Chicken with Kale and Wild Mushrooms

Yesterday we packed up the cookbooks, and most of the metal bakeware (the cookie cutter collection may need its own box...). It was a long, tiring day, fraught with annoyance over the past week's unreliable--meaning mostly absent--hot water supply and our landlord's efforts to get it fixed. The kids are watching a lot of TV these days while we pack. I was happy to get out for an hour by myself and visit the grocery store, where I bought a bunch of veggies and things pretty randomly. I already had chard from the Thursday market, and I was thinking vaguely of mushrooms. I came home and plugged search terms into Google and came up with this:

Chicken with Kale and Wild Mushroms

One thing about getting more experienced is that I rely a lot less on recipes than I used to. Which is not to say that I don't use them, but rather that I am better now at identifying the places where it's possible to go a slightly different route and still get to an acceptable place. I wasn't about to blanch my greens separately (for one thing, we were running out of clean pans) when I could throw them on the mushrooms for a minute. We don't have any decent wine right now, but a sauce of all chicken broth would do all right.

The one thing I forgot was the lemon juice, which probably would have helped; I found the flavor a little dull. Next time I might try throwing in some herbs, too. It wasn't a particularly ambitious meal, but it's the first we've had in a while that wasn't takeout or put together in a state of advanced exhaustion after a bad commute.

Come Tuesday I'll be 25 weeks along with Baby To Be Named Later, who has already developed a nice strong kick. Three of those weeks will be consumed by preparing to move, much of the next month by settling in to the new place, and then school for our newly minted first grader. October will be here before we know it.

Farfalle with Chicken, Tomatoes, Caramelized Onions, and Goat Cheese

It's been a while since I posted a new recipe here, let alone a new recipe that blew me away.

At least, I think this is a new recipe. D* says we've had it before. I don't remember if we did. In any case, I haven't blogged it, so it's probably been at least two years since I made it, if I did.

I wish I knew why this dish was so entirely awesome. Was it the basil, even hydroponically grown? The goat cheese, which melted all creamily into the nooks of the pasta? The fact that I was really, really hungry? I have no idea. But it was good.

Farfalle with Chicken, Tomatoes, Caramelized Onions, and Goat Cheese

I made it pretty much as written, except for using grape tomatoes. I left them whole, and even though I don't generally care for tomatoes, I loved their sweet bursts of flavor in this. I am looking forward to making this again in the summer, when fresh ingredients should make it even better.

New Recipes for the First Week of June

Having finally been inspired to put together a nearly-full slate of new recipes for the week, I have not been organized enough to blog about them individually, so here's a catch-up post. After the crap we ate on the road Saturday, I felt a serious urge to make good things that at least nodded in the direction of healthfulness. (I have also been working out every day this week, have traded in my beloved bagels for yogurt and fruit, and my supper glass of wine for milk--though that last is at least partially because I have a cold, and one does not mix wine and NyQuil).

• Monday - Spicy Orange Chicken Stir-Fry. This one is a definite keeper. I've tried orange sauces before and always been put off by them, but this strikes the right balance between the sweet and other notes for my taste.
  

• Tuesday - Orecchiette with Caramelized Onions, Sugar Snap Peas, and Ricotta Cheese. Reserving judgment. There was no fresh basil at the store, and I think that would have made a big difference. The onions turned out nicely, but the dish as a whole was on the bland side. We'll try this one again before deciding if we really like it. Also had to use frozen sugar snaps, which I'm sure didn't help.
• Thursday -Pasta with Goat Cheese, Lemon, and Asparagus. I made this with fresh local asparagus from the farmers market, and it was very good and easy to put together. No tarragon at hand, so I used some herbes de Provence, which provided a nice flavor, if not quite what the recipe developer had in mind. A good one to keep in the spur-of-the-moment file, since most of the ingredients are things one usually has on hand. My only regret was not having bought even more asparagus than I did!
  
