Author: Potty Mouth Panda

Just a Mom of 4 living each day with coffee, chaos, curse words and sometimes good food.
WTFs for Dinner

WTF’s for Dinner Wednesday: Lazy-Ass One Pan Cheesy Chicken & Broccoli Rice

Potty Mouth Panda

Why TF This Recipe Exists

It’s Wednesday, you’re out of energy, and the fridge rejects your half-assed attempts to conjure a meal like it’s some sort of mystical portal. The takeout menu is glaring at you from across the room. But no. Tonight, you’ll conquer dinner with the culinary equivalent of sweatpants: Lazy-Ass One Pan Cheesy Chicken & Broccoli Rice. It’s stupid-easy, cheap, and—wait for it—actually tasty. Your kids won’t riot. You’ll still be able to buy toothpaste tomorrow. Let’s do this.

Ingredients

  • 1 lb chicken breast (just cut into chunks, or hell, buy it pre-diced—keep it easy)
  • 1 1/2 cups white rice (uncooked, don’t overthink it)
  • 2 3/4 cups low-sodium chicken broth (that box in your pantry you keep moving around)
  • 2 cups broccoli florets (fresh, or just dump frozen in, nobody cares)
  • 1 cup shredded cheddar cheese (the budget bag or whatever you have)
  • 1/2 onion, diced (optional but worth the five seconds)
  • 2 cloves garlic, minced (jarred works, vampires be damned)
  • 1 tsp paprika or smoked paprika if you’re fancy
  • 1 tsp salt (adjust or ignore if you’re sodium-averse)
  • Black pepper, to taste
  • 1-2 tbsp olive oil or butter

Instructions

  1. Grab your biggest skillet or a deep pan. Lightweight heroism incoming.
  2. Heat oil or butter on medium. Toss in your diced chicken, sprinkle with salt, pepper, and paprika. Sauté a few minutes until just turning golden. (No need to cook it through. We are not overachieving today.)
  3. Add onion and garlic (if using). Stir for 2-3 minutes until they don’t look raw and sad anymore.
  4. Dump in the rice. Stir so the grains get a bit glossy and soak up all the nothing you just did. Not science, feels fancy.
  5. Pour in chicken broth. Give everything a stir. Turn heat to low, slap on a lid. Set a timer for 15 min and go scroll memes.
  6. After 15 minutes: Open the lid, dump broccoli right on top. Don’t even stir. Put lid back and let it steam with the rice for 7-10 more minutes, until rice is done and broccoli isn’t frozen anymore.
  7. Final lap: Take off lid, stir in all the cheese (and another handful if you’re feral). Stir until melted and everything looks sexy. Taste for salt. Shovel onto plates.

Swaps, Shortcuts, and Picky Kid Shit

  • Chicken: Sub with rotisserie/deli chicken, leftover turkey, or even canned chicken if your dignity is shot.
  • Veg: Use peas, carrots, or just skip the green stuff entirely. (They’ll survive, I promise.)
  • Rice: Brown rice works but takes forever, so use minute rice if you’re low on willpower.
  • Cheese: Whatever cheese isn’t moldy in the fridge. Even slices torn up. Who cares?
  • Zero chopping? Buy pre-chopped onions or garlic paste, or skip entirely. The Cheese is doing the heavy lifting anyway.
  • Budget straining? Go hard on frozen veg and skip the onion/garlic.

Why This Hot Mess Works

It’s got carbs, melty cheese, protein, and just enough vegetables that you can declare yourself a responsible adult (even if you’re lying through your teeth). Basically no dishes. Zero gourmet expectations. Pure weeknight sorcery in a single pan. May you never see another sticky rice pot again.

This is the kind of recipe I build my weekly plans around.

Parenting in the Wild

Why Can’t I Pee Alone? (And Other Monday Mysteries)

Potty Mouth Panda

Locked Doors and Tiny Hands

I’m going to tell you about the one thing I wanted on this hellish Monday morning: to pee, in private. Sounds simple, right? Listen, if you’re a parent, I already hear you cackling. Because you know there’s not enough locks and divine intervention in the universe for a mother to complete a fucking bathroom break alone.

Tale as old as time, ass on porcelain throne, I hear it: the Skrillex remix of my name. Sometimes it’s Mommy. Sometimes it’s MOMMEEEEEEEEE. This morning? It was the full government “Mother!”—the one they save for 911-level drama.

