Chicken Fettuccine

Get this recipe with nutrition information at Cook and Count!

Corn Chowder

I'm a big fan of soup, though most of my family could take or leave it. That's why I don't have too many soup recipes here. But corn chowder is definitely one of my favorites; I often order it at restaurants and I figured there's really no good reason that I can't make it at home. There was a recipe at Sarcastic Cooking that I used as the basis for this soup. The changes I made reflected what was available in my pantry at the time; I was also using up some leftover cooked (boiled) potatoes and roasted chicken. Here's the recipe as I made it today:

CORN CHOWDER (printable version)
Serves 6

3 TBL butter
1/2 medium onion, chopped fine
2 ribs celery, sliced
12 baby carrots, sliced
1 heaping TBL minced garlic
4 TBL flour
3 cups chicken stock
2 cups frozen corn kernels
1 tsp salt
1 tsp ground black pepper
1/4 tsp crushed red pepper
1/4 tsp cumin
2 TBL dried parsley flakes
1/2 cup cooked chicken, diced
1/2 cup cooked shrimp, diced
4 boiled potatoes, cooled, peeled and diced
1 1/2 cups whole milk

Saute onion in melted butter until translucent. Add celery, carrots and garlic and cook until the vegetables begin to soften. Stir in flour until all liquid has been absorbed. Pour in chicken stock and add corn and seasonings. Cover and simmer 20 minutes. Stir in chicken, shrimp and potatoes and simmer 5 more minutes. Slowly stir in milk and cook uncovered for 15 minutes. Allow to cool a few minutes before serving.

You could substitute more shrimp or other seafood for the chicken for a delicious meatless meal!

Coffee-Cup Spice

I love how a little spice makes a cup of coffee that much sweeter and mellower, but without the "fake" flavor of artifically-flavored coffee blends or creamers. Those always have a strange chemical taste, I think. So I mix up my own "coffee-cup spice." Cinnamon by itself is delicious in coffee. Just sprinkle some on top of the coffee grounds before brewing (about 1/4 to 1/2 tsp for a 10-cup pot of coffee). I put together a spice blend, cinnamon-based, that is great in coffee or as a spice for coffee cake or muffins. To use it in baking, add up the amounts of spice you'd usually use in the recipe and use the same measurement of this spice blend.

I store it in an old jar from any one of the spices used in the blend. If you do this, don't even wash the jar first; whatever's left in the jar will just mix in.

Depending on the size of your jar, you can adjust the quantity of each, as long as you keep in mind that some are measured in TBL and some in tsp.

TBL:  cinnamon
tsp:  nutmeg, allspice, cardamom, ginger

Place in the jar, cover tightly and shake until well blended.

Iron-Skillet Chicken Caroline

I tweaked my Chicken Caroline recipe so I could cook it in my cast-iron skillet. I thought it was even better this way--but if you want to cook more than 4 pieces you'll need more than one skillet. This would be delicious on a sandwich; I served it with oven-roasted Yukon Gold potatoes.

CHICKEN CAROLINE

olive oil for the pan
1 onion, sliced very thin
2 cups sliced mushrooms
2 TBL minced garlic
4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
Italian seasoning
salt
pepper
1/2 cup mozzarella cheese, shredded (I used a combination of mozzarella and provolone)

In cast-iron skillet, slowly saute onion in olive oil until it begins to caramelize. Push onion to sides of the pan. Add mushrooms and cook until soft. Stir in minced garlic and cook 2 minutes. Remove all vegetables to a dish and add chicken to pan. Drizzle top of chicken with a little more olive oil, then season with Italian seasoning, salt and pepper to taste.

Bake at 400 about 20 minutes. Top chicken with the cooked onion, mushrooms and garlic, then sprinkle cheese over it all. Return to oven for 5 more minutes until cheese melts.

Sesame Semolina Dinner Rolls

A large-capacity bread machine is needed to make this dough.  This batch makes between 24 and 30 rolls, depending on size. The dough was soft and pliable but not wet, and the oven-spring was impressive.

You'll find this recipe at my new website, Cook and Count!

Waste Not, Want Not: Potato-Chip Chicken

One of my neighbors works for a potato-chip company, and every so often he brings samples of new brands or new product lines to us for a taste-test. Yesterday he handed us a couple of bags of no-salt-added potato chips. 

If I'm going to eat chips straight out of the bag, they need to have a little flavor, like salt & vinegar or Honey BBQ. Not wanting these to go to waste, I figured out another way to enjoy them.

