Week 12: Lockdown Chicken Burritos

Shit's getting real, isn't it?    So we're basically on lockdown right now - the hubs and me are home from work for however long we are.    As such, I'm scaling back some of the creativity on dinners and I may be focusing on a few favorites and using what I have, because I'm not going to the grocery store more than I absolutely have to, and you don't need any more empty store shelf pictures to know what that's like right now.   You can definitely get what you need right now, but you can't always get what you want - but that does mean you have to make do with what you have or what's available.

Fortunately, I've always kept a good stock in the freezer and pantry.   I love making homemade freezer meals so I have easy scratch made dinners most nights.   Sometimes those meals are just a starter - like marinated chicken ready to thaw and roast or it's a complete meal that just needs some fresh vegetables or a salad to pair with it.

This week I wanted to use up a pack of frozen grilled chicken that I had.   I marinate chicken cutlets (thighs or breasts) overnight, grill, slice up, and then freeze it in vac sealed bags - when thawed, it's not quite as good as fresh off the grill, but it is still very good and you can't beat the convenience of having it on hand to add to salads, pastas, etc.    

I'm using a pack of chicken I marinated in Grill Mates Mesquite marinade, which I normally use for chicken fajitas.    I've wanted to try using it for burritos because the hubs loves burritos, so that's what I made this week.  

I started out by doing what I normally do for chicken fajitas, which is to sauté 1-2 onions with 2 bell peppers in olive oil with some salt and pepper.   Once the peppers are cooked down, I just add the thawed chicken and and let it cook a little longer until the chicken is warmed through. If I was just making chicken fajitas, this is the mix I'd use for those.

Since I was making burritos, I wanted to do a rice and bean component.    I made a variation on a salsa rice side dish that I do and I purposely made a large batch because I knew it would freeze well.

Mexican Rice, 10-12 servings

1 large onion, chopped
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 1/2 cups white rice  (can also use quinoa, brown rice, etc - just adjust cook times and amount of chicken stock accordingly)
2 14.5 ounce cans fire roasted tomatoes with green chilis  (or any diced tomato)
2 1/2 cups low salt chicken stock
1 1/2 teaspoons chili powder
1 1/2 teaspoons cumin
1 12 ounce bag frozen corn
1 15 ounce can black beans, rinsed
1 bunch cilantro, rinsed and chopped
juice of 1 lime
salt and pepper

First of all, don't let the amount of this recipe daunt you.    It freezes great and then you have it on hand for a quick side dish or to make more burritos.

If you like a spicier rice, feel free to add chopped jalapeño, red pepper flakes, or cayenne pepper as you like.

In a large 4 quart or larger pan over medium heat, sauté the onion in the olive oil with a pinch of salt until the onion has a softened and become translucent.  Add the rice and stir to coat the rice evenly in the oil, letting the rice toast 2-3 minutes.   Add the 2 cans of tomatoes, the chili powder, cumin, and chicken broth to the pan, give it a good stir and turn the heat down to a simmer.   Cover the pan and let it simmer for about 15 minutes, giving it a stir from time to time.     Add in the bag of frozen corn, stirring, and let it simmer for a few minutes more until the rice is cooked and the liquid has mostly been absorbed.   Turn the heat off and add the rinsed black beans;  cover the pot and let it sit for a few minutes off the heat to finish cooking.    Stir in the cilantro and lime juice;  taste for salt and pepper and add as needed.  

To assemble the burritos, you need about 6 ounces of shredded cheese (I like using a Mexican cheese blend, but whatever you like on tacos will be just fine) and large burrito style tortillas.   I made 4 burritos (dinner for one night, then lunch for the next day for the 2 of us), so I split the chicken/peppers/onions mix between 4 of the large tortillas, topped them off with some shredded cheese, and then about 2 spoonfuls of the Mexican rice blend.  

Just roll them up while the fillings are still warm.   I set 2 aside for lunch the next day, and then finished off the 2 for dinner.  

I decided to toast the outside of tortillas by adding a little oil into a
skillet on medium and then adding the burritos to the skillet.    I like how this crisps up the outside of the tortilla, plus it also helps the cheese inside the burrito melt.

You do want to keep an eye on these because they will burn quickly - just keep checking them, and flip over as necessary.

I also like to do this when I reheat burritos (usually I just make breakfast ones with egg/cheese/etc in them).    I find that I have to put them in the microwave for a minute or two first as the tortilla gets too crisp on the outside before the inside is heated through.

And there we have it...chicken burritos.   I mixed some sour cream with some lime juice and lime zest to have to dip these into.

Overall Rating:  7 out of 10.    These were very tasty, not too spicy, but definitely not any kind of authentic.   Still, it was a welcome change from tacos and I'd make them again.

Ease of Preparation:   6 out of 10.   While not particularly difficult, there's multiple steps to making the fillings for these.  Having the grilled chicken all ready to thaw and go made this much easier, particularly as I prefer to marinate chicken overnight before grilling.  

Will It Freezer Meal?   YES!    If I hadn't used grilled chicken that I had already frozen, I would have done a bunch of these for the freezer, and will do them in the future.   If you make everything fresh, you should make double or triple the amount of burritos and freeze them for easy dinners.   I froze the extra rice mixture and then vac sealed them, so I now have that on hand for making burrito bowls or as a side dish for enchiladas or tacos in the coming months.   