I’d barely gotten three seconds’ peace when suddenly stubby fingers appeared under the door, like something out of a low-budget horror movie. The soundtrack: rhythmic pounding, suspicious whispers, and the unmistakable clatter of LEGOs. I’m not proud, but I considered climbing out the window. I didn’t because, well, my pants were at my ankles and I don’t need a new headline in the PTA group chat just yet.

Here’s Why It Set Me Off

This was supposed to be my moment—my goddamn Mount Everest of tranquility. Instead, I’m conducting a full-scale negotiation while sitting on the toilet. I know some saints out there call it “connected parenting,” but I call it “I just want one uninterrupted bowel movement before I die.”

The chaos is relentless. You know when you’re so tired you forget if you already shampooed your hair, so you do it again (or never at all)? That’s how today felt, just in bodily function form. The bathroom was my fort, my panic room, my last stand—and they still breached the damn walls. And don’t give me that “just ignore them” advice. Have you met a preschooler? They escalate faster than a reality TV fight. My own bladder became collateral damage in the ongoing war against personal space.

What Actually Helped

Okay, here’s the trick I started using. I’m not about to tell you to “just build independence” or any of that Stepford crap. No, friend. Turns out all it took was one special bathroom basket—a bucket of random crap (think stickers, tiny snack packs, yesterday’s Happy Meal toy, whatever bribes I could source)—strategically outside the bathroom door. I call this my Peace Bribery Kit.

I told my kids: every time I go pee, you guys grab something from the basket and literally wait your turn. It’s Pavlovian. They see me head for the bathroom, they sprint for the basket. There’s still pounding (and the occasional argument over a squishy), but I get a window of peace long enough to maybe check Instagram.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s not magical. Sometimes they still storm the gates, and there’s always a risk you’ll run out of surprise loot. But I swear, the percentage of solo pisses has at least doubled. That’s empirical, baby.

This Is My New Normal

Is it dignified? No. But we signed up for the long game here, and sometimes survival is one weird trick and a half-empty basket. This is why I simplify literally everything else in life: I need to save my brainpower for where it matters (like strategic bathroom bribes).

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go raid the dollar store and prepare for round two. Wishing you many silent, sacred minutes for whatever bodily function you choose.

Hot Mess Hacks

Feed the Chaos Sunday Drop: No-Bullshit Survival Meal Plan

Potty Mouth Panda

Alright, Breathe, You’re Not Alone

Congrats! You survived last week and didn’t burn the house down. Or maybe just a little. Either way—fuck it, new week, new possibilities for controlled chaos. I handled the food stress for you, so your biggest decision can be which sweatpants to shamefully wear on Zoom. Let’s make it through the minefield of hungry gremlins (kids, partners, yourself at 4 p.m.) with a plan that might actually work. Here’s the damage:

Breakfast Lineup: Choose Your Fighter

  • Breakfast Quesadillas: Scrambled eggs, cheese, and the stuff you forgot you bought, grilled in tortillas. Hot sauce optional, but recommended for sanity.
  • Yogurt Parfait Station: Throw a tub of yogurt, some berries, and whatever crunchy stuff you’ve got into a bowl. Bam! Breakfast illusion.
  • Sneaky Oatmeal Bake: Dump oats, mash bananas, toss chocolate chips if you want. Oven does the work. Tastes like effort (but isn’t).

Lunches That Won’t Make You Hate Everything

  • Deli Roll-Ups: Tortillas + deli meat + cheese + greens if you’re feeling alive. Roll, slice, eat with your hands like a civilized beast.
  • Leftover Remix Bowls: Take the previous night’s dinner, dump it over rice, and boom—new meal. No shame, zero waste.
  • Chicken Salad Jars: Chuck chicken, crunchy crap (celery, apples, whatever), and enough mayo to make you care. Stuff in a jar, grab and go.

Snacks to Survive the Late-Afternoon Rage

  • Peanut Butter + Fruit Everything: Apples, bananas, a spoon… you get it. No assembly line needed.
  • DIY Popcorn Bar: Microwave a bag and hand your gremlins spice shakers. Everyone wins, kitchen stays intact.

