Grilled Chicken with Asian Slaw

Another good idea from SO. I think it came about because we had half a cabbage left in the fridge. The first half of it went to "Lazy Man's Cabbage Rolls" last week, which should be another post. In any case, this was easy to throw together and very delicious. Has that Asian flair from the 5 spice on the chicken, and the dressing is slightly spicy with fresh cilantro and ginger and a few of the "usual" flavours like rice vinegar, soy sauce, honey, and a bit of hot sauce. Round it out with some Edamame, peanuts, and some sprouts.

Grilled Chicken with Asian Slaw

Everything about this has a fresh taste - the grated carrot, the fresh cilantro, the sprouts. Kind of an Asian take on the Chicken Caesar in a way. I've never been a big lettuce fan, but this I could eat every week.

Next time: I would crank up the spice a bit. The sprouts give it some crunch, but maybe a sprinkle of those dried chow mein noodles would help.

Me: 9/10
SO: 9.5/10
SSO: n/a

Shepherd's Pie

EDIT 15 Nov, 2015: I think I found a version that the family likes better. Just little things can make a big difference it seems. I tried pork instead of beef, omitted the garlic, celery, and carrots, and substituted regular frozen corn and frozen peas. A bit of beef broth keeps it moist, and maybe a tad less Worcestershire. I added this as version #2 below.

Shepherd's Pie - version 2

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This is probably one of my all-time fav dishes, probably top 3 ever. When you look up "comfort food" in the dictionary, there's a picture of Shepherd's Pie.  There are as many variations as there are people who make this I think. My fav is close to "traditional", except I don't use lamb. This is also one of those dishes that is almost better the next day. Yea, hot lunches for work!

Beef, carrot, onion, & celery mixture.

The one big difference is cream style corn. That is the secret ingredient. Gives it a nice creamy texture, and prevents the dish from being too dry. I'm not one for gravy or stock in the beef layer, and I don't like the potatoes to be too smooth. Normally cheese on anything is awesome, but I don't like cheese in or on this. In my opinion it ruins the rustic and simple nature of the dish So a straight-forward ground-beef layer, a moist corn layer, and a rough-mashed potato layer. Perfect.


Next Time: sometimes SO likes peas mixed in the middle, but I prefer not.

Me: 10/10
SO: 8/10  update: version #2 is 10/10
SSO: 7/10 (with cheese on the side and little to no middle layer)

Almost Vegan Black Bean Soup

Another great supper made by SO, who had a craving for black beans lately. Delicious, not too thin, warming on a cool night. The almost vegan part is because of the late addition of crushed Doritos for some crunch and a blob of sour cream. You'd have to pick vegetable broth over chicken broth obviously. That is about as close to a vegan dish as you'll find on this blog, except for salads I suppose. And salsas. And granola bars. Never mind.

(almost vegan) Black Bean Soup

I would normally not crunch up Doritos in a soup, but we had dozens of those little tiny 16g bags left over from Halloween. Hate to waste. Other then that, I think the fresh cilantro and a bit of hot sauce made the dish.

Next Time: a different ingredient for the crunch

Me: 9/10
SO: 10/10
SSO: n/a

Grilled Shark with bok choy and skillet potatoes

There isn't really a recipe for this, I just wanted to remember the meal since it was so tasty. And unusual, I suppose. On Saturday, SO went out downtown with a friend and ended up browsing Whole Foods. It's a pretty cool place to look around, if not actually buy anything since it is so expensive. But you can get some products that are hard to find, and arguably the price is worth it to get whole grain, organic, no pesticides, free-range blah blah blah products.  That's how we ended up with two gigantic shark steaks.

Grilled shark with bok choy and skillet potatoes

We've been killing it lately with the cast iron skillet, it's just great for so many things. But potatoes it especially excels at. Golden brown, just plain yummy.  The shark and bok choy we both did on the bbq. The fish was oiled up just a tiny bit and lots of freshly ground salt and pepper. The bok choy was tossed with a bit of oil and I sprinkled a random Epicure spice on it. One of those spice blends with a strange name - maybe it was "Canadian" or something like that. Then it was into a cooking basket. The shark was done slightly more than medium, and the veggies were grilled al dente with a bit of char.  The steaks were so huge, we both only ate half of our portion, so the rest we ended up putting in a fish soup the next day.  That was also just great!

