Happy New Year....with a little sodium on the side.

We just finished our New Year's Eve meal...boneless BBQ wings and cheese fries! And yes, this meal was all my idea. I'm watching my feet grow as I type this from sodium overload...but I don't regret it! Not yet anyway:)

A year ago we started this little family blog. I can't believe how fast this year has flown! 2010 is full of wonderful memories...and I can't wait for what 2011 has in store! Our extremely active baby is due in 8 weeks....kinda hard to believe. Well, it's not too hard because I feel gigantic. My New Year's resolution is to post a belly picture. But not tonight...due to the wings and fries:)

I have no pictures to post tonight, but I will share a recipe! We made our own boneless wings and the recipe is completely random and it turned out delicious! Who need Buffalo Wild Wings when you can make it yourself?

Katie and Ryan's Random Boneless BBQ Wings

Chicken (We bought 2 packs of chicken tenders)
2-3 cups flour
2 eggs
2 cups milk
Random assortment of seasonings
BBQ sauce
butter
Worcestershire Sauce
Soy Sauce
Liquid Smoke
Honey

Chop your chicken into nuggets. Combine eggs and milk in a bowl. In a seperate shallow dish, combine flour and any seasonings you feel like throwing in. I added garlic powder, Tony's, seasoning salt, and McCormicks Montreal steak seasoning. Dunk the chicken in the milk mixture, then coat with the flour mixture. Repeat this process again so all of the chicken has been coated twice. I added extra flour a few times during this process so that I had enough to coat all of the chicken. Let the chicken chill for about 20 minutes. Ryan cooked these in our deep fryer. While the chicken was chilling, I made the sauce.

For the sauce, I melted a couple of tbsp of butter and added it to 1/2 cup BBQ sauce. I then added a few shakes of the other sauces until I was happy with the taste. When the first round of wings were done, I dumped them in the sauce and mixed until the wings were coated. I didn't want to make too much at first and have a big bowl of leftover sauce after we were done.

We do have a huge bowl of leftover wings...looks like they will be our New Year's Day meal as well:) And I'm trying to convince Ryan that we can make BBQ chicken tacos with the leftovers also...

We hope that everyone has had a great 2010 and will have a wonderful 2011!

Low Sodium....

One of the joys of pregnancy I have discovered is fluid retention. Ok...that's sarcastic....it's not a joy. It's actually quite annoying. I have been cutting out obvious and added sodium, but it's not doing the trick. So I've been doing some research on low sodium recipes. Ryan thinks most of them are super bland. I don't even notice what I'm eating at the end of the day and I get tired of swollen extremeties, so I am ok with bland. Tonight we tried a salmon recipe that was delicious and low in sodium! Ryan didn't add anything to it:) Here is the recipe for...

Salmon with Tomato Basil Salsa

2-4 salmon filets
3 tbsp mayo
2 tbsp fresh basil
1/2 tsp paprika
1/2 tsp garlic powder

Salsa:
6-10 oz grape tomatoes
2 heaping tbsp chopped onions
1/4 cup chopped basil
1-2 tbsp red wine vinegar

Preheat oven to 375. Grease a glass dish and place salmon in it. Mix mayo, basil, paprika, and garlic powder. Spread the mixture over the fish and bake for 20-25 minutes or until done.

While the fish is cooking, prepare the salsa. Chop the tomatoes and combine with the rest of the ingredients. Serve over the salmon.

We are at week 29! Besides the swelling and crazy bad reflux, things are going really well. Ryan gave me an early Christmas present...a Back n' Belly Pillow. It's a gigantic body pillow shaped like a horseshoe and it makes sleeping much more pleasant. Well, as pleasant as sleeping with a baby the size of a large squash in your stomach can be:) Hayes is winning by 5 votes! I still don't have a vote. I'm just enjoying feeling our little pumpkin dance around all day.

Enjoy the week! Christmas will be here soon!