Chicken Pot Pie

Once again, because I'm a MidWesterner I guess it's a necessary part of my identity that I make casseroles.  I love the idea of everything mixed together harmoniously, baked in one dish, and something that would feed a hungry crowd of pot-luck or carry-in (as I always say) goers.  This chicken pot pie was very easy, and I will put it into winter rotation.  The only problem was my "brilliant" idea to use the leftover cheese straws from the freezer instead of just making a crust.  The problem was that the puff pastry got soggy and never really crisped up like it was supposed to.  The picture below illustrates that.  I'll just make a regular crust next time.  

Chicken Pot Pie

• Meat from 1 whole chicken, reserve 2 cups cooking liquid (I cooked mine in the crock pot)
• 4 tablespoons butter
• 1/2 cup flour
• 1 1/2 cups milk
• salt and pepper
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 4 carrots, sliced
• 2 celery stocks, sliced
• 1 medium onion, diced
• 1/4 to 1/2 cup chopped parsley
• 1 cup frozen green peas
• 1 pie crust

1. Melt 4 tablespoons butter in a heavy pan.  Add flour, whisking the entire time.  Cook for 2 minutes on medium heat.  Slowly add milk, whisking to prevent lumps.  Add broth. Whisk.  Add chicken and season.  You will need quite a bit of salt and pepper for this.  Flour, butter, and milk all have pretty bland flavors, so add some salt and pepper, taste, then add some more until it's where you want it to be.  You have just made creamed chicken.  You could serve this over mashed potatoes on its own.

2. Set creamed chicken aside.  Preheat oven to 400 F.  In a pan, melt 2 Tablespoons of butter.  Add chopped carrots, onions, and celery and cook over medium heat for 5 to 10 minutes depending on how soft you want your veggies.  I wanted mine crisp, so I only cooked them for 5 minutes.  Add peas, parsley, and creamed chicken.  Stir everything together.

3. Place ingredients into a large baking pan.  Top with pie crust. (I'm thinking mashed potatoes might be a good topping for this too).  Bake for 40 minutes.  Enjoy!

Note: You could also put this in several small pie pans for individual serving.  You would want to bake those for around 20-25 minutes.  They would freeze well pre-baking.

When the Meal Plan is Ignored We Must Improvise: Creamy Mushroom Sauce with Chicken

I plan out my meals every week.  I made a chart in a word processing program, and every Thursday night or Friday morning I sit down and type in all the meals we will have for the week, and then I make a grocery list.  This is not because I'm super organized.  In fact, I wouldn't even classify myself as a little organized, but people who know this about me seem to be impressed and wish they could do the same (you can, it's really easy).  The reason I do this is because (1) if I go shopping without a list all hell breaks loose.  I end up with $80 worth of groceries and nothing that really constitutes an entire meal.  (2) This allows me to go through my pantry, refrigerator, and freezer and use up anything before it goes bad.  I really hate to waste food, and once again, I'm not organized so every little bit helps.  (3) It saves time because I don't have to figure out what I will make each day.  A lot of times I can prep meals the night before, or I can make sure I have enough time for complicated recipes.  So, the menu plan is a lifesaver for me, and I think it would be even more so if I had a bigger family.  I did this when I lived by myself, and it was helpful.  

The point to this long explanation of why I do a menu plan is that last week I ignored it.  I took an unexpected trip, which meant that I didn't get groceries, so I didn't have the stuff to make what was on the plan.  This threw the entire week off.  We ate some meals from the freezer, but eventually I needed to cook.  I looked through the shelves for something to make and then inspiration hit.  I came up with Chicken and Creamy Mushroom Sauce over Couscous.  This is a really great method, and if you don't like mushrooms use something else.  You could use broccoli, cauliflower, onions, spinach, or nothing at all and just have a cream sauce.  You could use canned cream of mushroom soup if you're in a hurry, but really this doesn't take long at all, and it's so much better than the canned stuff.  If you don't like couscous use rice, potatoes, pasta, or bulgar.  I will continue making this, but next time it will be on plan.

Creamy Mushroom Sauce and Chicken

1lb. boneless, skinless chicken breast

2 tablespoons butter

1tsp. seasoning salt

4 oz can chopped mushrooms, drained

2 tablespoons butter

2 tablespoons flour

1 cup milk (you may need a few more tablespoons depending on the thickness of the sauce)

salt

pepper

1. Melt 2 tablespoons butter and place in bowl with seasoning salt.  Coat chicken breasts in butter/salt mixture.  Place chicken breast in hot pan and cook through, adding remaining melted putter to pan.  Place cooked chicken on cutting board to rest.