Dinner—Six Ways to Keep Your Shit Together

  • Sticky Garlic Chicken + Broccoli: Toss chicken and broccoli on a tray, slather with sticky garlicky sauce, roast until tasty.
  • Weeknight Tacos: Anything can go in a taco. Beans, meat, a smug sense of superiority. People think you worked hard. You didn’t.
  • Pasta Dump Casserole: Literally pasta + sauce + cheese + random cooked vegetables. Bake till bubbly. Approval rating: high.
  • Sheet Pan Sausage & Veg: Minimal chopping, one pan. Little effort, lots of flavor. No one complains.
  • Creamy Tomato Soup + Grilled Cheese: Satisfies even your grumpy inner child. Five ingredients, max.
  • Baked Potato Bar: Line up toppings (cheese, beans, broccoli, leftovers) and let the herd go wild. Dinner with zero negotiation.

Why This Plan Actually Works (For People Who Have Shit to Do)

  • Zero fancy stuff. Unless “fancy” means you grated your own cheese instead of pretending the bag counts as a vegetable.
  • Snacks you can throw from across the room. Not that I’ve tried. (I have.)
  • Leftover magic built in. The food hustles for you.
  • Everything can be eaten in a car, at a desk, or in a locked bathroom. We get it.
  • No hour-long kitchen hostage situations. Five minutes, max for most lunches.

This is the overview. The full plan lives inside Feed the Chaos. Get the whole damn guide here.

Fuck-It Fridays

Fuck It Friday: You’re Not Failing Just Because You Let the Screen Babysit

Potty Mouth Panda

Let’s Get Real: The Tablet Babysitter Isn’t the Devil

I’m going for the jugular right away: letting your kid crash-land with a screen for more than the recommended number of minutes per day does NOT make you lazy or a failure. It makes you a goddamn survivor. We’re all rationing our energy, not competing in the Parent Olympics.

Give Yourself the Fucking Permission Slip

If you need a sign, here: It’s okay to shove a tablet into your kid’s jelly-covered hands so you can breathe, shower, or stare at the wall digesting existential dread for a hot minute. It’s also okay to not want to play imaginary pet shop, listen to neon-screechy toys, or role-play Bluey for the ten thousandth time. This is not negligence. This is called ‘parenting with the resources available.’

Shame is Trash—You’re Smarter Than That

Ever heard that whispering voice in your head? The one barfing guilt because some parenting influencer claims screens are the gateway to toddler hell? Yeah, give that voice the finger. The only thing you’re “ruining” is your martyr complex, and wasn’t that sucking the life out of you anyway?

Newsflash: a sane, functioning parent (ish) is better than an off-the-rails perfect parent. The former makes PBJs while doomscrolling. The latter snaps and considers faking their own disappearance by 3 PM.

The Reframe: One Hour of Screen Time ≠ Kid-Doom

Your children will not dissolve into screen-zombies or lose their souls to YouTube Kids because you needed peace to answer emails, take a dump, or plug your leaking sanity. Kids are adaptable. You’re not resetting their IQ. You’re coping, and coping is not a crime—it’s a skill they’ll need too. No parent in the history of ever has finished a day congratulating themselves on the number of “wholesome activities” checked off if they sacrificed their last shreds of patience to get there. But you know what feels fucking great? Being able to smile at your kid because you got a breather from them.

Deep Breath. Permission Granted. Now Go Scroll TikTok in the Bathroom

Seriously, everyone’s pulling shortcuts somewhere. Letting your kid zone out with Puppy Playhouse or whatever preschooler fever-dream monstrosity they love is not the end. It’s called triage. You are officially allowed to breathe. You don’t need to confess this to anyone; you’re not on trial. Go sink into your phone on the porcelain throne and let the guilt flush right down with everything else.

Give yourself the same forgiveness you offer your exhausted, messy friends. Life’s too short to care what some imaginary judge is thinking about your afternoon coping tools. Fuck it—it’s Friday.

WTFs for Dinner

WTF’s for Dinner Wednesday: Sheet Pan Chicken Fajita Hack

Potty Mouth Panda

WTF: Why Sheet Pan Chicken Fajitas?

It’s Wednesday. The universe is trolling you. The fridge is half-empty and your patience is emptier. Enter: sheet pan chicken fajitas. Throw shit on a tray, shove it in the oven, and pretend you planned it this way. Dinner = sorted, no skill (or sanity) required. No six pans. No flavors so “bold” your kids are planning a mutiny.

