Ellie: Nekkid Waldorf Chicken Wraps

Jessica of Johnstone's Vin Blanc chose this weeks recipe for CEiMB, Waldorf Chicken Wraps. I fully intended to photograph and eat this in wrap form, but due to rushed lunch-packing and rushed picture taking, my chicken salad has yet to don a wrap.


I was happy to see this pick, because it is a perfect, portable lunch choice. I work in a field in which a 10 hour day is just a normal, ordinary workday, and during busy times, the hours can get much longer than that. But I've been working part-time ever since I had kids, which means that I have a limited amount of time in the office and usually have a lot to do in a short amount of time. Therefore, I don't usually leave my desk for lunch. Also, I'm kind of lazy -- that's another reason I don't leave my desk. Inertia just tends to take over, and unless acted upon by an outside force, the walk to Chick-Fil-A just never seems worth it. I will even go to great lengths to avoid having to walk downstairs two floors to heat something up in the microwave, such as buying Thermos hot food containers, or eating food cold that should be warm. So this Waldorf Chicken salad is really the perfect lunch for me. I could pack it in my pink Pottery Barn Kids lunch box in the morning, and enjoy it at noon with minimal movement required.

Yogurt replaces the usual mayonnaise in this chicken salad (there's just a touch of mayonnaise in the dressing). I used nonfat Greek yogurt, which I somehow lived without for 35 years, but I have no idea how. Ever since I discovered it last year (thank you, food blogging community!) it has been as much of a staple in my house as bread or milk. Lemon juice, dijon mustard, thyme, salt and pepper round out the dressing, and grapes, apples, and toasted walnuts combine with the chicken to create the salad. I know that I have walnuts somewhere around here, but I couldn't for the life of me find them while I was making this, so I used almonds instead.

Result: I really like this chicken salad. While it might not be the best chicken salad I've ever had, it is light, flavorful and perfect for the ol' lunchbox. I'll make this one again -- might even wrap it next time. Thanks Jessica!

Ellie: Chicken Saté with Spicy Peanut Dipping Sauce

I got to choose this week's recipe for CEiMB, and I picked the Chicken Saté with Spicy Peanut Dipping Sauce. I had a hard time choosing, of course, but since this one was on my short list back in January when I picked for the first time, when I saw that it was still available, I decided to go for it. After I sent my email to Sara, I suffered some picker's remorse and commenced serious hand wringing and second guessing. The ingredient list is so long! We just recently (like last week!) made recipes that had an Asian flair - is this redundant?! What will the vegetarians do?! What if everyone hates it?! But once I made it, I relaxed and felt really good about this pick. Let's face it: there's just something fun about food on a stick.


Despite the long ingredient list, both the marinade and the sauce came together pretty quickly. The chicken marinates for an hour in a marinade of chicken broth, light coconut milk, soy sauce, shallot, garlic, fish sauce (or more soy sauce, which is what I used), dark brown sugar, lime zest, and ginger. Then Ellie says to thread the chicken on skewers and grill in a grill pan, but when I tried them in a grill pan, the chicken would not lie flat because the long skewers came up over the rim of the pan. So I moved them over to a regular grill:



I'd skip the skewers next time I want to do this in a grill pan. Skewers or no skewers, this one is going to end up being a finger food - fair warning.

The chicken gets garnished with peanuts, basil and cilantro (except if you hate cilantro, then for the love -- don't use it!)

The chicken was great on its own. But hubs and I agreed that it was the peanut sauce that made this dish really outstanding. I mixed up all of the sauce ingredients with my trusty immersion blender: creamy peanut butter, chicken broth, soy sauce, dark brown sugar, lime juice, ginger, garlic, red pepper flakes, red curry paste, and a shallot.



The sauce was sweet, spicy, smooth, creamy and utterly irresistible. I was so glad that it was just hubs and I eating this so any bowl-licking that took place could be overlooked. As good as the chicken was, next time I'm likely to just make the sauce and serve it with simple chicken grilled with salt and pepper - I felt like the sauce is what gave this dish most of its flavor, anyway. Ellie mentions that it's a "sublime" dip for raw vegetables, and I think it would be wonderful with grilled vegetables or tofu as well, or in a Thai noodle bowl -- so I really hope that the non-meat eaters in the group were able to find a way to enjoy this fabulous peanut sauce.

I hope that everyone enjoyed this recipe as much as we did!

Chicken Saté with Spicy Peanut Dipping Sauce, 2006 Ellie Krieger, All Rights Reserved

Ingredients

1/2 cup low-sodium chicken stock
1/2 cup lite coconut milk
2 tablespoons low-sodium soy sauce
1 shallot, sliced thin
1 clove garlic, minced
1 1/2 teaspoons Thai fish sauce (or 2 additional teaspoons low sodium soy sauce)
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon lime zest
1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger
1 pound skinless, boneless chicken breast pounded slightly and cut into 1-inch strips

Directions

8 (8-inch) bamboo skewers, soaked for 20 minutes

3/4 cup Spicy Peanut Dipping Sauce, recipe below
2 tablespoons minced fresh basil or cilantro leaves
1/4 cup chopped toasted peanuts
In a medium sized bowl, whisk together the chicken stock, coconut milk, soy sauce, shallot, garlic, fish sauce, brown sugar, lime zest, and ginger. Add the chicken strips and marinate for 1 hour. Remove the chicken from the marinade and discard the marinade.