Week 11: Chicken and Pasta with Broccoli and Sun-Dried Tomatoes

I had planned on doing something with boneless chicken breasts this week because I've been heavily doing bone-in chicken thus far for this challenge.   That's not surprising  - we do love our bone in chicken.

I pulled out Cook's Illustrated "The Best Chicken Recipes" and found a pasta recipe which I had most of the ingredients for - this was important because if you've been to the grocery store at all in the last couple days, you know what it's been like -  long lines, empty shelves.   Crazy.  

So - I'm not going to make a big deal about posting the recipe for the "Chicken and Pasta with Broccoli and Sun-Dried Tomatoes" here because frankly....it was a bust.   And you really don't want to make it.

I was intrigued because the sauce was neither cream based nor had a ton of butter in it.   It was quick to come together, but I was juggling multiple steps between 2 pans on the stove in order for it to all come together.

I sliced and sautéed the chicken breast cutlets in a large skillet in a little butter, letting them brown a bit.   In the other pan, I had boiling water and blanched the broccoli, fishing it out with a slotted spoon so I could use the same water to cook the pasta.  

Both of these are put to the side.  The recipe has you tenting the chicken to keep warm, while just leaving the broccoli to one side, which makes no sense, because later the chicken is warmed in the sauce and the broccoli is just supposedly added straight to the plate (and will have since gone cold).   Hmm.

Once I fished the broccoli out of the water, I used the same water to cook the pasta.   I also needed some pasta water to finish the sauce -  I always forget to save it, so I set a strainer right on top of a  Pyrex measuring cup.   It's a simple hack - you dump the pasta in to drain, and it automatically saves you a cup of pasta water to add to the sauce.    

Meanwhile, in the skillet, I sautéed half a chopped onion, a couple cloves of minced garlic, some fresh thyme, and a pinch of red onion flakes.   One would think this would give the pasta sauce some flavor, but no.   I should have done the full amount even though I was only doing half the recipe.   I added a little flour to the mix, then added chicken stock and white wine.

That gets simmered for a few minutes until thickened and slightly reduced, then the chicken is added back into the sauce.    The sauce gets a tablespoon (if you follow the exact recipe) of parmesan cheese and an ungodly amount of sun dried tomatoes - it suggested using an entire 8 ounce jar.    I did not add nearly that much - while I like sun dried tomatoes, they have a strong flavor and a little goes a long way.   I also ended up adding more cheese because well.  Cheese.

The pasta gets tossed in this with some of the reserved pasta water to bring it all together.   Although the recipe specified that the broccoli was to be added directly to the plate, I also added the broccoli at this point to let it warm through.    

Gave it a taste....and found it to be very bland.    Added salt and pepper....didn't especially help.    Added some more cheese and another tablespoon of butter.   Slightly better.      Finished with some fresh parsley which tasted like parsley.  

Overall Rating:   3 out of 10.   This wasn't terrible or inedible...it was just bland and ultimately very uninteresting.    Nothing that really popped.

Ease of Preparation:   6 out of 10.   While a relatively fast dish to pull together, you really have to have everything chopped and ready to go, as you're juggling back and forth between 2 pans.

Will It Freezer Meal?   No, but then, you probably don't want multiple dinners of this around either.

Week 10 of the 2020 Chicken Challenge: Chicken with Miso, Sweet Potatoes and Scallions

We're back cooking with Diana Henry this week, this time out of her latest book, "From the Oven to the Table".    The concept of this book is that you have one oven dish  - throw a bunch of stuff in - bake/roast - and that's dinner.   That concept gets two thumbs up from me.

Diana Henry being Diana Henry has an entire chapter on meals centered around bone in skin on chicken thighs.  (And yes....there are more chicken recipes scattered throughout the book as well).

I also realized after I made this that the other DH recipe I already made for this challenge was actually fairly similar to this one (Week 2's Vietnamese Ginger Chicken)....womp womp.   I'll make sure to do something very different from her next time (and there's plenty of that are different).

One thing I enjoy about DH recipes is the they do incorporate some ingredients that I wouldn't normally use but aren't necessarily hard to find.    This particular recipe uses miso paste - if you have a larger grocery store like a Wegman's or a local Asian grocery store, it's not hard to find at least some varieties of it (there are quite a few different ones).   I just ordered a tub off Amazon.

Miso paste is basically a fermented soybean product that adds a salty-savory-umami flavor to a dish and is widely used in Japanese cooking.  Ligher miso like the one I'm using here tends to have a sweetness to it and darker miso is richer and saltier.

This recipe came together fairly quickly.    Give the pan a little spritz of cooking spray (very important - you'll see why later).   I used my Aldi knock off of a Le Creuset enameled cast iron roasting pan again....love that pan.   I had one giant sweet potato that I peeled and cut into "wedges" which ended up more like thick cut fries, which go in into the pan.

For the chicken, I used 2 chicken leg quarters for no particular reason other than I had them and that's what I pulled out of the freezer.

You then make a marinade out of a couple of ingredients:

2 tablespoons white miso paste
1 tablespoon honey
2 tablespoons dry sherry
1 tablespoon temari/dark soy sauce
1 tablespoon fresh grated ginger
3 garlic cloves, grated finely

I tweaked DH's ratios a little bit here because I was only doing 2 servings but the leg quarters were on the larger side.    The recipe also calls for using sake, which I really don't keep on hand, but offers dry sherry as an alternative, which I did have.   I opted to leave out the fresno chili (with seeds) that DH calls for because hubs is still not feeling 100% so nothing too spicy on the menu.