Ingredients

  • 1 1/2 lbs boneless, skinless chicken breast or thighs (about 3 big-ass pieces)
  • 3 bell peppers (literally any color your people don’t whine about)
  • 1 medium yellow onion
  • 2 tablespoons olive oil or whatever oil isn’t expired
  • 1 packet fajita seasoning OR:
    • 1 1/2 tsp chili powder
    • 1 tsp cumin
    • 1 tsp smoked paprika
    • 3/4 tsp salt (or just wing it)
    • 1/2 tsp garlic powder
    • 1/2 tsp onion powder
    • 1/4 tsp black pepper
  • 8 small flour or corn tortillas
  • Whatever the hell toppings you like: sour cream, shredded cheese, salsa, avocado, lime wedges

Instructions

  1. Heat that oven. Crank it up to 425°F (218°C). Line a rimmed sheet pan with foil or don’t, depending how awful you want cleanup to be.
  2. Slice the life out of it. Chop chicken into strips. Slice peppers and onion thin-ish. Don’t overthink it. Uniform-ish is fine.
  3. Dump & toss. Throw chicken, peppers, and onion on the sheet pan. Drizzle with oil. Sprinkle with all the seasoning. Toss with your hands like you’re just done. Spread it out in an even-ish layer.
  4. Bake & ignore. Roast for 20-25 min until chicken is cooked and shit gets a little brown at the edges. If you want to show off, broil it for 2 extra minutes at the end to char the edges.
  5. Warm tortillas. Wrap ‘em in foil and throw on a lower oven rack the last 5 min, or nuke them. Whatever.
  6. Serve. Shove everything in tortillas. Let everyone slap on whatever toppings keep them from whining.

Swaps + Shortcuts

  • Chicken: Got thighs? Even juicier. Leftover rotisserie? Cut roasting to 10 min, just char the veggies.
  • Kid allergies: Sub tofu (pressed dry), shrimp, beef strips, or canned black beans.
  • Veg haters: Swap an extra onion for a bell pepper. Use only red peppers—they’re sweeter and less likely to inspire anti-veg speeches.
  • Super broke? Half the chicken, double the veg. Or use the budget “chicken breast strips” that look depressing but taste fine when roasted.
  • Spice wimps? Use HALF the seasoning. No shame in basic.
  • Tortilla swap: Whatever’s cheapest or GF or whatever’s mangled in the back of your breadbox. Rice bowls? Also legal.
  • Time crunch? Buy pre-chopped fajita veg. Minimal soul-crushing effort required.

Why This Actually Works

You get dinner in 30 minutes, piss-all effort, and fewer dishes than you have clean spoons. The flavors taste like you ordered takeout but you can claim it’s “home cooked.” Kids can DIY their own, so nobody blames you for putting beans on a tortilla. Make this once and you’ll wonder why anyone ever messed around with frying pans on a Wednesday.

This is the kind of recipe I build my weekly plans around.

Parenting in the Wild

The Magic Disappearing Shoes: A Monday in Parenting Mayhem

Potty Mouth Panda

Where in the Actual Hell Are Your Shoes?

At 7:36am Monday, my youngest hit me with seven of the eleven possible crises that occur before school. Socks fell off somewhere mysterious. Cat puked on backpack. Someone (probably me, but I’m pleading the fifth) forgot to put the ice pack back in the freezer. But the crowning moment—the spicy little chili on my existential breakfast taco—was when my kid asked, deadpan, “Where are my shoes?”

I counted to ten. Silently. Because if I spoke, only expletives would come out. Those shoes were on his feet, in our house, ten hours ago. Where did they go? No one knows. Not the dog (he tried to eat a Croc, but the shoes in question were non-edible, two-day-old sneakers). Not the older sibling (wouldn’t mind, couldn’t care less). Not even me. My IQ drops by half every Monday morning. That’s just science.

We tore the house apart. Like a SWAT team with no plan. Under beds, behind toilets (ask no questions: I have boys), inside the oven—listen, motherhood is a horror film sometimes, and the jump scares are shoes. Clock ticks. Bus ETA: three minutes. Kid looking at me, unbothered, as if he is not about to be the shoeless weirdo at school.

Why Mondays Destroy Souls

Here’s why this hit like a meteor straight to my frontal cortex. Monday is the Reset of Doom. Everything seems possible. Coffee’s fresh. You’re about to slay the week, maybe even brush your hair. But nope. Life is a prank show and your kids are the hosts.

It’s not about the shoes, right? It’s about the never-ending, soul-punching list of things you have to keep track of in your parental brain. Left shoe. Right shoe. Water bottle. Permission slip. Snacks. That stupid science diorama. If any single piece falls out of mental Tetris, everything crashes.

