As Promised: THE Chicken Wing Recipe

As promised, here's a look at the chicken wing recipe I did for my Project Date Night for March.  If you recall, we did a Hunger Games Mockingjay theme date and I called these "Mockingjay Wings". 

They were super tasty so I just had to share.  I can't get enough of the zingy glaze.  In fact, if you like your wings really saucy, feel free to double up on the glaze and serve the extra on the side for dipping and/or slathering. Your choice.

In the interest of full disclosure, Curtis Stone came up with the original orange/rosemary/Dijon combination in a chicken skewer recipe he did for The Biggest Loser, so I feel I need to credit him as my inspiration.  Although I used very similar ingredients and quantities, I took my chicken recipe a completely different (possibly simpler) direction.

If you're looking for a version of wings to serve at a party or as an appetizer but want something different than the usual buffalo wings or deep fried wings, give these a try.  The flavor is AMAZING. Most of the bazillion wing recipes I researched included some form of gluten/dairy/soy/refined sugar, but trust me - you won't miss those ingredients at all! The glaze is like a flavor party in your mouth.

Serious-ness.

Sweet + Spicy Rosemary Chicken Wings

by Raye

Prep Time: 10 minutes

Cook Time: 30 minutes

Keywords: bake roast appetizer dairy-free egg-free gaps gluten-free nut-free peanut-free refined sugar free soy-free lemon orange ginger

Ingredients (8-12 wings)

• Juice of 2 oranges
• Juice of 1 lemon
• 1 Tbsp grainy Dijon mustard
• 1 Tbsp honey
• 1/2 tsp garlic powder
• 1 Tbsp grated fresh ginger (or 1 tsp dried ginger)
• salt
• freshly ground pepper
• about 3 lb chicken wings (8-12 wings)

Instructions

• Preheat oven to 400*F.
• If desired, cut the wings in half at the joint. Rub with salt and freshly ground black pepper. Arrange wings on a rimmed cookie sheet in a single layer (I used a broiler pan). Bake for about 30 minutes or until wings are crisp and golden brown. (Juices should run clear when pierced with a fork.)
• While wings are baking, combine orange juice, lemon juice, mustard, honey and garlic powder in a small saucepan. Grind dried rosemary in a spice grinder (or with a mortar and pestle) and add to saucepan.
• Bring to a boil over medium heat. Reduce to low heat and simmer until mixture has thickened to form a glaze. Remove from heat.
• Remove wings from oven and brush with glaze. Serve immediately.

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Project Date Night: March

Here's a look at our Project Date Night for the month of March.  If you're wondering what in the world I'm talking about, check out my original Project Date Night post here.

Any other Hunger Games fans out there?  If you know me, you know that I am a huge Suzanne Collins fan. I "blame" my buddy C.E. for getting me hooked - she first loaned me the books 2 years ago and I've been a fan of both the Hunger Games books and movies ever since.

Since we're cheap thrifty and already went to see the Hobbit in theaters, we decided to wait until Mockingjay Part 1 was released on DVD and do a theme date at home... Netflix is our friend, guys. Oh yeah... that's how we roll. :). Watch the trailer here!

There are SO many ideas for Hunger Games parties, gifts, crafts, etc. online.  Most of them are for the Hunger Games (the first book/movie) and Catching Fire (the sequel). Not as much for Mockingjay (the 3rd installment).

Project Date Night: February

As promised, here's a look at our February date night.  You can read all about my Project Date Night commitment here.

Happy Belated Valentine's Day! Yes, I just made up a holiday for all you folks out there like me who are a little behind.  We're in the middle of moving to a new apartment right now (In fact, we picked up the keys on Valentine's Day and moved our first load of stuff over to the new place.  How romantic.  Am I right?) so we didn't want to do a big date night out.  We're too old tired for that!  And I'm just now getting around to posting about the date night. It's all good, I keep telling myself.

Love this guy!

I found a great idea on the Dating Divas site for a "Cuddle Kit".  Relaxing on the couch after a busy day sounded good, so that's what we did.

I printed out this card from Dating Divas' Loveseat Lounge date idea and "reserved" our seats on the couch. Then, I left the Cuddle Kit on the coffee table so M could get comfy while I got dinner out.  I decided to do a tapas inspired menu, just a collection of small plates we could share.