Spray a nonstick grill pan with cooking spray and preheat over a medium-high flame. While pan is heating, thread chicken onto skewers. Grill 2 to 3 minutes per side, until meat is cooked through and has light grill marks.

Serve chicken skewers with Peanut Dipping Sauce, and garnish with basil or cilantro and chopped peanuts.

Yield: 4 servings (2 skewers and 2 tablespoons peanut sauce per serving)

Spicy Peanut Dipping Sauce:

1/2 cup natural creamy peanut butter
1/4 cup low-sodium chicken broth
3 tablespoons low-sodium soy sauce
1 1/2 tablespoons brown sugar
1 1/2 tablespoons minced fresh ginger
2 tablespoons lime juice
1 teaspoon minced garlic
1/2 teaspoon chili flakes
1 teaspoon red curry paste
1 shallot, peeled and roughly chopped

Place all ingredients in blender and blend until smooth.

Sauce can be made 1 day ahead of time, and will keep 3 to 4 days in the refrigerator.

Yield: about 1 1/4 cups

Barefoot Bloggers: Croque Monsieur, and Craving Ellie: Balsamic White Wine Chicken with Spinach and Couscous Brown Rice

Kathy of All Food Considered chose this week's Barefoot Bloggers dish, Croque Monsieur. This recipe appears in Ina's book "Barefoot in Paris," which, as luck would have it, I recently bought for myself to celebrate the fact that I hadn't bought myself a cookbook in a couple of months. All you Ina and Jeffrey fans out there will love flipping through this book and reading about those two crazy lovebirds flitting around Paris with their tent, feasting on fine bread and cheese for a mere five dollars a day. Love this book!


While there are a lot of enticing dishes in Barefoot in Paris, it was the croque monsieur that called my name when I first read through the book. Casual French bistro food is my kind of French food, and to me, the croque monsieur, which is essentially a pimped out ham & cheese sandwich, epitomizes casual French bistro food.

The recipe calls for Virginia Ham. I knew immediately that I was going to have to hunt down some Boar's Head ham. I had Boar's Head deli meat for the first time when I was a student in Charlottesville. There was a really great deli close to where I lived called . . . actually, I don't know what it was really called. We all called it Fancy Exxon, because (1) it was fancy, and (2) it was in an Exxon station. Creative bunch, we law students. Anyway, they served Boar's Head meat, and their superb sandwiches stood out even in a really great sandwich town. If Boar's Head ham is not the best deli ham in the world, please don't tell me, because it would completely shatter my entire worldview in a way that I might not be able to put back together. Thanks. Anyway, for my croque monsieur, Boar's Head ham it was!

Start out by making the cheese sauce - melt butter, add flour, pour in milk and whisk until thickened. Off the heat, add in salt, pepper, gruyère, parmesan, and nutmeg. Confession: I skipped the nutmeg. I have tried to like nutmeg over and over again, but I just can't live a lie anymore. If it is not on eggnog between December 23 and 26, I don't like it.

Spread some toasted white bread with dijon mustard and top with ham and gruyère. Assemble sandwiches and slather with the cheese sauce. Top with yet more gruyère, bake for 5 minutes, then broil for another 3-5 minutes until topping is bubbly and browned.

Results: I loved this sandwich. The gruyère adds a sophisticated note to it (or, at the very least, it ensures that nobody in your house under the age of 7 will eat it), but at its core it is a comfort food. David liked this as well, although probably not quite as much as I did, because he's not as much of a fan of gruyère. Same old story with the kids -- my youngest gobbled it up, my older two refused it in highly dramatic fashion. Yawn. Great pick, Kathy -- this one totally lived up to my high expectations!



Marthe of Culinary Delights chose this weeks Craving Ellie dish, Balsamic Chicken with Baby Spinach and Couscous. I wasn't 100% sure until I got going, but I'd actually made this one before. I remember reading Ellie's intro to the recipe: "As a busy mom who is really cranky when she's hungry, I need delicious rush-hour meals I can get on the table fast" and feeling an instant kinship. Of course, we all know there is a new word for the "cranky when hungry" phenomenon, "hangry." I think that hangry is destined to enter the OED within the next five years. Some words that recently entered the English language, as determined by the Oxford English Dictionary, include "bahookie" (n., a person's buttocks), "celebutante" (n., a celebrity who is well known in fashionable society), "crunk" (n., a type of hip hop music characterized by repeated shouted catchphrases - a combination of "crazy" and "drunk"), "obesogenic" (adj., tending to cause obesity), and "Yogalates" (n., fitness routine that combines Pilates exercises with the postures and breathing techniques of yoga). Actually, I changed my mind -- hangry will be in the dictionary within three years.

Well, Ellie is not joking - you really can get this one on the table quickly, thereby minimizing the consequences of your hanger. Put a little salt & pepper on the chicken and saute in a tablespoon of olive oil. Remove from skillet. Wilt some baby spinach in garlic and a little oil. Remove from skillet. In the same skillet, make a sauce of balsamic vinegar (I used white wine vinegar because I was out of balsamic. Who runs out of balsamic?), chicken broth, and diced canned tomatoes, and deglaze the pan. Put the chicken and spinach on couscous (I used brown rice) and top with the sauce.