I know, “just be more organized!” Fuck off, Sharon. My organizational system is a sticky note pyramid and a hope spiral. I’m only human. Monday is a tornado. My kid’s disappearing shoes just happened to fly out of it this time.

The Actual Trick That Saved My Sanity

You know what I ended up doing? I stopped looking for the shoes. Like, I just… quit. My kid cried for a minute, and I let him. I forced myself to leave the mess, the missing Nikes, the guilt pile on the floor.

Instead, I handed him the last pair of shoes that fit (sorta, maybe-marginally legal by school standards), and said, “Congrats, you get to be the kid with Halloween skeleton shoes in May. Let’s go.”

Was it a parenting gold-medal moment? Hell, no. But here’s the deal: sometimes letting go of the idea that you have to solve every mini-disaster is the move. My tip? Pick one—just ONE—thing to drop in the heat of chaos. Let a ball hit the floor. Let the universe roll its eyes. You’ll survive. Your kids will, too.

Parenting, Man. It’s Just Shoes.

We both survived. The world didn’t end. When I stopped making lost shoes The Problem of the Month, everything chilled a little. Maybe it’s not about finding some inner zen—but sometimes you have to accept you’re gonna be the family known for odd shoes and messy mornings. So be it.

This is why I pre-pack backpacks at night, even when my body wants to rot on the couch.

Hot Mess Hacks

Feed the Chaos Sunday Drop: The Week You Don’t Have to Wing Shit

Potty Mouth Panda

We’re Not Doing the Frantic, Empty Fridge Stare This Week

Let’s cut the chaos. Another week, another round of me staring into the fridge, willing a dinner to materialize, only to discover the only edible thing is a shriveled carrot and a stick of butter. Not this time. This week, you get an actual game plan—food lined up, no fridge sobbing, no disappointing “snack-as-dinner” move on Thursday. Ready? Let’s go.

Breakfast: Hearty, Fast, or Just Not Annoying

  • Overnight PB&J Oats – Grab it cold, works even when you’re late as hell.
  • Egg & Veggie Breakfast Burritos – Freezer stashed, microwave magic, zero effort beyond that.
  • Cottage Cheese & Sriracha Toast – Protein you’ll actually taste. Weirdly addictive, don’t knock it.

Lunch: Not a Sad Sandwich

  • Big-Ass Chickpea Salad – Chopped, tossed, and lives happily in the fridge for a couple days.
  • Buffalo Chicken Wraps – Rotisserie saves you, buffalo sauce wakes you up.
  • DIY Sushi Bowls – Rice, seaweed, whatever sad veggies need using, plus soy sauce for flavor drama.

Snacks: For When You’re About to Lose It

  • Hot Honey Crackers & Cheese – Damn near gourmet if you use the good stuff (but the cheap stuff works too).
  • Fruit + Nut Butter Dunks – Actual fruit, not fruit snacks. Scoop it, dunk it, get on with your life.

Dinners: The Real Reason You’re Here

  • One-Pan Spicy Sausage & Broccoli – Weeknight effort level: minimal. Tastes like you tried harder.
  • Better-Than-Takeout Teriyaki Tofu Bowls – Sauce heavy, tofu that doesn’t suck.
  • Lemon Dill Baked Chicken Thighs – Toss in the oven, walk away, return to applause (even if you’re alone).
  • Queso-Stuffed Peppers – A veggie is involved, but you still get melty cheese. Win-win.
  • Sheet Pan Salsa Salmon – Fast, no fishy nightmares, would actually impress a date (or your own damn self).
  • Greek-Style Stewed Beans & Greens – Hearty, filling, one pot, actually tastes like something your body will thank you for.

Why This Plan Doesn’t Suck

  • No weird, single-use ingredients to rot in the crisper drawer.
  • You don’t have to prep for three hours on Sunday (unless you like that torture).
  • Comfort eats + some veggies, so you’re not surviving on air and caffeine.
  • Flexible enough for swapping in random leftovers or bonus snacks.
  • Zero judgment if you swap two meals or skip a snack—I’m not the boss of you.

Want the Full Plan and All the Chaos Taming Details?

This is the overview. The full plan lives inside Feed the Chaos. Get it here.

Fuck-It Fridays

Fuck It Friday: Dinner Didn’t Need to Be Fancy (And It Never Will)

Potty Mouth Panda

Strong Opening: Fancy Dinner? In This Economy?

