Have a picnic

Sometimes the best family dinners come with a theme.  The great thing about picnic food is that they can be packed up easily and eaten outside.  It's a perfect way to usher in the first really beautiful spring day of the year.

Simple directions: Chicken salad sandwiches, deviled eggs, and fruit of season.

Ingredients:
Bread Slices
Tomato Slices
Cheddar Cheese Slices
1 Cooked chicken breast
2-3 Tbs mayonase
Salt, Pepper, Garlic, mustard to taste.

6 hard boiled eggs
1 tsp mustard
2.5 Tbs mayonase
3 drops tobasco sauce
Salt and pepper

Directions:
1. Shred chicken breast.  Mix in mayonase, salt, pepper, and garlic to make chicken salad.  Assemble sandwiches with remaining ingredients.
2. Peel boiled eggs and slice in half long ways, keeping egg whites in tact.
3. Remove egg yolks into small mixing bowl.  Add mustard, mayonase, tobasco sauce, salt, and pepper and mix with hand mixer until smoothe.
4. Re-fill egg white divet with egg yolk mixture.

Serves:
3-4 adults

Time to table:
20 mintues

Breakfast For Dinner: Cinnamon Rolls

Not gonna lie, this one, the way I made it, is a time commitment.  But it's a DELICIOUS time commitment.  A time commitment that is reminiscent of Christmas Morning and better than Cinnabon moments.  I can't make this one without thinking of my Mom.  Mom, I aspire to your greatness.

(Measurements for this recipe are given in relative descriptions as the size of your dough recipe may be different)

Whole meal:
Cinnamon rolls, eggs, and bacon.

Ingredients:
Dough (I make the basic white bread recipe from my bread machine, but any dough you might have around: mash together some pop biscuits, rhodes rolls, whatever you consider "fresh bread" in it's dough form)
Melted Butter/Margarine
Brown Sugar
Cinnamon

Frosting Ingredients:
2 tbs butter
1 cup powdered sugar
1 1/2 tbs milk

Directions:
1. After first rise and rest, roll out dough into one large squarish shape roughly 1/4 inch thick.
2. Spread melted butter across rolled out dough.  Use enough to wet the entire surface of the dough generously.
3. Spread brown sugar across surface of rolled dough.  Unpacked brown sugar should thickly cover the surface, in a thickness of about 1/2 centemeter.
4. Sprinkle cinnamon on top of brown sugar, all surface should appear cinnamon colored without piling.
5. Taking one of the longest ends as a single unit, roll the flat surface into itself to make a spiral shape.  Final product should be cylindrical
6. Cut cinnamon dough spiral into coins, roughly 1 1/4 inch thick. 
7.  Lay the coins spiral side up in a greased cake pan with each roll 1 inch apart.
8.  Allow 30-45 minutes for rolls to rise.
9. Bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 20-30 minutes (or until golden brown on top)

10. Mix together all frosting ingredients with hand mixer until silky.  When rolls are finished baking, spread frosting across rolls while still warm.

Cook time:
All Evening

Servings: 1 batch from the bread maker yields 20 rolls.  Serve with eggs and bacon.

Creamed Eggs on Toast

Most often used as a way to use mass quantities of boiled eggs after Easter, my brother used to call this delectable family favorite "Egg Stuff," therefore making it a fun favorite for the kids to request with it's silly name.

Simplified instructions: Cream Sauce and boiled eggs on toast.

Ingredients:
1/4 cup butter/margarine
1/3 cup flour
3 cups milk
1 slice onion (if desired)
Salt and Pepper to taste
4 hard boiled eggs
Toast.

Directions:
1. Melt butter in frying pan on low.  Melt, not bubble.
     -If you choose to use the onions, dice them and sautee in butter before adding flour.
(I prefer to use a cast iron skillet, but my mom also used a 9-inch pot and that worked just as well.)
2. Add flour 1 Tbs at a time, mixing it into the butter until evenly distributed.
(I generally mix it in with a spatula)
Butter/Flour mixture should be doughey. 
3 . Add milk one cup at a time, mixing constantly to eliminate lumps before adding the next cup.
(My mom had the skills to use a whisk.  My white sauces were never really lump-free until I started to use a hand mixer to mix it all.  Hense the cast-iron skillet.)
4.  Add salt and pepper to taste.  The white sauce should taste delicious all by itself.
5.  Cube hard boiled eggs and mix into white sauce.
6.  Break toast into bite-sized pieces on each dinner plate.  Add sauce on top of toast.

Makes 3 servings (or one if you're me)

Prep time: 20-25 minutes