Joy in the Kitchen!

Summer is coming!!!  It's time to start thinking cool meals for warm summer days!  Salads are always a hit in our home and my teenage girls especially love pasta salad.  This delicious pasta salad is packed with flavor and pretty simple to assemble.  It travels well in a cooler to those summer potluck holiday meals.  Perfect! Chicken Bacon Ranch Pasta Salad 1 12-16 oz. package of shell pasta (Large or small), cooked until tender and drained. 2-3 boneless, skinless chicken breast, cooked, cooled, and diced (We like it grilled best but boiled is great too!) 2 C. Ranch Dressing thinned w/ a little milk - appx 1/4 cup. 4-6 slices of bacon, fried until crispy and crumbled (I like to use 6 slices of precooked bacon) 1 C. celery, sliced 1 avocado, peeled and cut into chunks and sprinkled with lemon juice to prevent browning. 1 can black olives, sliced Green onion, Optional Mix all of the above ingredients together saving a few pieces of avocado and bacon out for

Pretzel Dogs are a fun twist to using hot dogs for an easy meal!   Add a fresh fruit and vegetable tray and you've got a filling meal!  This is a perfect recipe to work with your kids in the kitchen!   Our family really loves the soft pretzels and pretzel bites we've been making.  Dipped in cheese sauce or just by themselves, once a batch comes out of the oven it hardly has a chance to cool before it's gone. These Pretzel Dogs use that easy Soft Pretzel recipe.   Enjoy! Pretzel Dogs 1 batch of Soft Pretzels dough  (Recipe HERE )  prepared up to the point of shaping the pretzels. 8 bun length hot dogs, patted dry with a paper towel. Heat oven to 400 degrees. Divide the dough into 8 pieces.  Roll one piece of the dough into a long snake-like strand about 12 inches long.  Flatten the roll with your fingers.  Place the end of one hot dog at the end of the dough strip and roll at an angle until hot dog is all covered, leaving both ends visib