Let’s just get one blindingly obvious thing out of the way: nobody—and I mean nobody—has ever landed in jail for feeding their kids frozen chicken nuggets for dinner. If you’re out here hand-wringing about whether it’s a crime that you microwaved three kinds of beige food last night, I’m gonna stop you right there. It’s not a crime. It’s not even a misdemeanor. That’s just called Tuesday.

Normalize the Shortcut: Frozen Is a Fucking Category

Frozen food is not a desperate hissy fit. It’s not failure. It’s a whole-ass category of food, right next to “sandwiches” and “whatever is about to go off in the fridge.” You don’t get extra credit for hand-spiralizing zucchini after work when you’ve got a 24-pack bag of pizza rolls with your name on it. Nobody at the Pearly Gates is checking your breading technique.

Snack plates? That’s called being a genius. Some people call it a “charcuterie board” and charge $39 for four pieces of cheese and three grapes. You call it a snack plate and suddenly people clutch their pearls. Screw ‘em. Pickles, crackers, a few sad slices of turkey, and a fistful of pretzels totally count. Throw a fruit on there if you’re feeling fancy. Boom—nutritional balance.

Reframe the Guilt: Bare Minimum = Survival Strategy

You know what’s genuinely exhausting? Acting like you have to audition for Top Chef just to feed yourself and your heathens each night. Who the hell came up with that expectation? Every kid everywhere will survive on dino nuggets, applesauce, and shredded cheese as their sole food groups for a full month and come out of it just fine. Science hasn’t proved it yet, but I’m fucking positive.

Let go of the pressure that you need to perform dinnertime theater. Survival eats are smart eats. The bare minimum is your friend when life is chaos, and let’s be honest, life is mostly chaos. Most of us don’t have an inner Martha Stewart, and if we do she’s probably in witness protection by now. You fend off meltdowns and get calories in stomachs. Gold fucking star. Truly.

Closing: Take a Breath and Pass the Nuggets

If your dinner table looks like a frozen-food graveyard tonight, you nailed it. If you scrounged up cereal and string cheese and called it cuisine, you nailed it. No one’s spirit will shatter because you phoned it in after a long-ass week. Feeding your people doesn’t have to look luxurious to be good enough.

Dinner was always food, not performance art. Eat, don’t apologize. Fuck it and move on.

WTFs for Dinner

WTF’s for Dinner Wednesday: Lazy-Ass Sheet Pan Chicken Parm

Potty Mouth Panda

Why Chicken Parm, Why Now?

Buckle up, because we’re not doing another sad spaghetti or dry-ass chicken breast tonight. Nope. We’re leveling up to Chicken Parmesan but without the restaurant bills, piles of dirty dishes, or an existential crisis about how long dinner takes. Sheet pan, baby. Kitchen mess? Minimal. Hotline to the pizza joint? Not needed.

What You Need (For Four Kinda-Hungry Humans)

  • 4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts (or thighs, you rebel)
  • 1 cup panko breadcrumbs (or use regular breadcrumbs if your store sucks)
  • 1/2 cup grated Parmesan (from the green can, I won’t judge)
  • 1 tsp garlic powder
  • 1 tsp dried Italian herbs (or just oregano if that’s all you got)
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1/4 tsp black pepper
  • 2 eggs
  • 1 cup store-bought marinara sauce
  • 1 cup shredded mozzarella
  • Some damn olive oil (about 2 tbsp, but we’re not measuring today)
  • Optional: handful fresh basil if you want to pretend you’re fancy
  • Whatever pasta, rice, or rolls you want on the side (or skip it)

How NOT to Ruin This (Instructions)

  1. Preheat your oven to 425°F. Don’t forget or it’ll take forever. Line a big-ass baking sheet with foil for easy cleanup. Spray or brush with a little oil, unless you like scraping crusty bits after.
  2. Pound the chicken flat-ish, about 3/4-inch thick. If you don’t own a meat mallet, slap it with a rolling pin or your aggressive frustration. Salt and pepper both sides.
  3. Mix panko, Parmesan, garlic powder, herbs, salt, and pepper in a shallow bowl. In another bowl, beat the eggs. You know where this is going: dunk each chicken piece in egg, then breadcrumbs, coat both sides, and toss ‘em on the sheet pan.
  4. Drizzle or spray with olive oil. Don’t drown ‘em, just enough so the tops aren’t sad and dry.
  5. Bake for 18 minutes. Top each with spoonful of marinara and a heroic mound of mozzarella. Bake 6-7 more min until melty and good. Chicken should hit 165°F inside if you care about not poisoning your family.
  6. Optional: squidgy handful fresh basil over the top if you’re feeling it.
  7. Serve right on the damn sheet pan with pasta, rice, steamed frozen broccoli, or literally just a big hunk of bread to mop up the cheese lava.