I used a Microplane grater for both the garlic and the ginger - this is one of the MVP's in my kitchen.   Any time you need something finely minced or zested, use a Microplane - it does the job far more evenly and quickly than I can do with a knife.   It's such a great tool.

You just add all your ingredients to a bowl and stir to mix.

Take the sweet potatoes and mix with some of this seasoning mix and spread out in the pan, then smear the rest of the seasoning paste over the chicken leg quarters and into the pan with them.    Just a note....DH says that the chicken and sweet potatoes should be in 1 layer, so if you really wanted to do that, use a sheet pan.   Even with cutting the serving size down for 2 people, I wasn't really able to do that in this pan.

These get roasted in a 400F oven for about half an hour.  

Meanwhile, trim a handful of scallions - I used about 6 as the hubs isn't a fan of them - but leave whole.

Also, make a glaze to add to the chicken, whisking together:

1 tablespoon white miso paste
1 tablespoon honey
1/2 tablespoon temari/dark soy sauce
1/2 tablespoon dry sherry

After the chicken has been roasting for half an hour, add the scallions to the pan, shuffle around the sweet potatoes around a bit to make sure they're cooking evenly, and pour the glaze over the chicken leg quarters.    Put the pan back into the oven to roast for another 15-20 minutes, until cooked through and looking lovely.

Yum!    DH says to make some stir fried veggies to go with this, and I was too lazy - I just steamed some broccoli, tossed it with a little toasted sesame oil, and then drizzled it with some of the pan drippings.  

I'll point out - notice how the marinade burned to the pan around the edges?    This is why it's important to spray the pan with a little cooking spray - partly because the sweet potatoes didn't stick too much (they did a bit because of the glaze), but the pan came clean easily with a 15 minute soak in hot water and dish soap.

Look how gorgeous that came out!

The chicken was very flavorful and juicy.  The skin was more sticky-caramelized than crisp because of the glaze and marinade.   The sweetness from the honey was very mild - the garlic, ginger, and other seasonings really balanced that out.    

I kept thinking that I'd want rice with this dish to drizzle some of those lovely pan drippings on, but the sweet potatoes were surprisingly wonderful with this flavor combination.   This is one of the reasons I so like Diana Henry recipes - she suggests something different, like using the sweet potatoes, that I would not have done and they come out delicious.    

However, I was not a fan of the roasted scallions - I find scallions when whole tend to be very fiberous and unpleasantly chewy.  I would have preferred them sliced thinly and scattered on instead of roasted whole.   

Overall Rating:  8 out of 10.    This was very tasty and well balanced.   The unusual addition of the sweet potato was surprisingly delicious.

Ease of Preparation:   9 out of 10.   The recipe contains a couple things you probably have to make sure you have on hand ahead of time, but the overall recipe is simple and comes together easily. 

Will It Freezer Meal?     You could toss the chicken with the marinade and then freeze it, with the glaze on the side, to make for an easy dinner.    The sweet potatoes won't freeze raw.

Week 9 of the 2020 Chicken Challenge: Mostly Homemade Chicken Soup in the Instant Pot

Mostly Homemade Chicken Soup.....sooooo good!

So the hubs was still battling with a bad cold earlier this week, no appetite and couldn't taste much of anything.    Obviously, it's just not a good week to try a new recipe ~ real life always seems to happen when I do these challenges, so I just roll with it.    He's starting to feel better though, so we should be back to something a little more unique on the menu next week.

I'm also having problems with Blogger this week - it really isn't letting me move the photos around where I want them to be in the post.   I tried a couple different ways, but I give up - maybe next week it'll behave better.

I opted to do an old recipe - my classic chicken noodle soup - but tweak it for the Instant Pot.    I have to admit, using an IP is fast becoming my favorite way to make soups  - it's definitely all I will use now to make stocks.  Instead of having to simmer it for hours, you can just run it on the pressure cook function for an hour or so for chicken bones (2-3 hours for beef bones, depending on what recipe you're following).   

I had the leftovers from the Herb Roasted Chicken I made last weekend, which is a great soup starter.  

Full confession:  I don't think I've ever made stock completely from scratch outside of a culinary class  (I do have plans to do that later this year as part of the Chicken Challenge - and today is not that day).    I do, however, like to combine store bought stock with bones and other seasonings to make a rich soup base, which is what I did here.   I picked all the meat off the chicken and set that aside, and put the remains into the Instant Pot.

In addition to the chicken carcass, I also added a couple carrots, a couple ribs of celery, an onion cut in half with the skin (the onion skin adds color to the stock), about 10 peppercorns, 2 bay leaves, and the stems off a bunch of fresh parsley.   In addition to the box of stock, I also added about 6 cups of water, which brought the liquid to just under the "max fill" line on my 6 quart IP.    Put the lid on, chose the pressure cook option, put the timer on for 45 minutes.   

Once the pressure cook cycle was done, I left it to natural release for about 20 minutes, at which point the pin still hadn't dropped, so I released the pressure.    When you're dealing with that much liquid, it takes a long time to come to pressure and it takes a long time to fully natural release.    