Next time: maybe try a different veggie, and go with smaller portions of fish

Me: 9/10
SO: 10/10
SSO: n/a

Sausage, Fennel, and Chili Pasta

I love an interesting pasta dish. I'm not an overly big fan of tomato sauce, or maybe I'm just tired of it. I like it when it is not overly "saucy", which is opposite to how SO likes it. Anyway. This dish started when some friends came over and brought some fresh hot chilies from their garden. Yea!  The perfect way to spice up a dish.

Sausage, Fennel, and Chili Pasta

There are quite a few recipes out there that mix sausage and fennel, I wanted to try that. Plus any excuse to use a kitchen gadget....in this case, the mortar and pestle. So will just add the chilies, and for good measure some fresh herbs like parsley and green onions. And pickle, it needs pickle.

Some of the fresh ingredients

Grinding up the chilies and fennel worked out much better than I anticipated. Apart from watering eyes, it worked really well with the browned sausage.I didn't taste the pickle much honestly, not sure if there just wasn't enough or if it was a dumb idea. Will try more next time.

Next Time: either more pickle, or eliminate it.

Me: 9/10
SO: 6/10 (a bit too spicy)
SSO: n/a

Fajitas and Mexican Pasta Salad

It's summertime, hot and humid. Guests were coming over for a bbq, there would be a camp fire, marshmallows, and some fun and games with the kids. Who's not tired of hot dogs and hamburgers. Chicken is getting old, pork chops are for week nights, and ribs are a bit of a production and not for a large group.  Our family idea person a.k.a. SO, thought we should do a Mexican theme with fajitas and a cold salad. Perfect!

Mexican Pasta Salad with Pico de Gallo

I had also made a batch of fresh Pico de Gallo. It sounds strange, but it was a good addition to the salad. The salad was quite tasty, but just a tad dry. It wasn't really dry, but it was missing some texture. In any case, a dollop of the fresh condiment on top was a surprisingly good match. I didn't think of it at the time, but it might benefit from a bit of crunch as well, maybe crumbled tortilla chips.

The fajitas turned out particularly good. Unfortunately I didn't think to snap a picture of the fajitas, but everyone knows what they look like. The most interesting part of this whole endeavour was trying to find skirt steak. The history is quite interesting. The name is a Spanish nickname dating back to the 1930's in West Texas where the throwaway meat trimmings (including skirt steak) was given as payment to the Mexican vaqueros. In any case, skirt steak isn't all that common anymore - and there's quite a back story to the whole thing.  I went to two grocery stores and neither carry it at all. So I used flank instead. In the end, I think the two most important key points are the marinade, and slicing across the grain. Well a good sear helps as well.

Next Time:  will try to find skirt steak, and will try to crumble some tortilla chips on the salad

Me: 9/10
SO: 9/10
SSO: 6/10

Epicure granola bars with home made Apple Pie spice

Most granola bars from the store are really sweet, often covered in chocolate, just not appropriate for breakfast - or so says SO. To fix this, I'll make some bars using an Epicure recipe and this Epicure "Perfect Petites" silicon baking mold. By the way, I don't sell or necessarily endorse Epicure or their products. We have a friend who likes to sell us this stuff, so we occasionally buy. Some of their spice blends are decent, and there are no preservatives and all that. Free range and grain fed. Anyhoo.

Epicure granola bars with home made apple pie spice

First, the bad.  These molds are really small. They are probably better suited to fancy little hors d'oeuvres than to granola bars - they hold around 2 Tb of volume. Then again, you could just eat two or three. OK that's not that bad.   The good - the silicon mold is really easy to scrape the filling into, easy to pop the cooked bars out, and easy to clean.

The recipe I'm copying here so I don't lose it - it turns out to be a pretty basic recipe which not only is the perfect balance of dry/moist, but is infinitely adaptable. You could add pretty much any kind of nut or seed, different cereals, and different sweeteners.

