No-Hassle One-Dish Peanut Chicken

You've heard it from me before: I am not a great planner. One day, I forgot that one of my friends was coming over to dinner. I had practically NOTHING in my fridge and pantry. But, I had peanut butter and chicken. Thus, this dish was thrown together at the last minute. On a good day, I can knock out the entire thing (prep time and all) in about 20 minutes. Can't beat that, right?

Here's the ingredient list:
4-6 medium boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cubed
Veggies (I used a full head of broccoli in this version)
1/2 c - 2/3 c "natural" peanut butter
1/4 c low-sodium soy sauce
A splash of Worcestershire sauce
Red pepper flakes, ginger powder, garlic salt, and garlic powder to taste
A "finisher" (I used chickpeas in this version)

I have gotten many requests for this recipe, and I have to say the hardest part about winging a recipe is getting it down on paper with finite measurements. I believe my first trial suggested a "glob" of peanut butter. In any case, I'll explain the reasoning on some of the ingredients as we go! When I cube my chicken breasts, I keep them in relatively large bite-sized pieces (1-1.5" cubed). This makes them an easy forkful.

I preheat my pan on medium. When it's warmed up, I do a quick spray with some vegetable oil and throw the cubed chicken in! Then, I season with garlic salt, garlic powder, red pepper flakes and ginger powder. I'm very liberal with the ginger powder and garlic salt. I have a MAJOR addiction to garlic salt, though, so I'd scale back on that if you're sensitive to saltiness. I compensate for the extra salt by using low-sodium soy sauce. It's not just for your health! The chicken produces a lot of water as it cooks. Drain it periodically with a baster or a collander, or the sauce will be quite watery and won't thicken properly. This image is right before I drained.

When the chicken is almost - ALMOST- cooked all the way through, I add just enough soy sauce to cover the bottom of the pan in 1/8". This turns out to be about a quarter cup in my cookware, but it may vary. I also add a splash of Worcestershire at this time. I've left it out before and the flavor had a really cheap quality to it, so definitely don't overlook the power of a splash!

Once the liquids are added, throw in the chickpeas (if you're using them). I used canned, and I find them fairly salty of their own accord, so I'm extra careful to strain them thoroughly. The chickpeas are added a little earlier than the other veggies because I personally find that they take longer to heat and become tender. My husband prefers brown rice with this dish to chickpeas, so we alternate which one we choose. If it's a rice night, I just throw the peanut chicken on top of a bed of rice and call it a night. With the chickpeas in the mix, I allow the chicken to finish cooking all the way through before adding the greens.

The almighty veggie discussion: LOVE broccoli in this dish. I've also tried celery, carrots, peas, corn, green beans and cauliflower. Cauliflower is disgusting. Of the others, I'd highly recommend celery and green beans as veggie alternatives. I like all of my veggies to be warm, but still quite crunchy. If you prefer your veggies more tender, adjust your steaming time accordingly. For the steaming portion of this dish, I put my peanut butter in the middle - JUST DUMP IT IN - and lay the veggies in a circle around the PB. Steam for about 5 minutes or so. The key is that the peanut butter starts to melt. I wish the picture quality was better, but these are pre- and post-steaming:

After the steaming, the peanut butter is nice and soft and ready to incorporate! If the soy sauce and other liquids cause the mixture to be too runny, I stir the pot until the excess moisture burns off.

This dish can be adjusted for pretty much anyone. I have made strictly peanut chickpeas for vegetarian friends and turned up the heat with lots of red pepper for my spice-loving father. When there are weeks that I won't have time to cook, have cooked 5 pounds of this up for my husband and I to eat throughout the week. It reheats well.

It's not authentic. It's not high-quality. But it is hot, delicious, and fast. Omnomnom!

I've always wanted to try this with real ginger and watercress. If you give it a go with those ingredients, report back!

Dragon Pencil Case

One of my favorite movies OF ALL TIME EVER is How to Train Your Dragon. Imagine my excitement when the sequel came out: How to Train Your Dragon 2. How can you not love a dragon that can give some perfect side eye??


For some reason, stores carry HtTYD2 backpacks, lunch boxes, tiny figurines, but no pencil cases. I found a promotional bag in the $2 aisle of Target. Inspiration struck. Let's get down to the crafting! The image below shows the bag, a 7" zipper, self-adhesive black felt, and gold spandex. I wound up not using the gold spandex. It's surprisingly saddening.