Strained stock

I strained off the liquid into a big mixing bowl and threw away all the solids - nothing more to try to use them for.    I tasted the stock and it was actually very flavorful, but desperately needed salt, which is exactly where I wanted it to be.    I will sometimes bring the stock to a boil and cook it down if I think the flavor isn't strong enough, but it was richly chicken-y at this point and I also had some other additions I was going to make to it that would bump up the flavor.

While the stock was doing it's thing, I cut up the veg that I wanted for the soup -  4 carrots, peeled and sliced;  4 ribs of celery, finely sliced, and about 5 diced shallots.    I really prefer to use leeks or shallots in chicken soup - the flavor is milder than onion and really wonderful.   I had the chicken meat set to one side with some fresh chopped parsley and also the leaves off the celery.   I love using celery leaves as an herb - they have a slightly bitter, grassy taste that's really lovely in a soup.   If I didn't have the fresh herbs, some dried thyme, sage, rosemary, parsley would have all been welcome in this.

I gave the IP pot a quick wash, then got it started with the saute function.   I put a little olive oil in the pan, then added the carrot/celery/shallot and sautéed that for a few minutes until the veggies softened up a little bit.    I poured the strained stock back into the pot.  

At this point, I knew the stock needed salt and I wanted to build the flavors a little more, so I pulled out some Better Than Bouillon, which is basically a bouillon paste.   I really like BtB products but they do tend to be salty to my tastes.   The saltiness is at a level that you can work with, but you have to be aware of it  - so I used no salt added boxed stock when I made the base stock, and I buy the low salt BtB when possibly (I think they just make chicken and beef in low salt), and if I know I'm going to use some of this bouillon in a recipe, I avoid adding extra salt until I taste the final product.    What's nice about them is that when you have a dish that needs a little extra salt, you can add a bit of this and it adds flavor as well as salt.     I added about a 2 teaspoons each Low Salt Roasted Chicken and Roasted Garlic to the pot.

I got the lid back on the IP and then ran the pressure cook cycle for 6 minutes.   It didn't need long - it just needed to cook the veg through and also blend in the Better Than Bouillon into the stock.    If I was going to use raw chicken here instead of using the leftover cooked chicken, I would added maybe a pound of boneless chicken and run the pressure cycle for 10 minutes, which is enough to cook the chicken so it's tender enough to shred easily.

I let it natural release for about another 20 minutes, then released the pressure.   Once the pin dropped and I took the lid off, I mixed in the leftover roast chicken, celery leaves, and parsley and let sit together just to warm the chicken through.

For the noodle component, I cooked fine egg noodles separately - I don't like how they bulk up and basically turn the soup to sludge, so I prefer to cook them on the side and just add them to the soup bowl, then ladle the soup on top.    The fine egg noodles will warm up quickly, so it's a really easy way to control how many noodles you want to add.

We didn't eat our way through an entire 6 quart pot of soup (surprisingly!), but if you're going to make soup - make enough to freeze so next time you want some, it's ready to go.    

I split the rest of the soup base into two glass containers with about 4 cups in each, each of which will make a generous meal for the two of us.    I like to freeze in these containers overnight, then I run some hot tap water on the bottom and use a butter knife to pop out the "puck" of soup.

I then vac seal that puck, and it's good to go hang out in my freezer for up to 6 months.   Next time someone gets a cold (or we just want chicken soup), it'll be there.

Overall Rating:  10 out of 10.   Comfort food at it's best, and my favorite soup. 

Ease of Preparation:   7 out of 10.     While not difficult, it does take some time to make the stock - the Instant Pot makes it a lot easier, but it isn't "instant".    However, the results are well worth the effort.

Will It Freezer Meal?   Absolutely.   You're doing yourself a disservice if you don't make extra and freeze this.   I prefer to freeze without the noodles in the soup, but you can if you like.

Week 8 of the 2020 Chicken Challenge: Herb Butter Roasted Chicken

Running a bit late on the post this week because I haven't cooked much the last week - the hubs has a vile cold and the meds are working but not sitting well with him.   He hasn't had much of an appetite, let alone been up for anything "experimental"....yes I made homemade chicken soup, and I'll probably make another batch this week.    As I've said with all the chicken challenges, they are "real world challenges", so sometimes the real world takes priority.

I wanted to do something relatively simple for dinner that was appealing to someone with no appetite, and roast chicken is always a good option.   I already have a couple of whole roast chicken options tagged that I'll be making for this challenge, so I picked one of the more straightforward versions, the Herb Butter Chicken out of "Everyday Dorie" by Dorie Greenspan.  

I love Dorie's cookbooks and "Everyday Dorie" is no exception.    Her "Baking:  From My Home to Yours" is possibly my all time favorite baking book, with her "Dorie's Cookies" being a close second.      I had intended to also make a dessert and a side dish out of this book as well, but the hubs wasn't up for a big dinner, and I can't be trusted having an entire cake to myself.  I'll do those another time.  

I opted to try one of Aldi's "Never Any" line of whole chickens - while not specifically organic, they are antibiotic-free, free range, no salt brine added, among other things.   They also don't have the organic bird price tag.  As always - the recipe calls for a nearly impossible to find 4 lb bird, so I went with a bird that was just a little over 5 lbs.

This is not a complicated recipe and includes several "tricks" I've tried before.   I started by making an herb butter with 6 tablespoons of butter, the zest of one lemon, about a half cup of minced fresh herbs, a couple minced scallions, salt, and pepper.    You really could use a lot of interesting combinations of herbs here, depending what direction you wanted to go with the flavors.    My (non Aldi) store was a little limited in selection the day I was there, but I did get some fresh thyme, sage, and parsley and used those.     Rosemary, marjoram, oregano, dill would all have been good as well.

