goat cheese & basil chicken

As it was personal training night for the boyfriend, it was another night for me to cook dinner. He said he wanted something relatively healthy and with chicken, so I decided upon this recipe from my Ina Garten cookbook. I've been making an effort lately to use my cookbooks more often even though the internet and SK and allrecipes are great resources.

This turned out really well. It was super easy to make, quick in terms of time spent on it (though it does have 40 minutes of cooking time), and tasted really good. We love goat cheese, so that worked out really well. I decided to make a little couscous salad to go with it, and I think that it paired well together. I got a few compliments on it, and since that always warms my little heart to hear I've made someone something delicious, I was a happy camper.

*I'm writing down my adjusted recipe. This was 2 breasts - he ate all of his but I had about 1/2-2/3 of mine.

2 chicken breasts [she says skin-on, boneless, but HEB doesn't sell that anymore. I bought the split breast with the bone-in and skin and then just cut the breast away from the bone. Also, it was considerably cheaper for much more meat than boneless, skinless.]
2 oz herb and garlic goat cheese [make sure you get a creamy kind]
2 fresh basil leaves
olive oil
salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 375.

Loosen the skin from the breast, leaving one side attached. Cut the goat cheese into slices and place a few plus a large basil leaf under the skin of each chicken breast. Pull the skin over as much of the meat as possible so that it doesn't dry out.

Rub each piece with olive oil and sprinkle generously with salt and pepper. Bake chicken for 35-40 minutes, until skin is lightly browned and chicken is just cooked through. [When I checked with my boyfriend after 40 minutes, he had me turn the oven up to 450 for another 5 minutes and it turned out really well. This helped get the skin a bit more crispy, and if I'm going to eat it, I definitely want it to be crispy.]



1/2 cup uncooked couscous [buy it in bulk from the grocery store for cheap!]
3/4 cup boiling water
Mix couscous and water and let stand, covered, for 5 minutes. Fluff with a fork.

4 campari tomatoes [between cherry and vine tomato size, but whatever works for you]
2 leaves fresh basil
1 oz herb and garlic goat cheese
1/2 clove garlic, finely chopped
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar [I didn't actually measure]
2 tbsp olive oil [I didn't actually measure]
salt and pepper

Cut the tomatoes and julienne the basil. I mixed the balsamic, olive oil, garlic, salt, and pepper together to make a salad dressing [a simple one I learned from a roommate in Bulgaria]. Mix tomatoes, basil, goat cheese, and dressing into couscous. Serve on the side of the roasted chicken. 

roast chicken with dijon sauce

So the boyfriend and I have started a bit of a routine on the days he does to personal training sessions with his friends that I cook dinner for him. On the one hand, sometimes I have a bit of a self-conscious meltdown it's a little bit stressful because he's a really good cook and I have more luck with baking. On the other hand, because he's not in the kitchen, I can fumble around and not feel too anxious about it. And by the time he gets home here, it's mostly coming together and I can just ask one or two questions about doneness of meat, etc.

This wasn't my most impressive attempt, but it was good. He made a simple risotto to go with it. I picked this recipe because it is SK's go-to chicken recipe. He decided we should add the mustard earlier in the sauce process rather than later and try to let it thicken up a bit.

Since we were cooking together, I had to scale back the cooking photos. He's pretty nice about a final product picture, but I think he thinks I'm a little insane while I take a bunch of the process. Is he wrong? Is he right? Uh, maybe.

The sauce is on the thin side but can be thickened up by reducing the sauce over high heat for several minutes. This concentrates the flavors as well, and if you haven’t used a low-sodium broth, you might find the results a little salty. Just a word of warning.

