Grilled Asian Chicken with Bistro Home Fries

So tonight I made a great quick marinade for skinless boneless chicken breast. Now I don't know about you but the chicken that you get at the store, at least for my family, is always too big and too thick. So I have taken to using only two of the gigantic chicken breasts, and butterflying them to create four nicely portioned (in fact might still be on the bigger side as far as a nutritionist is concerned) pieces. I put these in my marinade for maybe 10 minutes while I shucked my corn and prepared my home fries. Now the original idea was to have green beans with this meal, however being camping for the last five days didn't prepare me for the mess that was my green bean stash so I had to switch to something else. Notice too that I call them home fries and not just fries. I could do fries with my mandolin but sometimes just chopping them up into home fries takes less time and energy. My husband does all the BBQ so I can't take credit most of the time during the summer for our meals but I prep it all and then out to the backyard it goes. He uses a Le Creuset grill pan on our grill for anything that might fall through the grate so these potatoes pick up a lot of great BBQ flavor even if it is a gas BBQ.

As you can see above & below I use liberal amounts of pepper and herbs. This particular recipe had salt and pepper, olive oil, garlic powder (fresh garlic tends to burn on the grill) and parsley. Use whatever herbs you like, sometimes I like thyme, or rosemary but not too much to overpower everything else. If you don't have a grill pan, use an old cookie sheet, or even make a "cookie sheetesque" thing of tin foil (easy clean up). Throw it on the grill close the lid, maybe flip once after 10-15 minutes but overall just leave 'em the heck alone for 20-30 minutes (depends on how thick you cut them) but give them a taste as you go, remember they are hot, but you will know when they are ready. My husband likes to think I don't know he does this but honestly I swear they come back significantly lesser in volume than they went out the back door, and not just because of the cooking process, has more to do with the cooker!

Close up!

These home fries are one my families favorite things about summer, and grill action. OK now for the quick Asian marinade!

Grilled Asian Chicken Marinade

2 tbsp soy sauce

2 tbsp Dijon mustard

1/4 cup orange juice

1/4 cup honey

1/4 cup olive oil

pinch of red pepper flakes

2 tsp sesame oil ( I love this flavoring but some might find it too bold, use as you like)

1. Mix all together in a Ziploc, throw in your chicken breast squeeze it all around to quickly coat, leave on the counter for 10-15 minutes and then straight to the grill.

**Taken from Relish! My favorite go to meal planning site.

QUICK AND EASY! And  as my daughter says, "Yummy in my tummy, mommy. This is good, my favorite." (She is in her favorite stage, everything is her absolute favorite).

This post is linked up with Tasty Tuesday, Tempt My Tummy Tuesday, Tuesdays at the Table.

Miss Molly's Family Birthday BBQ

I cannot and will not take full credit for the family birthday BBQ my husband, bless him, was fantastic and helpful. And the menu was taken from my favorite website http://relishrelish.com/ish.com/ (my menu planning site) and since I am fairly brilliant at prioritizing and planning ( I mean come on, I am a teacher that is what I do!) it went off I think without a hitch, I wasn't stressed out, and we were able to get it all in and people back on the road in four hours! We started on Saturday, and thankfully we have our cleaning lady Carla and the house was in good shape so that wasn't something that we had to spend a lot of time on. Brian did work on the backyard quite a bit even though it was a downpour all day and we weren't really out there at all. I marinated the BBQ chicken (in homemade BBQ sauce) the day before, shucked the corn, made some chunks of ice with slices of lemon and lime frozen in it, and started the beans in the crock pot right before going to bed.
I woke up on Sunday morning fairly early, took a shower and all that jazz then proceeded on anything else that needed to be done. I had to do the dishes a few times, and Brian vacuumed for me. I made lemonade in my cute glass jug, and pre-baked the pizza crust. My parents arrived early to help if needed. It was great because they brought Molly a play table for her playroom and she was set for the rest of the day practically, they were able to distract her a bit and I finished some things up (made my mom and dad a blended coffee drink) eventually we were able to pry Molly away from her pretend kitchen and new table and my mom helped me make the California White Pizza (this was delicious... I changed the recipe a bit, but I have to say it was so good!) it had a garlic butter and parsley base, sliced black olives, artichoke hearts, and a 6 Italian Cheese blend on top. So good! This was my veggie stand in for the vegetarian in the family. The corn was cut in half next, and boiled with a little bit of milk (this is something my mother in-law does and I have started doing it myself, I don't know why it is done, I don't question it, I just like that the corn tastes more flavorful and softer some how) Brian got the BBQ started for the chicken and I got the pizza in the oven in time for everyone else to arrive.

By the time it was all ready Molly was hungry! She had a drumstick (she ate it all the way to the bone seriously!) she had a slice of watermelon (thank you auntie Jenn and Uncle Jim) she had two mini-slices of pizza some beans, a second try at a drumstick (that one only had a few bites out of it) We then took a break from eating for presents, Molly got some really great presents!

Then to finish the day she had her cupcakes! She had a shy moment when everyone was singing her Happy Birthday, and it took her a bit to figure out how to "blow" out the candles but eventually she managed it. We also had a bit of ice cream to go with the cupcakes. The cupcakes gave her her second wind, but all in all it was a great day for Miss Molly. She ended up going to bed at 5:00pm, she was a tuckered out little girl!