Someone Left The Cake Out In The Rain Quick Chicken and Gravy — Our Life In The Kitchen It’s been a busy week, one where quick and easy is the only hope of cooking dinner instead of doing takeout. A bag of frozen chicken tenderloins pulled from the freezer, steamed rice and whatever veggie might be on hand and dinner’s ready in about 30 minutes. Chicken tenderloinsButterFlourSalt/PepperMarjoram and Thyme tonight, because I’m out of Sage.Chicken Broth Melt enough butter to generously cover the bottom of a large saute pan. Add the chicken and season with salt, pepper and herbs. Once the chicken is starting to brown, turn it over. Cook just another minute or two, stirring a bit. Sprinkle with enough flour to coat the chicken well. Stir until chicken is well coated, butter is absorbed and flour just starts to cook. Add 3 cups of chicken broth. And then stirring in Better Than Bouilion paste. Simmer over low heat until the chicken is completely done and the gravy is thickened. Serve over rice or mashed potatoes. Tagged as: chicken and poultry, gravy
Baked Zucchini Sticks and Sweet Onion Dip: that bloomin’ zucchini! Today, class, it being late July and all, we’re going to examine our zucchini facts: •Zucchini is always at the end of any A-to-Z food list; •Zucchini and fruitcake are the undeserving targets of many a joke; •The zucchini plant literally grows like a weed, making it absolutely ubiquitous in vegetable gardens across America; •And for that reason, enterprising cooks have discovered ways to turn it into muffins, and cake, and pancakes, and… Baked Zucchini Sticks. You know that onion appetizer that came into bloom back in the late ’80s? Outback Steakhouse claims it invented the “Bloomin’ Onion” back in 1988, and it wasn’t long before quasi-fast food restaurants adopted it as the hottest appetizer since artichoke dip baked in a bread bowl. These zucchini sticks, with their melty-soft interior and crisp crust, are reminiscent of those onions – and equally addictive, especially when served with their special onion-mustard dip. Ready to go beyond muffins, bread, kebabs, and frittata? Warning!
White Chicken Pizza January 19, 2011 White Chicken Pizza In this house I know that anytime I make a pizza, it’s guaranteed that it will get eaten. Even if I screw it up, the mantra seems to be that there is no such thing as a bad pie. Only the “this is pretty darn good pizza, pass another slice please” pizza, the “thank you soooo much for making pizza mommy” pizza (trust me, dinner compliments from the six and under crowd are a rare treat so this is the sign of a job well done), and the “Get your hand off that last slice, I called dibs and I’ll fight ya for it if I have to” kickin’ awesome pizza. This pizza is of the third distinction. I made my own crust (my recipe’s here), but you can also use a pre-bought dough or pizza crust and it will still work just perfectly. Ingredients needed: Throw your chicken, shallots, garlic and the salt/pepper in a skillet and cook them up on medium heat. Once they’re cooked through, remove them from the heat. Next up, the spinach.
Baked Parmesan Zucchini Sticks I got kinda hooked on these this summer. I’ve always loved the zucchini sticks my parents served at their pizzeria and used to eat them often when I worked there. But let’s be real, though they are a “vegetable”… the deep fried part kinda trumps the veggie part don’t ya think? I started making these at home this summer…not sure why it’s taken me so long to put this zucchini recipe together. I love zucchini, but get kind of bored of the usual ways I cook it and am always on the lookout for new recipes for zucchini. These are so easy to make, just slice them into sticks, bread and bake. Baked Parmesan Zucchini Sticks Ingredients 3 large zucchini, sliced longways, halved and cut into sticks 2 eggs 1/2 cup plain bread crumbs 1/4 cup Parmesan cheese, grated 1 tsp dried oregano 1/2 tsp dried garlic powder Olive oil spray Instructions Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Tagged as: Appetizers, Side Dish, Vegetarian
make-your-own-pizza party - hollywood housewife When we have the whole extended family at the lake each July, we each take a night to provide dinner, because otherwise trying to coordinate dinner for 25 people every evening is too arduous. This year my sister-in-law did a make-your-own-pizza dinner and it was so genius that I blatantly stole the idea and had one of my own over the weekend. It's so easy, and great for groups. Here's how I did it: After rolling out a big 'ole sheet of butcher paper onto my kitchen island, I plunked all the ingredients right on top and wrote the instructions on the paper. We grilled the pizzas instead of baking them, saving tons of time and mess. Guests were instructed to coat their naan with olive oil to avoid burning on the grill. Then, toppings! There was pizza sauce, obviously (I just used Ragu pizza sauce - shhhhhh, don't tell) and loads of cheese. Throw 'em on the grill for as long as it takes for the the ingredients to melt together in a yummy fashion (about six minutes, we found) and then eat!
