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Foil Chicken Sausage Dinner

The great thing about Brian working at the school that he went to is that when friends make a visit to the school, it’s like they make a visit to us, too! A few of his friends were in town this week, so naturally they came over a few times for dinner. Which I loved. Like, that is what I live for.

Earlier this week I had gone to Trader Joe’s (which is 45 minutes away, but SO worth the drive because I am borderline obsessed with that place) and picked up some smoked andouille chicken sausage, not really having anything in mind on what to do with it, but it sounded good, so I got it anyway. While on Pinterest, I kept seeing foil dinners pop up over and over again, which seemed like the perfect thing to do with this sausage. Alas, this foil dinner with the smoked sausage came to be, topped off with a garlic cilantro yogurt sauce. Helllooooooo deliciousness.

I pride myself on my recipes being fairly simple to make. I want the person who has a ton of experience in the kitchen AND the person who rarely opens up their cupboards to be able to make the recipes I create. But this recipe in particular may be one of the absolute easiest recipes on here! Not to mention the clean up is a breeeeeze.

To make this, literally all you do is throw the ingredients into a square of tin foil, drizzle it in olive oil and pop it in the oven. ALL YA’LL CAN MANAGE THAT!

For another sausage dish by yours truly, click here.

The items I used to make this dish:

My goal with all of these recipes is to make things that you and your family will love. That will gather you around the table where you can talk about the great parts of your day and the really hard parts of the day. Because at the table, we can love the person sitting next to us simply by listening between bites. And what a beautiful thing that is.

I hope you enjoy this recipe! Let me know in the comments or on Instagram (@heyemilyann) if you try this out!
Emily xx

Shrimp and Roasted Veggie Pesto Pasta

When we first moved into our new place, the oven and stove weren’t working so I haven’t been able to cook yet, and this is my first fully cooked meal in our new house!!!! This is super exciting for me because not only can I cook, but I can use ALL of my fun kitchen gadgets that I have been dying to use!!! We received so many beautiful things for our wedding, and since we moved abroad right after we got married, all these beautiful things sat in storage and it KILLED me! So when we were unpacking last week, it was like Christmas re-opening all of these weird things I get excited about (ie our Vitamix, our food processor, our crockpot, etc etc etc).

So naturally, I had to put at least one of these gadgets to use, so I picked my faaaave, the Vitamix! You can use any type of blender, but other than that all you will need is a baking sheet and a pot to make the pasta and THAT’S IT! You’re welcome to whoever is on clean up duty at your house.

This shrimp and roasted veggie pasta is going to be a staple go-to dinner in my house from here on out. It is so light and refreshing and packed full of flavas, everything I want in a meal! 

I recently planted an indoor herb garden in my kitchen consisting of parsley, basil, cilantro and thyme. I have SO much basil and needed to use some of it before I died, and naturally, pesto was the first thing that came to mind. I’m not a yuuuuge pesto fan, so I went a bit lighter on the basil in this pesto than you would with a traditional basil pesto. Hence why there is not a green look to the noodles. I also used roasted garlic to give it a slightly different flavor profile that I LOVE. Alas, I’m no longer a pesto hater.

You want to start with boiling your water for your pasta and preheating your oven to 425 because the veggies and noodles will be done right around the same time. While you are waiting for the water to boil and oven to heat up, prep the veggies by washing them and cutting off the bottom inch of the asparagus’s (is that the plural word of asparagus, or is it asparagi?? I think I like asparagi…) and then cut the asparagus into around 2 inch pieces.

Place them on a baking sheet along with the garlic cloves and lightly drizzle olive oil over them. Take a wooden spoon and jostle the veggies around so that they all get covered in oil. When the oven is preheated, pop them in there for about 20 minutes or until they start to get charred. Place the pasta in the water while the veggies are cooking and cook according to the instructions.

In a frying pan, add 1 tsp of olive oil and then the shrimp. I bought frozen, pre-cooked shrimp (this is usually way cheaper than the fresh shrimp, I’m all about ballin on a budget) so the point is just to brown the shrimp a bit. If you buy fresh shrimp, make sure to cook them until pink.

When the pasta is finished cooking, drain the water and return the pasta back to the pot you cooked it in (savin ya on the clean up here). Remove the cooked veggies from the oven. Transfer the asparagus, tomatoes and shrimp into the pot with the pasta.

In your blender, add the olive oil, basil, parmesan and roasted garlic and blend until smooth. Pour the pesto into the pot of pasta and veggies and stir together until the pasta is coated in your pesto sauce. And that’s all there is to this recipe! Top with extra parm if you are a cheese fanatic like myself, and salt and pepper to taste.

Here is a list of every single kitchen item I used while making this meal. You can click on the photo of the item you need or want (let’s be real, sometimes they aren’t one in the same, even with kitchen gadgets) to purchase!

Thanks so much for reading!!