This is some of the food and what's left of the Cuddle Kit.

Here's the menu!

• Mediterranean Stuffed Tomatoes (didn't have a recipe for this as all the ones I saw used eggs, cheese or breadcrumbs... all no-no's for me. I stuffed some small camparisi tomatoes with canned wild salmon, Dijon, herbs and a little olive oil. Then I broiled them for a few minutes. They were pretty good, although the filling was pretty soft.  Next time I may add a little gf flour as a binder)
• Pinchitos Morunos (marinated pork on a stick)
• Prosciutto Wrapped Asparagus
• Mixed Greens Salad with a zesty Citrus Vinaigrette (I used a bagged salad mix for convenience, but prepped this dressing recipe ahead of time)
• Coconut Honey Candy
• Cherry Berry Fizz (Valentine's Day just begs for something pink! This was just cherry juice and blended frozen strawberries mixed with sparkling water... think agua fresca.)

On to the entertainment! While enjoying our tapas, we played a game called the "First Word Game" and then watched a bunch of funny YouTube clips. (Click here for the playlist) Disclaimer:  not everyone finds the same things humorous, but we laughed our heads off. Keep in mind, I would consider this playlist rated PG as there are a few instances of language in a few of the videos.

Overall, a fun and low key date night in.  Hard to believe this was our 5th Valentine's Day together!

Project Date Night: January

As promised, a grim look at my good intentions and date disaster. Ok, so it's really not THAT dramatic. Although, my camera's still busted, so no pics on this post. M got a replacement part though so I hope to have pics against soon!

My plan for January's date was to continue the Hobbit theme we started with our Christmas Eve T-Shirt Tradition.  M is a big Tolkien fan and his birthday is in January, so I thought we'd do a Hobbit themed 2-part date to celebrate his birthday.

Here's what I was supposed to do:


photo credit: the dating divas

On New Year's Eve, we were supposed to stay up late and do Dating Diva's Hobbit Date, with the following menu:
Hobbit Stew (beef stew)
York "Shire" pudding
Elvenking Cobbler (berry cobbler)
Bag End Brew (iced tea)
Treasure (Peanut Butter truffles and Lemon truffles wrapped in gold foil wrappers)
Dragon Jerky (beef jerky)
Ring Cookies (coconut flour cut out cookies)

Then, we were supposed to take the "treasure" (snacks) with us to M's parents' house (where we were headed for the weekend) for the second half of our Hobbit extravaganza  - tickets to see Battle of the 5 Armies in the theatre.
 
Here's what I actually did:

• I made Paleo lemon truffles.  They were really good. So good, I had a hard time staying out of the fridge.  I kept wanting to snack on them.
• I burnt the ring cookies because my brain was totally on hold and I forgot they were in the oven.
• I didn't get to make the Peanut Butter truffles because I took too long with everything else. 
• I was planning to make homemade jerky, but forgot a few weeks ago and ate the beef, so no beef = no jerky and also no Hobbit stew. 
• M requested a cheesecake for his birthday dessert at his parents' house, so I made one here before we left. My thought was, I'll skip the cobbler since we're having cheesecake tomorrow. But, the cheesecake was terrible.  I mean, really terrible. 
• At that point I ended up saying, "FORGET IT!" and skipped the rest of the menu altogether, ate the remaining lemon truffles and went to bed early.

Fast forward 2 days. We went to M's parents' house and I bought more ingredients for cheesecake and actually nailed it. I can't have dairy or eggs, but everyone else seemed to enjoy it. I also made chocolate bark for me and that came out wicked yum.  We decided to go to the movie on Friday night for the 7:20 showing, which worked out ok, except we were still full from dinner, so we didn't actually snack on the nut mix I brought.  That's probably ok. We had a snack back at the house.

The movie was good. "Very epic", M said. I agree. Really didn't feel like 2-1/2 hours - the action kept it moving. And it was nice to get out without the baby.

So, we had a fun movie date, although it wasn't quite as extensive as I'd hoped.  Oh well. M didn't seem to mind.  Isn't he a keeper?