Queso Blanco Dip {Sugar Rush Reinvented: #6} And so…another week of my anti-Sugar Rush continues. Well, not that I’m anti-sugar, but like I explained last week, I am changing it up this year and doing two weeks of savory, delectable appetizer “treats” with a highlighted recipe from years past of Sugar Rush. I feel a little redundant swooning over each of the recipes I’ve posted with Sugar Rush Reinvented, but I’m telling you, I hit on some wondrous recipes this go-round. Even though I stated the pinwheels were my favorite, I had to sidestep that claim when the pizza bites knocked my socks off, and now…if the quantity of queso blanco dip I devoured (rephrase: me and the baby devoured) is any indication, this might be my actual favorite. So creamy. Click HERE to see all of this year’s Sugar Rush Reinvented recipes. Note: White American cheese can be found at the deli counter in most grocery stores. Ingredients Directions Heat the oil in a medium saucepan over medium-high heat. Printed from Mel's Kitchen Cafe (www.melskitchencafe.com)
Crispy Chicken Sandwich Topped with a Fried Egg, Prosciutto and Spinach-Garlic Aioli As a grownup, I now know that breakfast-for-dinner wasn’t a loving concession but a well-orchestrated cop-out. Most pre-10AM treats take a hot minute to prepare and they’re always crowd-pleasers. Show me the person who flips off Cinnamon French Toast or Apple Pie Pancakes; who thumbs her nose at Eggs Benedict or a plate piled high with Hash Browns. That person doesn’t exist…and if they do, we don’t need to meet. For this month’s installment of Secret Recipe Club – SRC, as it’s known in the biz – I was sent to From the Bookshelf: a fantastic blog that plumbs the pages of classic cookbooks and adapts them into NYC-friendly creations. Inspired by From the Bookshelf‘s rendition, I decided to blow the doors off the thing and put the “dinner” back in “breakfast-for-dinner.” Print This Recipe Crispy Chicken Sandwich Topped with a Fried Egg, Prosciutto and Spinach-Garlic AioliServes 2 Directions for the Aioli: 1. Directions for the Crispy Chicken: 1. 2. 3. 5. 6. Directions for the Rest: 1. 2. 3.
Chicken Parmigiana This is one of the go-to dishes I make for my family of six. Rich, flavorful, and totally satisfying, we all love it, including my big, strapping cowboy of a husband. And that’s a very, very good thing. Break out the good Parmesan for this one, my friends. Begin with four to six boneless, skinless, trimmed chicken breasts. I’m actually beginning to believe fear of raw chicken is a diagnosable phobia. Place the chicken breasts inside of a Ziploc bag—either one at a time or, if the bag is gigantic like this one, all at once. I put them inside Ziplocs so that when I pound the heck out of them here in a second, microscopic particles of raw chicken will not end up across the room on my computer’s keyboard. Now THAT would gross me out the door. Pound the chicken with the smooth side of a mallet. You want them to be very thin–about 1/8 to 1/4″ thick. Add the flour to a large plate. And pepper. Then season the other side. The raw chicken is almost over. Now it’s ready to cook! And butter. Mmmm. Oh!
Spaghetti and Meatball Pot Pie Remember those meatballs I made for a “special idea” on Friday? Here is that idea, Spaghetti and Meatball Pot Pie. I took the concept and figured if pizza was a good pot pie, then spaghetti and meat balls would be too. This isn't as much a recipe as it is a process. I started by greasing the inside of ramekins (1 cup sized, 3 1/2” in diameter). Next I add in two of the meatballs and sauce. Top that with some vermicelli that had been tossed in the sauce too. Another piece of cheese. For the crust, we made one order of our standard pizza dough and then cut out 3 1/2” circles. I rolled those out a little bigger and then pressed them over the top of the ramekins. Since I wanted the crust to be reminiscent of garlic bread, I made a glaze of butter, roasted garlic, parsley and thyme. I fired up Alexis' Big Green Egg to 450f and set it up in “convection oven” mode with the plate setter legs down. I baked the pot pies on a pizza stone on the plate setter. About 15 minutes in, they started to brown.