This is undeniably quick, but I think there has got to be a way to jazz up that sauce a bit without adding a whole lot of extra time. I realize that by definition we are already in a foul mood when we are making this one, but nobody is going to get hurt if we take the few extra seconds to throw in few red pepper flakes or some kalamata olives. I love the basic idea of this recipe, but for me, the vinegar, broth and canned tomatoes alone just don't provide enough flavor. There are a thousand different ways to amp up the flavor in here, and I will try one of them next time. But you can't go wrong with the chicken, spinach and tomato foundation of this dish. I bet that my CEiMB pals did all kinds of creative things with this, and I can't wait to read everyone's posts. I will definitely make this again with a few changes. Thanks for the great pick, Marthe!

Barefoot: Tomato Goat Cheese Tart and Ellie: Chicken with Mango Barbecue Sauce

When you have a library full of cookbooks, as many of us do, it can be really hard to decide what to make. Many recipes look good, but are they really good? Internet recipe sites can be helpful for answering that question; many recipes are online and have been reviewed by numerous cooks. Reading food blogs, of course, is my favorite ways to get the real scoop on recipes -- food that is tested in advance by people I virtually know and really trust? You can't go wrong there. But if ever have to make a really important dinner or dessert, and I need it to be good, I might just ask myself "What would Anne Strawberry pick?" Or better yet, I'll just ask Anne herself! Because since I've been blogging, Anne has chosen at least three recipes that I can think of: Ina's Apple Turnovers, Dorie's Tall & Creamy Cheesecake, and now this week's Barefoot recipe, Tomato and Goat Cheese Tarts, that have made me want to head straight to the highest mountain I can find and give her a loud, echoing shout-out of gratitude.

This tart was simply delicious. Here is a large view of my tart, sideways:


Don't you feel like the sideways orientation really captures the essence of this savory tart? What's that you say? No, it just makes you kind of dizzy? Sorry about that. Last night Blogger started flipping my tart pictures, which had been oriented horizontally, and made them portrait. I tried to outsmart Blogger by going into my pictures and changing them to portrait, hoping that then Blogger would then flip them to landscape when I uploaded, but no, Blogger apparently likes them vertical. Here is the thing about me and technology: it is A MIRACLE that I figured out how to set up a blog by myself, and that I managed to figure out how to upload pictures, underline things, and other basic blogging tasks. My hubs still has to upload music onto my iPod for me. He tries to explain it to me, but I just hear "blah, blah, blah." NOT that he does not explain it in an interesting manner, but I just don't have the gene that makes things like that intuitive to me. So my point is, yes, I have mastered the technical basics of blogging, but it is still very precarious, because if Blogger doesn't want to work correctly for me, I'll never be able to figure out how to fix it. It will just have to fix itself, or I'll be posting sideways pictures forever. Sorry!



Well, back to the tart. It is fabulous. It is made on frozen puff pastry, and the pastry puffs up beautifully around the tomatoes, basil and goat cheese filling. This is super easy to make - saute onions, garlic, add white wine, thyme, salt and pepper. Roll out the puff pastry and trace two 6 inch circles on each sheet (I cut the recipe in half and just made one sheet). I just scrounged around until I found a plate that was about the right size -- no need to go out and buy a compass or anything. Score a half inch border, and fill inside of the border with the onion mixture, herbed goat cheese, and a slice of tomato. Brush the tomato lightly with olive oil and top with fresh basil, salt and pepper, and a few shards of fresh parmesan. Bake 20 to 25 minutes until the pastry is puffy and browned. I used a few plum tomato slices rather than one larger tomato slice because that's what I had, but the good thing about a recipe like this is that the tomato will get roasted, which brings out the flavor in even a sub par grocery store tomato. Of course, I can't wait for the farmer's market to open so that I can make this with really delicious tomatoes -- even better!

David and I really enjoyed this. I think I loved it more than he did, but his nature is more reserved in general than mine is, and he tends not to gush over things as effusively as I do when I love something. So maybe he did love it as much as I did, but just showed his love differently (i.e. D - "This is really good!" as opposed to C - "OH. MY. HOLY. LORD. (puts fork down dramatically) Can you even believe this tart? I can't even believe this tart. *sigh* I love Ina Garten. I love Anne Strawberry. This is the most amazing thing I've ever eaten. Ever! Do you hear me? Ever!"). In any event, this would be perfect for a special luncheon, or, in our case, a regular ol' dinner. Oh, and with the leftover pastry (there was a lot of it!) I sprinkled sugar and cinnamon, rolled up, sliced it into pinwheels, and baked. Great treat!

My great bloggy friend Aggie of Aggie's Kitchen chose the Ellie recipe this week, Chicken with Mango Barbecue Sauce. Blogger apparently thought that these worked just fine horizontally and kept them that way, even though I uploaded them at the same time as the tart pictures.