First I opened the bag, let out the air, then held the bag closed and crushed the chips. Then I poured some Old Bay seasoning into the bag, closed it tightly, and shook until the potato-chip crumbs were spicy. This became a delicious, crispy coating for oven-baked chicken drumsticks.

Here's the recipe for POTATO-CHIP CHICKEN

10 large chicken drumsticks

1 egg

3/4 cup milk

1 5-ounce bag unsalted potato chips, crushed

1 TBL Old Bay (or more to taste)

Cover a cookie sheet with foil and brush with olive oil. Preheat oven to 375.

Add Old Bay to the crushed potato chips. Close the bag tightly and shake until the crumbs and spice are well mixed. Pour into a shallow bowl (I used a pie plate).

Beat egg and milk together and pour into another shallow bowl.

Dip chicken drumsticks in egg mixture, then roll in chip crumbs until coated.

Place on prepared cookie sheet.

Bake 35 to 40 minutes.

You can use any spice you like with this, and you get to control the salt. This is also a good way to use up the broken chips in the bottom of the bag. (You can freeze the chips until you get enough to use for one batch of chicken.)

Dessert Time: Cookies & Cream Brownies

Dress up a boxed brownie mix with crushed Oreo cookies and mini chocolate chips! This is an easy recipe to make with the kids; even little ones can help crush the cookies and then sprinkle on the toppings before baking. And it's never too early for kids to learn that even broken cookies are good for something.

Here's the recipe for Cookies & Cream Brownies:

1 box brownie mix, prepared as directed (I used a Dark Chocolate brownie mix for this recipe)
1 cup crushed Oreos or mini Oreos
1 cup mini chocolate chips

Prepare brownie mix as directed on box and pour into foil-lined 9x13 baking pan.
Top with crushed cookies.
Sprinkle chocolate chips evenly over the top.
Bake as directed.

Soccer-Mom Friendly Dinner: Chicken Caesar Sandwiches

Sometimes it pays to procrastinate JUST a bit. I was working on my meal plan over the weekend and browsing Twitter instead of focusing on the task at hand. Fortunately, I follow Jeff Young, the Catholic Foodie, and he tweeted a link to a recipe for Creamy Chicken Caesar Sandwiches.

My kids are fans of Caesar salad, especially when there's chicken involved. (Little Brother will eat just about anything if it includes croutons; in his world, croutons should have their own food group). With Little Brother and his crouton obsession in mind, I decided to serve these sandwiches on garlic bread instead of just plain rolls. (If you're local, I got the rolls from DeLuca's in Riverside.)

The original recipe is linked above; I'm writing it here as I made it.

Get the recipe at Cook and Count!

Dutch Oven Macaroni & Cheese

With an eye to planned leftovers that can be used for a quick lunch or dinner this week, I put together some baked macaroni & cheese.

3/4 pound small macaroni (mini penne, mini shells, elbows or cavatappi all work), cooked al dente
2 cups milk
4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) butter
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
10 ounces extra-sharp Cheddar, grated (3+ cups)
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/4 teaspoon ground mustard
salt, to taste
1/4 cup seasoned bread crumbs
Cook pasta as directed on the package.

Heat milk in a small saucepan, making sure not to boil it, or heat it in the microwave for 1 minute. Meanwhile, melt butter in a Dutch oven. Whisk in flour and then the hot milk and cook until thickened and smooth. Remove from heat. Add cheese, pepper, salt and mustard. Stir until combined. Fold in cooked pasta. Sprinkle with bread crumbs. Cover and bake 20 minutes at 350, then remove the cover and bake 10 minutes at 300 until the sauce is bubbly and the casserole is browned on top.
This is great with a salad and crusty bread!

Singapore Street Noodles

This is one of those "kitchen sink" recipes; there is a ton of ingredients but I'm sure that some substitution wouldn't turn out badly. I thought the sauce in this recipe would work well with just about any combination of stir-fry vegetables.

I taste-tested this recipe with just my 10-year-old. I thought he might back away from the spice in it, but he never complained about it. He loved, loved, loved the rice noodles and asked me to make it again. I served mine on top of the noodles, but he wanted his noodles separate from the meat and vegetables.

