Try-A-New-Recipe-Every-Week Challenge: February

 In February we continued our new recipe-every-week challenge, and we tried five new recipes (one was to make up for January, when we just got three in.

Here are the results:
1. Best Whole Chicken in a Slow Cooker, recipe from 100 Days of Real Food (we used the cookbook version).
VERDICT: **** (4 asterisks out of a possible 5). This was super easy to make and tasted great, but just a little on the dry side.

2. Tarragon Oven Fries, from The Smitten Kitchen cookbook (similar to the Baked Pommes Frittes on her website)
VERDICT: **** These fries tasted great (I added sweet potatoes because I love them). However, you have to boil them and then bake them, and I've gotten nearly the same taste skipping the boiling step, which adds a good 15 minutes. Just looking at the photo makes me want some more!

3. Paula Deen's Spinach and Strawberry Salad I found a good deal on strawberries and wanted to use them in a salad. This recipe looked good, and it sure was!
VERDICT: ***** Delicious! And quick to make. (I substituted some mixed lettuce for some of the spinach called for and didn't have poppy seeds, so I guess I will just have to make it again.)

4. Cube steak and gravy, recipe from Food.com. We have several packages of cube steak in the freezer, and I wasn't quite sure how to make it, so gave this recipe a try. I didn't manage to get a photo (I know, blogging failure!). But click on the link and you'll see. It's not a particularly pretty presentation, a steak covered with brown gravy. But looks aren't everything when it comes to food!
VERDICT: **** My husband wolfed this down. I thought there was a little too much flour taste to the steak, so I would like to tweek the coating mixture next time.

And the bonus recipe to make up for January:
5. Easy key lime pie. This is an original recipe, invented by Desert Boy. We love key lime pie (thanks, Kristin!). We recently got some Chobani Greek yogurt, key lime flavor. I wasn't sure what we would do with it, and someone said to mix it up with cool whip and put it in a graham cracker crust. I mentioned that to Desert Boy, and he asked if we had graham crackers. He then proceeded to put the yogurt right on the graham crackers. Presto, a super easy key lime pie!
VERDICT: ** I much prefer the real key lime pie. But this one made the kids happy, so I was happy too.

We also tried the Southwest Chicken Breasts recipe from last month in the crock pot (thanks, Janille!), and it turned out super. We'll be doing that again.

Have you tried any new recipes lately? I'd love to get some inspiration for March!