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Archive for the category “chicken”

04 Feb 2012
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Smorgastarta…sorta

I prepared food for a party this weekend. It was far from the many Super Bowl parties going on – this one was a bunch of ladies getting together to have fun at a private home. Television off. Music and conversation on. They wanted some filling food without loading up on the calories, and nix the seafood. I have reliable recipes I’ve made for years, but also like the thrill (geez I need to get a life!) of trying a new recipe for the first time and serving it at a party. The centerpiece I made was a cake…sort of. It was a spin off of a smorgastarta. If you have never heard of such a thing, it is basically a layered sandwich frosted like a cake. The original version is popular in Sweden and served at parties – bread, herring mousse, cucumber, bread, smoked salmon, sauce, lettuce, bread, then frosted with a cream cheese/sour cream ‘frosting’. A beautiful version is described and presented at Panini Happy. Since the party would include people who are not partial to seafood, I came up with a version that is about as friendly to the masses as possible. How can I go wrong with chicken, ham and turkey? It was really fun to make, much prettier than an old fashioned sandwich tray and deeeelicious! The leftover bits and pieces from the garnish made a great salad. Heh. My garnish ended up looking a little different than I originally planned (and described below in the directions), but I just went with the flow and I like my results. Let them eat cake…

Smorgastarta…sorta

24 slices large whole wheat bread
1/2 cup Butter (room temperature)
4 ounces thin sliced ham (about 15 slices)
4 ounces thin sliced turkey (about 15 slices)
8 ounces thin sliced cheese
1 English cucumber, peeled and sliced thin
7 cups diced chicken (about seven chicken breasts)
1 cup mayonnaise
1 cup diced dill pickle
1/4 cup shredded onion
1 tsp curry
24 ounces cream cheese (room temperature)
16 ounces sour cream (room temperature)
1 large round tomato
10-14 leaves of green/purple lettuce or flat leaf parsley sprigs
3 boiled eggs (10 minute boil)
1 tall red or yellow bell pepper
1 bunch green onions
1 large carrot

Make sandwich decorations and chill them while constructing cake:
-use peeler to make long thin ribbons from the carrot
-trim green onions until there is only 2″ of green above the white portion, then slice the green parts in quarters lengthwise, not cutting into the white
-make vertical cuts in radishes almost to the bottom four time around the radish
-place carrots, onions and radishes in ice water and set in fridge for at least an hour. The carrots will curl, the onion greens will curl and the radishes should open up and become ‘roses’.
-remove chilled vegetables from water and set on towel to dry (radishes and onions should be done in an hour, but carrots may take two hours to curl if thick)
-core bell pepper and slice horizontally, making rings

Peel tomato skin in one long ribbon to make a tomato rose. Lay it flat for about 30 minutes so it can relax and flatten out. It needs to be flat so you can roll it, otherwise it will try to keep the shape of the tomato and not roll tightly enough. When ready to decorate the cake, roll the skin like a roll of tape. One side of it will naturally form a rose. Garnish with some mint or basil leaves.

To make chicken salad combine chicken, mayonnaise, pickle, shredded onion and curry. Set aside.

Remove crust from all slices of bread. Butter one side of eight pieces of bread and place them butter side up in a rectangular shape on a serving tray. Spread chicken salad on bread, bringing as close to the edges as possible. Place a layer of cucumber on top of salad.

Butter both sides of eight pieces of bread and place on top of the cucumber. Arrange ham and turkey in loose rolls on bread, making sure slices are not pressed flat. Drizzle mustard over meat. Add a layer of cheese. Butter one side of eight pieces of bread and place butter side down on top of cheese.

Thoroughly blend together the cream cheese and sour cream until smooth. Use the mixture like frosting and cover the sandwich on top and all sides.

Press parsley sprigs or lettuce fans on side of frosted sandwich. Arrange egg slices, radishes, carrots, green onions, tomato roses and bell pepper rings on top to decorate. Chill sandwich for at least three hours before serving.

Posted in bread, chicken, Mom's Kitchen, sandwich
30 Jan 2012

Chicken Enchiladas with Cilantro Cream Sauce

My tex-mex run is coming to an end. I promise. I am ending it (for now) with a pleasant flourish. When offered enchiladas there is usually a choice between cheese, beef, chicken or spinach. I usually want chicken/spinach enchiladas, so I just go -harumph- and choose between the two, or abandon both and go for cheese. I am not complaining. It is not a curse to have four good options to choose from. There just has to be a choice made, or I resort to a combination plate that mixes them all, which also means mixing the sauces and not really getting a pure, committed bite of any one enchilada from a crowded plate. I do not usually ponder the nuances of enchilada purity, but I live where there exists only mediocre Mexican restaurants, so my mind wanders to places it normally wouldn’t. Here is my solution for being surrounded by mediocrity:

Chicken Enchiladas with Cilantro Cream Sauce

1 pound cooked, shredded chicken

4 ounces roasted green chiles, chopped

1 cup cooked spinach, well drained and chopped

8-10 ounces shredded cheese blend (such as monterrey jack, mild cheddar and asadero)