This is another really easy, gushworthy recipe. This barbecue sauce is FABULOUS!!! The roster of ingredients is long, but it comes together quickly: onion, garlic, red bell pepper, molasses, Worcestershire sauce, allspice, salt, pepper, red wine vinegar, lime juice, tomato sauce, jalapenos, and, of course, mango. Look at how colorful and pretty this is, pre-blending:



I just used my immersion blender (how did I ever live so long without one?) to mix it all up in the saucepan -- so much easier than transferring it to a separate blender! Mine had more of a salsa-like consistency, which I loved, but I could have pureed it longer to get more of a barbecue sauce consistency. What a combination of flavors!! It is sweet, tart, fruity and spicy all at the same time, and it totally WORKS. If I closed my eyes while eating this, I could almost imagine myself sitting on a balcony overlooking the beach -- it just tastes summery and delicious. I served the chicken with roasted vegetables and brown rice, and the next day turned the chicken, vegetables and a little mozzarella into quesadillas, with the sauce on the side. Equally delicious. This one will be a regular in our house. My whole family enjoyed this.

Thank you, Aggie and Anne. We thoroughly enjoyed both of these recipes, and I'll be making them again and again!

Ina Garten's Chicken Piccata and Ellie Krieger's Fish Tacos with Chipotle Cream

It's another Thursday double header today, with the Barefoot Bloggers taking on Ina Garten's Chicken Piccata, and the Craving Ellie in my Belly group cooking up Ellie Kreiger's Fish Tacos with Chipotle Cream. I was a bad, bad Barefoot Blogger in February and failed to post either of the February recipes. I actually made the Real Spaghetti and Meatballs (late) but never got around to posting it (I'll cut out all of the extraneous content that would have been in my post and just say that it was great!). The other February Barefoot recipe was Meringues Chantilly, which really sounded wonderful, but ever since January I started to feel like my days were looking like this: wake up, brush teeth, get kids breakfast, run around all day, make dinner, whip egg whites, go to bed. I felt like I had to take some steps to return egg white whipping to its proper place on my schedule; i.e., an event that takes place no more than quarterly. So I hated to miss that one, but I will be sure to try it sometime down the road!


But I vowed to do better this month, and I've started the Barefoot month off right by making Ina's Chicken Piccata, which was chosen by Lindsey of Noodle Nights and Muffin Mornings. This is a simple dish. It does involve breading chicken, which I rank right up there with making meatballs and squeezing frozen spinach as my most dreaded kitchen tasks. While I am an omnivore, I really hate manhandling raw meat. Touching uncooked meat makes me momentarily reconsider my omnivorous habits, but I just try to keep my eyes on the prize and get those babies in the skillet as quickly as possible. The breading assembly line, which included one dish for the flour/salt/pepper mixture, one for the egg/water mixture, and one for the seasoned bread crumbs:


After browning the chicken in the skillet, move them to a baking sheet and finish them off in the oven. I really like this technique. I often have problems with burning the outside of the chicken when I try to cook it through in the skillet, and this method helped me avoid those problems.

The chicken was delicious on its own, and even my kids liked it. But it's the lemon butter sauce that transforms your dinner from "chicken" into "chicken piccata!"


Ina says to use 1/3 cup of lemon juice, or the juice of two lemons. Well, two of my lemons yielded a little more than 1/2 cup of juice. I decided to give greater weight to the "juice of two lemons" part of Ina's instructions than the "1/3 cup lemon juice" part, probably because I am coming off of a recipe (for lemon cup custards) in which the general consensus was that you could stick a whole lemon tree in there and it still wouldn't taste lemony. As it turns out, that was a mistake -- I should have stuck with 1/3 cup, unless I was also going to increase the amount of butter and white wine proportionally. My sauce was a little bit TOO lemony. I think the goal is to achieve a nice balance between the lemon, wine and butter, but the lemon definitely overpowered in my sauce.

I served the chicken piccata over angel hair, and we really enjoyed it, although again, it was a little too lemony. But this is an easy and flavorful dish that I will make again. I'll just keep in mind next time that this is not a lemon cup custard, in which eggs lie in ambush waiting to suck the life out of any other flavors that dare step onto their turf; it's chicken piccata, and with this chicken piccata, anyway, more is not more when it comes to lemon juice.

ELLIE KRIEGER'S FISH TACOS WITH CHIPOTLE CREAM



I was really excited to see that that Sara from imafoodblog chose Ellie's Fish Tacos with Chipotle Cream for CEIMB this week. One of my new year's resolutions is to cook more fish, and this looked like a simple, non-scary recipe to start with. I think that fish tacos are readily available in many regions (Ellie mentions California), but I am somewhat ashamed to admit that I have never had a fish taco. Also, something about saying "fish tacos" makes me laugh. They remind me of "fish sandwiches," which also makes me laugh, probably because David can do a dead-on impression of the classic line from the old SNL sketch, the Ladies' Man: "Hey sweet thang, can I buy you a fish sandwich?" and every time he does it, it's as funny to me as the first time I heard it.



I really don't need lots of different jokes. The same three or four over and over again work for me. That doesn't bode well for the future of my blog, but it does keep me eminently entertainable with minimal effort on the part of my family and friends, which I view as a plus. So while David does have lots of very funny stuff up his sleeves, he knows that if he is feeling lazy one day, he can just break out the fish sandwich line without ever having to look up from the paper, and I'll be good to go.