3 pounds chicken parts (thighs, drumsticks, and/or breasts), with skin and bones [I used skinless, boneless breasts]
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
2 small shallots, thinly sliced
3/4 cup dry white wine
3/4 cup reduced-sodium or sodium-free chicken broth
1/4 cup heavy cream
2 tablespoons smooth Dijon mustard
1 tablespoon finely chopped chives or the green parts of scallions

Preheat oven to 450°F with a rack in middle. Pat chicken dry and season generously with salt and freshly ground black pepper. Heat oil in an ovenproof 12-inch heavy skillet (if you’ve got a cast iron skillet, it is great here) over medium-high heat until it shimmers. Working in 2 batches, brown chicken, skin side down first and turning once, about 5 minutes per batch. I like to take a lot of care in this step, not moving the chicken until the skin releases itself and has a nice bronze on it, which will provide the best flavor and seal in the most juices.

Return all chicken, skin side up, to skillet and roast in oven until just cooked through, 15 to 20 minutes. Transfer chicken to a platter, then add shallots, wine, and broth to pan juices in skillet and boil, scraping up any brown bits, until reduced by half, 2 to 3 minutes. Add cream and boil until slightly thickened, about 1 minute. To thicken the sauce further, turn the heat to high and boil it until it reduces to a consistency you prefer.

Strain sauce through a sieve into a bowl, if you’re feeling fancy (I never am, but if you don’t, you might find some chicken bits scraped up from the pan in your sauce. We don’t mind.) Whisk in mustard, chives, and salt and pepper to taste. Serve chicken with sauce.

guest: lemon chicken marsala

I had the treat of having this made for me for dinner last Sunday, and it was really yummy. He didn't follow  a recipe, but after looking up a chicken marsala recipe, it was very similar. Ours had zest, some juice, and slices of lemon in it, along with parsley, but otherwise, it is pretty similar to this recipe by Emeril. I really liked it, especially with the addition of the parsley and lemon. I could have licked that plate clean, but I behaved myself.

1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon Essence, recipe follows
2 (6 to 8-ounce) boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut in halves and pounded thin
1 tablespoon olive oil
4 tablespoons butter
3 cups sliced mushrooms (cremini, oyster, shiitake)
3/4 cup Marsala [we just used white wine I had in the fridge]
1 cup chicken stock
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
Chopped chives, for garnish [we garnished with slightly cooked lemon slices and freshly grated parmesan]

In a shallow bowl or plate combine the flour and Essence and stir to combine thoroughly. Quickly dredge the chicken breast halves in the seasoned flour mixture, shaking to remove any excess flour.

Heat the oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat until very hot but not smoking. Add 1 tablespoon of the butter and cook the chicken breasts until golden brown on both sides, about 3 minutes per side. Transfer to a plate and set aside.

Add 1 tablespoon of the remaining butter to the pan and add the mushrooms. Cook, stirring frequently, until mushrooms are golden brown around the edges and have given off their liquid. Add the Marsala wine and bring to a boil, scraping to remove any browned bits from the bottom of the pan.

When the wine has reduced by half, add the chicken stock and cook for 3 minutes, or until the sauce has thickened slightly.

Lower the heat to medium and return the chicken breasts to the pan and continue to cook until they are cooked through and the sauce has thickened, about 5 to 6 minutes. Swirl in the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter, add salt and pepper, to taste. Garnish with chopped chives and serve immediately.

Essence (Emeril's Creole Seasoning):
2 1/2 tablespoons paprika
2 tablespoons salt
2 tablespoons garlic powder
1 tablespoon black pepper
1 tablespoon onion powder
1 tablespoon cayenne pepper
1 tablespoon dried leaf oregano
1 tablespoon dried thyme

Combine all ingredients thoroughly and store in an airtight jar or container.
Yield: about 2/3 cup

parmesean chicken couscous

I didn't use a recipe for this! Yes, it isn't complicated, but I still have been pretty reliant on recipes and hesitant to shy away from it. I have made a lemon chicken recipe a couple times lately, so I guess I was feeling like I had a sense of what to do and then was ready to mix it up a little. I saw that I had one chicken breast left over in the fridge, a few basic ingredients, and midway through cooking I remembered that I wouldn't want chicken alone, and so I decided that couscous was a good save since pasta would take too long.

