Courtesy of Sandra Lee Semi Homemade Magazine; reprinted with permission from Hoffman Media, LLC

We are excited to be partnering with Semi Homemade with Sandra Lee! We will be cooking one of Sandra’s recipes each month. Sandra Lee will provide us with a recipe and instructions. The Lazy Moms will lead you step by step through the recipe, feed our families, and report back to you, our readers.

Sandra Lee has a passion for simple solutions that create dramatic results in all areas of home life. She is editor-in-chief of Sandra Lee Semi-Homemade magazine, a popular television host and internationally-acclaimed home and food expert who has revolutionized the way people think about homemade. With her trademark 70/30 Semi-Homemade® philosophy, which combines 70% ready-made products with 30% fresh and creative touches, Sandra is recognized as the foremost advocate to over-extended people. She created the platform to continually supply savory tactics that allows anyone to take 100% of the credit for something that looks, feels and tastes as if it were completely made from scratch.

Be sure to visit our Lazy Mom Amazon Store! We have Sandra’s cookbooks available as well as a subscription to her new magazine. Additionally, you can check out her website here.

This moth we are cooking Raspberry Mustard-Crusted Chicken from Sandra Lee Semi-Homemade Money Saving Meals. This recipe is from the “Fix It Freeze It” Chapter.  The freezing portion is optional, but if you spent a Sunday afternoon cooking you would have meals for all week.  Freeze food in individual or meal-size portions – it will thaw quicker and you can pop out the number of servings you need.

Courtesy of Sandra Lee Semi Homemade Magazine; reprinted with permission from Hoffman Media, LLC

Raspberry Mustard-Crusted Chicken
Prep 15 minutes Bake 20 minutes (after thawing)
Makes 4 servings
4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, trimmed
1?4 cup Dijon mustard, Grey Poupon®
1?4 cup frozen raspberries, thawed, Dole®
2 tablespoons raspberry preserves, Smucker’s®
1?2 cup panko (Japanese-style) bread crumbs, Ian’s®
1?2 cup pecans, finely chopped, Diamond®
1 tablespoon dried parsley, McCormick®
1?2 teaspoon salt
1?2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
Nonstick cooking spray, Pam®
Fresh chopped parsley (optional)

1. Place chicken in a large zip-top plastic bag; set aside. In a small bowl, stir together mustard, thawed raspberries, and preserves. Pour into bag with chicken. Massage bag gently to coat chicken. Squeeze air from bag and seal. Set aside.
2. In a small zip-top plastic bag, combine bread crumbs, finely chopped pecans, parsley, salt, and pepper. Shake to combine. Squeeze air from bag and seal. Place sealed bag with chicken and sealed bag with bread crumbs in another large freezer bag. Seal bag, label, and freeze.

THAWING AND COOKING: Thaw chicken completely in refrigerator. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Empty bread crumb mixture onto a plate. Press chicken breasts into bread crumbs to coat. Place chicken on a baking sheet that has been lightly sprayed with cooking spray. Bake in preheated oven about 20 minutes or until an instant-read thermometer inserted in center of chicken breast registers 170 degrees F. Sprinkle with chopped parsley (optional).

This was a really simple recipe to make.  Here is what the chicken looked like with the rapsberry mixture before I froze it:

After the chicken and bread crumbs were thawed out I coated each piece of chicken in the bread crumbs and put in the pan.  You will notice that I have more than 4 pieces of chicken.  That’s because I have 5 people in my family, so I tweaked the recipe to accomodate a bigger crew!

Here is a picture of the finished product:

This chicken was a BIG HIT!  I wish you could come inside your computer screen and get a bite.  Oooh, maybe some day they will have scratch and sniff computer screens.  Don’t take my word for it, though.  You MUST make this one.  PLEASE make this one.  It is so good.  In fact, my sister called the day we were working on this one and asked for the recipe.  She made it for her family and they loved it too!  My kids even had seconds.  Are you getting the point?  This was delicious!  And easy!

For dessert, we made an Apple Pie Parfait.

Start to Finish 10 minutes
Makes 4 servings
1 can (20-ounce) apple pie filling, Comstock® More Fruit
or Wilderness® More Fruit
1?3 cup candied walnuts, chopped, Emerald®
1?4 teaspoon allspice, McCormick®
16 oatmeal cookies, Mother’s Cookies®
1?2 cup butterscotch caramel sauce, Mrs. Richardson’s®
1 pint vanilla ice cream, Häagen-Dazs®
Candied walnuts, Emerald®
1. In a medium bowl, stir together apple pie filling, the 1?3 cup chopped candied walnuts, and the allspice. Set aside.
2. Crumble two oatmeal cookies into the bottom of each of four parfait glasses. Top each with 1 tablespoon caramel sauce. Divide half of the apple mixture among the four glasses. Add a scoop of ice cream to each glass. Repeat layering, ending with ice cream. Sprinkle each parfait with candied walnuts.

Excerpted from the book, Sandra Lee Semi-Homemade Money Saving Meals, by Sandra Lee
Copyright © 2008 SLSH Enterprises, Inc. www.semihomemade.com

Here is LML hard at work on desserts for my family. (Incidentally, when her daughter, Grace, found out she was cooking for Sandra Lee today she was super excited.  She was way disappointed when she realized that the cooking was taking place at my house and it would be dinner for my kids.) 

Here are the finished parfaits.  I am so excited about these that I am going to serve them this weekend when I have dinner guests.

Man, these look terrific.  Lazy Dad Daniel is going to be super impressed when he gets home from work tonight.  He will think I was hard at work slaving over this meal and dessert, but in reality, this is what I was doing:

LML told me these would be good with sugar.  Well, we didn’t put sugar on the rim of our glasses, so I got my puppy Sugar to sit with me.  I look like I am a resident of Del Boca Vista with the Costanzas as my neighbors!

In fact, I even had LML serve them to me poolside.  This was one terrific drink and it goes so well with the Raspberry Mustard-Crusted Chicken!

You’ll notice we are in our poolside party attire.  Every day is a party when you are a Lazy Mom.  Remember last month when LML channeled her inner-June Cleaver?  Well, this month we are channeling the Real Housewives of Sugar Land.  If this book deal doesn’t work out, maybe we can get a reality show!

Initially we thought that this recipe didn’t seem very semi-homemade.  Boy were we wrong!  This is one quick and easy recipe.  Not only that, but it looks gourmet.  This is a great recipe to make for company.  They will be very impressed and you won’t have to spend much time in the kitchen.  We would love for you to email us and let us know if you try it.  Don’t forget to take a picture.  Some of your emails may be seen by Sandra herself.

Speaking of Sandra, don’t forget to submit your cooking tips.  This week’s winner will be receiving an autographed copy of Money Saving Meals.

Sandra Lee Raspberry Mustard-Crusted Chicken

Sandra Lee Apple Pie Parfaits

Frozen Raspberry Lemonade