Back to the fish tacos. I am happily married, but back in my single days, I could have totally gotten picked up if someone offered to buy me one of these fish tacos. As with many of Ellie's recipes, they offer big flavor with minimal effort. You marinate the fish (I used tilapia fillets from the Publix fish counter) in a simple marinade of olive oil, lime juice, salt and pepper, and then grill them for a few minutes, until they are cooked through. Flake the fish before filling the corn tortillas, and serve them with corn, lime wedges, sliced lettuce or cabbage, and a seriously delicious chipotle cream, which is a very simple mix of plain nonfat yogurt (I used nonfat Greek yogurt), a couple tablespoons of mayonnaise (I think lowfat would be fine), and a couple of teaspoons of minced up chipotle chile in adobo sauce. The finished product is good enough to hold its own with fresh salsa and guacamole in any chip dip contest. It is fabulous on the fish tacos, and we finished it off tonight with some chicken, black bean and veggie quesadillas. It was great with those, too!

I can't think of too many dinners that are faster to throw together than this one, but these tacos are delicious and satisfying enough to serve guests as well. I feel like I am saying this a lot about Ellie's recipes lately, but this one will most definitely be assuming a prime spot in our regular weeknight dinner rotation.

Lindsey and Sara, thanks for the great picks! We ate well this week thanks to you!

CEIMB: Sesame-Teriyaki Chicken Thighs

This week's CEIMB recipe for Sesame-Teriyaki Chicken Thighs was chosen by Jessica of Johnstone's Vin Blanc. I was excited to see this recipe picked; I love Chinese food, but don't cook it nearly enough. I just never think to cook it for some reason. When I mentally travel around the world on those nights when I can't figure out what to make for dinner, I usually don't get any further than Mexico or Italy. But the stars definitely aligned for Chinese food this week. It was already on my brain -- I went out for Chinese with some friends on Saturday night. It's funny, when I worked in a restaurant in my early 20s, everyone once in a while a group of women would come in -- they looked old to me at the time, but they were probably just in their 30s -- and you could just tell by the crazed look in their eyes that they didn't get out much and that this dinner was a BIG DEAL for them. We would groan if they ended up in our section, because it was obvious from the outset that they'd be settling in for the night and laughing too loud at their own dumb jokes.

Well, I am now one of Those Women. It used to be that when we went out for one of these twice-annual GNOs, we'd choose the restaurant based on the quality of the food. Then when we got kicked out of the restaurant we'd move to Starbucks, and when Starbucks closed we'd move to either the parking lot or the Whattaburger (with all of the local high school kids) to continue our Very Important Conversation. At that point, the husbands would start calling to make sure that nobody was in a ditch (I am proud to say that my husband has NEVER rung my phone during a GNO -- he knows me well enough to know that I am not in a ditch, but in a parking lot somewhere turbo-talking, and that I will show up eventually). Anyway, all of that transitioning between talking venues was really disruptive to our conversation flow, so we were thrilled when we stumbled upon this Chinese place, which will let us sit there and gab long enough to cut out the need for the intermediate Starbucks stop. Now it's dinner, and then straight to the parking lot or Whattaburger.

So we had a great time at the Chinese restaurant the other night, and dinner was capped off by the best fortune EVER:

"You will do better in real estate than in stocks."

That is like saying "You will do better in third circle of hell than in the fourth circle" -- but hey, thanks for the heads up, fortune.



So I was looking forward to cooking some Chinese this week. These sesame chicken thighs start with THE BEST TERIYAKI SAUCE EVER!!! I am not kidding -- I could drink this stuff through a straw. It is THAT good. It's made with soy sauce, brown sugar, sherry, rice vinegar, garlic, ginger, and red pepper. SO easy, and amazingly good. I've actually made this once before, and since I knew how good it was I doubled the recipe so that I can use it later this week -- maybe in some fried rice, maybe as a pork tenderloin marinade. It keeps in the fridge for a week, so it makes sense to double it.

Marinate the chicken thighs in a half cup of the sauce, for at least 30 minutes and up to 4 hours. I would say "the longer the better" with the marinating. Mine only marinated for an hour or so, and I didn't think they were quite flavorful enough (which was easily rectified by spooning some of the extra sauce onto the chicken before eating it, but still). So I'd change that instruction to say "marinate for at least four hours, or overnight." After they marinate, broil them for 8 minutes per side, and then add some sesame seeds to the top and broil for another couple of minutes. That's it!

David and I really liked these. The teriyaki sauce will most definitely show up regularly in my rotation, even if I use it on chicken breasts, pork and vegetables more than chicken thighs. Thank you for picking this, Jessica -- we loved it!

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Also, some of my favorite bloggers have recently passed on some very cool awards to me. And very interesting awards, too! I think there should be separate "blog award designer" awards for the behind-the-scenes inventors of Bloggys. Step up and be recognized, people!