• Friday -Hoisin Pork Tenderloin with Asian Carrot Salad. Lest you think that we've gone vegetarian over here. My store was out of pork tenderloin. Which was supposed to be on sale this week--a buying error, the butcher explained a bit sheepishly, and gave me some pork loin at a markdown to apologize. It worked reasonably well. This is another simple one, hard to go wrong. For the dressing I used Newman's Own low-fat sesame-ginger, which is okay for a bottled dressing (why do they all have so much sugar? the fabled American sweet tooth at work?).

Also on Friday, my birthday presents from D arrived: a copy of The Omnivore's Dilemma, and Hot, Sour, Salty, Sweet. I have started reading the former, and am learning fascinating things about corn sex.

Sauteéd Chicken Cutlets with Asparagus, Spring Onions, and Parsley-Tarragon Gremolata

Another mile-long recipe name from Bon Appetit. No pictures from me, but there's one after the link.

Sauteéd Chicken Cutlets with Asparagus, Spring Onions, and Parsley-Tarragon Gremolata

This was a very nice spring meal, light and satisfying, and of course anything that gives me an excuse to eat asparagus is good. It wasn't much work at all once the gremolata was put together, and the flavor combination was... I want to say sprightly, but that sounds precious. It was tasty, leave it at that.

We have been insanely busy lately, but I wanted to mention two important kid milestones: L is finally and completely potty-trained, and JJ is sleeping through the night. Hooray!

Chicken in Red Wine Sauce with Root Vegetables and Wilted Greens (whew)

I mean, I get that it's not quite the same thing as coq au vin, but couldn't they come up with a shorter name? I forgot to take a picture, but there's one on epicurious, so you needn't feel bereft if you really need to know what this dish looks like. The important thing is that it tasted great for very, very little effort. Given that we were getting another storm on Wednesday, I was working at home. Threw the marinade together in the morning, started cooking around five, and had dinner ready a little after six. Other than L's meltdown at the sight of her plate, the meal was entirely successful.

Needless to say, I didn't make this exactly as written (do I ever?), but I don't think my changes were significant enough to write up. I served it with some corn bread (the recipe on the back of the canister), for which I have had a serious hankering lately. I suspect that what I really want is to make chili, but I didn't have the things on hand for that. Will probably make some this weekend.

I have started leaving the subjects off my sentences. Time to get off the blog and on to something else....

Chicken Tikka Masala

I seem to be on an Indian kick lately... this particular recipe was selected because, last time I went to Zigo for lunch, their trusty chicken tikka--one of my all-time favorite things to eat--was... horrible. The chicken was overcooked, half the rice was mushy and half crunchy, and the sauce lacked zing. What's worse, I was eating in a rush between meetings and didn't have time in which I might go back and complain. As I resentfully finished my "meal," I grumbled to myself that I could do better. Well, I had this past Monday off, and damned if I wasn't going to use some of my free time to cook a meal that would erase the memory of that terrible tikka.

Much of Monday morning was occupied by my continued hunt for a decent grocery store in the Worcester area. I have finally grown sick to death of the Webster Square Shaws--on Saturday I went in there to pick up game snacks, and every vegetable in the place looked like it had been there for days. Even the squashes were wrinkly. (Squash is the easiest thing on the planet to store, people; I can keep it on my counter for a week or more just dandy. What the heck are you doing to it?!) So I went up to the Shrewsbury Stop N Shop to see if it was any better, and it was! Not swoonworthy like the Wegmans my lucky mother has, but a big improvement on what I've been seeing by my place lately. On the way I passed an Indian grocery, which I will have to check out another time. I have never wanted to be one of those people who goes to four different stores in the course of their normal shopping--I spend too much time in the car during the week to enjoy running around in it on my days off--but apparently the alternative is making my family endure my grousing about our produce every week until summer and the farmer's markets return.

But anyway. After my shopping trip, I went to Borders (it was right there...) and used some of my Christmas money to pick up Martha Stewart's Cookies (because I don't have enough cookbooks, or enough about cookies... right). Then it was home for lunch and then out in the back yard to play in the snow with L, then back in for hot chocolate, and eventually a movie. Around four I put the marinade together and glooped the chicken into it.

