Buffalo Chicken Mac & Cheese

This week's Meals On Wheels recipe is for buffalo chicken mac & cheese. I got the recipe from Tiffany, my all-things-buffalo obsessed friend. After spending so much time making it, there was no way I was giving it away without a little taste, so I scooped a couple spoonfuls into a bowl & tried it. OMG, ya'll! Seriously, omg. You want to make this.

Buffalo Chicken Mac & Cheese

Ingredients:

7 tbsp unsalted butter

1 lb elbow macaroni

1 small onion, finely chopped

2 stalks celery, finely chopped

*3 cups shredded rotisserie chicken

2 cloves garlic, minced

3/4 cup Frank's Buffalo Wing Sauce, divided

2 tbsp AP flour

2 tsp dry mustard

2 1/2 cups half-and-half

*1 lb extra sharp cheddar cheese, shredded

*8 ounces pepper jack cheese, shredded

2/3 cup sour cream

1 cup Panko

1/2 cup crumbled blue cheese

2 tbsp chopped fresh parsley

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees & butter a 9x13 baking dish. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil; add the pasta & cook until al dente, about 7 minutes. Drain.

Meanwhile, melt 3 tbsp butter in a large skillet over medium heat. Add the onion & celery & cook until soft, about 5 minutes. Stir in the chicken & garlic & cook 2 minutes. Then add 1/2 cup buffalo sauce & simmer until slightly thickened, about 1 more minute.

Melt 2 tbsp butter in saucepan over medium heat. Stir in the flour & mustard with a wooden spoon until smooth. Whisk in the half-and-half, then add the remaining 1/4 cup buffalo sauce & stir until thick, about 2 minutes. Whisk in cheddar & pepper jack cheeses, then whisk in the sour cream until smooth.

Spread half of the macaroni in the prepared baking dish, then top with the chicken mixture & the remaining macaroni. Pour the cheese sauce evenly on top. Put the remaining 2 tbsp butter in a microwave safe bowl & microwave until melted. Stir in the Panko, blue cheese & parsley. Sprinkle over the macaroni. Bake until bubbly, 30-40 minutes. Let rest 10 minutes before serving. Drizzle with some buffalo sauce for color.

Garnish with more buffalo sauce, blue cheese & sour cream if you want!

*A couple of things: 1) for the "3 cups shredded rotisserie chicken" I just boiled a bunch of chicken breasts & shredded them; 2) I bought blocks of cheese & grated them, which took a good 10 minutes & turned my hand into a claw, so you may want to buy shredded cheese to save time; 3) this is by no means a 30 minute meal, save this for a Sat or Sun afternoon when you have a lot of time.

Highly, highly recommend this recipe. Thanks, Tiff!

Weekend Wrap Up

Photo credit: John Brassil

Friday:

Last week was Next Big Nashville. John went to the majority of the shows/nights, but I only participated Friday night. We started at 6:15pm with The Features at the Neuhoff Bldg in Germantown. Our next show wasn't until 10pm, so a big group of us went to Bombay Palace for dinner. Then we went to Cannery Ballroom for Yeasayer. I LOVE Yeasayer, but I was a little disappointed in the show. The music doesn't translate well live & they played more songs from All Hour Cymbals than from Odd Blood. Weird. Not awful; not worth $25. How I Became the Bomb played at Mercy Lounge after Yeasayer, but at that point, it was 1am, they weren't going on for 30-45 minutes & I had been up since 4:45am. I went home.

Saturday:

I hit a wall on Saturday & did absolutely nothing. I don't even think I left the house. John went out to more shows & I stayed home & watched The Last Station on DVD (interesting - not bad, not awesome).

Sunday:

I met Jessica for a 4 mile run at Shelby Bottoms. Then John & I met Sarah & Adam at The Belcourt to see The Agony & Ecstasy of Phil Spector, which was AWESOME & left us all wondering whether or not he really did kill Lana Clarkson.

Last night we went to Ryman Auditorium to see The National, aka my favorite band. I bought tickets so long ago that I forgot where our seats were. Oh, they were third row. I've never had seats that good. It was amazing! During the encore, he came out into the audience & stood in the pew right in front of me (see above, I'm one of the arms reaching up at him). I could touch him. I almost died. Seriously. For their very last song, they played "Vanderlye Crybaby Geeks" without mics, on the front of the stage, with everyone in the Ryman singing along. Mind blown.

Let's Get Physical

While we're somewhat talking about health related topics, I thought I'd share two things: 1) a blog I recently discovered geared towards running & healthy eating & 2) my own personal exercise regimen.

A few weeks ago, Katie told me about this blog, (never home)maker. It's a blog written by a married couple who practice healthy living & they're both runners. I'm only a week or two into it, but I'm a fan. The recipes are a little too healthy for my taste, mainly because they're vegetarian, but some of you (Nichole) would probably like them. And, of course, I love the running themed posts, especially the ones where a person writes in & tells their story. The blog is well written & informative. Definitely check it out.