In any event, I never thought that anyone would read my blog when I started blogging. In fact, I remember my poor hubs kind of cringing when I first told him that I set up a blog, presumably because he is well aware of my loose cannon tendencies, but I told him that he didn't need to worry, because nobody was going to read it anyway (note that I could not tell him that he didn't need to worry because I would not be a loose cannon). So to know that people actually read my blog, and like it, is really exciting and flattering. These awards come from some of my very favorite bloggers, which makes them all the more thrilling. Thank you!

Some of these awards might come with rules, but despite carrying on on Tuesday about how I am a rule follower, I am just going to pass these out all willy-nilly like, without any regard for the rules. Yes, it does make me kind of uncomfortable.

Barbara at Barbara Bakes passed on the Kreative Blogger Award:



I am going to pass this on to the wonderful Vibi at La Casserole Carree. My day is always a little bit better for having visited Vibi's blog.

And also to pinkstripes, an all-around talented baker, cook and blogger, and one of my favorite stops.

Melissa at Love at First Bite and Barbara at Barbara at Barbara Bakes shared the uber-cool Uber Amazing Blog Award:



I am going to pass this one on to Pam at For the Love of Cooking. Pam, you have a knack for posting what I am craving for dinner before I even know I am craving it!

And also to Jess at cookbookhabit. I love following Jess's adventures as she works her way through her cookbook collection!

Aggie at Aggie's Kitchen and Michelle at Alwayz Bakin' shared the Butterfly Award.



I'm going to pass this one on to Heather at Diary of a Fanatic Foodie. Heather is a lawyer who is generous with sharing her war stories, both in the kitchen and in the courtroom. Entertains me AND gives me good things to eat = Butterfly Award material.

And to Jessica at A Singleton in the Kitchen for a great blog, and for doing a fantastic job of feeding Dudley while he's visiting. My grandmother would be proud!

Shari at Whisk: A Food Blog shared the Lemonade Award. Award motto: When Life Gives you Lemons, Make Lemonade. Love that philosophy! It is intended for blogs that show "great gratitude and/or attitude."



This one goes to Steph at Obsessed with Baking. I have great gratitude for Steph's blog, because the girl knows how to bake -- I can always go there and know that I will come away with the perfect muffin/cookie/biscuit recipe.

And Katrina of Baking and Boys -- a fun mom with a really fun, really tasty blog!

Barefoot Bloggers: Easy Sticky Buns and CEIMB: Chicken Cacciatore

The Barefoot Bloggers recipe this week is Ina's Easy Sticky Buns, chosen by Melissa of Made By Melissa. I actually posted about these Easy Sticky Buns back in December, shortly after causing a family uproar by buying myself her new book, Back to Basics, ten days before Christmas. I do crazy things like that sometimes. So if you want to read an old, stale account of these buns, click here. For fresh new perspectives, go here.


The only thing I will add to my earlier post is that these are best eaten fresh out of the oven. Let them cool a little, of course -- those sticky buns suddenly won't seem so easy anymore if you end up having to ice the roof of your mouth -- but definitely plan to eat them within a couple of hours of making them. I found that they got kind of hard as the day went on. I made a full batch (12 buns) for my family of 5. Although we have 5 people in our family, only 3 of us actually eat food -- my husband, my one year old, and myself. The 6 year old and 4 year old subsist on air, ketchup and Flinstones (but somehow miraculously manage to grow anyway). Well, out of the three eating members of my family, I am the only one with a lumberjack-sized appetite capable of eating my share (four) of these twelve buns (I did not eat four buns. But I was capable of it). Therefore, we had a lot of uneaten buns that ended up in the trash once they hardened up. So that's my tip -- calculate the number of real-time bun eaters in your house and adjust the recipe accordingly. These are not good keepers (but oh my, are they ever good out of the oven!)

The Ellie recipe this week is Chicken Cacciatore, chosen by my good friend Peggy over at Pantry Revisited. Peggy is another one of my co-workers -- I can't tell you how much fun it is to have foodie friends at work. We compare notes on the weekly recipes and share things like that pesky quarter cup of wheat germ or a tablespoon of Chambord, always being sure to say something lame like "here's that balsamic vinaigrette you asked for" when handing off hard alcohol. Since I work a part-time schedule, I had kind of gotten into a bad habit of locking myself in my office during my limited time at work, so it's been great to have foodie friends here to keep me from being completely anti-social! In my early TWD days, I emailed Peggy and my other work baking friends from Publix: "Subject: Self-rising flour and cake flour are the same thing, right?" Peggy, bless her, immediately sent me an email back, high-priority, in red and with all kinds of exclamation points that said "SELF-RISING FLOUR IS MOST DEFINITELY NOT THE SAME THING AS CAKE FLOUR, CATHY!!!!!!" Saving me from myself -- it's just part of the job description of being my friend.

Anyway, the worst part of this recipe was that Billy Joel's "Movin' Out" was stuck in my head for the better part of the week that I was thinking about making this/making this. And that just brought up other Billy Joel associations. Now, Movin' Out refers to MISTER Cacciatore, not Chicken Cacciatore, but that was close enough for me. So all week long, my inner dialogue went something like this: "I need to make that Chicken Cacciatore. Down on Sullivan Street, across from the Medical Center. Okay, grocery list, grocery list, grocery list. What do I need for that Chicken Cacciatore again? YEEEEEAAAAAHHHH and he's tradin' in his Chevy for a Cadillacacacacacac."

