probably two-three servings in each bag). When dinner is ready, I get some rice and then put some chicken and an ample portion of sauce on top of it. Then, Kevin puts the rest of the rice in a bigger bowl before dumping what’s left of the chicken and sauce on top of that.

We don’t usually have leftovers in our home. But we certainly have full bellies!

If you’re looking for a quick, delicious meal, I highly suggest that you add this to your to-make list.

Eggo Breakfast Sandwiches

Breakfast is my absolute favorite type of food. I could eat it three times a day most of my life and be content. I need things like pizza and Japenese food occasionally, but otherwise I’d be good.

Most mornings, particularly during the week, I want something fast, simple, and tasty. This usually involves the microwave. And it is also going to more than likely come in the form of a sandwich. Because who doesn’t love sandwiches?

Well, I discovered this new creation of Eggo‘s a couple of weeks ago and had to try the Bacon, Egg & Cheese version. There are also Egg & Cheese and Sausage, Egg & Cheese versions of this product.

But I can’t cheat on bacon.

When I first opened the box and freed a sandwich from its plastic imprisonment, I was a little confused. It was slightly smaller than what I had been expecting and the breading didn’t really look like waffles. If you look at the picture on the box, which is also in this post, you’ll note that it does not look like the waffles you would usually buy. I hadn’t noticed this in the store when I purchased them.

I pushed aside my concerns and nuked the sandwich, barely waiting enough time for it to cool (as usual) only to discover that it was delicious!

While the bread isn’t actually composed of two “normal” Eggo waffles, it’s waffle like enough with its tasty little pockets of syrup and waffle-y texture. The bacon on this sandwich was magically crisp, which is something you don’t typically find in microwaved, once frozen bacon; the cheese was a great, sharp cheddar; and the egg was fluffy and juicy, tying it all together.

This is a great option for breakfast with the surprise benefit of only being 210 calories with an add-in of 2 grams of fiber. It is rather high in sodium though. Just a heads up if you’re counting these things.