Emily xx

For more shrimp dinner recipes, click here and here   🙂

 

Egg and Veggie Bake

This recipe came about because my stove top is currently out of order and I have been dying for eggs! I usually eat an egg everyday either for lunch or breakfast and I needed my fix. We have a small convection oven, and thankfully for my time in Czech and Australia I have become quiiiiite familiar with cooking full blown meals in these things 🙂

 This is such an easy recipe and is a perfect dish to make on Sunday and have to eat for the whole week. Trust me, you won’t get sick of this thing. I have also linked my dishes and silverware for you below!

I hope you enjoy!! Send me a pic on Insta (@heyemilyann) when you make this, I LOVE seeing your creations!!

Thanks for reading!

Emily xx

Click here and here for more heyemilyann breakfast ideas!

Life Update- America, We’re Home!

That’s right, Bri and I are back in the good old US of A! For those of you that don’t know, my husband Brian and I have been living abroad our first year of marriage as he has been playing professional basketball overseas. We lived in the Czech Republic for a bit and just moved back from Australia. It has been such an awesome year for the two of us to establish ourselves in our marriage and really create our family unit, all while traveling the world.

But it is time for this chapter of our lives to come to and end and to start a new chapter together in Charlotte NC! We will be starting out on new adventures both professionally and together personally and are really so excited about it! We feel so at peace because we truly feel like The Lord was blatantly leading us to this new adventure, so we are trusting that we are walking in line with His plan, and there is no better feeling when you are confidently walking in His path.

So what will be both be doing down there?? Well what is taking us specifically to Charlotte is Brian’s job- he will be the Director of Student Athlete Development for the basketball team at Davidson College. Bri played college basketball at Davidson and absolutely loved it there and is so pumped to be working with and learning from coaches that coached him. So even though he may be retiring as a player, I will still be going to basketball games every weekend. #ballislife

Bri during his playing glory days at Davidson, and me jersey chasin after him, per usual.

And as for meeeee, I will be going to culinary school at Johnson and Wales University starting in November!!!! Culinary school has always been a dream of mine, but I was always too scared to take the leap of faith and go, but it’s time to jump! I always thought culinary school was that far fetched dream that I would never really do and had other “more realistic” plans for when we moved back to the US. But again, I really truly feel like The Lord is pointing me in this direction and accepted my offer with confidence and tons of excitement! I am also teaching cooking classes at Sur La Table down here! I really want to hone in on my culinary skills, and then at some point re-join them with my dietetics background. But for now, one step at a time.

This pending huge life change has not come without its share of anxiety and fear, as often happens to me with uncertainties and change. But what we find comfort in is knowing that God has a plan for our lives and that he is leading us here. So we will follow.

Things I’m excited about include: Chipotle. Getting to use our wedding gifts that have been awaiting our return home in a storage unit. Being closer to family. Seeing what it’s like living in America as a married couple. MAKING A HOME!!!

As every single member of our family continually reminds us, this is just a start of a new adventure (I think they’re worried we’ll downward spiral if we think our adventure days are over). I am so excited to bring you all on this new adventure and all that lies ahead with life in America to culinary school and beyond (especially with hurricane Florence welcoming us back). Thanks for coming on the adventure with us!

Emily xx

Creamy Tomato Chicken

This creamy tomato chicken is a creamy dreamy dish that I think is going to be one of your new favorites. I made it for dinner on Monday night and then I made it AGAIN on Wednesday night because I just couldn’t stop thinking about it #truelove.

Other than the chicken, these are the ONLY ingredients that you need for this dish! Nothing is worse than looking up a recipe and then have a million and one ingredients, half of which you have never heard of and the other half you don’t have at home. What I love about this dish is that it is made out of a few, simple ingredients that are pretty likely already on hand.

To start making this dream chicken, you are going to cook the chicken a bit in the oven before finishing it off on the stove. Line a baking sheet with foil and place the chicken on the baking sheet. Sprinkle a bit of salt and pepper over the chicken and then put it in the preheated oven (at 350) for 25 minutes. By cooking the chicken partially in the oven before finishing it off on the stove, the chicken will retain a lot of its moisture and have a super nice consistency in the end.

While the chicken is cooking, heat up olive oil in a frying pan over medium heat and add the diced garlic. Cook for several minutes until the garlic is golden brown. This is going to give the chicken a subtle garlicy flavor, but not too overpowering where you can’t speak to anyone for days.

After your garlic is browned, turn the heat down to low and add your cream and tomato paste. Stir slowly (as to not slosh the cream all over as I did the first time) until it is all combined. It should look like the photo below once it is all stirred together nicely.

Next, add in your cherry tomatoes and squish them with your spoon. This will release some of the juices and flavors from the tomato for more flavor and for a better consistency of the tomato in the end.

When the chicken is done in the oven, place it in your pan and bump the heat back up to medium. The time it will take to cook will depend on the thickness of your chicken breast. Mine cooked for about 8 more minutes and then it was cooked through. After about 5 minutes, cut through the thickest part of the breast to check and see if you need more time.

This creamy sauce is so delicious that I served the chicken overtop some pasta, drizzling the extra sauce over the chicken and pasta.

Hope you enjoy!
Emily xx