Dash of salt

10 corn tortillas

1 bunch fresh cilantro (leaves only), chopped

1 clove garlic, crushed

1 lime, juiced

1 cup heavy cream

¼ cup sour cream or Greek yogurt

1/2 cup chicken stock

2 tsp oil or butter

Preheat oven to 350F. In a small bowl combine heavy cream, sour cream, chicken stock, lime juice, garlic and cilantro. Stir together until well mixed. Set aside. Grease shallow baking dish with oil or butter. Spread a thin layer of the cream sauce in the bottom of the dish, leaving enough to cover the top of the enchiladas. Combine together chicken, chiles, spinach and about half the cheese. Season with salt to taste. Warm the tortillas right before rolling to make them easier to work with. Place in a tortilla about 1/3 cup of the filling, roll it up and place it seam side down in the dish. Repeat with all tortillas until pan is full. Pour sauce over filled tortillas. Sprinkle remaining cheese over the top. Cover with foil and bake for about 20 minutes. Uncover and bake another 10-15 minutes until enchiladas are a golden color on top. Remove from oven and let cool about five minutes before serving.

 

Posted in baked, chicken, lime, wheat free | Leave a Comment
24 Jan 2012

Orange Chicken Redux

Adaptability. The need for it comes in small and large ways. With two aging oranges in the fruit bowl the chicken in the freezer was calling to be joined with them. My original idea was to make a stir fry, with the sauce caramelizing around the meat and veggies, trickling down into the rice and filling every bite with a sweet spiciness. In the end, the dish was delicious, but only after a bit of adapting. I pulled the chicken out of the fridge when it came time to make dinner. Arghh! Still frozen! Since I hate defrosting meats in the microwave – it always partially cooks it and encourages rubberiness – my options were to wait way too long to start dinner, make something else, or switch up the recipe. I decided to (sigh) bake the chicken instead of stir fry. Not the end of the world, but not exactly the plan.  I jumped in and went with the flow. I am including directions for what I did (redux) and what I meant to do (original). In the end it turned out yummy with a slow heat from the sauce.

Orange Chicken

4 chicken thighs, skinned and deboned (redux version used chicken with skin and bone intact)

Salt to taste

3 Tbsp canola oil

2 oranges, juiced with meat

1 tsp red chili flakes

2 Tbsp chili sauce

1 Tbsp teriyaki sauce

1 garlic clove, diced

½ medium onion, julienned

4 cups stir fry vegetables (snow peas, carrots, cauliflower, watercress, etc)

Original Directions

Mix chili flakes, chili sauce, teriyaki sauce and orange juice. Set aside. Cut chicken into bite sized pieces, sprinkling it with salt to taste.  Heat oil in wok at medium high heat. Add garlic to oil until browning begins. Add chicken and cook until half cooked. Add onions until they begin sweating. Add remaining vegetables and until almost done, covering if needed to speed up cooking. Turn up heat, add sauce and continue cooking and tossing until chicken is cooked and veggies are desired crispness. Serve over rice or noodles.

Redux Directions

Heat oven to 350F. In a small bowl combine ½ the oil, all the chili flakes, chili sauce, teriyaki sauce, orange juice and garlic. Set aside. Arrange onions in the bottom of a 9×9 baking dish. Season chicken with salt and arrange on top of the onions.  Pour sauce over chicken, making sure it runs over all the meat. Bake in oven for 45 minutes until juices run clear. Heat remaining oil in wok over medium high heat and toss until vegetables begin sweating. Turn heat to high. Draw about one cup of juices from the chicken dish and add to the vegetables. Toss the vegetables and sauce until they are done and the sauce thickens. Serve chicken, vegetables and sauce over a bed of rice or noodles.

 

 

Posted in chicken, chili, vegetables, wheat free | Leave a Comment
16 Jan 2012

Chicken A Go Go

 

What do you do when chicken is on sale for 79 cents a pound? I don’t know about you, but two things happen to me. Number one, I let all pure thoughts of free range and grain fed go out the window. Number two, I buy it. A lot of it. Until the freezer is full of thighs and legs. Then I cook some.

I am starting my chicken marathon with something simple, reminiscent of a dish my mother-in-law makes that my husband (aka Big D) adores. I simply chop up tomatoes, artichoke hearts, onions and broccoli. I then drizzle them with lime juice, olive oil and some chopped garlic, with salt to taste. On top of the veggies I place chicken thighs that were sprinkled with salt, pepper, chili powder and cumin. A little pat of butter is then perched precariously atop each piece of chicken. Ideally it will all fit in a 9″x13″ baking dish, but if you are like me such a dish is still in the fridge with leftovers, so in this case I used a 9″x9″ and a glass pie dish. They worked great.

After cooking it all for about 45 minutes at 350 degrees it is done, the skin is crispy and itching to be eaten. I serve it over some brown rice cooked in ½ chicken broth ½ water and voila! Dinner! And leftovers for lunch! And maybe another dinner…

Posted in baked, chicken, rice, vegetables, wheat free | Leave a Comment

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