First, I trimmed the bag down, centering the dimensions (7.5" x 4.5") on Toothless (the black dragon). I also cut the felt to match those dimensions. The inside material of the bag is canvas-like material.

The felt is the inside layer of this pencil case. The best part of adhesive felt is that there is no work to tack it to the outside layer.

The only details on assembly involve the zipper. I use two seams to sew the panels of the bag to the zipper. On the first, I pair the outside of the bag to the outside of the zipper and sew as close to the zipper as possible.

Once this is done, I flip the zipper under and stitch on top of the panel along the outermost edge of the zipper.

This helps hold the zipper in place and I think the extra detail makes the bag cuter.

Repeat for the other panel.

The rest is just some easy stitching. Pair the outsides together and stitch the 3 sides closed. Then flip it right side out and enjoy the cuteness.

I'm very excited to deploy this much fierce adorableness on my first day of second year!

I might have a small obsession.

Here's the breakdown:
Bag: $2.00
Zipper: $1.76
All other supplies on hand: $0.00
TOTAL: $3.76

I daresay Toothless would approve.

Guitar String Cat Toy

I've slowly been moving my collection of crafting supplies from my parents' house to my apartment. Last week, I found some guitar strings in that collection, mementos of my time as a bassist in high school jazz band.

Donner, my younger cat, found the guitar strings when I brought them home and appropriated one as a toy. I decided to spruce it up a bit and make it more cat-friendly than just coiled wire. Delving into my collection of beads, I found a cheap, lightweight plastic one that originally came in a hemp jewelry kit. The color wasn't very important to me, but the material and weight of it was. I didn't want to use anything that would break when hit on the floor or injure my cat because of a heavy weighted bead. My strings are ball-tie, so they have a built-in stop for the bead I added.

Next, I gathered a bunch of feathers from a previous project and my superglue. For the life of me, I can't remember what kind of feathers these are, but I suspect quail. I wound up using 5 feathers in total. The base of the feather was coated in glue and inserted into the space between the guitar string and bead.

Once there was no more room for additional feathers, I flooded the center of the bead on the side opposite the feathers with super glue. Once this hardened, I tugged on each feather individually and as a group to ensure that they won't pull out during play.

 The new toy is a huge hit! Due to the nature of the guitar string, the toy easily mimics the jerky motions of an injured bird. Donner loves it.

That being said, this is not a toy that I will leave out. The feathers are a potential choking hazard if my boys should chew them, and my boys shouldn't be given the chance to chew on the string.

Such intensity!

Such focus!

This craft cost me nothing, as I had all the supplies on hand. Overall, it took about 10 minutes to make, including glue drying time.

Antler Jewelry Display

Okay. This one technically doesn't involve any sort of crafting. I casually mentioned to my father that if he had a full rack of antlers he didn't want, I'd like to mount some to hold my long necklaces. He immediately offered me a skull which he had cleaned a couple years ago. 8 points and lovely.

Since all the work was already done for me, I just had to hang it. The trick is using some really long screws (3.5") and some anatomy. The supraorbital foramen is the perfect size through which to drive a mounting screw.

Measure, level, drill holes in the wall (woooo power tools!), and fix it to the wall!

The rack is irregular, so it will always look a bit uneven. Fortunately, I'm not interested in symmetry.

There it is, all bedecked in my longer jewelry. Previous to this, all of my long necklaces were hanging from a single command hook. I'm happy to have them spread out. Even happier to have an excuse to own a deer skull. Feeling very Gaston now - I use antlers in all of my decorating!

Redneck Chandelier

Let there be light!

Our first apartment is a wonderful little place - large windows, spacious bedrooms, a full bath and kitchen.... and overhead lighting in every room. Except the living room, where most of our studying/socializing happens. My husband and I have spent a lot of time looking into solutions for this lack of light. Even with a tall floor lamp, the room is dingy at best when the sun goes down. And since we live on the ground floor, we're not comfortable leaving our blinds or curtains open for long periods of time.

I was Pinspired by hula hoops, initially. I was worried that the hula hoop left something to be desired in the way of providing useful luminescence. Instead, I forged ahead and recycled some of the embroidery hoops from our wedding. I think that the completion of this craft leaves about more 70 hoops! Woohoo!

The first task was determining how to arrange the hoops. Should I use 6 or 8?

