{BBQ Ranch Pizza}

There's nothing like getting confident enough in your own abilities in the kitchen like experimenting with recipes of your own. While this one has a few kinks to work out ( namely, I still need to find a dough that I like better), This was a DANG tasty pizza, and is on the repeat list in our house!

BBQ Ranch Pizza

Ingredients:

• 2 chicken breasts
• 1 cup BBQ sauce of your choosing
• 1/2 cup ranch or blue cheese dressing (I'm a huge fan of BBQ/Blue Cheese combo, but don't have it here in China. Let me know if you try it out with this!)
• 1 1/2 cups of shredded cheese
• 1 pizza crust

Instructions:



1. Cube two raw chicken breasts and season them. Salt and Pepper should be sufficient, though I throw a little garlic into the mix, too. In a medium pan, heat a teaspoon of oil and add chicken. Cook thoroughly. Once cooked, add BBQ sauce and simmer for 4-5 Minutes. Set aside.

2. Roll out pizza crust onto a pizza pan/stone/ whatever you use to cook your pizzas. Spread a generous layer of the ranch/blue cheese dressing on the pizza. layer the chicken and BBQ mixture on top of the dressing. Add cheese on top, and fold the crust of your pizza. Brush a little dressing on the crust, because lets face it, crust is just tastier with stuff on it. Ranch crust, oh yeah.

3. Bake in the oven on 400° F Until the crust is a golden brown and your cheese is bubbling. ( I like my cheese a little browned too, so I wait for it to burn just a tad before taking it out). 
Remove from oven and allow to sit and cool for 5-10 minutes. Cut and serve.... and go back for seconds. 

Happy munching, 
-Ashley

{Culinary Wish List}

We eat well for living in China. We really do. We've been blessed by having good friends to leave behind spices and left over pantry items, even better friends who go through enormous efforts to arrange care packages with tastes of home, and an expat rich community that blossoms western style restaurants and groceries so that we can always get a fix if we need it.

That being said... we, as fat people, have had some wanderlust over food lately, especially with the new knowledge that home is only three months rather than another year away. Perhaps it's in poor taste to make a list like this, but I'm doing it anyway. Here's a list of the places and food we're going to be visiting when we get home:

• IHOP - Bacon. French Toast. Sausage. Colorado Omelet. Pumpkin Pancakes with Butter Pecan Syrup. Stretchy Pants.
• Taco Bell - This one is all Jeff. Though I'm sure it will involve the destruction of a lot of tacos. and Mt. Dew. 
• BBQ - Oh so much BBQ. 
• Frozen Yogurt - This one is all me, but it WILL include a girl date and pedicures. 
• Hamburgers - Cheeseburgers. Bacon Cheeseburgers. Monster Thick Burgers. Hugh Jass Burgers. Burgers with burgers on top. Mostly we just miss BEEF. It's so expensive here, so we've only had it a few times. 
• Steak - Medium Rare ( Jeff just gagged... he'll get over it) with a bottle of A-1. It's gonna happen. Grilling in the snow. That's what boots are for.
• Butterfingers - and chocolate. Really. They suck at it here. I don't even like chocolate all that much. 
• Chinese food - Don't laugh. We're serious. The food in China is yummy but NOTHING like your run of the mill drive through/ delivery/ Chinese take-out in America. There will be some OM NOM NOMing of crab rangoon, egg rolls, general tsos chicken, sesame chicken, Mongolian beef, and beef and broccoli.
• Gigi's Cupcakes - and baking in general is going to happen. So much baking. Kentucky's apples and pumpkins better run, we're coming, and we're hungry. 
• Popeyes - This will take a drive to Louisville or farther, but it's going to happen. I never want to see another KFC in my life.
• Fazolis - I miss you, bread sticks. I'm sorry I have forsaken you. I'll be back soon, we'll talk. Johnny Carinos, we'll be seeing you soon, too. Don't leave town.
• Ice - and cold beverages in general. Yes, they exist in China, I will just enjoy the becoming the assumed preference, again.  

Who's up for helping us complete the list / work off the calories afterward?

-Ashley

{Finding Beauty on a Gloomy Day}

Today is cold, and wet, and gloomy. We decided to try out a Texas BBQ joint that was a rousing success. It's run by a Texan expat, and is some amazing food.

After Lunch, we wondered about and found a FREE art exhibit, and some out door art installations as well. It was a nice, cultured way to spend a gloomy afternoon... Jeff played games with the ipad and apparently took pictures.

Thanks Jeff.

Have a great weekend!
-Ashley