BBQ Pork/Chicken Salad

A few of you have been asking about this delicious salad I made last night.

Here's the recipe:

In the photo below, we got pre-pulled/cooked chicken from Costco.

It was frozen and all we did was heat it up.

You can cook a pork shoulder in the crock pot all day or just get a frozen meat.

That's what we did. Frozen.

The Costco one comes with BBQ sauce on it. You can add your own though.

If I were making my own pulled pork/chicken from home, I would normally soak 1 container of Sweet Baby Rays BBQ sauce and 1 cup Ketchup in 2 cups of shredded BBQ chicken/pork. The recipe below is the more complicated/time consuming one.

The above cheat sheet, is the fastest/easiest one. 

Gotta love Costco frozen goods :)

You can try both ways and see which one you prefer. They're both excellent!

BBQ Chicken:

- Put 4 chicken breasts in crockpot.

- Cover with mixture of 2 cups of BBQ sauce, 1 cup Ketchup, salt and pepper, garlic powder, and 2 cups water.

- Mix it up and cook on high for 4-6 hours or until it falls apart when you stick it w/a fork or a knife.

The recipe continues on:

1 cup corn

1 cup black beans

1/2 cup sharp cheddar cheese (shredded) *not pictured below

2 tomatoes (chopped)

1/2 cup carrots (chopped) * optional

1/4 red onion (chopped) *optional

1 full avocado *optional

1 can black olives *optional

Crushed tortilla chips

And you can omit things like carrots and onions but the other items are a necessity and really make the taste of the salad.

Finally....Drench with Ranch Dressing :) 

Photo taken on my iPhone

It's a really good summer salad and is extremely effortless, in my book. 
You get a lot for very little :)
I don't usually crush my tortilla chips. I usually leave them on the side, and when I'm tired of picking at my salad w/the fork, I usually let the tortilla chips jump in and take over. They're great for picking up all the other little pieces, when you run out of lettuce.
We usually put all the little ingredients on the side, in individual dishes, so people can add whatever toppings they'd like.
Normally, though, I just get romaine lettuce, dump it in a large serving bowl, and add all the above ingredients and mix together all at once. It just depends if you have picky eaters or not.
This is real easy and yummy.
Enjoy :) 

Tulip Festival

Every year we go to the Tulip Festival at Thanksgiving Point, in Lehi.

Every year guys.

2011

2012

2013

Yes, I realize we take the same picture in the same spot.

And, yes, I realize we looked our best in 2011 when we were dating.

I (also) realize the flowers never change, but we still go every year.

And I still take the same gosh darn pictures.

Heaven help me.

This year, we drug along our good friends Shawn & Cari. 

We had so much fun with them! We even rented a golf cart

In our defense, Cari was five months pregnant. Would you wanna walk 52 acres?!?!

I don't think so.

Yes, it's 52 acres of gardens. Golf cart it was! 

This year was actually the warmest year we had ever been. It was so nice though.

Look how cute this little bee is!!!

I absolutely love this time of year, and get so excited to go to the Tulip Festival every spring. This became our tradition, when we first went in 2011. We decided we would go every year after that, and make it our special little *thing*

And we have done just that.

Spring of 2011 we were just starting to seriously date. I had told Jake that I wasn't really interested in pursuing a serious relationship. That obviously changed. I flew home for a wedding, for about five days and that's all it took. Five days I was gone and away from my love, and I had wished (every single day) that I was with him. I enjoyed my time in CA with friends and family, but I was missing Jake more than I ever possibly thought I could. I talked to him every second I could. 

The day after I got back, we spent the whole day together. We went to the Tulip Festival (for the first time), then went engagement ring shopping, and then out for dinner. That was on Saturday, April 30th, 2011 and it was our favorite date ever!

We love the beautiful Tulip Festival and cannot wait to go back next year! It's always fun going back reflecting on the previous year. 

Baby brother gets married. What?

A couple weekends ago, my brother got married in California

The husband and I decided to fly, since it'd be such a short/quick trip.

We actually ended up getting on the same flight as my sisters (flying out there).

So it ended up working out perfectly well! I was excited to fly w/them.

04/04

We took off from SLC Thursday night and landed in LAX that evening

We picked up our rental car and drove straight to the temple apartments to meet up w/the rest of my family. 

Photo taken on my iPhone

These were my wedding nails BTW

All Essie brand. "Fiji", "Mint Candy Apple," and "Set in stones."

The next morning, my brother was married to his new bride, Carlie

They had a ceremony at 11am in the Los Angeles, California Temple

Friday

04/05

Photo taken on my iPhone

Aubre . Courtney . Kelsey

Aubre and Jake 

Grandma Smith and Aubre

And here they are as the new Mr. and Mrs.

Side note: For some reason, this photo looks out of focus on my blog, but on my computer it's just fine. Weird.

The rest of these photos, are just random ones I got while we were hangin around

The wedding colors were mint green and peach. Or coral. Whatever 

They called it coral, but that aint coral folks. It's peach

Anyway- The girls wore mint green, and the guys had matching peach ties. Yup

Jake, Aubre, Austin, Carlie, Tyler, mom, dad, Courtney and Kelsey

And that, my fellow readers, is my baby brother. Married. Say what?!?! I still can't get over it. That's something I thought I wouldn't be saying for a long, long time. Congratulations to the new Mrs. and Mrs. Tyler Albert! 

We flew back to SLC the next day, and got back safely, thank you very much. Extremely exhausted though.