Cheesy Chicken + Spinach Pasta

Howdy y'all!

Welcome to another installation of Cooking with Sammi!!! Today we're making pasta! Who doesn't love pasta? It's actually one of the best things on earth.

I'd first like to start out by saying I only took one picture from the actual cooking process because the chicken for some reason was giving me so much trouble and I was just frustrated and totally over taking any photos. So you get one picture of the cooking and then a picture of the final product!

Oh and btw this pasta is actually incredible. I'm beyond proud of myself for making something that tastes this good (without using a recipe). Like I just made this up.. Amazing.

Ingredients

• jack cheese (grated) ((should be about 3 cups))
• 2 tablespoons flour
• 1 tbsp butter
• 1 cup milk 
• chicken (I used chicken thighs but I recommend using chicken breasts instead) 
• a bag of spinach honestly
• pepper 
• garlic salt 
• thyme 
• salt
• pasta of your choice (I used penne) 

Directions

• I started off by cooking the pasta. (Boil water, add pasta, cook for 10 minutes).
• Then I cooked the chicken in a pan on the stove on medium high. I seasoned the thighs with garlic salt, pepper, ad thyme on both sides and cooked it until they were a little brown on each side. 
• Cook the spinach in some olive oil in a pan and add to pasta. Now I only had half a bag of spinach which obviously wasn't enough so I recommend using an entire bag if you plan on making this. 
• Cut up the chicken into small squares and throw into spinach/pasta mix. 
• For the sauce you will melt a tbsp of butter. Once it's melted, add the 2 tbsp of flour and stir util its smooth. 
• Add the milk and keep stirring until thick and creamy. Season to your liking. I put a bit of pepper and the tiniest pinch of salt. Like barely any salt. 
• Add the grated cheese bit by bit and stir until it's all melted. Once it's melted to your liking pour over the pasta mix and mix it up completely. 
• Voila! The cheesiest yummiest pasta to ever exist! 

Also sorry this post is a day late! Was a very busy hectic day yesterday! 

Thank you for reading! See ya next week 

July Favorites + some light reflections

Hey everyone! Today I'm going to talk about all of the things I've loved this past July. This year has been flying by! I can barely keep track on what day it is to be honest.. Except for Thursday's obviously since that's when I post on here :-)

So before I get into my favorites, I just want to reflect a bit on the past month. My work schedule was pretty hectic and I wasn't getting much sleep so I've been running on empty all month.

I've been so tired and out of whack but things are calming down a bit and I'm excited to be able to put in more time on the blog and with my other endeavors!

I also recently went on a little much needed vacation (which I just posted a blog about! Check it out here if you missed it!!).

I absolutely love the mountains and being able to be there with my boyfriend and our friends was so incredible. Even though it was totally hot and there was 10 of us staying in a two bedroom cabin, I wouldn't have traded it for anything.

Anyways, I won't bore you with everything that happened in July, but just know that I feel recharged, extremely grateful, and almost as if I had an epiphany. Or an epiphery, as Michael Scott would say.

On to the favorites!!!

• Fruit - this feels so weird to put as a favorite but it's true. I've been eating so much fruit lately and I can't get enough of it! I put it on oatmeal, I make tons of smoothies, I'm eating it by itself. I just can't stop. 
• Living Proof by State Champs - THIS ALBUM RULES. THIS IS. THE BEST ALBUM OF 2018. POSSIBLY EVEN EVER. this shit SLAPS. 
• Animal Crossing 'New Leaf' - okay I know this game is like super old but ??? It's incredible. I bought a 3DS a few months ago and I'm not kidding when I say I play this game every. single. day. 
• Amali Multi Strap Sandals - These slide sandals are so friction cute I can't even stand it. They are from Target and they have them in red (the color I got) and in black. The straps are sometimes annoying because you have to fix them if your foot slips out even the slightest bit. I purchased these for Fourth of July and they were perfection!!
• Cooking - I've just really been loving cooking lately! I want to cook all the time and I want to create new recipes and try other people's recipes as well! It's very relaxing to me (even though I get frazzled while I'm actually cooking.) I love learning new things and I love eating so this has been a really fun thing for me to explore. Of course I'll be sharing my cooking journey here on the blog with all of you as well!
• Mamma Mia - This is one is kind of embarrassing honestly. I've watched this movie (the first one) more times this month than I care to admit. Sometimes even watching it more than once a day.. I'm so obsessed with it and the soundtrack. And if I'm being honest, the movie itself is all over the place. It's not even like a 5 star movie, but I just can not stop watching it. Here I go again! 

Sorry if this is boring y'all! I got more to come to the blog soon so keep an eye out! 

As always thanks for reading!!

New Music Thursday - Summer Sun

Hi guys I've got another playlist for my 'new music thursday' series!  If you haven't listened to HAIM's album.. do it. It's seriously so good. Anyways, here's all the stuff I've been listening to! Enjoy!! I hope you're all having a great week! Thanks for reading ♡

New Music Thursday ♫

Sorry I haven't posted in like two weeks you guys! I've been really busy and then I got sick so I've just been a mess. :-/ I'm going to be posting regularly again so keep your eyes peeled for a new post early next week!

Today's post is just going to be a little playlist I made of some new tunes I've been listening to lately. I want to try to do a post like this at least once a month!!

Harry Styles new album is E V E R Y T H I N G to me. So a few songs from that are on here obviously. Enjoy!!