Finally...a create-your-own recipe meal that worked for me!!

Let me start this off by admitting it. I am a terrible cook. I feel sorry for my husband whose mother cooks delicious food from scratch. I'm sure marrying me was a big shock to his system getting used to eating the meals I prepared for him. I'm thankful that my husband and my sweet boys will eat just about anything and are not picky eaters.

Part of my problem is that I don't prepare ahead of time and have all the necessary ingredients on hand before I start cooking. I will be in the middle of a recipe before I discover that we are out of vegetable oil or some other ingredient such as a spice. In those moments, I mistakenly think that I morph into Rachael Ray and start grabbing other things to throw in there to substitute for the thing that is missing. That usually turns out to be disastrous, and for some reason I am always surprised at the end when it doesn't taste good.

Well, after many tries, I finally made a meal with add-on ingredients that tasted really good!

My sister gave me a good, low-fat recipe for pork chops. Although we eat it all the time,I thought I'd try it with a different twist (yes, I know the add-on ingredients made it not-so-low-fat, but was yummy anyway):

Ingredients:
Seasoning (receipe calls for Salt/Pepper but I like to use hamburger seasoning)
2 eggs (my add-on ingredient)
1 cup seasoned bread crumbs (my add-on ingredient)
1 package of boneless pork chops (I like the thin-sliced b/c they cook faster)
2 cups salsa
1/2 cup sour cream (my add-on ingredient)
2 cups rice
EVOO

Measure out the appropriate amount of water and start heating in a sauce pan. While waiting for that to boil, start making the pork chops.

Season boneless pork chops.
Crack 2 eggs in a bowl
Put bread crumbs in another bowl.
Dip pork chops in eggs and roll in bread crumbs.
Drizzle EVOO in a pan and heat to medium.
Place pork chops in a large pan and cook until no longer pink, flipping sides as needed.
By this time the water for the rice is usually boiling so add the rice to the sauce pan and cover.
When pork chops are fully cooked, add salsa and a dab of sour cream on top of each pork chop.
Cover pork chops and simmer until rice is ready.

Serve pork chops over the rice and spoon the extra sauce over the rice.

In the words of Rachael Ray, YUM-O!

Maybe there is a little bit of Racheal in me after all...(probably not, but I can dream, right?)...