Last week JennieO ground turkey was BOGO at the grocery store. You best be believin’ I stocked up. I’ve only recently started buying ground turkey but have quickly fallen in love with it. Toward the end of summer we were eating lots and lots of turkey burgers. I figured to save me time & thinking ahead of defrosting something, I would just keep a packaged of the ground turkey out for dinner last Sunday night. JennieO’s website has a lot of great recipe suggestions so I headed there and found this recipe.

Turkey Black Bean Chili

Level of Difficulty: Super, super easy

What I did Differently: The recipe called for 28 oz can of whole tomatoes, cut up. Well, I used 2-14 oz cans of diced tomatoes and since I don’t totally love all things tomato, I drained one of the cans before I put it in the pot. Then, I added a whole can of chicken broth.

Serving Suggestions: I served this with saltine crackers, shredded cheese & sour cream and a salad on the side.

PROS: It was good & healthy! And it made enough that I had at least 3 servings worth of leftovers…2 of which are in my freezer. Perfect for the mornings I’m running behind and don’t have time to throw a lunch together!

CONS: Cons? What cons? Seriously…this would was great all the way around.

Will we make it again?: I’m sure I will, but not necessarily any time soon. We don’t eat a lot of soups…especially not chili. But, I’m definitely keeping this in my cooking arsenal. It’d be a great dish for a tailgater or something like that too!

With Thanksgiving coming up later this week, I’m not trying any new recipes…before Thanksgiving we’ll just be keeping it simple and after Thanksgiving we’ll be eating a whole lotta leftovers!

So, since Andy’s trip to Alaska over the summer we have an abundance of halibut. Not a ton, but enough to get sick of it if I make it the same way every time. Know what I mean? I make it once every 3 weeks or so and I’m trying to use a different recipe every time.

This week was Foil-Baked Fist with Black Beans, Corn & Chipotle. I got the recipe out of America’s Test Kitchen, 30-Minute Suppers, Winter 2010 edition.

Level of Difficulty: All in all, this was pretty easy. Parts seamed a tad difficult, but that’s because I had a 3 and a half year old sou chef.

What I did Differently: I actually did quite a bit differently than the recipe called for. I didn’t use chipotle peppers because I didn’t want to buy a whole can of them to only use 2 teaspoons worth. So I used a touch of chili powder and some red pepper flakes. The recipe also called for orange zest and fresh orange juice…which I TOTALLY forgot to buy an orange so I ended up using lime zest, lime juice and a little bit of lemon juice. Worked out great!

Serving Suggestions: I served this with some rice and in hind sight? That was a whole-lotta carb action. It was definitely filling, but I’d suggest going with steamed broccoli and/or a salad too.

PROS: It was really good! And it didn’t take too long to make either…a 1/2 hour tops between prep and cooking. And bonus, since the fish were baked in foil packs, my house didn’t have a nasty fishy smell!

CONS: With just Andy & I (and Rylee), it was a too much. We did eat all the halibut, but mostly because we’d hate to see it go to waste. We could have easily fed 1 to 2 others. And there was entirely too much of the corn-black bean mix. We ended up throwing some out. I don’t have a recipe to link to. If you’re interested in seeing the whole recipe, let me know and I can email it to you!

Will we make it again?: Well, I already said that we try to cook the halibut different every time, but I would definitely make this again. This is a great dish to make when there’s more people over because the beans & corn are so filling.

Next week I’m making TWO brand new recipes: Turkey & Black Bean Chili and Baked Penne. Which would you like to hear more about??

To make sure we don’t fall into a “food rut” I’ve decided to try at least one new recipe each week. And to help keep me accountable, I thought I’d do a little recipe review each Sunday.

This week’s new recipe was crock pot buffalo chicken that I had found on Pinterest and heard great things from a lot of other blogger friends.

{Click the image to go to the original recipe} 

Level of Difficulty: SUPER EASY-I used frozen chicken breasts, overall prep took about 5 minutes tops.

What I did different: I only used 4 chicken breasts, not a 3 lb bag. I still used nearly an entire jar of the buffalo sauce. I poured the sauce and ranch packet in first and whisked it together, then put the chicken in. Mine cooked in 4 hours. I was able to shred the chicken right in the crock pot. I never used the butter.

Serving Suggestions: Based on the recommendation of other bloggers that tried it, we added cheese to our sandwiches…because, DUH, cheese makes everything better! We served it with corn. I’m thinking salad would have been a good side for it too.

PROS: This was definitely a crowd pleaser! I was a little apprehensive about it at first because my dad was going to be joining us for dinner and I thought it might be too spicy for him, but he loved it! Another pro: I only used 4 chicken breasts and it easily fed 4 men and me, with leftovers for at least 2 or 3 more sandwiches.

CONS: It only took about 4 hours to cook in the crock pot, so it’s not one you can start in the morning before work.

Will we make it again?: I have a confession, I didn’t really like it…but, the guys all did, so I figure if we have some kind of gathering that will have lots of dudes and I need something easy to throw together, I’ll make it again, but not likely just for our little family of 3.

Next Week? Foil-baked halibut with black beans, corn and chipotle.

You can see what we’ve got planned this week for dinner by checking out my “on the table” tab.