Here is the recipe I used: Chicken Tikka Masala. And it was in fact considerably better than the disastrous one I had last "enjoyed," though I again seem to have overcooked the breast meat a bit--that's becoming a bad habit. All the cumin gave it a wonderful smoky heat without being overwhelming, and I liked the paprika. My changes to the recipe were as follows:

• I didn't add any salt. I'm not by any means a salt-free sort of person, but a total of seven teaspoons? Ick! Between the spices and canned ingredients, I figured there would be enough flavor to go around. Next time I will add a bit, but certainly less than they suggest.
• Again, I had no jalopeno, or other hot peppers for that matter. I don't know why I keep forgetting those little suckers. Again, I put some extra ginger in.
• I didn't have any tomato sauce, either. I used a can of Muir Glen diced tomatoes, which I nearly always have on hand. I think they represented something of an improvement.
• My cream was way past its prime, so I used about 2/3 of a can of non-light coconut milk.
  

I also made Saffron Rice with Peas and Garbanzo Beans--an old stand-by and one of the few ways in which I can be convinced to consume peas. The recipe as written makes a ton, but I figured I can take some to work this week. (I go through phases where I am so sick of sandwiches that I can scarcely stand it, but I seldom have the planning capacity to prepare anything else for lunches on office days.)

I'm trying to work on my photography. Here, for kicks, some of my prep work:

The meal was very satisfying, though my daughter refused to countenance any of it and requested toast for dinner--she has been known to eat chickpeas on occasion, but apparently this was not one of those days. And JJ is still battling tummy bug; it hasn't knocked him for quite the same loop it did his sister, but he hasn't been sleeping well, so neither are his parents.

Chicken Biryani

Life has been unexpectedly hectic this week, with a lively meeting schedule, L's tummy bug, and D's newly-developed knee problem. Times like these I can't imagine not having a menu plan; getting off the highway at 5:30, getting home and having to decide then and there what to make for dinner would result in a much higher percentage of our food budget going to takeout food.

But this week I do have a plan, and I was even able to fit in a few minutes over the weekend to look through the latest issues of my cooking magazines and find a new recipe to try. Cooking Light's latest rendition of Chicken Biryani is my first four-star recipe of the year (I'm going to start putting star ratings in the labels so I can find them again later - not sure why I never thought of that!). It's almost no work at all, and though the result might not be quite what you'd get at a restaurant, it's surely good enough to make a standard at home.

I didn't have a jalapeno, but I upped the ginger, and the result was pleasantly warm without being overly spicy. It took just about the thirty minutes called for, making it quite doable on a weeknight--especially since only the first fifteen of that is "active time." I often have problems when making dishes where the rice cooks along with other ingredients, but it was perfectly done. It made for a very satisfying, warming meal on a cold night.

In other news, I've really been sort of hyperfocused on food lately. I think it's the cold weather, or the passage of the holidays, but all I want to do is burrow into a warm place full of good things to eat. I want to make bread and soups and braise things, I want to have warmth. It's not that I mind the weather, per se; I used to say that I hated winter, but now it seems to present an opportunity of sorts. I sit at my desk drinking tea all day, writing online help and dreaming of muffins, chocolate, stews. Unfortunately I can't spend all day cooking even on the weekends, so I've been doing a certain amount of vicarious living through the written word. I am thoroughly out of temper with Bon Appetit after their recent redesign of the magazine, so when my subscription there runs out I will not renew it. But I might replace it with Fine Cooking.

Jamaican Chicken Stew - Bringing Back an Old Fave

This used to be a staple in our household, something I probably made once a month. It's been years now, for one reason or another, but last night I brought it out of retirement to general acclaim. In fact, it tasted better than I remembered, possibly because I'm using higher quality spices these days. It's a bright and tasty one-dish meal, and since it relies entirely on pantry ingredients, it's easy to put together on a weeknight or at short notice. It also doubles nicely, and makes good leftovers.