Next Time: try different combos of seeds and nuts

Me: 8/10
SO: 8/10
SSO: n/a

Skillet fried chicken with green beans and leeks with potatoes and gravy

This is a Sunday dinner type thing, but we ended up eating it on Saturday. SO was really jonesing for fried chicken, so I thought I'd give it a try. I'm really enjoying the cast iron skillet these days. Some swear by it as their only pan. I won't quite go that far, but still it is good for many things: rib eye steak, corn bread, and yes, fried chicken.

Fried chicken, beans and leeks, and potatoes with gravy

Essentially I dredged the chicken in some seasoned flour, and threw it in a hot skillet. Not much more to it than that. I found some local green beans and was going to do it with parsnips but our grocery didn't have any so I substituted leeks and some red onion. Finally, some good old roughly smashed potatoes with the best gravy ever. I'm not a gravy expert, but you cannot make bad gravy in a skillet after frying chicken - there's just too much goodness in there. Just get the right amount of fat and flour, the rest is stirring and time.

The best gravy ever, from the gubbins' left in the skillet

In the end was a really nice meal. And the best part of all, SO got her fried chicken.

Next Time: maybe asparagus with the beans, and a little less cayenne in the gravy

Me: 8/10
SO: 8/10
SSO: 4/10

Grilled Salmon salad with Veg skewers and Skillet Cornbread

This is all about the cornbread, really. SO suggested we have salmon and cornbread for Sunday supper. I've been slowly building up the seasoning on my 12" cast iron pan lately, and was dying to do cornbread in it, so perfect.  There's nothing easier than throwing salmon on the grill, and maybe some summer vegetables on skewers to go with it all.

Grilled salmon on salad, with vegetable skewers
and skillet cornbread

I cut the tomatoes in wedges, peeled half the skin off the zucchini and sliced thickly, and also cut some big pieces of yellow pepper. Threaded them on some skewers, and basted with a bit of Briana's Dijon Honey Mustard salad dressing. I don't normally plug specific products, but I love this one. No preservatives, lactose and egg free, etc.

Nothing special about the salmon, although I made up a quick marinade of dijon, maple syrup, and soy sauce then put it and the salmon in a ziplock for a couple hours. I tore up and washed some romaine, and lightly dressed with the same salad dressing.

Most skillet cornbread recipes are pretty similar, with minor variances in the amount of flour, sugar, and baking powder. I've seen different types of milk, usually buttermilk, and also different pan sizes.

After heating up the pan in the oven, swirl some butter around the bottom and sides.

Cast iron pan ready for the corn bread batter

Getting the eggs and milk nice and frothy is a good idea, and not over mixing is another key step. The cast iron pan is way better than normal baking pans. You get a nice crust and it keeps it warm afterwards.

All done - nice crust!

I've seen variations that use bacon grease, hot peppers, all kinds of interesting things. I used to have an old recipe that called for cream style corn, it was awesome but had like 25 ingredients so I didn't make it very often. Maybe I'll try to adapt that one.

Next Time: will play with the ingredients a bit, but the cast iron pan is great!

Me: 10/10

SO: 10/10

SSO: 3/10

Victoria Sponge Cake

Also known as Victoria Sandwich, this was supposedly a favourite of Queen Victoria. This is likely why it seems to be strongly associated with tea. As in the British afternoon snack time. So High Tea for the Queen, and Afternoon Tea for the rest of us.

Victoria Sponge, a.k.a. Victoria Sandwich

Most versions of this seem to favour just strawberries, but I mixed in some raspberries as well. Actually very easy to make, and looks nice. It is a bit drier than I thought it would be, but I think I was confusing it in my mind with Angle Food Cake. In any case, the berry filling and cream make up for it!

Next Time: maybe try different berries, and a different type of jam.

Me: 7/10
SO: 9/10
SSO: 8/10

Mustard and Dill Potato Salad

It's getting hot these days, finally, after a long cold winter. So what do we serve guests at a Sunday dinner? BBQ chicken and grilled asparagus, with potato salad and a strawberry cream dessert called Victoria Sponge (see post).