Project Date Night

Happy New Year, everyone!!  I decided not to do "resolutions" per se this year. Instead, I'm going to do a monthly post on a date night in order to keep me accountable.  Spoiler alert: January's date was a fail... not to epic proportions, but let's just say it didn't go as I'd planned. Stay tuned for that post, if you're interested.

I've said a lot on this blog about the importance of dating your spouse. I still believe that! It does, however, get exponentially harder to do when you have a small child at home (especially if you're nursing), and we've been very lax about dates this past year and a half.  Some families in this situation choose to forego couples only dates and do family outings instead, but I feel that we already do enough family outings and want to make sure M and I get some alone time once a month to connect as adults and spouses, not just parents.

So, Project Date Night, here we come.  Each month, I will post about what we did for a date that month.  Some will be an activity or date "out", some will be a simpler activity or date night "in". Some will be expensive, some will be frugal. Some will be successful, some will flop miserably, I'm sure.

So bear with me!  While I'm doing this more for us than anyone, I do hope that my readers will gain some fresh date ideas to use in strengthening their own relationships.

Here's to building better marriages, one date at a time!

Christmas Countdown Week 4

I had this post ready to go and was just waiting to get my photos uploaded before posting when LO AND BEHOLD my camera went and freaked out. Literally crazy. It thinks the battery door is open so it won't turn on, which means I'm having trouble uploading pictures from the camera to the computer. Bummer. So, for those of you who were waiting to see what we did to finish up our Christmas countdown, here's the text and a few bad cell phone photos. Sigh. I hope to get the camera issue fixed soon; thanks for your patience in the mean time.

Hard to believe Christmas is here already! I feel like December just FLEW by. We had a busy week, and had to be a little flexible with our activities due to bad weather.  Check out how we wrapped up our Christmas countdown below.

Day 22: Mistletoes craft.  I saw this idea on Pinterest and had to do a version of it.  It poured some green fingerpaint onto a plate, pushed Ry's feet into the paint (one at a time) and then stamped the feet on a 5.5 inch x 8.5 inch piece of cardstock.  Later, I added the word "Mistletoes" and bow at the top.  I plan to use these as thank you notes. They turned out so cute!

Day 23: Wrap presents.  Yeah, there's no way I would be able to wrap presents with a busy toddler running around. I imagine he would have WAY too much fun ripping the paper to shreds as I tried in vain to wrap items. I decided to avoid that catastrophe and just wrap the presents after he went to bed.  We left them out on our 3-season porch until after he was asleep on Christmas Eve, then moved the gifts in under the tree.  His little face was so cute when he saw the all the packages under the tree on Christmas morning!  He was like, "WOW!!"

Day 24: Christmas Eve service at church and t-shirt tradition.  It was a blessing to take part in our Christmas Eve service at church this year.  We sang several carols, the choir sang, and there was a vocal duet.  I accompanied on piano and that was challenging, but I enjoyed it.  I have to admit, though, I'm glad I don't have to practice the arrangement for the choir number anymore. I've been playing it multiple times almost every day for the last 2 months! Whew!!!  After the music, our pastor spoke for a few minutes on Christ.  Truly, Christ is the whole point of Christmas - not just his birth, but his life, death, and resurrection as well.

Also on Christmas Eve, I did our T-Shirt Tradition.  I know most of you have no idea what I'm talking about, so I'll elaborate.  A lot of families give their children special pajamas to wear Christmas Eve, etc.  I have kind of an obsession with t-shirts and have quite an extensive collection: t-shirts that have funny quotes or cute designs, or commemorate an event or vacation spot.  This is our 3rd year doing the Christmas Eve T-Shirt Tradition.  I typically pick a theme and buy coordinating t-shirts for M and myself (last year was Keep Calm shirts from LOL Shirts).  This year, we felt that Ry was old enough to join in, so we did a shirt for him as well.  I had originally planned to do a different theme, but I came across this Hobbit inspired t-shirt and knew I just had to do something similar for Ry.  Of course, once I picked his shirt design, I had to carry on the theme for both M and myself.  In the interest of frugality this year, I did iron on transfers and "made" the shirts myself.  I already had a couple of plain t-shirts hanging around that I never wear (because they're plain and boring), as did M.  I actually sewed a new shirt for Ry using this tutorial from Dana Made It and one of M's old shirts that had a stain on it.