I really do need to start taking pictures, this is the most boring-looking blog ever....

Chicken Breasts with Avocado, Tomato, and Cucumber Salsa

One of these days I really will start taking pictures of recipes; it would make the place look a little less boring. But probably not this one, because it was, well... kind of boring, too. Not that there was anything wrong with it, it was easy and quick to put together and tasted fine, it was just kind of dull. Maybe grilling the chicken would have made all the difference, but my grill pan needs to be cleaned and reseasoned, and it's one of those things I just don't get around to. And I think I have to come to terms with the fact that I don't like avocado much. Perhaps I have simply never been exposed to a good one, since the one we had for this salsa tasted somewhat watery to me.

But anyway. If you're looking for something quick and simple and have the stuff on hand, there's no reason not to make this, but if you have some time and ambition, might want to keep looking.

Chickpea, Chard, and Tomato Stew

Another great way to get your greens, and assorted other veggies. This one cooks up quickly, and is actually a sort of takeoff on chili, both in flavor and thanks to the use of ground chicken (the recipe name makes it sound vegetarian; it is not, though it could certainly be adapted). It could have used more spice, in my opinion, but CL is famously cautious about its seasoning.

Chickpea, Chard, and Tomato Stew

This weekend with any luck we'll be going house hunting, and out for dinner with the supper club crew at Allora, so I might not have a lot of time to cook. I am trying to enjoy summer, which places its own restrictions on cooking, and not look ahead to fall just yet. It's a good time.

Thai Chicken Saute

I am fortunate enough to live with a man who is frequently and (I think) genuinely complimentary to my cooking. It is fairly rare, however, that he says something is "outstanding," so when it happens I try to take note. Unlike a lot of Thai-inspired dishes, this one has a short ingredient list. It also cooks in about ten minutes, which (together with the spice factor) is handy when the temperatures have spiked.

The day as a whole was a bit of a mix. We think JJ's night waking may be due to reflux, so I am drinking decaf tea this morning. We went to Marlboro and there seem to be houses there we'd consider, which was cheering, but it's still pretty far from my job. We'll look at the coasts next, and see what the economy does....

Pulled Chicken Sandwiches

With temperatures in the 90s, look for warm-weather recipes here! A morning trip to the grocery store was my one venture outside yesterday. I had this recipe in mind as something I might want to make again while we're at the lake this summer. It cooks quickly and can be made ahead if that's a consideration.

Pulled Chicken Sandwiches

Northerner that I am, I have no idea how well this compares to other recipes for pulled meats, but I like it. Sweet sauce, rich meat, soft white rolls... it's easy to eat too much of. When corn is in season, obviously go for that, but when it's not I tend to serve this alongside a cucumber salad with rice wine vinegar for a cool contrast.

Spicy Soba Noodles with Chicken in Peanut Sauce

An oldie I pulled out, thinking that the warm weather forecast for this week would make it welcome. And it was! It's probably been years since I made this -- a distinct problem with trying new recipes a lot of the time. This is everything one could want in a hot-weather dish: fast, easy, and full of spicy flavor. I can't be bothered with poaching chicken and usually saute it in some peanut oil. Adding more vegetables never hurts this dish, either.

If you watch sodium, check your soba noodles before buying, some brands have an insane amount of salt, while others have none at all.

Another "loosely inspired by..." recipe

I had clipped the recipe for farfalle with chicken, tomatoes, caramelized onions, and goat cheese from the new issue of Bon Appetit. With the changes I had to make, it doesn't even seem like the same recipe.

• I didn't have a reason to buy a whole rotisserie chicken
  
• There's no heirloom tomatoes in these parts for probably two more months
• There's no basil, either - I even managed to run out of dried!

So what I did was cook the onions, then sauteed some boneless chicken breast (cut up small) in olive oil. To that, I added a can of basil-and-garlic diced tomatoes, added the onions back in with some chicken broth (I didn't have any white wine, either - shocking, I realize), let it all simmer for a bit. Since this obviously wasn't going to be any kind of salad, I added the spinach to the sauce, stirred in some big chunks of goat cheese, and voila.

