Little Dairy On the Prairie - my perfectly stinky life

Virgin Strawberry Sangria with Whipped Cream

Created by Amy Engberson 9 Comments

A red drink in a clear glass with strawberries floating on top and whipping cream

The whole family will enjoy sipping on make ahead Virgin Strawberry Sangria’s all summer long! Adding whipped cream to the top takes the fruitiness to a whole new level of decadence! A few years ago I met Cathy from Lemon Tree Dwelling and she is as amazing in person as you would expect her to be! I was thumbing through her blog and totally fell in love with the way her Strawberry Shortcake Sangria’s looked. Since my family doesn’t drink alcohol I knew I needed to adjust her recipe just a bit to create a non-alcohol version. The flavors in this family friendly version are spot on! I’m a Get The Recipe

Lemon Pesto Pasta Salad with Grilled Chicken

Created by Amy Engberson 14 Comments

Lemon Basil Pasta Salad in a bowl with grated parmesan cheese sprinkled on top and a sprig of basil on top, with a black spoon

Lemon Pesto Pasta Salad with Grilled Chicken is a light main dish salad that’s full of zesty flavor! It’s can be made ahead of time and includes leftover grilled chicken! Now that’s my idea of a Get The Recipe

Cheesy Bacon Ranch Monkey Bread

Created by Amy Engberson 14 Comments

Monkey Bread in a bundt pan

Cheesy Bacon Ranch Monkey Bread is extra cheesy, buttery, and has bacon...what else is there in life? Every salad, bowl of soup, and main dish is begging to for this to be served right along side of Get The Recipe

Chicken Taco Pizza {A 20 minute meal}

Created by Amy Engberson 16 Comments

Chicken Taco Pizza - featured image

Grilled Chicken Taco Pizza is a super versatile dinner you can make in about 15 minutes! Choose from several easy crust options, then pile it high with your favorite kind of cheese, and all the Get The Recipe

The Best 3 Ingredient Grilled Chicken Recipe (All purpose chicken)

