Chicken Piccata

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I love trying new recipes! It is a great way to learn about new ingredients, how to cut vegetables or fruits, you learn about certain cuts of meats and herbs. I watch a LOT of Youtube videos. I follow this channel called “BarefootButterNHeavyCream” and they post nothing but the Barefoot Contessa cooking shows!

The most recent episode that I watched was the one called “It’s Friday Night Again” and in this episode Jeffrey was on his way home and Ina had this wonderful meal prepared. This dish in particular was called the Chicken Piccata and it looked delish!

I had to try it. The recipe is below and it was super easy. Enjoy!!

My chicken piccata




Ingredients

2 split (1 whole) boneless, skinless chicken breasts

Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

1/2 cup all-purpose flour

1 extra-large egg

1/2 tablespoon water


3/4 cup seasoned dry bread crumbs

Good olive oil

3 tablespoons unsalted butter, room temperature, divided

1/3 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice (2 lemons), lemon halves reserved

1/2 cup dry white wine

Sliced lemon, for serving

Chopped fresh parsley leaves, for serving






Here is the video from the show

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Line a sheet pan with parchment paper.


Place each chicken breast between 2 sheets of parchment paper or plastic wrap and pound out to 1/4-inch thick. Sprinkle both sides with salt and pepper.


Mix the flour, 1/2 teaspoon salt, and 1/4 teaspoon of pepper in a shallow plate. In a second plate, beat the egg and 1/2 tablespoon of water together. Place the bread crumbs on a third plate. Dip each chicken breast first in the flour, shake off the excess, and then dip in the egg and bread crumb mixtures.


Heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil in a large saute pan over medium to medium-low heat. Add the chicken breasts and cook for 2 minutes on each side, until browned. Place them on the sheet pan and allow them to bake for 5 to 10 minutes while you make the sauce.


For the sauce, wipe out the saute pan with a dry paper towel. Over medium heat, melt 1 tablespoon of the butter and then add the lemon juice, wine, the reserved lemon halves, 1/2 teaspoon salt, and 1/4 teaspoon pepper. Boil over high heat until reduced in half, about 2 minutes. Off the heat, add the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter and swirl to combine. Discard the lemon halves and serve 1 chicken breast on each plate. Spoon on the sauce and serve with a slice of lemon and a sprinkling of fresh parsley.

Recipe via the Food Network, see here.




Being Elegant at “Reading” People

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It is so hard sometimes dealing with liars, trouble makers, and down right rude people. I pray constantly for discernment and I am pretty good at “reading” people. There are some situations that I will not put myself into because I can tell if someone is not going to like me.

And that is okay. Not everyone is going to like me. But we must learn how to deal with these individuals. I was reading an article from Real Simple.com called “5 Tricks to Reading People”.
This article gave wonderful hints on what to pay attention to and how to deal with it.


Take Them Out to Dinner.





As a waiter, I always watch to see if, and how, customers’ demeanors change when they talk to me as opposed to the person they’re eating with. If they’re engaged and personable with the people at the table but then don’t look me in the eye or say “please” and “thank you,” I think that reveals a lot. I’ve heard of people taking job candidates to restaurants to see how they interact with the servers because it’s a good indicator of how they will treat their coworkers. It’s also telling for me to see how people react to bad news. When I say we’re out of a dish or the food is going to take longer than normal, do they let it roll off their backs? Or do they ask how that could possibly happen and say it’s unacceptable? In most cases—in restaurants and in life—there is a reasonable explanation. When people get upset, it tells me that they sweat the small stuff.
—Darron Cardosa is a blogger and the author of The Bitchy Waiter. He lives in New York City.


photo credit Clay Banks

Watch for “Actually.…”

There are telltale words that show a person is the type who likes to bait you into an argument—
especially online. If someone starts a comment with “Actually,” he is trying to correct you. 
Or ending a comment with “Right?” He wants you to engage. 
Another common indicator is chiming in with an anecdote to shut you down. 
For example, you write, “X percent of baby boys don’t get this vaccine.” 
And he writes, “My brother got that. You’re wrong.” OK, you have a personal story that 
you think negates all other information. What I tell people, especially female writers I work with,
is that when a person comes back more than once with an “actually” or a “Right?” 
or an anecdote, that person is trying to cause trouble.

—Annemarie Dooling is the head of growth and audience correspondence at Vocativ.com, 


a news website. She lives in New York City.



Have Them Tell a Story Twice.

With all of our electronic communication these days—and even more so with dating apps—
everyone has the chance to fabricate. Maybe they tell one person one thing and another person 
something else, just to get what they want out of situations. I’m newly single for the first time 
in seven years, and one of the things I look for is consistency when someone tells me a story. 
I’ll say, “Hey, remember that story you told me? What happened at the end?” 
Getting the same response—or not—says something about his honesty.
—Jessie Kay is the founder of the Real Matchmaker. She lives in Los Angeles.



Listen for a Straight Answer.

How directly someone speaks to you can be a big indicator of how forthright she is overall. 
This is something we look for when we’re working with witnesses but also when we’re looking 
at jurors. When someone immediately answers the question, we usually feel she is being honest with us. 
When someone talks and talks in a roundabout way, giving 15 explanations for what she’s about to say, 
and then gives you the answer at the very end, she might be telling the truth, or she might be wrestling with it. 
It hurts your credibility if you’re not immediately direct.
—Leslie Ellis, Ph.D., is a jury consultant at DecisionQuest, a national litigation consulting firm. 
She lives in Washington, D.C.