Dorie has you roasting the chicken in a Dutch oven, so I pulled out my 5 1/2 quart Le Crueset.   More on vessel type later....given that it was a slightly larger bird than the recipe intended, I think I had better options than what I used.

You build the pot by using a couple of slices of stale-dish bread (I used some from a mini baguette that I specifically bought and then left out to dry) spread with a  little bit of the herb butter blend.   Drizzle a little oil in the bottom of the pan, add the bread, a sliced onion, and a bay leaf.

You also need some white wine for the pot.   So - just stating the obvious - I love wine.  I far prefer to drink red wine over white, so I don't always want to open a full bottle of white to use in a recipe, and then have it sit for weeks in the fridge until I finish using it up.    

And so keep these mini bottles of white wine in the pantry - they're the type you find in 4 packs at the booze store.   The bottles are about 5 to 6 ounces i.e. about the equivalent of a glass of wine.....and about what you need for most recipes.

I added one of these little bottles to the pot as well per the recipe, because wine with butter and herbs and chicken are just never a bad thing.  Usually.  More on that later too.

Then there's the chicken.    I loosened up the skin as well as I could without tearing it, and worked the herb butter in chunks under the skin, spreading it out as much as possible.    The outside of the bird got a hefty sprinkle of salt.   I cut the lemon I zested for the butter in half and stuffed that inside with the stems leftover from the herbs, plus some extra parsley and scallions.

The chicken gets added to the pot on top of the bread and onions and wine, then into the oven for about an hour at 425F on the convection setting until cooked through.   (Note:  the recipe calls for roasting it at 450F, but I dropped the temp 25 degrees to compensate for using the convection setting on my oven.

Beautiful, isn't it?    Well, sort of.   The breast browned up well but if you look, you can see the drums (and the thighs) really didn't brown well.    I did temp check them to make sure they were cooked through (they were).      It's definitely not nearly as evenly browned as the picture in the cookbook....but there you have it.

As I mentioned, the hubs hasn't had too much of an appetite, so I just made a salad with butter lettuce, cucumbers, scallions, dried cranberries and goat cheese crumbles tossed in a homemade red wine vinaigrette for a side dish. 

As always, whenever I roast a chicken, I snag the breast to eat first.  White meat is always the first to dry out and if that's good....it's a good recipe.

The chicken itself was extremely moist and delicious, as a roast chicken tends to be...really nice flavor from the herbs and butter under the skin.   I had even gotten some down into the thigh area, even though the skin didn't brown over it, the meat itself was extremely flavorful and tender.      The chicken worked really well with the sweet cranberries and butter lettuce and the vinaigrette cut some of the richness of the chicken skin.

But let's address a couple issues.    The non-browning of the legs is obviously an issue because cooked or not, they're just better with crispy skin.   I think that was a result of it being a bigger bird then called for and not getting enough exposure in a high sided dutch oven.  I think it would have worked better either in my braised (wider, low sided) or even in a baking dish.  I'm particularly fond of the enameled cast iron baking dish I've been using lately - I should have gone with that.    The lower dish would have allowed for more exposure/air circulation around the legs.....had I spatchcocked the chicken, the overall chicken would have browned more evenly.

Let's also address what's going on in the bottom of the pan, which I didn't get a picture of but should have.   I've done several recipes that use bread under a roasting chicken ~ one of Dorie's recipes from "Around My French Table" which was my first time doing it, and subsequently in other recipes like Ina's Roast Chicken and Bread Salad, which is a riff on the famous Zuni Cafe roast chicken.    You put chunks of dry crusty bread on the bottom of the pan to roast under a chicken and 2 things happen - the bread gets deep deep brown and crusty (but not hard) on the bottom and then the top (and bottom as well) soak up all the fat and juices from the roasting chicken, making the bread amazing and rich and decadent - you can't eat too much of it but soooo good.  It can be a bit soggy but not terribly so.

Because this recipe called for the addition of wine into the bottom of the pan - the bread never got that super brown bottom and it was soggy to the point of falling apart into mush.    Very disappointing - so the bread and onion mix in the bottom basically got wasted.

Overall Rating:   8 out of 10.   Despite the browning issues and the bread issues, the chicken itself was delicious, and ultimately, that's what this recipe was about.     

Ease of Preparation:   7 out of 10.   Although it takes a little time to make, it's a fairly simple, straightforward recipe to make.   

Will It Freezer Meal?   Dorie's recipe calls for you to make double the herb butter and save half for later - and yes, that herb butter will freeze just fine.   I make compound butters and freeze all the time to use up fresh herbs that may otherwise go to waste.   You could also prep the bird by stuffing the butter under the skin and then freezing it.  I would probably more likely do that with chicken legs rather than a whole chicken.   Then just thaw and pop right into the oven to roast.

Week 7 of the 2020 Chicken Challenge: Sweet Tea Brined Fried Chicken from Outlander Kitchen

Happy Outlander Season 5 Premier Day!   Woot!

(Actually, they released the season premier early so I watched it yesterday.....really great adaption of "the longest day ever" and a wonderful kick off to the season).  