1 chicken breast
1/2 lemon juice
1/4 cup white wine
1 pat butter
1 tbsp half and half
1/3 cup dry couscous
1-2 tbsp grated parmesean

I put the butter and squeezed the lemon juice into the pan to heat up. Once it was melted, I mixed it up, and then I put my chicken breast in. I poured in about a 1/4-1/2 cup of wine and about a tbsp of half and half. I swished it around the pan to mix it up and coat the chicken in it. I waited until the chicken was cooked pretty well on one side before flipping it, probably about 4-5 minutes. Then I flipped it over and mixed it around with the sauce, which was starting to cook off a bit but there was enough under the chicken to keep it from burning.

While the chicken was cooking, I put some water on to boil in my electric water heater (I don't have a coffee maker or microwave, which drives my mother crazy, even though she doesn't live here, so she insisted that I at least have this). Once the water was boiling, I mixed 1/2 cup of water with 1/3 cup of couscous and some salt. I covered the couscous and let it sit for about 5 minutes before fluffing it.

Once the chicken and couscous were done, I put the couscous in a bowl, sliced the chicken on top, poured in any of the remaining sauce from the pan, and grated some parmesean on top. I mixed it all together, and I was a very happy camper with my lunch.

Nutritional information (for 1 cup couscous and 1 chicken breast):
513 calories
11g total fat
49g carbs
44g protein
*note: I wasn't exactly sure how big my chicken breast was, so I used an entry for 3.5 oz

mexican food

This weekend was the 2nd Annual NACHO COMPETITION amongst the International faculty at ACS. I was very excited about it, not least because the rubric is hilarious. I was a little distracted talking to someone on skype, so I didn't really get my entry ready in time. But I did make some chile con queso, because it is one of my favorite foods of all time and I figured it would be unique amongst regular melted cheese nachos. I was correct. I had a bunch of other ingredients for my planned-but-not-executed nachos, and they turned into dinner tonight plus a few other ingredients. I had to invite a couple of other teachers over to help make sure everything got eaten.

The menu was chile con queso, guacamole, spicy black beans, spicy chicken, and cilantro-lime rice. It featured a little more spice and kick than my normal meal because I had jalapeños in my ingredients for the Nacho Competition and because aforementioned skype friend teased me about not eating spicy foods, so I'm trying to branch out a bit. Plus, I need to get ready to move back to Texas and eat spicy food again.

• For the chile con queso, I used a recipe that I found after googling chile con queso on both US and Mexico's google sites and decided that this was the one that would work best for me. 
• For the guacamole, I just used my innate Texas guacamole skills. And it was delicious.
• The spicy black beans, I just sort of threw some things together as I was heating them up, and I liked the outcome even though it was spicy and I am usually a gigantic spice wimp.
• The spicy chicken was from a recipe I did a while ago for spicy lime chicken, and I really like it a lot. Plus, it is quite simple. 
• For the rice, I just cooked rice, which generally is a task unto itself for me, but I am finally starting to get the hang of it. Then I decided to try something new and stirred in some lime juice and fresh cilantro to give it a bit of flavor and to fit the theme of the meal. 

Chile Con Queso 

[note: she says serves four. She must mean 4 linebackers eating it as soup, as this made a GIGANTIC bowl and I didn't even use all the cheese]

1/2 onion diced (about 1/2 cup)

4 cloves of garlic minced

3 Serrano peppers diced [I have no idea what kind of peppers we have here, so I just grabbed one of each]

3 jalapeno peppers diced

2 tablespoons of butter

2 tablespoons of flour

1 cup of milk

6 cups of shredded cheese, can use any combination of Longhorn cheddar and Monterrey Jack

1/2 cup of cilantro, chopped

2 plum tomatoes, peeled and diced (about 1 cup, can use canned if tomatoes aren’t in season)

1/2 cup of sour cream

Salt to taste

1. Melt the butter in a saucepan on medium-low heat, and then cook the onions and peppers for about five minutes or until onions are translucent.