SINGAPORE STREET NOODLES, my way (serves 4)

SAUCE:
1 TBL rice wine vinegar
2 TBL curry powder
1 pinch turmeric
2 TBL soy sauce or Ponzu
1/2 cup oyster sauce
2 TBL sriracha (sweet chili) sauce
2 TBL ketchup

VEG/MEAT:
1/2 lb. raw shrimp, peeled and tails removed
1 boneless, skinless chicken breast, cut in thin strips
2 TBL vegetable or peanut oil for the pan
1 cup cole slaw mix
1/2 small onion, chopped fine
2 cups baby carrots, julienned
1 TBL minced garlic
1 medium tomato, cut in chunks

NOODLES:
1 pound Asian rice noodles, uncooked
1 tsp sesame oil
handful of fresh cilantro, chopped
1 lime, cut in quarters

1.  Mix vinegar, curry powder and turmeric until well blended. Add remaining sauce ingredients and stir. Set aside.

2.  Boil water in large pot for noodles.

3.  Stir-fry shrimp and chicken in oil until cooked through. Push to edges of pan and add all vegetables except tomato. Cook 1 to 2 minutes, then stir in tomato and sauce. Cook until everything is heated through.

4.  Cook noodles 2 to 3 minutes (according to package directions), stirring occasionally. Drain and toss with cilantro and sesame oil.

5.  Serve noodles with meat and vegetables and 1/4 lime to squeeze over the dish just before eating.

I plan to make a big batch of this (just the meat, vegetables and sauce), then divide and freeze it. The rice noodles take no time at all to cook, so this would be an amazingly quick meal for those really busy days. But I'm probably going to leave out the tomatoes next time and use some other vegetables instead. Also, some chopped dry-roasted peanuts or cashews would add to this dish.

Source for original recipe: Food.com (I changed some ingredients and re-worked the directions so the steps were actually in order. In the original recipe, also, there were some ingredients in the list that never were accounted for in the steps of the recipe.)

The Big Send-Off

Four more days until Big Brother goes back to school! This time he won't be living in the dorms, but in an on-campus apartment complete with (tiny) kitchen. He's excited about his upcoming Freedom From Dining-Hall Food.

It occurred to him the other day that if he's going to be cooking his food, he'll need to buy the groceries and have time to cook the food. I took it as a huge compliment that he asked me to help him make a grocery list.

And here's where it got interesting, and I realized something. Most of the groceries I buy are ingredients. Since he plans to use my recipes (he AND his girlfriend have both bookmarked this blog) he is going to have to keep ingredients in the house.

So I asked him to list 8 to 10 meals as a starting point, figuring that we'd stock him up on the nonperishable ingredients (and frozen meat and pasta sauce) for those. From that list, I made him a shopping list. I've already been collecting spices like assorted pepper grinders, bay leaves and a few staples such as chicken soup base.

I hope his mini-kitchen is big enough to hold his stash of ingredients as well as his roommates' food.

And I'm happy to say that my son is heading off to college with grocery bags containing Old Bay, ginger, and sesame seeds--and he knows how to use them.

Sure beats dining-hall food.

Original Recipe: Pasta with Beef and Fennel Sauce

Much as I may claim that "laziness is the mother of invention," there are times when I agree that necessity deserves that title. It's certainly true in cooking. This recipe was born out of a moment of panic when I realized that somehow I had run out of spaghetti sauce with meatballs without realizing it--and I'd planned that very thing for dinner (and had no time to start up a big batch).

I did have some sauce without meatballs, though, and some ground beef. So I thought I'd make a baked ziti with meat and cheese...but that's not really what I wanted for dinner. That's when I got busy inventing. The result was a big hit; it has the flavor of Italian sausage without all the grease.

The whole thing cooks in the time it takes to boil a big pot of water and cook pasta, so it's a quick and easy meal.

PASTA WITH BEEF AND FENNEL SAUCE
Serves 6

3 to 4 cups spaghetti sauce without meat
1/2 lb. ground beef
1/2 medium onion, chopped fine
1 TBL olive oil
1 TBL fennel seed
1/4 tsp. crushed red pepper

Brown ground beef and onion in the olive oil.  Drain, add fennel and pepper, and cook 2 minutes more until spices are fragrant.  Stir into spaghetti sauce. Heat until warmed through and serve over your choice of pasta.

Skillet Chicken Parm

My husband's favorite dinner is Chicken Parmesan. But while I am a big fan of pasta with red sauce, Chicken Parmesan is not high on my list of best-loved dishes--either to make or to eat. Breading, frying, then baking the chicken is a mess and a chore. Today I bought a new cookbook: The Cook's Country Cookbook (from the America's Test Kitchen editors) and found a Skillet Chicken Parmesan recipe in there.

I know that the America's Test Kitchen people are all kinds of scientific and they think they have found the One Best Way to make anything. Honestly, though, I didn't buy this cookbook for the recipes but for the information on technique (like shaping rolls and boning chicken) that had lots of useful photographs. So while the recipe below was "inspired by" the ATK one in the cookbook, there were a lot of changes that I made to accommodate the ingredients I had on hand.