Ry's shirt says, "I Eat Like a Hobbit" (inspired by this one) surrounded by a list of Hobbit meals (the book talks about the Hobbits eating 7 meals a day and sometimes I feel like Ry does too! It was perfect for him!).

M's shirt is a graphic of Gandalf, Bilbo and the 13 dwarves similar to this one.  I wanted something a little more understated, so I went with a simple  J.R.R. Tolkien quote: "Even the smallest person can change the course of the future." 

Fun fact:  You can download some Lord of the Rings/Hobbit fonts for free here.  It totally makes everything look more authentic!

Anyway, I digress. The point of our t-shirt tradition is that we wear the t-shirts Christmas morning while we open presents and take pictures. It's wicked fun. What will next year's theme be, I wonder?

Hope your Christmas season was jam packed with blessings and memories. Mine was!

Christmas Countdown Week 3

Here's the recap of the Christmas countdown activities we enjoyed this past week.  See the countdown explanation here, the Week 1 summary here, or the Week 2 summary here.

 

Day 15: Hot cocoa with homemade marshmallows.  Check the bottom of this post for my own Dairy Free Hot Cocoa recipe.  Yummy.  I also made these homemade marshmallows from Urban Poser. It would have been a good idea to have a candy thermometer, but I wanted to try the recipe anyway.  Oops... I over cooked the honey syrup a little, so my marshmallows were a little dark and slightly "brown" tasting, but still good. I also loaded the whipped marshmallow creaminess into a pastry bag and piped it out in long rows on a sheet of parchment paper, then chilled it for a couple hours before snipping into mini marshmallows.  Super easy and cute.   Hot cocoa + marshmallows = YUMMMMMMM.

Day 16: Watch a Christmas movie.  This one was for the grown-ups, but that didn't stop us from watching a kid's movie.  M chose Prep & Landing/Prep & Landing: Naughty vs. Nice. (2 short films I have on DVD) It took us about 45 minutes to watch both parts, and then of course we had to watch the "totally tinsel" bonus features:  hysterical "elf" versions of TV commercials and cast interviews. I personally wouldn't recommend this cartoon for really young children, but we thought it was pretty cute. You can watch the trailers here and here.

Day 17: Mess-free fingerpainting activity. I got the idea for this on Pinterest (where else!?).  I wanted to do more of a transparent consistency (a simplified version of this), but couldn't find my food coloring! So, I started with a squirt of hair gel (to make things goopy), then added some red, green, and yellow fingerpaint, then added some sprinkles for texture.  Next time we do this activity, I'll skip the sprinkles and gel and just do the paints - or, find the food coloring and do the activity more like the original idea.  Anyway, Ry Guy had fun with it! We'll definitely be doing more variations of this one in the future.

Day 18: Play "stuff the stocking".  This was an easy game that Ry Guy really enjoyed.  I gathered about 15 objects of different sizes, shapes and texture, and stuffed them into a Christmas stocking.  Then, we took the objects out and named them, then put them back in one at a time until Ry got bored with it. A good 15 minutes of entertainment there, though. Next year, we'll try having him reach in without looking and try to guess what the object is before pulling it out.

Day 19: Make cookies for the neighbors. In the past, I've done cookies or quick bread or goodie trays. But, last year I decided to do cookie dough instead and it was a big hit.  People get so over sugared around the holidays between parties and family get together.  It can get a little overwhelming. So, we decided to bless our neighbors with a package of frozen cookie dough balls that they can thaw and bake at their convenience. This year, I created a new recipe, Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Pecan cookies.  I may have to find a name that's less of a mouthful. They smell like toffee and got RAVE reviews from M and one of my neighbors who couldn't wait to indulge!  Check back for the full recipe post coming soon.

Day 20: Shop for stocking stuffers.  I had most of M's and Ry's stocking stuffers already, but I needed to get a few things for my other family members since we'll be doing stockings with them.  Wow is all I can say.  Traffic is crazy... so many people!  Now I remember why we try to avoid shopping in stores between Thanksgiving and Christmas. Yikes.

Day 21: Read the Christmas story in the Bible.  So we remember what Christmas is truly about, we read Matthew 1:18-2:12 and Luke 1:26-2:20. Familiar words, but what a great reminder! God is WITH us!!