Ask if They’ve Broken a Bone.
This is strictly observational; there’s no data out there on this. But I have seven children, and 
I’ve noticed a definite bimodal distribution when it comes to broken bones. 
Three of them have had multiple broken bones—arms, shoulders, whatever. 
Four of them have never broken a bone. The ones that break bones tend to be more aggressive and daring. They’re also risk-takers, which can be a good thing. 
The others are more cautious and deliberate. It’s the same with my grandchildren.
 I have one who will jump off a couch and assume Grandpa will catch her. 
Her brother will climb up and down the stairs of the slide until he finally goes down slowly.
—Stephen Camarata, Ph.D., is the author of The Intuitive Parent and a professor of hearing 
and speech sciences and psychiatry at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine. 
He lives in Nashville.









































(original article see here)

Chinoserie Curtain Panels

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My love for chinoserie continues to increase. I just think the print is so beautiful and timeless. My daughter and I went to T.J. Maxx about a month ago and I spotted these chinoserie inspired curtains! I was over the moon! It is rare to see something like this here. Indiana is SO laid back and everyone seems to have the same decor style so to see this was a huge shocker to me!
I snatched them up quickly and I did not care if I did not have a place to hang them. I was not walking away without them! They are just that fantastic to me!
I could not find mine on the website but here is a close match.

Here they are in my loft.
I have seen a few people with them on Instagram. They are very lovely. If you find a pair at your local T.J. Maxx grab them fast!
(photos via Mrs. Shockley)

A French Beauty Secret

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I saw this quick facial scrub tip from The French Beauty Solution. I am still reading this book and as I said before it has been a great book! You should really pick up a copy. It is very educational but moving right along here is the quick tip…

For an anytime scrub, simply mix one tablespoon of baking soda with water until you have a paste, rub it gently on, then rinse with warm water. This is an instant way to get rid of dead skin cells and give your skin that special glow. ~ Mathilde Thomas 







Photo by Content Pixie on Unsplash


My Nail Regime

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Every Sunday evening after all the weekend chores are done I began to settle down and plan out my week. I get my clothes ready for work the next day and then I start on my nail regime.

I remove all the old polish, file them down, push back my cuticles and just clean them up a bit. Then I put on a calcium polish and let it dry in my nails.

Then I add my nail color for the week. I love neutral colors so I will probably us a pink blush, gray, dark pink, lavender and lately I have been wearing red. Once I put on my color for the week I then polish on my top coat and Voila.

My nails are set for the week and they look clean, manicured and lovely.

My favorite colors for the last several weeks. I really like Revlon’s Sheer Petal.
I always make sure I put on a calcium or nail hardener as my base coat. 




The finished product. If you find that you don’t like colors try a sheer pink.
It brightens your nails very nicely. 




(photos via Mrs. Shockley)

Elegant Revelations

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Every once in a while I find a list so inspiring that I repeat it in my mind, print it out and make notes. I recently read this list from another blogger. I thought it was so inspiring that I had to share it.

1.When you don’t want a vacation from the life you live everyday, that is a very good sign you’re listening and abiding by your authentic self’s yearnings and innate predilections.

2. When life gives you unexpected good news but you don’t know how to deal with it, be grateful. The universe doesn’t give what it doesn’t think you can’t eventually handle (excuse the triple negative).

3. Being around sincerely positive people will change your life for the better if you’ll let them.

4. We often pick small battles with others when we aren’t content with how our lives are currently going. Instead, take a breath and a step back and ask yourself, is this debate really worth the energy or do I just want to feel as though I can have control over something? Let it go. You have more control over your life’s direction than you realize, and in time, so long as you are making progress, no matter how small, the change you seek will come.

5. Save one-third of what you make before taxes. You’ll have a much larger smile come April 15th (for U.S. residents).

6. The little everyday luxuries make a tremendous difference in the quality of our lives. 

7. Say no when it doesn’t feel right even though you can’t explain. Something that you will want to say yes to will be glad you waited, and so will you.

8. Learning something new will seem impossible initially, but eventually, the wall of obstruction to the knowledge you seek will begin to crumble as a result of your patient persistence.

9. Listen to what speaks to you and follow it where it leads. 

10. Work better, not more.

If you want to read more from this blog post by Shannon Ables from the Simply Luxurious Life see here.
(photo via This is Glamorous) 

Keeping an Air of Mystery

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We are in an age where sharing everything has become the norm and keeping things private has become weird. It is so easy to get caught up in sharing too many details about one’s life.

I wrote a small blog post about this last year, see here. I try to make sure I practice this on a daily basis. Learning to find the balance between sharing your life and keeping things private is very hard sometimes.

We as women can have a tenancy to want to share and discuss everything with our girlfriends, co-workers, and family members. I have had my “oops I should have not said that” moments. I hate that! But since I am getting older I am learning to pause in between my thoughts before I speak.

There are some things that should be left unsaid. I had someone recently tell me that I didn’t post as much on Facebook anymore. I was very happy to hear that. For the most part I post photos or statuses that inspire. When I joined Facebook in 2011 I was venting things and emotions that I should have kept to myself but as I can see I am learning.

I read this recently from Jennifer L. Scott’s book about “the Air of Mystery”. She said, “Poise resides in the space between our thoughts. If we pause, we are less likely to say something that is not in our best interest. We will not engage in a “Twitter feud” because we will have paused and assessed. Your secrets will stay safe. We must remember that poise is in the pause. Pausing when agitated. Pausing when excited. Pausing before saying something that isn’t wise to say.

I could not have said it better myself. I am going to make an extra effort in keeping an air of mystery. Because there is beauty in mystery.

photo credit Llyas Bolatov