Sheet Pan Dinners {easy}

Life is hard; food doesn't have to be #124 [vol4, 3.3]

I love a good sheet pan meal. Love they’re easy to put together and easy to clean up. Probably my first exposure to the genius of a sheet pan was with the Lazy Genius’s Change Your Life Chicken. Please make it if you haven’t already.

Last week I saw Alexandra Cooks has a similar - but different - roasted chicken with cabbage. When I was teaching cooking classes, I loved to demonstrate (then make everyone taste!) roasted cabbage. I stopped keeping track of converts. Usually I’d cook on stovetop, high heat, and with a coleslaw mix. Cabbage is an unsung hero. Please roast some soon.

Another sheet pan meal on repeat is some version of this mediterranean chicken dinner with fresh cilantro and lemons.

Do you own a sturdy sheet pan?

I like the size 13x18; it's the equivalent of two 9x13 pans. In professional circles, this size is called a half sheet. Find them at kitchen stores or restaurant supply shops. I don’t recommend non-stick. I use industrial amounts of parchment paper.

Sheet pan uses:

• double a recipe for say, breakfast bars

• sheet pan dinners like this or Change Your Life Chicken

• roast veggies

• use as a tray for deboning chicken

• chocolate sheet cake for a crowd

• give stability to a flimsy disposable pan

• baking granola

• dehydrating lotsa something

• a defined area for toddler's play doh, water color, Lego building

• freezing zip top bags flat 

• bake muffin pan on top so the bottoms of the muffins don’t over brown.

On the Menu

My big boy was home this week for spring break. I made Kid-friendly Pad Thai and beef enchiladas. I need to re-write the enchilada recipe because I tried using dried chilies from New Mexico to make sauce and was a game changer. When I drove out west to take my oldest to college in Phoenix, we ate a few meals in New Mexico. I’ve been making enchilada sauce all wrong…it’s never to be made with tomato sauce. I started making sauce years ago because my husband is crazy sensitive to MSG, a common ingredient in sauces. Find dried chiles at your local Mexican store or Amazon. Search New Mexico Chiles or Guajillo.

My daughter made these Chewy Chocolate Sugar Cookies.

If you’re a St. Patrick celebrator, try this Reuben Dip for dinner tomorrow.

Life is hard, food doesn’t have to be.

Julie