So yes...I'm an Outlander fan.   I've read all the books - multiple times (and if you're familiar with them, you know how long they are) - and love the show.     In honor of the new season of Outlander starting today, I decided to cook out of Theresa Carle-Sanders' "Outlander Kitchen" cookbook.   She also has a website, Outlander Kitchen.

There's only a grand total of four chicken recipes in the book, so I opted to try one I found most interesting, Sweet Tea Brined Fried Chicken.  (At some point, I'm totally making the mock turtle soup, but not this week...maybe I should have done that for Valentine's Day?)

The author notes that this isn't a particularly period recipe - it's more "inspired by" than "authentic".   I further tweaked it with some lemon in the brine and extra seasonings to the flour.    I had originally planned on using boneless chicken thighs but chicken tenders were on sale this week and they do make for a good frying option if you're not doing bone-in.


Serves 4

1 1/2 lbs chicken tenders, tendon trimmed out

For the brine:

3 tea bags (I used Typhoo, a strong English black tea)
1 lemon, quartered
2 springs fresh rosemary
1-2 bay leaves
10 or so peppercorns
1/2 cup sugar
2 tablespoons salt

The brining process isn't complicated but it does take a couple hours.   The original recipe doesn't call for lemon but if you have sweet tea  - you need lemon.     You add all of your brine ingredients to a heat proof container (I just used a rubbermaid style one) and then add in 2 cups of boiling water.     Stir to dissolve the salt and sugar and let the tea brew.    When you feel the tea is strong enough, add about 2 cups of ice and stir to melt, then put the brine in the fridge for half an hour or so until it cools down.

Once the brine is cool, add the chicken tenders to the mix - there should be enough of the brine to cover the chicken.    I let the chicken brine for about 4 hours total in the fridge.

I drained off the brine and just used a couple paper towels to pat the chicken tenders dry.

For the coating:

1 1/2 cups buttermilk

1 1/2 cups flour
1/3 cup cornstarch
1 teaspoon pepper
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon onion powder
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon dried thyme
1/2 teaspoon paprika
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper

Vegetable oil for cooking  (usually more than you think you need)


Coating is fairly straight forward.    Add the buttermilk to a shallow baking dish and whisk in 1 teaspoon of salt and 1/2 teaspoon of pepper.    Add all the flour and the seasonings to another baking dish and whisk together.  

First go through and dredge all the tenders in the seasoned flour.   I set up a sheet pan with a baking rack in it to set them on.  (I also set up a 2nd one with paper towels in the bottom to drain the chicken as it comes out of the oil).  

After the first coating of flour was done, I did a little trick I like to do with fried chicken - I took a couple tablespoons of buttermilk and drizzled it over the flour, and used a fork to toss it in - you're not trying to make a batter, you're just trying to create some clumps in the flour.    Those clumps end up giving the finished coating of the chicken extra crispy bits when frying (which as we all know is the best part!)

The floured chicken fingers get dipped in the buttermilk and then dredged a 2nd time in the flour (with as many clumps sticking as you can get).  

For frying, I used a 4 quart pan with about 2 inches of oil in it.   I prefer to use a deep pan because it keeps the splatter to a minimum....it did mean I could only fry about 4 tenders at a time, so I ended up doing several batches.   Ah well.   I had to add some extra oil to the pan once or twice in between batches, as is normal.

It only takes a couple minutes to fry a tender, just until they are golden brown.  It's useful to use an instant read digital thermometer to make sure the oil is at 350F when the chicken goes in and that the chicken gets up to about 160F internally before pulling it out.

I drained the chicken off to one side and let it cool down a bit.

Meanwhile I made a quick dipping sauce of grainy dijon mustard and honey, as well as a simple cole slaw to go with this.  


As a bonus recipe, I also made the corn muffins out of Outlander Kitchen.  I did a half recipe and baked them in mini loaf pans - it made 4, which is plenty for us.

So, how were they?

You know.....it's fried chicken so they can't be all bad, right?   And it was indeed tasty.   I did add extra seasoning to the flour over what the recipe called for, so I did feel they were seasoned well.   But if I'm going to be nitpicky......the flavor of the tea was very subtle and I wonder if brining them overnight would help with that and let the flavor really soak in.    Once the chicken started cooling, the coating really didn't stick well to to the meat, which is annoying.    I always make extra fried chicken when I make it (because if I'm making the mess, I want 2 meals out of it) and then reheat in the oven, and again the coating didn't stick well on the chicken during reheat.

I was not a fan of the cornbread - I prefer a sweeter cornbread.  I didn't like the creamed corn that I used in it - I tried Aldi brand creamed corn, and I'm usually an Aldi fan but this was more just mashed kernels, very little creaminess to it, and it really affected the overall texture of the cornbread, so there's some user error in that.    I won't buy Aldi creamed corn again.

Just as a note  - my standard recipe for doing fried chicken tenders is a 24 hour brine in a heavily seasoned buttermilk, then straight into a heavily seasoned flour for a single dredge, then into the fryer.    There's still some issues with the coating staying on once cooled - there always is with frying skinless chicken - but not to the degree that I saw with the tea brined chicken.    The buttermilk brine is still my preferred method for tenders.   Ruhlman's fried chicken is still my gold standard for bone in fried chicken.

Overall Rating:  6 out of 10.     Tasty,  but I didn't feel the brine added a lot to the chicken, nor did the coating stick well to the chicken.   I probably wouldn't make again, as I have other recipes I prefer more.

