What to cook for dinner?

With my kids' busy schedules, it seemed necessary that I find something easy to make and/or ready-to-serve, as well as good tasting. So I searched Costco, Sam's Club, Trader Joe's for more non-traditional grocery fares. What I found are food items that are too spicy to serve to kids at a moment's notice.

My kids likes food that are less "traditional" kids meals. They don't like Mac and Cheese and chicken nuggets, so I try to find food items that they would find appealing as well as tasty for adults too.

I was excited to find at Costco a box of Chicken Portobello (32 oz/2 lbs) with 4 servings of Boneless skinless chicken breasts with hand-stuffed mushrooms and smoked gouda cheese. It was easy to bake from frozen and all I have to do is the side dishes (noodles or rice) and some vegetables.

Oven Bake: from frozen: Preheat oven to 375F. Remove stuffed chicken breast from plastic package and place on baking sheet. Bake uncovered for 45-50 minutes.

But this dish turned out to be a failure because it was spicy in an unpleasant way, even for adults. No where on the package said it was spicy. It did mention that it was "Enhanced with up to 15% of a seasoned solution." My kids struggled with eating it by picking at the chicken breast part, but it was not tasty.

At $10.29 a box, it's not a good deal if the kids won't eat it. I would give it a thumbs down. We are better off with the $4.99 pre-roasted roast chicken from Costco.

While at Sam's Club the other day, I found Bacon Wrapped Chicken (Rotisserie Breast Appetizers) $9.08 for 35-38 handmade pieces (1.5 lbs total weight). It's grill ready (5-7 minutes per side), but I baked them in the oven. Using conventional oven, I baked them at 425F for 30 minutes. These are delicious bites, but again, the chicken bites are spicy. So my kids didn't like them. These bacon wrapped chicken appetizers are great with Trader Joe's fettuccine alfredo. These $3.29 (1 lb) fettuccine alfredo is ready in 7 minutes. It's very tasty and quick to make. The bag says it serves 3, but I would say it's enough for 2 adults. I usually add 4-6 oz more of cooked fettuccine to this batch because the bag contains lots of sauce. By adding extra pasta, I was able to serve 4.

The combination of the fettuccine alfredo and the bacon wrapped chicken makes it a great adult meal. The adults enjoyed the meal with a bottle of Pinot Noir. Unfortunately, I would have to rule it out as a possible dinner option at my household because my kids won't eat spicy food.