Swaps, Cheats, and Picky Kid Insurance

  • Chicken: Thighs are cheaper and more forgiving than breasts. Or hell, sliced tofu for a veg option.
  • Breadcrumbs: Smash up some old crackers or use crushed cornflakes. Panko is best, but we work with what we’ve got.
  • Cheese: Skip the Parmesan, double the mozz. Use part-skim to avoid an oil slick.
  • Sauce: No marinara? Ketchup and Italian seasoning in a pinch. (Not gourmet, but it’s dinner, move on.)
  • Kids hate green stuff? Hide it under the cheese, or leave it off. Drop the herbs if that’s a fight starter.
  • No eggs? Use milk, yogurt, or even mayo as a sticking agent in the breading step. No one will know.

Why Your Life Just Got Easier

There are like three things to wash. Zero babysitting. The only thing complicated about this is hiding leftovers from snack goblins in your house. Mess stays on the pan; you stay sane. Budget win, taste win, sheet pan hero. Try not to eat straight from the pan (or do, I’m not your boss).

This is the kind of recipe I build my weekly plans around.

Parenting in the Wild

Why Is My Kid Suddenly Obsessing Over Socks? (And Other Monday Mysteries)

Potty Mouth Panda

Monday: Bringing the Chaos Like a Champ

I knew exactly 0 seconds of peace this morning. I had what I thought was a firm grip on life: lunches were packed, reminders were set, and I even had the audacity to enjoy a hot coffee before waking up the gremlins—uh, children.

Enter the Monday Plot Twist. The seven-year-old—usually prone to meltdowns over things like which hoodie is the only acceptable one—today decided that wearing any socks at all was a crime against humanity. Seriously? We’ve worn socks every damn day for YEARS. Suddenly they’re the devil?

It went from casual negotiation to outright shouting in under a minute. “These are bumpy!” “These are slidey!” “My toes are TRAPPED!” Like, kid, what do you want from me, a silk foot-glove personally spun by angels?! I just stood there (socks in hand, wild hair, coffee abandoned, eye twitching) wondering how the hell we got here. The clock was yelling at us to move faster. The older kid was making a peanut butter tornado in the kitchen. My brain evaporated.

Why It Pissed Me Off So Much

Of all the things to battle about, SOCKS? The morning was already a high-wire act. We were running late. I had to be logged in for work in, oh, 23 minutes. Nothing makes you question your life choices quite like trying to rationalize with a tiny human losing their actual mind over cotton foot tubes.

This wasn’t just any old meltdown, though. It was a sneak attack, and what really got me was how fast everything spiraled. There’s no warning siren for this level of chaos. I couldn’t fix it, couldn’t logic my way out. Just stood there, my mental to-do list bursting at the seams, wondering if Oprah does giveaways for personal assistants who handle sock drama.

Part of me was just plain tired of having to be the human sponge soaking up everyone’s stress and odd hang-ups. Why does the universe choose to fuck with me over things no one warns you about in the parenting manuals?

What Actually Got Us Out The Door

Okay, here’s where I copped out and stopped fighting. I gave the kid a choice: shoes with no socks (FINE, rebel, whatever), shoes with the thinnest socks I could find, or rain boots “just for fun”—because sometimes bribery is fine. The real trick wasn’t even giving the choice; it was letting my panic simmer down for a damn second.

When everything is going off the rails, my one practical hack is this: stop. Just ask: “Is this actually going to matter by noon?” Half the time, I can let the battle go, or at least choose a different hill to die on. Kid went to school in rain boots. Was it the weirdest look? Yes. Did anyone die or get arrested? No. Did I still hate Mondays? Also yes, but at least everyone survived.

Gentle Close (Kinda)

Some Mondays, the chaos wins. But sometimes the hack is literally just: let the little crap slide, and save your energy for the weird existential stuff that’ll definitely be next.

This kind of Monday makes me triple down on prepping what I can (and always having extra socks in every imaginable freakin’ texture).