Ease of Preparation:   4 out of 10.   These weren't particularly hard to make, clean up is always a project for deep frying - it makes a lot of dishes, plus general mess of deep frying.  Made a LOT of dirty dishes.    You do have to plan ahead because the brine takes a while to cool down and then the chicken needs a couple hours in it.

Will It Freezer Meal?      Fried chicken is never better than when it's fresh out of the oil....but you could brine and bread the chicken, flash freeze it on a sheet pan, and store it in the freezer, to be fried from frozen (will take a couple extra minutes).      

Week 6 of the 2020 Chicken Challenge: Valentines Day Special - Cooking from Fifty Shades of Chicken

"Blushing Parts"....recipe adapted from Fifty Shades of Chicken by E. B. Fowler.

With Valentine's Day approaching, I decided to cook out of everyone's favorite bondage-and-chicken cookbook, Fifty Shades of Chicken.    I've had this book for quite a few years and have made a number of the recipes out of it.   The descriptions/stories that go with the recipes are laugh-out-loud funny in a PG-13 adult humor kind of way (and are meant to be more funny than erotic), and the recipes themselves, while not anything breakthrough or exceedingly original, are decent.

I had to do a little digging through to find a recipe I hadn't made before that looked interesting, and "Blushing Parts" (i.e., cranberry baked chicken with apple cider) was the winner.

Serves 2

2 chicken thighs and 2 chicken legs, trimmed of excess fat and seasoned with salt and pepper

1 1/2 cups apple cider
3 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
1/2 cup dried cranberries
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1 inch piece of fresh ginger, peeled
1 tablespoon butter, cut into 4 pieces

Set aside 1/2 cup of apple cider and 1 tablespoon of apple cider vinegar.

To get started,  I cranked the oven up to 450F.

For this recipe, it has you making a glaze that also reconstitutes the dried cranberries.  I smashed the chunk of ginger with the flat of a knife.    I put the 1 cup apple cider, 2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar, the cranberries, cinnamon and ginger into a small saucepan and brought it up to a boil.   I then lowered the temperature and let the blend simmer.   The recipe calls for you to do that for 20 minutes until the mixture is well reduced - I found it only needed about 10 minutes or so to get to the consistency shown above.    Once the glaze was done, I removed and tossed out the piece of ginger.

The chicken gets seasoned with salt and pepper and put into a roasting pan, skin side up.  I always give my pan a spritz of cooking spray just to make sure it doesn't stick.    I poured the fruit and glaze over the chicken and dotted with the butter.  

As you can see, there's really not a lot of liquid in the pan from the glaze.    

I got the chicken in the oven and set the timer - according to the recipe, it should take about 40 minutes for the chicken to roast.

I checked back after about 25 minutes, and while the chicken looked good, I really didn't feel it was "blushing" much - the glaze wasn't visible on the chicken, the cranberries were looking kind of dry, and there wasn't much liquid in the pan other than some but not a lot of the roasting juices.  

So at this point, I opted to deglaze the pan by adding extra apple cider and apple cider vinegar.  I scraped the bottom of the pan, and then basted the chicken with the pan juices, which really gave the chicken some of that blushing color....because if we're going to call it "blushing parts" well then I need a little more color on it LOL.    I let the chicken continue to roast, but went back and basted it two more times to build up the glaze those lovely legs and get some browning going on.

I could have let the pan juices reduce a little more but I felt the chicken was well cooked at that point, so I pulled it out of the oven.

For sides, I made a tri-color quinoa cooked with a little chicken stock and steamed mixed veggies.

So how was it?

I thought this chicken was good but far from great - I frequently enjoy pairing chicken and fruit, and obviously cranberry and apple both pair well with poultry.   However,  it was a little sweeter than I care for, and the ginger flavor was too subtle.   The glaze was very one note - it needed something to really balance it and add complexity.

I did enjoy the combination of apple/cranberry/chicken enough that I'll play around a little bit in the future.    If I keep the ginger/cinnamon, I'd want to add more savory Asian flavors, like temari sauce and fish sauce, with some fresh scallions to finish.    Otherwise, I'd ditch the ginger/cinnamon and swap in more aromatics - rosemary and garlic, or shallots/sage/thyme.    I would also consider swapping the apple cider for a bottle of hard cider, which would tone down some of the sweetness.

I would say that my feelings about this particular recipe really reflect my overall experience over the years of cooking from Fifty Shades of Chicken  -  I can't ignore the book because it really does make me laugh with it's tongue in cheek naughty humor.    The recipes are good but a little basic - with some tweaking, they could be much better.  

Overall Rating:  4 out of 10.   This was decent, but too sweet for my tastes.   It needed a little more savory flavors to balance the sweetness of the apple/cranberry.    

Ease of Preparation:   8 out of 10.   Easy weeknight meal.   The glaze was simple to make.    Roasting was easy but does benefit greatly from basting several times throughout the cooking process.   

Will It Freezer Meal?   The glaze should freeze just fine - make per instructions and after removing the ginger, cool and pour into a freezer bag, add the chicken.   Seal and freeze.    To cook, thaw out and add chicken to a roasting pan; roast as normal.