The Piano Man. Listen at your own risk.




And then my mind drifted to the year that Billy was a speaker at graduation for the class a couple of years ahead of me in college. One of the Jesuits protested vigorously because he didn't like the line "you Catholic girls start much too late" in Only the Good Die Young. Now that I am older, I can think of lots of even better reasons to protest Billy as a college graduation speaker, but at the time, we (the Catholic girls who start much too late) were all like "C'mon, lighten up, Father R!!!"

And THEN my brain shot over to the summer when I was 20 and cleaning out the ice cream case at the Ice Cream and Candy Bazaar on Edgartown Harbor, Martha's Vineyard, MA, and I looked up and THERE WAS BILLY. He and Christie Brinkley (now I'm dating myself) had docked their boat in the Harbor, and Billy came in for a frozen yogurt cone. He was very, very short. I handed Billy his cone, and he said "that's a small?" I tried desperately to come up with something clever, something interesting, something that would make Billy REMEMBER his stop at the Ice Cream and Candy Bazaar. Instead, I said "You should see our large! Love your music." Then he left without leaving a tip. There, now it's on the internet. Take that, Billy!

So anyway, this recipe definitely challenged my powers of focus, which had already been severely compromised since having children, but luckily I was able to pull it all together long enough to make this. Because this was a REALLY FABULOUS dish.



The prep time for this one is pretty quick, although the actual cooking time was longer than I anticipated. But it is that long cooking time that gives it such an intense flavor. Brown the chicken and remove from pan. Add onion and red pepper and cook covered until they begin to soften, then add the mushrooms and cook for 10 minutes. Add garlic and cook for 30 seconds, and then the wine and cook until it is reduced by half. This will deglaze the pan, and I think this is the point at which the flavors of this dish really start to come alive. Then add the tomatoes, oregano, and red pepper flakes and simmer covered for 10 minutes.

The recipe calls for no-salt added plain diced tomatoes. I had some in my basement, but I had these in my pantry:


Since I had heard that a few people were underwhelmed by this recipe, I figured that I'd go crazy and try to amp up the flavor using the seasoned tomatoes. Plus, that saved me the walk to the basement, which seemed fitting given that Billy's warning that workin' too hard can give you a heart attackackackackackack was at the forefront of my mind. I can't imagine that this was enough to make the difference between a "meh" and a "wow!" dish, but I'm mentioning it anyway in case it helps us get to the bottom of why David and I loved this when others did not. Of course, adding extra spices to the plain tomatoes is always an option!

Finally, add the chicken back and simmer covered for another 20 minutes. All told, you're tending to that skillet on and off for close to an hour from the time you start browning the chicken. I think the long cooking time helps the flavors really meld together and produces a beautiful, velvety, intensely flavored sauce. Anthony, Sargeant O'Leary, Mama Leone and the rest of the gang would approve.

We LOVED this. David called it "sneaky spicy" because the crushed red pepper kind of comes at you out of the blue. I halved the recipe because I am tired of throwing leftovers away, and I really wish that I hadn't, because David got up to get seconds and there were none. My sweet Italian grandmother would not have been pleased. When I first brought David home to Connecticut to meet my family years ago, she pulled me aside at one point and said "I like him," and then she got really serious, furrowed her eyebrows and said "You make sure you feed him!" It is like she decided that I finally brought home a boy worthy enough for her to let me in on the Italian Grandmother Secret of the Universe. She would definitely call me back for a refresher course in Feeding Boys if she were here today. Sorry, Grandma. And sorry about the lack of leftovers, David. I'll make more next time now that I know how awesome this dish is.

Many thanks to Melissa and Peggy for these great picks!

CEimB: Oven Fried Chicken

This is my first post for a new blogging group that I just joined


Craving Ellie in My Belly ("CEimB" -- just for fun, I'll go ahead and define some terms for my peeps back at the office!), which is a group that will be cooking its way through Ellie Krieger's "The Food You Crave."

After much deliberation, I decided to join CEimB because:

(1) I'm a joiner. It's what I do. I join, therefore I am.
(2) I've really been looking for a healthy cooking blogging group. I LOVE Tuesdays with Dorie and Barefoot Bloggers, but sometimes my arteries just get tired of being caught in the middle of the epic battle between Dorie and Ina over who can use the most butter. Light cooking feels more normal and familiar to me, and I've heard rave reviews about this cookbook. I've enjoyed doing the occasional Cooking Light Night post (thanks, Clara!) and reading Cooking Light Night posts by my blogger friends, so I thought it would be fun to try the light cooking concept in a more formal group.
(3) My work friends Amanda, Peggy, and Jen signed up for CEimB, and I didn't want to feel left out of the water cooler talk. I'm already the last to know all the office dirt since I only work part time. It's not that interesting, but still.
(4) I joined the group early enough that I might actually get to choose a recipe sometime before the next millennium!
(5) I respect any blogging group that goes the extra mile to come up with a rhyming group name.

