Friday, April 11, 2014

Who's Cooking: Jen (Hatfield, PA) + A Pampered Chef Giveaway!

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I met Jen when I was in college out in Indiana, our husbands love to “geek out” together over tabletop and video games, so it’s a great excuse for us to hang out together when we can. Jen is also a Pampered Chef consultant and I rely on her to keep my kitchen stocked with my favorite Pampered Chef stuff (especially the stoneware!).

Jen grew up in Northern Indiana and married her husband in 2003. Since then she’s had three beautiful babies (Gwen is 6, Lewis is 2 1/2 and Olivia is 4 in heaven).  After working various management jobs, she decided to be a stay-at-home mom when they moved to Pennyslvania in the summer of 2008. In 2009 she started working for Pampered Chef and has since turned it into a full-time job. Being able to set her own hours, meet people, earn extra income for her family and get fantastic Pampered Chef products are only a few of her favorite perks of the job.

She’s also extremely involved in her local church (planning the community fair, singing in the worship team and attending Bible study, her local Mothers Of Preschoolers (MOPS) group and sits on the Board of Directors for Women of Grace USA.  She writes a monthly article for Women of Grace USA, loves to create music and refinish/fix up furniture when she has time.

Make sure you check out her Pampered Chef page: www.pamperedchef.biz/jenfretz and check out the bottom of this post for ways to win a piece of Pampered Chef stoneware (I know I wouldn't cook pizza or roast veggies without my stoneware pieces, they’re my favorite kitchen pieces by far!).

Q&A With Jen

Why do you cook at home? I've always enjoyed cooking. I always thought it was fun to create my own dish based off of a simple/classic recipe. While I do love it, I get busy and sometimes it can seem like a chore. Still, the fact that my husband and kids love my cooking keeps me going. 

I get a lot of satisfaction out of presenting a new creation made with things that I already had on hand (hence the name of my Facebook fan page:
“Cook With What You’ve Got”) and everyone loves it! My husband often boasts about my mad cooking skillz so that does give me motivation in the kitchen. When it comes down to it, as much as I would love to leave the dishes in the cabinets and go out to eat, we are on a tight budget and I have no choice but to cook for my family!

My passion is using ingredients that I already have on hand to create something new. I love to show other people (at my Pampered Chef parties) that making a homemade, healthy meal can be easy and very inexpensive if you are using simple techniques and staples that are already in stock in your pantry.  We’ve all fallen on hard financial times once in a while and it's comforting to know that I can still provide a yummy dinner for my family by just thinking outside the box and getting creative instead of running to the store or through the drive through.

What is your favorite ingredient to cook with? Chicken is always an easy thing to create a meal with.  Everyone loves it; it's inexpensive and mild in flavor so it can be seasoned and cooked in just about any way!  I love to include it in pizza, sandwiches, casseroles, roasts, salads, soups, in nugget form and pretty much anything else you can come up with.

Another thing that I love doing every week (usually Fridays) is making homemade pizza for our family dinner. I use a simple dough recipe and then I top it with whatever I have left over in the fridge that week!  This is a fantastic way to use up leftovers in a new way. Sometimes it’s the standard tomato sauce with pepperoni or sausage, but sometimes it gets funky in the form of BBQ Chicken Pizza (BBQ sauce, chicken, cheddar, onions, Chicken Club Pizza (chicken, mayo, cheese, bacon, diced tomato), Breakfast Pizza, (cream cheese or mayo, scrambled egg, sausage or bacon, cheese), Mexican (simple Mexican seasoning of choice to flavor leftover meat, salsa, cheese, any veggies on hand). It's always a hit and the kids have fun helping me make it!

If you could travel to any city or country in the world, just to taste their food, where would you go and why? I LOVE good authentic Mexican cuisine!  I would love to go somewhere to get an authentic Mexican meal bursting with fresh flavors with a perfect margarita.




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7 comments:

  1. I love BBQ chicken pizza! A second favorite is Thai chicken pizza!

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    1. Oooo Thai Chicken Pizza sounds amazing, what ingredients do you use?

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  2. bacon ham and h-burg - I like meat!

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  3. I wish I was as motivated as you, Jen! :) Miss you and the family!!
    Cori

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  4. Veggie pizza with mushrooms and olives! I tried simmering balsamic vinegar with tomato sauce and had some pretty tasty results.

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