Week 5 of the 2020 Chicken Challenge: Vinegar Chicken with Crushed Olive Dressing, aka NYTimes Most Popular Recipe of 2019

I spent a lot of time the first couple days of 2020 digging through boxes looking for cookbooks and looking at a couple favorite websites and generally coming up with a list of what the first couple chicken dishes I would make for this challenge.  One thing that kept popping up online - the #1 for 2019 on the NY Times Cooking site was from Alison Roman for a Vinegar Chicken with Crushed Olive Dressing, so of course I was interested in making it.

I don't actually subscribe to the NY Times online, but a quick search found the recipe elsewhere online in several places, including here.

The recipe is a simple roasted chicken seasoned with turmeric, and using the chicken drippings to make a vinaigrette with olives and herbs.  Very simple but it sounded like a great week night option.

I cross referenced Alison Roman's book, "Dining In" because the NYTimes recipe sounded similar to one in there:  "Skillet Chicken with Crushed Olives and Sumac".  The cooking method was a little different,  but the same concept - cook chicken, add acid (lemon juice in the case of the book), finish with herbs and crushed olives.   The book version of the recipe is also here.

I went back and forth about which version I wanted to do and ended up doing the NY Times version, but I will also go back and do the Dining In version as a bonus recipe in the near future to compare the two versions.

So this recipe does have a few items I didn't have in my pantry, specifically turmeric and Castelvetrano olives.    Castelvetrano olives are a new one for me - apparently they are hugely popular in Italy - they are a mild, buttery brilliant green olive.   I actually prefer black olives to green olives, and I had a back up plan if I couldn't find these.     However, no issues there - my local grocery store had them.  

I went with my go-to option for bone in chicken, which is a combination of legs and thighs.    The ones I got were particularly hefty, so I just used 2 legs and 1 thigh, which was plenty for the two of us for dinner.    The chicken is seasoned with turmeric, salt, pepper and a little olive oil, and then white wine vinegar is added to the baking dish and then roasted.

For side dishes, I knew I wanted something that would work well with that vinaigrette - something that would absorb it, be dressed by it, be complimented by it.   I decided to roast a pan of brussels sprouts, carrots, and shallots in the oven that roasted while the chicken was in the oven.   I also made some quick cook faro for a grain base.

While the chicken is roasting, you make a simple herb salad with crushed olives, olive oil, garlic, and fresh parsley.  I also had some fresh dill, so I added that as well.  

The idea is that you are basically making a vinaigrette by adding this fresh olive/herb mix to the vinegar roasted chicken.

The chicken came out a rather brilliant shade of yellow, courtesy of the turmeric.   The vinegar had just about completely reduced down to nothing and there was a lot of glorious fond on the bottom of the pan.    I wanted to make sure I got all that up, so I took the chicken out of the pan and added a couple extra tablespoons of white wine vinegar to the pan to deglaze the roasting pan.

At that point, you add the olive/herb/garlic mix to the pan and to make the pan sauce/vinaigrette that you pour over the chicken.   The pan had the chicken fat/juices and olive oil, then there was also more olive oil in the olive/herb mix.    I had already added extra vinegar to the pan to deglaze and found that the pan sauce needed quite a bit more vinegar to cut through all the richness of the fats already in the pan.   I ended up adding close to another half a cup of vinegar to get a good bite to it.   I thought the salt level was fine but added a couple solid grinds of black pepper.

So, how was it?

This was a really good, solid weeknight dinner.   It took a grand total of about 45 minutes start to plate.    I didn't feel that the turmeric brought much to the chicken other than color.    I did enjoy the Castelvetrano olives more than I normally like green olives, but I'd really like to go back and try this with some of my favorite black olives (or use some Trader Joe's Olive Tapenade, which was my back up plan if I couldn't find the Castelvetranos).    I'd also like to try this in warmer weather served over hearty salad with spinach and arugula.    

When you look at the similarities between the NY Times recipe and the Dining In version, you can see that there's a lot of options to play around with this basic method, and that's always a win.

Overall Rating:  8  out of 10.    Easy weeknight option with a lot of room to play around.   Very flavorful and moist.

Ease of Preparation:   9 out of 10.    Simple, easily sourced ingredients that would be easy to swap out depending on what's available in the pantry.    Can't skip the fresh herbs, but could easily change up the mix used.

Will It Freezer Meal?   No.  There's really not much to prep ahead with this recipe and much of the recipe's success relies on that fresh vinaigrette and herb finish.

As a bonus, I also decided to make Roman's Salted Butter and Chocolate Chunk Shortbread (also here), which became a wildly popular cookie recipe when Dining In came out.  

These were excellent - crisp and sweet and salty.  I used my favorite blend of Trader Joe's semi-sweet chocolate and 72% chocolate, chopped by hand from their Pounder Plus bars.  

I'll respectfully disagree with Roman's view of chocolate chip cookies (but then...mine also feature chocolate chunks and are sprinkled with coarse salt), but these cookies are an excellent version of shortbread.   No reason not to have both in your life.  I'm going to have to try making them with browned butter (also something I do for my chocolate chip cookies).

Overall Rating:  9 out of 10.    

Ease of Preparation:   7 out of 10.   They're a fairly standard shortbread method.  I'm not a fan of doing roll and slice cookies, but I think it's the right method for these particular cookies.

Will It Freezer Meal?   Absolutely.  Any butter based cookie dough freezes wonderfully - I made a double batch of the dough and froze 2/3.    Shape and cut your cookies but instead of baking them, put them on a sheet pan and freeze.   Bag up frozen cookies and bake from frozen when you want them, adding an extra 2-3 minutes to baking time.