Mustard and Dill Potato Salad

I love this particular potato salad since it is vinaigrette based instead of mayo. I think the vinegar and mustard give it a bright and sharp flavour, and well, you can't have a decent potato salad without fresh dill. Some recipes use prepared mustard or a dijon, but the mustard seeds give it a fresh earthy tone. The trick is to soak the mustard seed for at least an hour in vinegar. I used part white vinegar and part sherry vinegar for a bit of extra oomph. SO thought I didn't soak long enough, I thought it was OK. Red onions give it colour and a bit of tang. Yum!

Next Time: I would eliminate or bump up the parsley. Also I was a bit stingy on the red onion.

Me: 9/10
SO: 7.5/10
SSO: 2/10

Beef Stew with Cheddar and Dill Biscuits

So what do I make for Sunday supper when I have a 2lb bag of beef cubes staring at me? Well I've been meaning to try out my new meat grinder attachment, but that can wait for another time. We only have some (getting old) celery, and the usual pantry staples onions and potatoes. Stew it is!

My expectations were a bit on the low side - how good could it be with some old onions, 5 day old celery, and frozen beef cubes? And I had to go to the store around the corner to get a cheap bottle of red wine.  Huh.  Turns out it could be probably the best stew I've ever made, plus the best biscuits as well.  No fancy herbs or veggies, no advanced techniques, just basic stew with a real depth of flavour.

Beef stew - celery, potato, onion, and lots of red wine

And what goes well with stew? Biscuits of course!  Let's throw in some cheese and dill this time. They ended up being a big hit - we had 3 each!

Cheese and Dill Biscuits

I'm not a big bread maker, but biscuits are OK. They are pretty easy really, just a matter of not over kneading, and getting the butter in the flour without melting too much. Some people will grate frozen butter, I've had more luck just cutting a stick into small pieces and using a pastry blender.

Cutting a cold stick of butter into little pieces

Mixing the butter into the dough is just a matter of going at it with a pastry blender or fork. It should be loose and crumbly.

Mixing butter pieces into flour

Once you add the milk and start mixing it, the dough will start to come together. It should be pretty dry, but there should be no loose flour in the bottom of the bowl. Finally, rolling it out and cutting rounds of your favourite size. I have a ring that is 2.5" diameter.

Cutting rounds of dough

You can gather the remains and roll it out again to get more rounds.

Next time: I would try turnip and/or carrot just for some variety, and fresh tomatoes instead of canned

Me: 10/10
SO: 9/10
SSO: 7/10

Quick Fennel salad

There's nothing particularly inventive or special about this salad. It is, however, a nice change from the usual lettuce with veggie blah or even fruit/cheese blah. I don't buy Fennel every day, it is a pretty strong flavour and so must be used with purpose. Usually I would combine it with orange and red onion. This time I had neither, so it was time to improvise with what was left in the fridge. That turned out to be green grapes and a few old strawberries.

Fennel and grape salad

So I pulled out the mandolin, mostly because I like to use it more than because I really needed it. Although, with fennel the thin pieces are better than thicker big pieces. Cut the green grapes in half, diced the strawberries, and finally tossed with a generous splash of sherry vinegar, the juice from half a lime, and a sprinkle of sugar.

Next time: would experiment with different fruits

Me: 8/10
SO: 5/10 (she thought the fennel was past its prime, I thought it was still ok)
SSO: 4/10

Our comfort food, part 2: Sausages and Potatoes

No, this isn't fancy home-made sausages. It also isn't roasted garlic and rosemary potato wedges, or Hasselback potatoes. It is breakfast sausages, with boiled potatoes that were going soft and needed to be eaten. And the third key ingredient - a can of creamed corn.  This is 8/10 on the low-brow scale (yes, there is plenty of room left on that scale - think Kraft Dinner with cut up hot dogs, for example). But it is also something we grew up with, and so have a fondness for. It is comfort food, and at the same time somewhat of a guilty pleasure. 

Sausages and Potatoes

Of course when we eat it, it sort of gets all mushed up together but that would make for a pretty gross photo. I would usually throw a rather large pat of butter on the potatoes along with generous salt and pepper. Start to finish in 20 minutes, and could do it while sleep walking. The potatoes can be peeled and cooked in about the same time the sausages take to cook.  Throw the plates on tv dinner trays and watch Jeopardy....Perfect. 