So, here we go! The first recipe is for Oven Fried Chicken, which is theoretically the perfect choice for my family. While I almost always blog about how David and I like the food that I make, I rarely blog about what my children think of it. That's because my children don't eat what I cook. Really! It's not just a catchy profile slogan! My two older kids are maddeningly picky eaters, and chicken nuggets are among the foods they will eat, along with peanut butter waffles, fish sticks, grilled cheese sandwiches, Scooby cheese (it's like regular cheese but it comes in a Scooby Doo wrapper), french fries, grapes, and cereal. Their preferred eating style reminds me of the preferred decorating style of some of the hip interior designers of the mid-2000s: very monochromatic, very beige-on-beige. They will tolerate a punch of color in the form of ketchup, and in fairness to them, they'll eat a red apple or a piece of orange cantaloupe, and if all the planets align, the occasional green vegetable. But try to jazz up a naturally beige food like chicken or potatoes with green flecks, and it's freak-o-rama at the dinner table.

So I was excited about this one because it could potentially be marketed to them as chicken fingers and served with dipping sauce (aka ketchup). In fact, I decided to skip the thighs and cut the breasts into strips from the outset. Also, I knew that I could control the flavor and color content to maximize the chances that the 6 year old and 3 year old would eat it. And who knows? -- maybe it would even earn me rave reviews such as "I don't like it, but I can eat it without holding my nose." Oh yes, check your ego at the door before signing up for this parenting gig.

In terms of the ingredients, I knew that sesame seeds would not get me closer to my goal of getting my kids to eat these. So I skipped them. I also cut the cayenne down from 3/4 teaspoon to more like 1/4 teaspoon. See, blander already!

Other than those small changes, I stuck to the recipe, and these came together easily.

Crackers (I used Whole Grain Wheat Thins), corn flakes, garlic powder and a wee bit of cayenne:




And egg whites, yogurt, dijon & salt for the first dredging:


Aaaaaaaaand then dredge again in the crumb mixture.

I went downstairs to my Pam cellar and retrieved my finest 2008 Olive Oil Pam:



[I know you're going to ask, Amanda. Yes, I think I buy Pam even more obsessively than than I buy ice cream sundae toppings. No, I don't know what's wrong with me. But please continue to enable me and bring me any coupons you happen to see -- thanks!]

Lightly sprayed my chicken fingers, and baked:



Incidentally, I only used half the meat called for, and I still ran out of crumbs. That's why there are those three sorry little half naked chicken pieces at the bottom of my baking sheet. Next time, I think I'll increase the amount of the crumb mixture.

Plated the chicken with a careful eye towards the presentation:



And served to my toughest critics:




The verdict?

J, age 6: "Ummmmm. I don't really like it. Well, it's pretty good if you put a lot of ketchup on it. Actually, this is too spicy. And I put my cheese toast in the grape area so the bottom got soggy. May I please have dessert?"

E, age 3.5: "It's too cinnamon!"

C, age 14 months: Ate it with gusto, then chanted "muh, muh, muh, da! da! da! da!"(translation, "I want more. When is Daddy getting home?") and then as soon as I let her out of the high chair, headed straight to the pantry to eat a paper plate that was on the floor. She is so refreshingly easy to please.)

Mom, age 36 (the reasoned voice of objective reality): These really were a bit too spicy for most kids, I think, even with the smaller amount of cayenne. I'll leave the cayenne out next time so that my kids can come up with a different reason not to eat them. I thought this was excellent oven fried chicken. Nice and crispy on the outside, but the chicken stayed moist and tender, and had a great flavor. They definitely had a little kick to them. I assume they would have had a lot of kick if I used the full amount of cayenne called for in the recipe.

Dad, age 36.5 (really, almost a full year older than Mom): Really enjoyed these. Upon learning that they were too spicy for the kids, said "Great! More for me!"

Summary: I still think this is a family friendly recipe despite the fact that only one of my children ate them. I'll leave out the cayenne next time, but they'll definitely show up again in our rotation. They were really easy to throw together, and one of the better oven fried chicken recipes I've tried lately. All in all, this was a great way to kick off CEimB! Thanks for picking this, Macduff of Lonely Sidecar!!!

OVEN FRIED CHICKEN, from Ellie Krieger's "The Food You Crave"
Ingredients
1/2 sleeve (about 20) whole-grain salted crackers, pulsed in a food processor until fine (about 1/2 cup)
2 1/2 cups corn cereal flakes, pulsed in a food processor to fine crumbs (about 1/2 cup)
2 tablespoons sesame seeds
3/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
2 egg whites
1 cup lowfat, plain yogurt
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
1/2 teaspoon salt
Olive oil cooking spray
4 medium sized skinless chicken breasts and 4 skinless chicken thighs, rinsed and patted dry (about 3 1/2 pounds chicken)
Directions
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Lightly spray a baking sheet with olive oil.

Combine the crackers and corn cereal crumbs, sesame seeds, cayenne, and garlic powder in a shallow bowl. Reserve.

In a large bowl, combine egg whites, yogurt, Dijon mustard, and salt. Add the chicken pieces and coat thoroughly with the yogurt mixture.

One at a time, dip the chicken pieces in the cracker mixture, packing crumbs onto chicken. Arrange the chicken on a baking sheet and spray lightly with olive oil cooking spray.

Bake for 45 to 50 minutes, or until juices run clear when chicken is pierced with a knife.