I chose 6 in the end. The goal was to attach a string of white lights to the "frame" of embroidery hoops. I thought that though the 8-hoop frame was more visually appealing, the 6-hoop frame would be easier to fill with lights.

Using superglue, I created 2 triads of hoops (only the solid inner circle). I used clips to hold the points of contact together until the glue dried. Wood glue would have been more appropriate for this purpose, but I had superglue on hand.

The triads were spray painted white and allowed to dry. Then I used superglue to affix the them together at juxtaposed angles. I did not take a picture of the final 6-hoop frame, but it looked exactly like the earlier picture when they were just laid out.

Finding white string lights in the middle of August is difficult. With the help of my wonderful house guest, Ryan, we found some icicle lights at Menard's. I wasn't planning on using icicle lights because of their bulk and branching, but the small icicles actually made it easy to run lights along all surfaces of the frame. The lights were attached with white electric tape. Almost any strong tape could be used. The benefit of electric tape was that we could reposition lights easily as needed.

With the lights firmly attached and the plug located in the center, it was ready to go! Ryan used more electric tape in an attempt to wrap the outside edges of the frame. Though it disguises the wire, I don't find it to be any prettier.

Three wires were affixed to the frame. Each wire had two points of contact, located where the superglue was applied to form the triads. These inner points were chosen because the traction broke the delicate frame when the wires were attached to the outer edges. A small piece of wire looped together the 3 pieces supporting the chandelier and the extension cord supplying power.

This is now tacked to our ceiling with plastic cable staples. I had no idea what these were before starting this project, but the wonderful workers at Home Depot helped me find them. At our apartment, we're allowed to put nail holes in the walls (and ceilings, too!). If anyone else cannot do this, there are other options that use adhesive pads similar to Command products that would be suitable. The staples are easy to install, hold the weight of the chandelier, hold the extension cord tightly to the ceiling, and are pretty cheap. Additionally, the U of the staple allows me to adjust the chandelier wires when it tilts slightly due to an uneven weight distribution (I'm not THAT good).

Isn't it pretty? Well, pretty enough anyways. It provides enough light to read by, but it still counts as "mood lighting" in my book. Bonus - I was able to surprise my husband with this when he came home from work. I'm horrible with keeping surprises secret, but I pulled this one off and he loves it.

I Use Antlers in All of My Decorating...

I had a Gaston moment. Okay. Let's be honest. All my moments are Gaston moments where wildlife decor is concerned...

 

I've had this lust for antler jewelry for about a month now. I asked my dad for a tip to with which to work, but finally took matters into my own hands and purchased an antler tip marketed as a dog chew toy.

This necklace was pretty ridiculously simple to construct. I used 5 eye pins, a chain, 4 beads, and an antler tip.

Here's how it went down. I purchased my antler tip from the pet store, so I had to remove the maker's mark that had been stamped on it. The mark came right off with a little nail polish remover and elbow grease.

Then, I used a power drill to bore a hole through the thicker portion. I tried thinking of a MILLION ways to avoid drilling, but this was the easiest. In the end, I love the resulting look. And who doesn't like using power tools?

I threaded the antler with an eye pin, then trimmed the excess to form another eye on the opposite end. Before completely closing the second eye, I attached the prefabricated chain to it.

With that portion completed, I moved onto my bead work. I'll admit, I splurged on the beads and got a string of the good stuff. It's some sort of tumbled natural stone. I love the red and mottled gray/turquoise appearance.

I threaded each of the beads with eye pins, trimmed and created a second eye. Each time, I attached the next eye pin before closing the second eye. The result was a chain of beads. This could be accomplished with wire instead of pins. I was looking for fast results, so I went this route.

The last eye of the bead chain was attached to the prefabbed chain. The chain I used had a pattern of many small links with larger links sporadically interspersed. I saved one of the larger links to attach to the antler and the bead chain. This gives just a little bit more space so the beads can hang properly.

That's it! It took all of 30 minutes, and I can add on extra charms or feathers later if I find it too plain. I'm digging the simplicity for now.

Absolutely perfect! Here's the breakdown:
Antler tip: $5.78
Eye pins: $1.49
Beads: $6.79 (I used a coupon. Original price was $11.99)
Chain: $3.49
TOTAL: $17.55

If I had been more patient and less obsessed with these beads, I could have gotten away with this project for a little over $5.