Mr. Noodles Pho

I think most everyone has tried, and possibly consumed, many instant noodle packages - probably through college and into bachelor/bachelorette days. We even have a dish we make once a month or so based on the noodles. Other than that, there isn't much to recommend about them other than cheap price. So much to my surprise, browsing the grocery store the other day I came across a new Mr. Noodles food item - a soup bowl, supposedly instant Pho.

Now, I'm instantly skeptical. There are many good pho restaurants in Ottawa. Over the past 15 years or so, my colleagues and I have regularly tried a large variety of them, one of our number even created a blog dedicated to our amateur reviews of pho. So while not experts exactly, we certainly knew a bad soup from a good one.  But it's all about expectations, right? So I bought a couple of them and one day tried it out.

Mr. Noodles soup bowl with spice packets

First thing to notice, it comes with 4 little packets instead of 1. There is a spice package, one with little bits of dehydrated veggies, and two tiny ones with hoisin and Sriracha. And when I say tiny, I mean probably 1 tsp worth. The instructions actually say to heat in the microwave, but I'm not sure I wanted to try that so i just boiled some water and poured in the bowl. After a few minutes, a good stirring up of the noodles and contents of the packages got it looking ready to eat.

Mr. Noodles Pho soup bowl.
Might as well eat like you do in a restaurant.

To me it tasted exactly like the other regular instant noodle packages, except a bit spicier thanks to the Sriracha. But on the whole, not to bad for $1.49 or whatever it was.

Braised Balinese Pork Chops

Alright, full disclosure right off.  This recipe is probably about as Balinese as maple syrup. I only really threw in the name for two reasons: a) it does have some elements of Balinese flavours, namely lemon grass, cane sugar, and kaffir lime, and b) I used Epicure "Bali Glow" seasoning.  No, I don't sell Epicure products, I am only pestered (in the best way possible) to buy them from a friend. So seeing that I have a decent stock of their spices, I feel compelled to use them once in a while. But you know, they are actually pretty decent - no preservatives, low in sodium and often certified non-GMO. That is not something I generally think much about, but came across it by accident in a search. Here is a list.

Getting some colour on the chops
with some Bali seasoning

Onions, mushroom soup, and
Sherry vinegar

Anyway, I was actually aiming to make one of our family stand-by Sunday dinners, pork chops with mushroom soup (don't judge). Except we had no mushrooms, and I felt like jonesing it up a bit. So I thought I'd start by rubbing both sides with Bali and getting some good colour on them.  After browned, I then sweated some onions and deglazed with Sherry vinegar. Add in the mushroom soup, heat it all through, and then finally in the oven for 30 minutes. Turned out really nicely, the flavours were awesome. It helps that the pork chops were from the butcher - tender and really flavourful. Throw that on some rice, with lots of awesome sauce to pour over the lot.

Braised Balinese Pork Chops

Next Time: nothing.

Me: 9/10
SO: 9/10
SSO: 7/10

CrunchyWhole Wheat Peanut Butter Oatmeal Cookies

So I was sitting in line at the car wash and got the urge for peanut butter cookies. Yes, a bit random. But it was such a nice day after a really long spell of super cold weather, and the car really needed a wash. But back to the cookies. I think what got me on the idea was my trip to the grocery store before the car wash. Peanut butter was on sale, $2.99 for a 1kg jar, which is close to half price - which is why I got a smooth and a crunchy.  I'm the only one who likes crunchy in the family so had to get both. Incidentally, I almost got a jar of Skippy instead of the usual Kraft, because lately we've been listening to and singing that Mark Ronson & Bruno Mars song "Uptown Funk" featuring the best music lyrical passage for a long time:

Wait a minute
Fill my cup put some liquor in it
Take a sip, sign a check
Julio! Get the stretch!
Ride to Harlem, Hollywood, Jackson, Mississippi
If we show up, we gon’ show out
Smoother than a fresh jar of skippy

We laugh every time we hear it. But the Skippy wasn't half price, so no go.

