Lynda Giddens

The dog is a lot better now. She knows “sit”, “lay down” and “shake”. She’s 90% housebroken (still a few accidents – hopefully she’ll figure out she needs to let us know when she needs to go out!). She’s excellent on the leash. We still need to go over “come” with her because we’ve had too many incidents of her getting off her leash and running around wild. Which is very dangerous when she’s running around in the middle of a busy road.

Mark and I tried a new recipe last night and it was really good and most importantly easy. I don’t remember what it’s called because I already lost the original link for it, so I’m calling it Chicken Alfredo Macaroni. So, so easy and there are lots of customizations that would make it even tastier.

• 1 rotisserie chicken, de-boned, skinned and cut into 1 inch cubes
• 8 ounces macaroni
• 1 cup alfredo sauce
• 1 cup shredded monterey jack cheese
• 1/2 cup freshly grated parmesan

Pre-heat oven to 350. Cook macaroni according to package and drain. Combine with chicken, alfredo, monterey and half the parmesan. Sprinkle remaining parmesan on top. Bake for 20 minutes until warm and bubbly on top.

We took several liberties with the original recipe however. I don’t care too much for dark meat, so we only used the chicken breasts from the chicken. There was more than enough meat to go around. We used 10 ounces of alfredo sauce because that’s how much came in the container. I will not use less than 10 ounces in the future and may use more than that or add a little bit of milk or cream next time because it could have been a touch creamier. Also, they didn’t have any shredded monterey jack and we didn’t feel like breaking out the food processor, so we used monterey jack mixed with colby, which was delicious.

If I gave it any thought, I probably would have added broccoli because this dish was really missing nice pretty green vegetables. Mark says it would have been even better with tuna instead of chicken. I agreed, but not canned tuna because for some reason I can’t eat that stuff anymore! I think rotini also would have been more fun to use as the pasta than macaroni.

The only thing it relies on for us is the ability to get a rotisserie chicken (we’re certainly not going to do it ourselves as that defeats the “quick and easy” purpose). Publix normally has them available, but it’s not 100% guaranteed. I’d prefer to pick up a chicken the night of instead of buying and refrigerating one beforehand though, so it makes this meal a little hard to plan for. I guess in a pinch pan cooked chicken breast would do, but the meat wouldn’t be as flavorful or moist.

I haven’t needed a passport yet as I’ve never really been out of the country (except for a cruise the the Grand Caymen Islands and Mexico, but they don’t require a passport). I currently don’t have any plans to go out of the country, but getting a passport would probably be a good idea for many different reasons.

I don’t think it’s too terribly difficult to get one, so I don’t know why I haven’t looked into it.