Krasnow Living: Cooking with The Pioneer Woman

The other day I jokingly tweeted to The Pioneer Woman that I should blog about cooking my way through her cookbooks the way Julie Powell did with Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking. I love watching her Saturday morning cooking show on the Food Network. So much so that I have my favorites saved and I will go back and watch old episodes. I especially loved the first Christmas one that aired in 2011. And, because the show includes her family of four, cowboy husband and working cattle ranch, I feel like I know them and that we've been friends for years. Okay, two years.

So who is The Pioneer Woman? Ree Drummond, that's who! As she says in her Saturday morning intro, she's a mother, a wife, a blogger, a photographer and an accidental country girl. She, and her family, live on a sprawling working cattle ranch in Oklahoma and she cooks for a lot of people! What I love about her show is I truly feel like I'm part of her family on a weekly basis. She's your neighbor, one who lives miles away, and she truly makes you feel at home. And her recipes are meals I would cook and do! Which is why I came up with this truly unoriginal idea!

In addition to her show, Ree has a blog. Actually, she had the blog first where she photographs her kids, the ranch and the food she makes. She posts about everything, but what I love most is that when posting recipes, she provides step by step photos and directions. When cooking, I often wonder what it should look like during the process. Am I doing it right? Did I cut that correctly? Is that what it's supposed to look like? So while thinking about blogging my way through her cookbooks, I thought I should probably take photos like her. (Wish I had thought about this while preparing the first seven meals of hers. Guess we will have repeat meals...)

Last night I made one of my favorite summer recipes of Ree's, her Grilled Chicken Salad with Feta, Fresh Corn and Blueberries. This is one of the best, filling salads we've tried and we've been testing salads all summer! And, it's a great two day meal, which is something I love. I am constantly on the hunt for two day meals so I don't feel like I'm cooking every day of the week. Who has time for that? I digress....

So here are some photos as I prepped for the salad. Joel grilled the chicken and corn while I cut up everything else. The only thing I do differently with the salad is add lettuce. I added romaine and lettuce straight out of garden! So without further ado, the first in a long series of cooking with Ree!

This is the salad bowl lettuce from our garden. I know it doesn't look like much which is why I added the Romaine as well!