This version of Skillet Chicken Parm cooks in about the same time as a big pot of linguine, so it's great when you want to have dinner on the table in under 30 minutes!

This was way easier to make than conventional Chicken Parm, and there was plenty of sauce to go around (that's my favorite part!) I used my own homemade pizza sauce, but you can use your favorite thick spaghetti sauce.

SKILLET CHICKEN PARM

Get the full recipe plus nutrition information at Cook and Count!

My Kitchen Bucket List

Every cook has one:  the things she would like to learn to make someday.
In no particular order, here are some of mine:
paella
apple-cider donuts
empanadas
popovers
sandwich bread
shaped round rolls
cheesecake
corn muffins
Irish brown bread like the kind we had in Ireland when I was 15, and which is probably so mythologized in my mind that NOTHING will come close to it
General Tso's Chicken

And I'd like to start a sourdough starter and NOT kill it off after only a couple of weeks! (I'm a little lacking in the follow-through in the sourdough department).

In view of the kitchen goals I have, I requested a couple of baking pans for my birthday (hey, the kids asked...and these are not things I'd go out and buy for myself.)

My baking-pan cabinet is going to get out of control if I add anything more to it, but I have had these on my wish list for so long--and as soon as it gets a little cooler I'm going to be baking!  I asked for (and received) a donut pan and a Pullman loaf pan. This heavy-duty covered bread pan makes those square "sandwich" loaves. I've got 4 weeks to get that right before school starts.

FINALLY! Sweet Corn Casserole

Every cook has one of those dishes that they want to make, and they try, try, try every recipe they can find (and some they make up).  They waste batch after batch of ingredients on not-quite-right results, but chances are they never completely give up.  And sometimes they happen upon just the right recipe.

I think I've been trying for about 20 years to make the sweet corn casserole like what was served at the Chi-Chi's restaurant my husband and I used to visit.  It was so good...whenever I was offered two sides, I'd just get double the corn casserole.  But no matter how many recipes I tried (and there were many--very many, which is why Big Brother is no fan of corn to this day) I couldn't get it right.

Today I followed a link in a tweet by CatholicFoodie to this recipe for Easy Corn Casserole.  I almost didn't try it, figuring I'd once again be disappointed.  Then I decided that if I had all the ingredients on hand, I'd make it with dinner tonight.

I used a Corning-ware baking dish, and I found that 45 minutes were needed to bake it all the way through.  5 more minutes probably wouldn't have hurt either, and it's a good idea to let it set for 5 or 10 minutes after removing it from the oven.  But oh, my, this is good--and just exactly what I was after (I knew that all those recipes calling for sour cream weren't going to lead me to the right result!)

Thanks, FamilyFoodie, for sharing your friend Charlie's recipe for my favorite corn dish!

Blueprint Recipe: Chicken Thighs with Rosemary

Get this recipe, photo and nutrition information at Cook and Count!

Cinnamon-Almond Bread

I have this recipe clipping from a 1998 issue of Better Homes & Gardens for "Spectacular Cinnamon-Almond Ring."  Honestly, there are very few recipes of mine that I'd include an adjective like "spectacular" for, but BH&G apparently thought this was pretty special.  It's a cinnamon-swirl yeast bread that is baked in a fluted tube pan, and is designed to be refrigerator-raised overnight.  I've made it several times, and the results are delicious, but it is pretty work-intensive.  Recently I'd been thinking about making this recipe in regular loaf pans, so that's what I tried today.  Instead of a refrigerator rise, I mixed the dough in my trusty dough machine (I'd call it a bread machine, but I never actually bake any bread in it.  I prefer baking it in the oven in a pan that is not tall and square and does not leave a big hole in the bottom of the loaf.)

The original recipe did not call for bread flour, but all-purpose.  I didn't add any gluten, either--wanted to see what would happen if I left it alone.  As it turned out, no gluten was needed, and AP flour worked fine.

Cinnamon-Almond Bread

DOUGH
1 cup milk
1/2 cup water
1/2 cup butter, cut up (1 stick butter)
2 eggs, beaten
zest of 1 lemon
zest of 1 orange
1 tsp salt
3 TBL sugar
5 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 TBL yeast

Add ingredients to your bread machine in the order recommended by the manufacturer.  Select dough cycle.