Created by Amy Engberson 12 Comments

You know what I love most about The BEST 3 Ingredient Grilled Chicken Recipe? Besides it being extra moist and juicy, it only has 3 super simple ingredients I’m sure you already have on hand! Grill extra for leftovers and you’ll have a headstart on so many meal options! One of the most common requests I get from readers is asking for quick and easy recipes that let you get dinner on the table day after day. You guys like simple recipes that are made with normal ingredients that most people already have in their pantries and fridges and so do I. A hack on making dinner preparation easier. Here’s my #1 time saver, get the dinner on the table day in and day out hack. If I have meat thawed and ready to go I know I can easily come up with something for dinner. You know what is even more helpful? Having meat already prepared and sitting in the fridge all ready to go. If I have meat cooked, sliced, or diced and in the fridge I can turn it into a hundred different semi homemade meals. It’s a make ahead trick that makes life easier! Here’s how it works Think ahead and be sure you have meat already thawed for the next day. Whenever you grill meat be sure to grill extra for leftovers. When you slow cook meat be sure to make a extra for another day. Before you put away leftover meat slice it, dice it, shred it, or whatever you need to do to it so it will be ready to go as soon as you pull it out of the fridge. What can I make out of leftover grilled chicken? I’m going to start sharing ideas for cooking once and repurposing the leftovers a couple times. My family eats leftovers, or semi leftovers, several times a week and they never complain. As I create more leftover grilled chicken recipes I’ll come back and add them to this list, but this gives you quite a few ideas to start with! Chicken Cordon Bleu Quesadilla Chicken Cordon Bleu Braid Alice Springs Chicken Quesadilla Italian Chicken Bacon Sandwich Greek Yogurt Chicken Salad Sandwiches Chicken Tacos Chicken Burritos (like these Quick and Easy Beef Burritos except use chicken) Pasta with added grilled chicken Pizza with grilled chicken (Chicken Bacon Ranch, Chicken Alfredo, etc) Grilled Cheese with Chicken Add it to green salads Chicken Pasta Salad All purpose grilled chicken is a basic chicken to start with. This Grilled Chicken Recipe I’m sharing today is a bit like that black pencil skirt, or those favorite blue jeans that you can wear with anything. It’s the piece you go back to over and over again because you know it works every single time. Some grilled chicken recipes have Mexican, garlic, citrus, or some other defining flavor. Although a Mexican flavored grilled chicken would work well in Chicken Burritos it wouldn’t be so great in a Chicken Cordon Bleu Quesadilla. This make ahead grilled chicken recipe is neutral enough you can spin it anyway you want later on in the week and it will work! Don’t misunderstand though. It’s packed with flavor and is incredibly juicy. Not only is it my staple leftover chicken recipe it’s AMAZING grilled and served with a nice salad for dinner! Grilling meat to the right temperature Don’t overcook. I think this is the biggest chicken mistake of all time! My husband always wants to grill it until it’s jerky! Chicken breasts are cooked through when the juices run clear, if you don’t have juices you cooked it way too long! 160 degrees is the safe temperature for white chicken. It should rise to 165 degrees as it rests. I like grilling my chicken at 400 degrees I usually grill a chicken breast for about 10 minutes. The amount of time really will depend on how thick the chicken is and how hot your grill is. After removing chicken from grill cover it with foil and let it rest for 10 minutes. This gives the juices a chance to redistribute and makes it even juicier! Simple grilled chicken. This recipe really is the BEST grilled chicken recipe because it’s so stinking easy! There’s no need to buy those expensive marinade packets. Don’t worry about marinating the meat ahead of time (although that is handy sometimes. See Honey Citrus Chicken Marinade) Liberally season the chicken breasts with salt and pepper. Just as I promised, you already have the ingredients in your cupboard! Don’t skimp though! This chicken can be grilled on an outdoor grill or an indoor grill. Obviously grilling outdoors adds that smoky flavor. Grilling indoors is great for cold days when I just don’t want to plow through the snow to get to my grill! How to get criss cross grill marks on chicken. To get criss cross grill marks set chicken breasts on the grill for about 1-2 minutes. Rotate chicken 45 degrees and grill another 3-4 minutes, basting chicken with melted butter after a couple minutes. Flip and repeat the process be sure to baste with melted butter after the chicken is seared. Why baste grilled chicken with butter? Basting with melted butter helps lock all the juices in the chicken. It also adds incredible flavor, because you know butter has a way of doing that! Baste the chicken a couple times on each side. Make sure the chicken is seared before you baste it. This prevents contaminating the butter with raw chicken stuff! Be sure to discard butter after basting chicken. How easy is that? Three super simple ingredients and only a few minutes later and you’re going to be set for dinner tonight and ready to tackle a weeks worth of meals! It’s such a relief knowing you have chicken all prepped and sitting in the fridge ready to go. Somehow it makes dinner time feel like a task you can actually tackle! What’s happening on the farm. Today we are starting to harvest our hay. That means we need more tractor drivers than usual. I have a feeling if I’m not driving today I will be driving tomorrow. I better go do some laundry and clean my bathrooms before I’ve gotta head out to the field. Hey, at least dinner is halfway ready!

You know what I love most about The BEST 3 Ingredient Grilled Chicken Recipe? Besides it being extra moist and juicy, it only has 3 super simple ingredients I’m sure you already have on hand! Grill Get The Recipe

No Bake Chocolate Chip Cookies and Cream Icebox Cake

Created by Amy Engberson 16 Comments

icebox cake on a square plate

No Bake Chocolate Chip Cookies and Cream Icebox Cake No Bake Chocolate Chip Cookies and Cream Icebox Cake only has four ingredients and takes about 5-10 minutes to assemble. Be sure to make it ahead Get The Recipe

The Easiest Way to Cut Watermelon

Created by Amy Engberson 11 Comments

The Easiest Way to Cut Watermelon Raise your hand if summer means watermelon! I'm about to show you the Easiest Way to Cut Watermelon! This method is so easy you'll be wondering why you've been Get The Recipe