It was excellent.

Chicken with Fresh Herbs and Sherry Wine Vinegar

This is another one of those "loosely inspired by" the recipe dinners. I am not about to spend $10 on fresh herbs for one meal (dried were subbed), and I did this on the stovetop since I was concerned about the idea of putting a sheet pan over the burners as directed. I oversalted it a bit, but the sauce was quite acceptable and the chicken was tender. We had rice pilaf and steamed carrots with it.

Chicken with Fresh Herbs and Sherry Wine Vinegar

This was my first time using those Perdue Perfect Portions, which my Shaws has just started carrying. I think it's a great idea, though I'm not normally a fan of Perdue. Mostly I buy Shaws "Wild Harvest" stuff, but their supply is dreadfully inconsistent, so I don't mind having a few well-packaged chicken breasts in the freezer.

Last night during dinner, JJ invented the "drop something and daddy picks it up for me, and I smile and drop it again" game. This morning he is playing the "put a toy over my face and then wiggle frantically until mommy takes it away" game.

Bistro Roast Chicken

Car shopping yesterday took up far more of the day than I had hoped it would, and this is not a quick dish to make, but I had already thawed the chicken and didn't have anything else ready to go.

This is quite possibly my favorite chicken recipe. The seasoning and basic method can be used with any bone-in chicken parts (or whole chickens, or turkey for that matter). It's dependable, and better than it has any right to be for something so easy. I like to make it with potatoes, though I have not mastered pommes frites. It's my default dish for company when I'm not sure about their tastes, and for weekends at home when I have time to spend in the kitchen and want that wonderful roasting smell.

April Supper Club - Eggs

It was a smaller group than usual, but a convivial evening as always. The conversation ranged over countless topics, but it was mostly families, jobs, and food.

The menu:

F--Yellow cake with chocolate frosting


K--Potato and onion frittata


P--Asparagus bake with hard-boiled eggs

And for me... as you may recall, in March we tried a new sort of planning, which involved random drawing of who did which course; I drew "main." We had already picked eggs as a theme, perhaps a little giddy with sangria or longing for spring. For weeks all I could think of were things that either didn't travel well (souffles) or were so egg-heavy that they wouldn't give much opportunity for everyone else's dishes to shine.

The answer arrived the day before Easter. The April issue of Saveur has an article on Ethiopia, which included a recipe for a chicken stew called doro wat, which includes hard-boiled eggs. Perfect!

I have subscribed for years, but never actually cooked from this magazine. They are the National Geographic of food lit: slim, gorgeously photographed, well-written, sturdily immune to fads, and worth keeping indefinitely. When Dave tried the other night to convince me that I am in fact a "foodie," he pointed to my shelf of back issues as evidence. I have never minded the fact that most of the actual recipes they publish don't strike a chord with me; I treasure the magazine as an island of quality writing in a field where it increasingly seems that advertisers have more to say than the publishers.

Here is their doro wat recipe:

4 Tbsp unsalted butter
2 large yellow onions, coarsely chopped
1 Tbsp finely chopped fresh ginger
1 Tbsp finely chopped garlic
1 1/2 Tbsp berbere, plus more to taste
4 chicken legs, skinned and divided into drumsticks and thighs
Kosher salt to taste
4 whole hard-boiled eggs

1. Heat butter in a large, straight-sided skillet over medium-low heat. Add onions and cook, stirring occasionally, until deeply caramelized, about 25 minutes. Add garlic and ginger and cook, stirring, until softened, 6-8 minutes. Add berbere and 2 c water; stir well. Season the chicken with salt; nestle the pieces in the skillet. Reduce heat to low and simmer, covered, turning occasionally until the chicken is cooked through, about 40 minutes.
2. Uncover skillet and raise heat to medium-high; simmer to reduce the liquid to a thick gravy, about 5 minutes. Add eggs; stir to warm through. Taste and season with more salt and berbere if necessary.
   

