Chicken Shawarma

My two kids and I love sandwiches. I make homemade bread weekly and every week my kids and I fight over sandwich ingredients. We all have a major peanut butter craving and I am not afraid to say that peanut butter is probably one of my favorite foods. I have tried giving it up over the years, but I always go back. My peanut butter obsession seems to go back to when I was little and we had very little money. We had to stand in the line at the church food line and the best part of the experience was the peanut butter. It came in huge jars and I loved it. I would literally eat it out of the jar with a spoon, sometimes actually squirting honey into the jar to combine and eat. Now that I'm older, while I still love peanut butter I have forced myself to branch out and try new sandwich combinations. One of my favorite sandwich fillings is grilled chicken, so I was very excited when I saw a recipe for Chicken Shawarma in the March/April issue of Eating Well magazine.

This recipe has 13 ingredients. It takes a total of 45 minutes, all of which is active and makes 4 servings. I had no problems finding any of the ingredients and made no ingredient modifications. I chose to use whole wheat pita bread, I try to use whole wheat whenever possible. I found a beautiful tomato at the farmer's market which worked perfectly for this recipe. Since I used an indoor grill my total grilling time was closer to 4 minutes per side. I weighed out my chicken breast to ensure proper amounts, I encourage anyone that doesn't have a food scale to buy one. They really are worth the money and can make a huge difference in recipes! Normally I would have used fresh lemon juice, but I completely forgot to buy lemons, so I used bottled instead. I followed the remainder of the recipe as written.

My three-year-old loved these sandwiches. I wasn't sure if he would eat the sauce or turn up his nose, but he ate his whole serving. At first I thought that the chicken was too salty, but once the sauce was added to the sandwich the taste was perfect. The recipe states that it makes four servings, but my family eats a lot of meat so this dish made more like 3 servings. I would suggest doubling the recipe if you have a meat eating family like I do or if you want leftovers. Overall, a popular new sandwich recipe in my house.

For the recipe go to Chicken Shawarma.

Everday Food Buffalo Chicken Thighs with Celery and Blue Cheese Salad

When my oldest son was around two years old, he decided to eat an entire habanero pepper out of the fridge. He absolutely loved anything spicy, and the spicier the better. Eventually he outgrew his love for spiciness and his younger brother took over. My two-year-old is now the one eating hot sauce like chocolate. I think that they must get this particular habit from my husband who seems to put Franks RedHot sauce on everything he eats. Given my family's love of spicy food, I was intrigued when a recent issue of Everyday Food magazine had a recipe for Buffalo Chicken Thighs with Celery and Blue Cheese Salad.

This recipe has 10 ingredients. It makes 4 servings and takes approximately 40 minutes, 20 minutes of which is active. All the ingredients are basic and I had no problems finding any of them at my local grocery store. My chicken thighs were on the large side and in order to temp correctly with a thermometer it took 5 minutes longer of cooking time than the recipe suggested. I used the extra butter mixture both over the chicken and on the salad. The mixture gave the salad a nice spicy undertone, which was delicious. I followed the remainder of the recipe as written.

The celery and blue cheese salad is the best part of this recipe, it was delicious and simple. It was even better the second day with the leftover melted butter mixture. The buffalo chicken thighs were good, but like all baked chicken a little mundane. My husband found the chicken skin to not be crispy enough and would have preferred if the chicken was first pan fried skin side down and then cooked the rest of the way in the oven. The combination of the salad and the chicken worked well together and the tastes complimented one another nicely.

For the recipe go to Buffalo Chicken Thighs and Celery and Blue Cheese Salad.