Grape Salad (with Greek Yogurt)

Created by Amy Engberson 23 Comments

Grape salad in a white serving bowl with a black spoon on a black and white striped napkin with a bunch of green grapes in the backgroundl

Grape Salad with Greek Yogurt Grape Salad with Greek Yogurt only takes about 5 minutes to make and has a handful of simple ingredients; cream cheese, Greek yogurt, sour cream, sugar, vanilla, and Get The Recipe

Coconut Banana Bread

Created by Amy Engberson 29 Comments

Coconut Banana Bread is my new favorite go to banana bread recipe! It’s a light quick bread that’s perfectly sweetened! The addition of coconut brings the best flavor to this bread! One time when I was a kid my family visited a couple elderly friends of ours. They had a dish of candy on the end table, of course I wanted one. I politely sat there and eyed the candies until I couldn’t help myself. I blurted out, “Can I please have one of those?” My dad was horrified that I would ask our friends if I could have a candy. The candy was there’s and I quickly remembered what I already know...you don’t ask people if you can have something that belongs to them. Let’s just say I got in trouble. Okay, it was big trouble and I never asked for anything again! A few years ago I went to visit my friend, Andra. Her house smelled amazing and she was just taking a couple loaves of Coconut Banana Bread out of the oven! Holy cow did I ever want her to share a slice of that warm bread with me! Of course I didn’t ask her and I don’t think I even sat there and eyed the bread. She must have read my mind, or maybe it’s just because she’s super nice, either way she offered me a slice of bread! Lucky me! That bread was amazing and I don’t even like bananas! I’ve kept my love of her Coconut Banana Bread in the back of my mind, but since I don’t like bananas I try not to keep them around! Justin and the kids don’t go grocery shopping with me very often, so when they do they go hog wild adding all the junk I never buy. Junk like bananas, licorice, barbecue potato chips, and corndogs! The dang boys devoured all the licorice and barbecue chips and left the bananas on the countertop until they were overripe. Their crazy shopping spree now meant I had to take care of the overripe bananas! I’ve literally tired a million banana bread recipes (the boys buy bananas every single time they go shopping and never eat them, maybe they really don’t like bananas just banana bread) over the years and this one is my favorite! Well, I’m still in love with Strawberry Banana Bread and Chunky Monkey Muffins, but this is my new go to regular banana bread recipe! I happen to love the addition of coconut, some of my boys won’t even touch any food that contains coconut even though they’ve never tried it! There’s an easy fix to this problem. I add half of the batter to one bread pan, add coconut to the remaining batter, then put it in the pan. Problem solved. Coconut Banana Bread for me. No Coconut Banana Bread for them! This bread has a different texture than so many of the banana bread recipes I’ve tried. It’s not too cakey, not too heavy overly moist. It’s has a mild banana flavor which I love! You’ve got to add Coconut Banana Bread to your list of recipes to make when you have extra overripe bananas! It’s seriously so good that I might even bring my boys grocery shopping a little more often just so we’ll wind up with extra bananas!

Coconut Banana Bread is my new favorite banana bread! Adding coconut gives it that tropical twist and takes it to a whole new level of yumminess! This quick bread is golden brown on the top and is Get The Recipe

Chicken Pasta Salad

Created by Amy Engberson 14 Comments

Chicken Pasta Salad- summer salad3

Thank you to Albertsons for sponsoring today's Chicken Pasta Salad post! AD #MySignatureSummer Summery Chicken Pasta Salad is full of colorful fruits and vegetables; mandarin oranges, pineapple Get The Recipe

Chicken Cordon Bleu Braid

Created by Amy Engberson 13 Comments

Chicken Cordon Bleu Braid - featured image

Chicken Cordon Bleu Braid looks impressive and tastes amazing, yet it’s super simple to assemble which makes it a perfect weeknight dinner! Chicken, ham, and cheese all wrapped up in a warm, freshly Get The Recipe