Allright, exercise. Disclaimer # 1: A pinnacle of health, I am not. But I do work-out A LOT & in the past few weeks I've been asked how often I work-out, what I do besides running, etc. Disclaimer # 2: I weigh a good 20 lbs more than I'm supposed to. I have recently lost about 10 lbs, or enough to go down a size, which I believe is due to the increase in exercise because god knows it's not due to diet.... I digress, so here's what I do in a typical week:

Sunday:

Long run, which is only 4 miles right now, but I'm working towards 6

Monday:

45 minute Body Sculpt class

Tuesday:

45-60 minute Spin class

Wednesday:

45 minute Body Sculpt class

3-4 mile run with East Nasty

Thursday:

60 minute Yoga class, when I go...

Friday:

3 mile Pancake Run

Saturday:

45-60 minute Spin class, which I've been neglecting lately

I work downtown & have a flexible schedule this time of year, so I drive to the Downtown Y & work-out on my lunch break. In a perfect week, I like to run three times, take at least 1 Spin class (4 days of cardio) & then 2 days of strength training (Body Sculpt). I could stand to work in 1 more day of strength training if I could find the time. Here lately I've been taking Thursdays & Saturdays off because I'm so busy with school & studying for the comps, but I really should get back into the habit of going to Spin on Saturday mornings (right, Alexis?).

I'm a social person, aka a talker, so exercising with people helps me. I rarely, if ever, work-out alone. It's also encouraging that the majority of my friends work-out &/or run just as much as I do. Surrounding myself with like-minded people helps keep me on track.

Again, as anyone who actually knows what I look like can attest, I'm not in a body most people would strive towards, but whatever. At the ripe 'ole age of 34, I've kind of given up the ghost of being a single digit size again, it just doesn't matter that much to me anymore. But I do want to be healthy & take care of myself, which, I think, is what I'm doing.

Need Healthy/Vegetarian Cookbook Recs

Dear Readers, I need your help. See below.

Hello My Blogger Friend. I am writing to you for your advice. I have a cookbook dilemma. I’d like to start cooking more (I finished The Omnivore’s Dilemma last month). I want to start cooking more frequently with a lot of fresh vegetables, local, seasonal foods (I don’t eat meat other than fish). My cooking skills are minimal at best, so I don’t want too many ingredients or complicated directions. I’m also cooking for one for the most part. And I like pictures in my cookbooks. Based on these criteria, is there a cookbook (or two) that you’d recommend for a beginner who wants to cook in this way? I checked out the cookbook section at Borders and got overwhelmed by the options. I thought that since you’re always cooking and have mentioned that you love buying cookbooks that you might have a few standards that you could recommend to me. Julia Child I am not.

Thank you! Any suggestions that you’d like to send my way would be much appreciated.

I know a lot of you are more experienced cooks than I am & most of you eat a little healthier that I do. I'm specifically looking for vegetarian friendly options. Katie....

Please leave your cookbook recs/suggestions/advice/etc. in the Comments section.

Thanks!

P-I-Z-Z-A

John showed this to me over the weekend & I can't get it out of my head. Stick with it until at least 2:15 if you can. Yes, those are the Olsen twins. You're welcome.

Weekend Wrap Up

Saturday:
I had an early morning hair appointment at Trim. My colorist is moving to NYC next year, so we spent a good two hours talking about where he should live, which subway line runs closest to Parsons, what he should & shouldn't take with him, etc. I always get a little homesick for NYC this time of year & I'm really missing it right now.

For dinner we tried Bombay Palace for the first time. Man, that place is nice. Who knew? We loved it. Their food is so good! I had the malai kofta with garlic chili naan. OMG. That naan. Amazing! Definitely try this place if you haven't already.

Sunday:
Jessica & I decided to keep up our early morning run prior to studying for the comps. Our study comrade, Emily, lives in Lebanon so we decided to go to her this time since she came to us last week. I met Jessica on Donelson Pike & then she drove us out to Long Hunter State Park. There's a good, flat two mile trail there. We ran it twice, without stopping, except for a quick bathroom break. That's the first time I've run four miles straight through. I was so proud of myself! And it was a perfect place to run. There were deer & turkeys all over the place. And even at 8am, there were a lot of people out there walking, fishing, etc. It was really nice.

Post run, we met Emily at the Panera Bread at Providence & studied for two hours. Ugh. This test is the bane of my existence right now. Five more weeks, five more weeks....

Last night I finished watching Season One of Hung. Meh. It's definitely an interesting storyline & I did enjoy it for the most part, but I don't know if I love it enough to continue on with Season Two. We'll see.

Linda Wins

Linda McCartney, aka Smuggy McSmuggerson

Rudy & Toby

Penny

Well, as you can see, the bed is back upstairs. For those of you following along at home, this brings the score to Linda 1, Baldwins 0. Thanks for all the emails and suggestions. It's good to know I'm not alone in this. Apparently all of you have had this same pet bed struggle.

Jessica's two dogs, Rudy & Toby refuse to sleep in their respective, size-appropriate beds. Toby, the larger of the two, likes the small bed, so Rudy, the runt, gets to stretch out in the big bed.

And then there's Penny. Oh, Penny. April did the same thing I did - initially bought a cheap bed, assuming in the immediate future she'd switch to a nicer/better bed. But Penny wasn't having it, so now Penny's new $40 cat bed serves as a toy box while she snoozes in her old, tiny bed.

As the saying goes, the heart wants what it wants, albeit a two year old, smelly, filthy, cheap faux suede dog bed from Big Lots. Oh, Linda.....