2. Add the garlic and cook for another minute.

3. Whisk the flour into the butter, vegetable mix and cook for about 30 seconds.

4. Add the milk to the pot, and cook on medium, whisking constantly until sauce is thick, about five minutes. Stir in the cilantro and tomatoes.

5. Turn heat down to low, and a 1/4-cup at a time, slowly add the shredded cheese stirring into the white sauce until completely melted. Repeat.

6. Stir in the sour cream.

7. Add salt to taste.

Guacamole

3 avocados

1 tomato

1/4 onion

1 jalapeño

1 clove garlic

1/2 lime juice

cilantro

salt

pepper

Remove avocado however you like. Pour 1/2 lime juice into bowl and mash up avocado pieces to desired consistency. Salt and pepper to taste. Chop up tomato, onion, jalapeño, and cilantro. Mash/dice/press garlic. Mix everything together. Check flavors, refrigerate until ready to eat, and then enjoy! :)

Spicy Black Beans

can of black beans, drained (rinse if you like)

1/2 onion, diced

jalapeños as desired, chopped

1 clove garlic, chopped/diced/pressed

butter/olive oil

Heat up butter/olive oil [I used a combination of both]. Add garlic, onions, and jalapeños. Saute over medium heat until onions are soft. Add in black beans on medium/medium low heat until warm. Serve!

lime chicken/tofu and caramelized broccoli

I haven't posted in a while because I went on spring break to Italy, which was very fun and exciting. I met up with one of my closest college friends, and we had a very relaxing and food-filled trip. The first Monday back, I made an unimpressive shrimp wrap dinner, largely unimpressive because the avocados were bad and I had never used frozen shrimp before, so I don't think I cooked them correctly.

This Monday, in spite of being in the middle of third quarter grades (now finished!), I am back to cooking. I found a recipe on 101 Cookbooks that I wanted to try, but the HIT sabotaged me by not having cilantro. I even went back and had a conversation in Bulgarian to try to find it, which my students would kill to have me relive, but still had no success.

So, cilantroless, but with all the rest of the ingredients, I stressed a bit about what to make. I decided that I couldn't fudge the recipe that I had chosen without cilantro, so I resorted to googling my ingredients: lime chicken, and broccoli garlic. I got two recipes, one for spicy garlic lime chicken and one for caramelized broccoli with garlic. I decided to make the chicken and tofu, separately, using the spicy garlic lime recipe, the caramelized broccoli with garlic, and attempt rice again, which always stresses me out because I find that I either burn it or its too wet and mushy still. In the end, it all turned out well, and as we have a Williams visitor who is currently walking across Europe, we got rid of all the leftovers, too.

I will post the recipes separately below, but the way I timed it:

1. Start water for rice, get boiling, add rice, cover, etc, hope for the best 
2. Get broccoli started
3. Marinate chicken in lime juice (not in recipe, but my improvisation)
4. Cook chicken and tofu, separately, after applying spice mix

Caramelized Broccoli with Garlic

3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

2 heads of broccoli (1 1/4 pounds total), stems peeled and heads halved lengthwise - I may have used less

1/2 cup water

3 garlic cloves, thinly sliced

Pinch of crushed red pepper

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

In a large, deep skillet, heat 2 tablespoons of the olive oil. Add the broccoli, cut side down, cover and cook over moderate heat until richly browned on the bottom, about 8 minutes. 

Add the water, cover and cook until the broccoli is just tender and the water has evaporated, about 7 minutes. 

Add the remaining 1 tablespoon of olive oil along with the garlic and the crushed red pepper and cook uncovered until the garlic is golden brown, about 3 minutes. Season the broccoli with salt and black pepper, drizzle with the lemon juice and serve.