Now, how to be inventive...let's try crunchy peanut butter instead of smooth, maybe whole wheat flour instead of regular, dark brown sugar, some oats, and maybe some freshly ground nutmeg. As a friend likes to say, "how bad could it be"?  Uttering that sentence is usually prelude to disaster, so we'll see what happens.  Here's what they look like going into the oven:

cookies about to go into the oven

...and....here's what they look like coming out of the oven:

Crunchy Whole Wheat Peanut Butter Oatmeal cookies

Next Time: would try to make them a bit chewier, so a big more brown sugar, maybe an extra egg, and a bit less fat (or a bit more flour instead)

Me: 9/10

SO: 10/10

SSO: 8/10

Two layer whole wheat chocolate cake with creamy chocolate frosting

I felt like something yummy for dessert. I almost made Chef Michael Smith's peanut butter brownies. Why not?  The recipe called for 1 cup of flour, and.....I ran out. Ooops.  Like seriously, who runs out of flour.  I forgot to put it on the list. I had just come from the grocery store too. I did however have whole wheat flour. It got me thinking, what is a dessert better suited to whole wheat flour? Well generally you can just substitute 7/8th of a cup of whole wheat to 1 cup all-purpose. That doesn't mean it will be a good substitute however. While looking around for ideas I thought why not just go for a good old chocolate cake. And if you're going to make a chocolate cake, you need to have a good frosting, and of course two layers. By the way, the hot water helps the cocoa to dissolve and also makes the batter nice and smooth. It will look thinner than you might be used to, but really it works!

Two layers of chocolate cake ready to go

So what's the best thing about a two layer cake? The extra icing in the middle of course! Well that, and I get to use my cake top remover, a.k.a. cake slicer. Not only do you get nice flat layers, but you get to eat the part you cut off.  I like this frosting quite a bit. The slight orange flavour is awesome. Edit: I tried part white flour and part whole wheat, also very good. I was walking by the dairy section at the grocery store, and saw the cream cheese.  So there is an alternate cream cheese icing recipe that also works very well. Notice the icing recipes are almost identical except the milk is replaced with cream cheese.

Next Time: Maybe try a different frosting, although this one is really good

Me: 9/10
SO: 9/10
SSO: 10/10

Shrimp and Clam Risotto with Thyme butter

I love making risotto. It's time consuming, yes.  Also can be quite fussy. It's easy to over or under cook, and when seasoning I find it's never salty enough until suddenly it's way too salty. I think of Gordon Ramsay doing his "angry chef" bit, yelling at some hapless hopeful on many a cooking reality show - "THIS IS INEDIBLE! YOU'RE USELESS! DO IT OVER!". So it could be the challenge, or the fact that it is so creamy and decadent when you hit it right.

I was going to make a shrimp risotto from Martha Stewart, but she calls for a pressure cooker which I don't have. I started looking for variations, and saw one recipe that called for clam juice with the shrimp. Well why not add clams as well I thought. I started by cooking them almost through with the can of clams and fresh thyme.

Shrimp. clams, and thyme

I've seen a few recipes with tarragon, but SO can't eat/doesn't like tarragon so thought I'd try basil and thyme. I cooked the shrimp with thyme, and also made a little herb butter with more thyme and a fair bit of basil. The butter was added at the end to the dish, and also a little pat as garnish.

Shrimp and Clam Risotto with thyme butter

Other than that, it's a pretty standard mushroom risotto with less mushrooms and lots of shrimp and clams. Even though this was shaping up to be a seafood risotto, I can't help but put mushrooms in. Mushrooms and risotto is kind of like pork and apple sauce, or orange and chocolate. The pairing is just too good.

Next Time: maybe try different seafood combinations, maybe different herbs

Me: 9/10
SO: 9.5/10
SSO: 3/10

Black Bean and Kale Braised Chicken

As often they do, this new recipe (for us) started as a large box of chicken legs from our local butcher. Quality is good, and much cheaper than the grocery store. So....what to make with chicken legs?  Also as we often do, SO finds a great recipe idea (planning and analysis) while I do the cooking (design and implementation). Hmmm, wonder what I do for a living.  This is based on a Tobasco Braised Chicken recipe from foodiecrush.com. I made some changes to suit us, and I think it turned out great. I ended up spicing it differently, omitted the tobasco in favour of Sriracha, and halved the chick peas to make room for black beans. Also threw in some celery along with the onion.

