Mommy, Where do Babies Come From?: Ripley Nuggets

I have been trying to feed our family healthier, real foods lately after learning some really disturbing things about the "food" we eat in America. So, taking itty bitty baby steps, I'm slowly incorporating and substituting healthier ingredients in our old favorite recipes, and I'm also brain-storming for new healthy ideas. For the past couple months I've been making some really yummy granola bars. Each time I make them, I play around with the recipe a little bit, so we've had them several different ways.

You can probably guess this on your own, but the chocolate ones are my favorite and Dan prefers the peanut ones. All of the kids love them both.

Last night as I mentally mapped out the day ahead - meals, activities, school work - I groaned at the idea that I might need to give the kids chicken nuggets AGAIN for lunch. It's such a staple for us, and I feel a little pang of guilt every time I serve them. Then I remembered a bunch of chicken I had in the deep freezer and wished I had thought ahead to thaw it so we could have that for lunch.

Instead, I took it out in the morning, allowed it to thaw just slightly, so that it was still frozen, but soft enough to cut into bite-sized pieces. I had enough chicken that I decided to separate it out and try several different flavors. On the first group, I just sprinkled it with garlic powder (because that was the first thing I saw in my spice rack) and sauteed it. I sprinkled the second group with poultry seasoning and then covered it in a Garlic & Herb marinade (something Dan had picked up from the store) and cooked the same way. Then I sprinkled a third group with poultry seasoning and covered it in Taco Sauce, and sauteed it. The final group was sprinkled again with the poultry seasoning, covered in Ranch Dressing, and sauteed. Once I figure out the kids' favorite kind, I'm hoping to make most of this stuff on the grill. I'm thinking the Taco ones will go great in quesadillas, so I'm pretty sure I'll make more of those, and I let Vince try one of the Ranch ones before I put them in the freezer and this was his response: "Mmmm! Mom, that's good!!" It feels so nice to hear that from your son and know he's not lying. He hasn't started telling those little polite social fibs, so I know that if it was gross I would have seen him gag and spit it right back out, crying at the injustice of it all.

I'm not that bright: I wanted to freeze them all while they weren't touching each other because I thought that they might stick together if they were frozen in a pile...I may have just wasted A LOT of time though.

The dark pieces are bits of dark meat that had been on sale and I stockpiled them at the time because they were so cheap.