FILLING
1 stick butter, softened
3/4 cup sugar
4 tsp ground cinnamon (I used Penzey's Indonesian Cinnamon)
1 cup sliced almonds

Divide the dough in two pieces on a floured surface and roll thin.  Mix butter, sugar and cinnamon and spread on dough, leaving a 1-inch margin.  Sprinkle with almonds.  Roll tightly and place in greased loaf pans.

Allow to rise 1 hour, then bake 35 minutes at 350.  Remove to wire rack to cool.

MAKE SURE you roll this very tightly, as otherwise there will be huge air pockets inside the bread.  This makes slicing and toasting a little difficult, though there's no impact on flavor.

NEXT TIME I will divide this recipe into 3 loaves instead of 2.  That might have kept things more manageable!

Spicy Oatmeal Cookies

We enjoy spicy cookies around here (these Molasses cookies are a particular favorite, and I always add some cinnamon to chocolate-chips).  That's why I wanted to try out this recipe from Cooking Light:  Spicy Oatmeal Crisps.  I made a change in the baking time because I didn't want crispy cookies; I prefer them to be soft and chewy.  The "secret ingredient" here is black pepper!

SPICY OATMEAL COOKIES

3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 cup packed brown sugar
5 tablespoons butter, softened
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 large egg
1/2 cup old-fashioned oats

Preheat oven to 350°.
Combine flour and next 7 ingredients (through pepper) in a medium bowl. Beat sugar, butter, and vanilla in a large bowl with a mixer at medium speed until light and fluffy. Add egg; beat well. Stir in flour mixture and oats.
Drop by level tablespoons 2 inches apart onto prepared baking sheets (I use a silicone baking-sheet liner). Bake at 350° for 10 minutes. Cool on pan 2 to 3 minutes or until firm. Remove cookies from pan; cool on wire racks.  Makes about 24 cookies.

2 dozen cookies is not usually enough around here; I'll double this next time.  Also, I think they'd be great with the addition of some chopped walnuts or hazelnuts, and maybe a bit of ginger as well.  These cookies were a crowd-pleaser, and they made the kitchen smell terrific, too!

Trinity Rice with Almonds

There's a whole bunch of things you can make with leftover rice:  rice pudding, fried rice, and breakfast rice to name just a few.  Today, though, I didn't want to make any of these.  I was looking for a way to use up about 2 cups of cooked white rice.  I found a recipe here that looked good, changed a few ingredients (wasn't in the mood to put raisins in it) and everyone was happy with the result.  This recipe would be just as good with brown rice as it was with white.

I called it "Trinity Rice" because it uses the vegetables that, in French cooking, are called the "trinity"--carrots, celery and onion, all chopped the same size.

TRINITY RICE WITH ALMONDS

Get the recipe and nutrition facts at Cook and Count!

Making Space and Sharing Space

An occupational hazard of letting the Big Kids use your kitchen is that on the (rare) occasions when they do clean up and put things away, things are not necessarily put away where you usually keep them.

Last night I practically tore this drawer apart looking for the meat fork.

I never did find it.  This drawer was getting so bad that it wasn't always easy to open or close.  Something had to give.

So I dumped the contents of the entire drawer on my kitchen table, cleaned out the inside of the drawer and the baskets, and started fresh.

I found a few items that were duplicates (and who needs two "push-me-pull-yous" for oven racks?) so I put those aside for Big Brother to take to his college apartment in the fall.

Some other items, like the pancake turner, are used so frequently around here (grilled cheese and tomato, anyone?) that I didn't want them back in the drawer.  But they didn't fit in the oatmeal canister that I use for a utensil crock.

Then I remembered the coffee can from Cafe du Monde that I'd saved.  It brings back memories of my trip to Louisiana during my own college days, when I was my school's delegate to a campus ministry event.  I sanded down the open end with some coarse-grit sandpaper, cleaned the can, and tossed some ladles and pancake turners in there, as well as a few other things.

The kids will be able to find things easily, and they might even put them away in the right place when they clean up.

I have coffee-can lids on the bottom of both of those cans to prevent rust.

I'm still working on the arrangement of the rest of the drawer, but at least it's cleared out enough now that it can be opened and closed without things getting stuck.

Like my fancy paper-tower-tube holder for my cooking tongs?  Yes, it looks junky, but it takes a lot of abuse.  Eventually I will use up the last paper towel on the current roll, and then I'll have a whole new holder.

It's a little change, but it should make a big difference in a kitchen that is no longer a one-mom operation.

Now the issues involved in sharing a 10 x 10 kitchen with 3 kids (2 of whom are taller than me) and 1 husband are a different story.  We trip over each other a lot.  It's a traffic nightmare, but that's a project for another day.