I was doubling the recipe, so I did the onions in the food processor--they were much too finely chopped as a result. Next time I'd do them by hand. I didn't see that the chicken was supposed to be skinned until it was all together; oops.

The recipe they included in the magazine for the spice mixture called berbere was a bit too complicated for me, calling for a spice grinder and whole versions of many spices I already have in ground form, so I went with one I found online instead. I used less of the red pepper flakes than it calls for, to be on the safe side of the group's tongues. I have quite a bit left over, so I think I will make this again some time soon.

I also made the injera (flatbread) recipe they included in the article, but I can't say it turned out all that great, though perhaps I just need practice. It was certainly easy to make.

Next month I will be traveling, and everyone will just bring one of their favorite dishes. I'll be sorry to miss it!

Planning Ahead; Roast Chicken with Cumin, Honey, and Orange

After another long day, on Friday all I was good for was take-out pizza in front of the TV, but Saturday was another story. For once, instead of coming into the weekend with a to-do list twenty items long, I was determined to do nothing much with the day but play with the kids and relax. The only thing I did want to get done was plan the week's menus.

Once upon a time, the vast majority of my life was lived on a straight line between Lechmere T station and Porter Square, a distance of about four miles. Stopping at the grocery store after work to pick up a few things was a perfectly sensible thing to do, particularly since we didn't have a car and shopping trips were limited to what I could carry home. Then I got a job farther away, and we did have a car, and then we had a baby, and then we moved, and time in the evenings became a precious thing. I started doing a week's worth of planning at a time, and doing pretty much all of the grocery shopping at once.

It has become one of my favorite things to do, as long as I am not too tired or rushed, and it's something like doing a jigsaw puzzle. What's on sale or in season this week, what do I have in the fridge to use up, what's in the freezer that could be slotted in, what new recipes have caught my eye, what standbys have gone unused for a while, how much time am I going to have to cook?

This Saturday I got up, set JJ on the Gymini and settled down next to him with my notebook, cooking magazines, and so forth, and in an hour I had a week's worth of food sorted out and a shopping list written. I wanted to roast a chicken, since it had been a while. My normal recipe involves olive oil, garlic, and spices, and is wonderful, but I thought it might be nice to try something different, so I leafed through a folder of untried recipes until I came up with this one. For sides, I kept it simple with a box of long grain and wild rice mix and some steamed cauliflower.

This recipe was extremely good, and I'd make it again, but the honey didn't come through particularly (perhaps mine is too mild?), and I think the amount of cumin could be usefully increased (it's one of my favorite spices).

1 (3-pound) roasting chicken
1/4 cup honey
1 1/2 tablespoons grated orange rind
1 tablespoon ground cumin
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon black pepper
1 garlic clove, minced

Preheat oven to 400°.

Remove and discard giblets from the chicken. Rinse chicken with cold water; pat dry. Trim excess fat. Starting at neck cavity, loosen skin from breast and drumsticks by inserting fingers, gently pushing between skin and meat.

Combine honey and remaining ingredients. Rub honey mixture under loosened skin and over breast and drumsticks. Lift wing tips up and over back; tuck under chicken.

Place chicken, breast side up, on a foil-lined broiler pan. Pierce skin several times with a meat fork. Insert meat thermometer into meaty part of thigh, making sure not to touch bone. Bake at 400° for 30 minutes; cover loosely with foil. Bake an additional 40 minutes or until the thermometer registers 180°. Let stand for 10 minutes. Discard skin.

Yield: 4 servings (serving size: 3 ounces)

CALORIES 273 (27% from fat); FAT 8.2g (sat 2.2g,mono 3g,poly 1.9g); PROTEIN 31.2g; CHOLESTEROL 95mg; CALCIUM 37mg; SODIUM 241mg; FIBER 0.2g; IRON 2.4mg; CARBOHYDRATE 19g

Cooking Light, JANUARY 2000