Spicy Lime Chicken with Garlic 

(for the tofu, I just added a bit extra of each spice and then mixed it with lime juice on about 5 oz of tofu)

3/4 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon black pepper

1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper

1/8 teaspoon paprika

1/4 teaspoon garlic powder

1/8 teaspoon onion powder

1/4 teaspoon dried thyme

1/4 teaspoon dried parsley

4 boneless, skinless chicken breast halves - I used about a pound of little chicken tender filets

2 tablespoons butter

1 tablespoon olive oil

2 teaspoons garlic powder

3 tablespoons lime juice

In a small bowl, mix together salt, black pepper, cayenne, paprika, 1/4 teaspoon garlic powder, onion powder, thyme and parsley. 

Sprinkle spice mixture generously on both sides of chicken breasts.

Heat butter and olive oil in a large heavy skillet over medium heat. Saute chicken until golden brown, about 6 minutes on each side. Sprinkle with 2 teaspoons garlic powder and lime juice. Cook 5 minutes, stirring frequently to coat evenly with sauce. [I had added my lime juice to the chicken to marinate earlier and so didn't add it in later.]

couscous salad and greek chicken

When I was in Athens at the end of October, I bought a pack of various spice mixes from a street vendor. I stuck them on my shelf and promptly forgot to ever use them. I've been telling myself to remember to get the few ingredients necessary to put the spice blends into action, and I finally got around to it today. My vegetarian roommate was out, so I looked at the chicken recipe (chicken, lemon juice, spice mix, salt & pepper; cook in oven) and decided to give it a whirl. As a backup supplement, I also wanted to make a couscous salad, in part because of the box of couscous I bought however long ago that is also sitting on my shelf collecting dust. Tonight, in short, was an evening of 'use that stuff that you bought and forgot.' Unlike the packages of butter in my fridge, which I go through frighteningly quickly with baking projects. I digress.

So that chicken recipe isn't so much of a recipe, and I have no idea what spices are in the blend; I do not have that kind of a palate yet. But the couscous salad is a simple recipe that I found with a google search. Both turned out pretty well. I threw some cyrene (like feta) into the couscous salad to make it just that much more yummy.

2 cups cooked whole wheat couscous
1 cup chopped cucumber
1 cup chopped tomatoes
1/2 cup chopped red onion
1 cup canned garbanzo beans, drained
1/3 cup fresh mint, chopped
Juice of two large lemons
1 tbsp olive oil

Cook the couscous first; this is simple. Check the directions, but I'm pretty sure its equal parts couscous to water, plus a bit of olive oil. I used 2/3 cup couscous. Boil water, add olive oil, mix in couscous with a fork, cover and let sit for 5 minutes, fluff again, and it's ready to go.

Combine couscous, cucumber, tomatoes, onion, garbanzo beans and mint in a large bowl. Whisk together lemon juice and olive oil. Pour over couscous salad and stir well. Cover and refrigerate for at least 2 hours [I only put mine in for about 40 minutes without consequence].

apple and sage chicken, tomato almond pesto

I cooked two meals this week since one of my roommates is stateside for work, so Sunday night I made Apple and Sage Chicken for my fellow meat eating roommate and two other teachers, I always enjoy a good casual dinner party, and Monday night I made Tomato Almond Pesto for the three remaining housemates. Katie sent me the recipe for the Apple and Sage chicken and when I found out the vegetarian roommate was eating out, I decided to give this a try. I admit that I was hesitant at a couple points along the preparation, partly because I don't cook with meat very often and I would hate to have someone eat improperly cooked meat, and partly because I couldn't tell if my meal was turning out as it should. Once it was served and sampled, though, there were four votes of approval, so now I can advise you to give it a try if you are a meat eater.