Black Bean & Kale Braised Chicken

I went really easy on the hot sauce because SSO doesn't like "spicy".

Next Time: would spice it up more, maybe try different veggies

Me: 8/10
SO: 9/10
SSO: 6.5/10

One-pan Baked Sausage Pasta

It wasn't long ago I did a "Potato Sausage Bake".  I guess we are really into sausage and potato these days.  This one is a bit different, is saucier and has pasta. Actually it came together as one of those "let's get rid of leftovers in the fridge" kind of dishes.  It's also a lesson in what not to do, and what I like and don't like. We had some celery going soft, a big bag of carrots that needed to be winnowed down, and a tupperware of cooked plain pasta from the other night that would have otherwise been thrown away soon. Oh, and a huge sausage in a take-out box from SO's lunch at some restaurant.

One-pan Baked Sausage Pasta

So there are two things I liked about this: it was all done in one pan, and it used up some stuff from the fridge. I didn't like a few things though: I put too much cheese, and I didn't like the refried beans I put in. SO really liked the beans on the other hand.  Oh yeah, the breadcrumbs on top was really nice, added a little crunch.

Next time: if it's going to be saucy, then don't go half-way. It was mushy instead of saucy.

Me: 5/10
SO:8/10
SSO: 3/10

Cuban Meal - Fried Plantain, Pineapple and Avocado salad, Chicken Fricasse, Cuban Flan, and Rice pudding

So with the arrival of 2015, a few things happened. SO is celebrating a milestone birthday, and we decided we needed to get away to some fun in the sun as a family. Cuba is relatively close and cheap, and has nice beaches. Perfect!  So that went well, and after getting back we thought why not have some friends over and cook up a Cuban-themed meal. One of the friends that came also had ended up in Cuba (also partly because of a milestone birthday), although to a different part of the island, and 2 weeks after us. The following is what came of it all.

The recipes are all from cubanfood.org. I can't vouch for how truly "authentic" these are, but they seemed Cuban to me. I'm not sure it's all that important to always be "authentic" anyway. If the food is good, inspiration can come from many places. In any case, I've seen all of these dishes, or something resembling them, on our recent Christmas trip to the island. Plantain popped up here and there.  Our fav chicken dish at the buffet was a sort of roasted chicken not too dissimilar to the below recipe.  Pineapple was common as you might imagine.   I also saw rice pudding, although the one I made is thicker than what we had down south. Finally, the flan I definitely saw, although it was a bit more solid and cut into squares, whereas this one was round, taking the shape of my bundt pan. Interestingly, two of the recipes use orange juice (actually sour orange), and two call for pieces of lemon peel and cinnamon. Prevalent ingredients in Cuban cuisine perhaps.

So on to the dishes.

Fried Plantain. This was actually pretty tasty, if you like plantain. Hot chips well salted, not much more to say. I used Pink Himalayan, mostly because it looks pretty and I had this silly Jamie Oliver plastic grinder to use. Does it taste better? I don't think it is any different. But it contains more trace minerals that are good for you!  Well, perhaps, but not enough to make a whit of difference. Here is one skeptical look at pink salt, and here is a quick run-down of salt difference. It is pretty, however.

Forgot to take a picture again, so here is an image I borrowed from the web
which looked  exactly like how it turned out. Except mine had pretty pink salt. 

Chicken Fricassee.  What is a fricassee anyway? According to wikipedia, it is is a method of cooking meat in which it is cut up, sautéed and braised. According to Martha Stewart, it is half-way between a sauté and a stew. In any case, it seems to be a popular Cuban dish.  There isn't anything that particularly screams "Cuba!" to me, although there are a couple of elements that add some flair such as capers, olives, and cumin. Cooking it longer and slower produced flavourful and tender chicken.

Chicken Fricassee. Honestly, it tasted awesome.
Fall-off-the-bone chicken!

Pineapple and Avocado Salad.  I never would have thought of combining an iceberg lettuce and a whack of pineapple. I didn't see a lettuce and pineapple salad in Cuba, but I would think that is something one might see, since pineapples would be as readily available as apples in Ontario, and both ingredients seemed common if not together. The avocado as a garnish worked really well.  I like how the lettuce was chopped up finely, not in big leaves.