My adaptation of the recipe:

650 g chicken tenders (I think - deboned, deskinned slivers of chicken, packaged at the store)
1 1/4 teaspoons salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1 tablespoon packed brown sugar (as mentioned before, I have dark brown sugar only)
2 apples (preferably Gala; 3/4 lb total), peeled, cored, and cut into 1/2-inch cubes
1 chopped shallot (or small onion, which I what I had available and used)
2/3 cup reduced-sodium chicken broth (I used a bouillon cube boiled in water)
1 teaspoon cider vinegar (I didn't have cider vinegar so I used white wine vinegar)
1/2 teaspoon chopped fresh sage

I cut the obvious connective tissue and such off the chicken so it was as pretty as raw chicken can get in my hands and patted them dry in a paper towel before laying them out across my cutting boards. I sprinkled them with salt and pepper and then cooked them to about 80% done in olive oil in a frying pan. I had to cook them in two batches so they didn't crowd the pan and when they were finished, I set them on a plate to wait. In the same pan, I put in the butter, onion/shallot, and brown sugar for a minute before adding the apples. I cooked this until the apples were tender and a little brown. Then I added my chicken broth, a splash of vinegar, and the chopped sage. I think I used too much water for my bouillon, expecting more to boil off, but I think the 2/3 cup would be accurate if you measured it. Still, even though mine didn't reduce as much, it still tasted great, so don't worry too much about perfection. After a couple minutes, I put the chicken back on top of the apples and alternated covering the pan with a lid to steam the chicken a bit and taking the lid off to let the sauce reduce. I repeated this process for about 20 minutes, stirring occasionally.

I served it plain in bowls and we ate the entire batch in one sitting - the flavor was really nice, a mixture of sweet apple and slightly of brown sugar with chicken and sage. Everything was soft, tender, and well cooked. I was impressed and it well exceeded my expectations.

When I make this again, I will use less bouillon, as mentioned, in an effort to make it reduce more. There was a lot of sauce, so I served mine with my slotted spoon so that I left the liquid in the pan, but I think the idea is that it is all soaked up and thicker so that it is served together. The original recipe called for chicken legs and thighs with skin, but I don't like cooking with bones and skin, and I am sure there were some differences because of the meat changes.

***

Monday night I made Tomato Almond Pesto from SK and again felt some trepidation as the recipe progressed that it wouldn't taste great, but it turned out all right. Probably not my favorite recipe, but we were all satisfied with the dinner and I always like experimenting a bit.


3/4 cup slivered almonds
1 large handful fresh basil leaves
1 to 2 large garlic cloves
salt
5 tomatoes, cut into chunks
1/2 cup grated Parmesan
1/4 olive oil
1 pound pasta - my package said Vermicelli but it was essentially spaghetti, her recipe used linguine

The first step was to toast the almonds in a skillet - I am not sure I was totally successful, especially as her recipe instructed me to use olive oil and my limited exposure to toasting nuts has been in a dry pan or sheet in the oven, and it seemed like my almonds did not evenly toast. At any rate, it wasn't a disaster but I definitely need to have more finesse. If I had a food processor, I would dump the almonds in, chop them but keep them chunky, remove them, and then chop the basil, garlic, and salt in the processor before adding in the tomatoes, almonds, olive oil, and parmesan to mix them all together.

I do not, however, have a food processor, so I chopped up my almonds by hand and then, as finely as I am comfortable and patient enough to do, chopped my basil, a bit of sage (I still have a lot of fresh sage in the fridge), and the garlic. I mixed the garlic, sage, and basil together in a bowl and then cut up my tomatoes and mixed them in. I grated the parmesan directly into the bowl, eyeing about 1/4 cup, and then used the immersion blender to mix all of that together. I added salt and pepper once it was almost smooth and then mixed by hand. I cooked the pasta between al dente and done, and quickly mixed it in with the pesto, as suggested. I stirred it around a bit before serving it into bowls and grating some more parmesan on top.

And as it is now bedtime for this tired teacher, buona sera!