Pineapple and Avocado Salad. Looks like a lot,
but it was for 10 people. 

Rice pudding. I think this was the hit of the evening. Partly because it was awesome, partly because it hit the nostalgic factor for a few. Just a hint of lemon, and a whiff, but not too much, of cinnamon. Some added raisins after the fact, but I didn't cook it with them. I would make this again for sure.

Rice pudding with cinnamon

Flan Cubano. When I think of flans, I think of these horrible (well some like them a lot) flat thin sponge cake things, sometimes custard, sometimes fruit with whipped cream, with lots of fruit with gelatin yuck all over it, like this:

NOT WHAT I MADE!  This is what
I had a lot as a kid, and didn't like. Ick.

This Cuban flan is much better. It is essentially custard with a sticky caramel outside. It was fun but a fair bit of work to make. Making the caramel is not too hard, but it thickens really quickly when it cools and so you have to work fast to coat the bottom and sides of your baking dish. Then there's the fussing with the water bath, etc. But it turned out great, so it was worth it.

Cuban Flan. Here it is in the pan just starting to cool,
before I inverted it on a plate. You can see the delicious
caramel on the sides and on the top (well, bottom I guess).

Next Time:

• for the salad, I would drain the juice and thicken the dressing so it wasn't so liquidy
• for the chicken, I think using bone-in chicken but taking the skin off was a good call. We left the skin on a few pieces for flavour however. I would use really small Parisienne style potatoes, the ones I used took too long to cook.
• for the flan, hmmm. I darkened the caramel a bit too much, although the custard was good.

Me: 9/10

SO: 10/10

SSO: 7/10

Potato Sausage Bake

This is one from the vault, so to speak. I had written down the ingredients and what I did, but then forgot about it. Oh well, looks good. I think the sausage was from the butcher downtown next to where SO works. Don't remember much else. SO says it wasn't greasy, which was good.

Potato Sausage Bake

Next Time: hmmmm. Nothing comes to mind.

Me: I'll guess a 8/10
SO: 9/10
SSO: 5/10

Chicken Parmesan

Now this is home comfort food. I would do this any day of the week, 45 minutes from start to finish - 15 minutes for prep, 30 minutes or so for baking.  My weekly meal planning email from SO said "chicken parmesan" for Thursday. It was 5:15pm already, SO was due home by 6pm.  Small problem, forgot to take the chicken out of the freezer. I hate that. Oh well, run it under water for a bit, then defrost in the micro for a while.

Also, I love pounding meat. Ahem. Chicken breasts come so gigantically huge these days, thinning them out makes them cook much faster anyway. I found that sticking each one in a small ziplock is a great way to reduce mess. There is also plastic wrap, but I find that is messy to reuse. I also enjoy breading things. Chef Michael Smith always talks about alternating dry and wet layers - that works great. In this case, I started with flour with salt & pepper, then eggs mixed with some milk, then bread crumbs mixed with some spices like oregano, parsley, garlic and onion powders, and a bit of paprika. Bake, throw some cheese on top, back in for a bit, then serve on pasta. Voila.

Chicken Parmesan

Next Time: well I may fancy it up with home made sauce, or maybe a sharper cheese. Maybe a different type of pasta.

Me: 7.5/10
SO: 8/10
SSO: 6/10

Chicken Tortilla Soup

This is a great soup. Quick and easy, but flavourful, spicy, and great for leftovers. Also, it is all stuff I always have in the fridge (or freezer), with the possible exception of fresh cilantro which has a 50/50 chance. Well, and the hot green chili I suppose.  Many similar recipes on the Interweb suggest all manner of veggies to throw in, or strange cheeses, and layering the soup over tortilla chips - but why would you do that, they get soggy in 2 seconds.  I prefer something a bit simpler, browned chicken with garlic, onion, black beans and corn. The chips make a great garnish however.

Chicken Tortilla Soup

Next time: wouldn't do much different

Me: 8/10
SO: 9/10
SSO: 7.5/10