2. In a small sauce pan melt 2 tablespoons butter.  Whisk in 2 tablespoons flour and cook for about a minute whisking constantly.  Slowly add milk while whisking constantly.  Add mushrooms to sauce.  Cook over low heat, adding salt and pepper and stirring until sauce thickens.  If your sauce is too thick, add a few more tablespoons of milk.  I needed to add about 2 more tablespoons when I made my sauce.  Keep in mind that the sauce will thicken even more as it cools.   (I add a lot of pepper to mine because we like really spicy white sauces in my house)

3. Slice cooked chicken breasts.  Place chicken in saucepan and cook for 2 minutes over low heat to incorporate flavors.  Serve over couscous, rice, pasta, or potatoes.

Herb Roasted Chicken

This is a super easy chicken method, and you can vary the spices.  I think it's even better the next day right out of the refrigerator because the spices have a chance to really get into the chicken.  I don't have a roasting pan, so I take a wire cooling rack and set it on a cookie sheet instead.  This was my first time breaking down a whole chicken, but it was actually pretty easy.  You will have leftover chicken backs, but you can (and should) save them for broth.  This is why I prefer to buy bone-in chicken breasts.  They are cheaper than the boneless, skinless kind, and I can keep the bones for soup. I keep a gallon zip-lock bag in my freezer and I put chicken pieces in it.  When it gets full, I put all the parts in the crock pot with some garlic, cover it with water, and let the crock pot run all day.  Then I strain the broth and freeze it for soup.  Seriously, don't buy broth!  I do the same thing with vegetable scraps.

Herb Roast Chicken

1 whole chicken cut into legs, wings, breast, and thighs.  

1 tablespoon mixed dried herbs (I used parsley, basil, rosemary and oregano)

salt and pepper

olive oil

Rub olive oil on chicken and then rub on herbs, salt and pepper.  Let sit in the refrigerator for 1/2 an hour.  Place chicken in roasting pan, or on wire rack on a cookie sheet and bake at 400 F. for about 25 minutes.  You can check to see if it's done by putting a thermometer in the thickest part of the thigh.  It should read 165 F.  You can also pierce the thigh and see if the juices run clear.

I served the chicken with steamed green beans and an Asian pasta salad.

Smoky Chicken Sandwich: Laugh When it Goes Wrong

I call this chicken sandwich smokey as a joke.  It was chicken breast marinated in lime juice, honey, and chili powder.  It was then cooked on a cast iron grill pan.  Everything was going well with the cooking of the chicken until it started to smoke.  I thought I would be able to eliminate the smoke from the kitchen by turning on the oven fan.  This worked for about 3 seconds, but then the smoke started billowing from the pan and filled up the adjoining living room.  My husband, who was in the living/dining room setting the table began opening windows.  4 windows were opened, ceiling fans were turned on, and the house was a smoky mess.  I started coughing, but I continued to cook that chicken.  Finally, when the chicken appeared to be blackened I cut it in slices to reveal pink chicken.  "Really?" I yelled "After all that it's still not cooked?".  I just stuck the chicken in the microwave, as my husband made jokes about my serving him raw chicken strips about 6 months prior (I still have problems frying anything on this electric stove).  When we finally sat down to eat I piled the now cooked chicken slices onto rolls with avocado, tomato, lettuce, and salsa.  "What kind of chicken is this?"  my husband asked?  "Smoked" I said.

Chicken Likka

I'm always a little hesitant about cooking Indian food.  I've never really eaten any authentic Indian food that I know of, and so I'm never sure if I will get the flavors right.  While flipping through a cookbook, I found a recipe for Chicken Likka that looked interesting.  Basically, cubed chicken gets marinated in a mixture of yogurt, garlic, ginger, cumin, coriander, allspice, and tomato paste, and baked quickly in a hot oven.  The recipe called for the chicken to be skewered, but I didn't have any skewers, so I just baked it on a cookie sheet.  The chicken was extremely flavorful and tender.  It was actually a little too powerful to eat on its own. I took the leftovers and wrapped them in flat bread with cucumber, which toned down the powerful spices, and was just right for my tastes.  Other than the marinade, the dish came together very quickly.  This chicken made me think that maybe I should take more of an interest in Indian cuisine.

Weeknight Kitchen: Crispy Chicken Cutlets on a Heap of Spring Salad

Wow, yet another recipe from The Splendid Table's Weeknight Kitchen.  For those of you who are new around here, The Splendid Table, a weekly show about food on NPR, puts out a newsletter with an easy week night recipe once a week.  You can go here and sign up if you're interested.  

This weeks recipe was Crispy Chicken Cutlets on a Heap of Spring Salad.  I don't really think I make cutlets but more of chicken strips.  I was very worried when I first began breading these because they seemed to have an abnormal coating, but once I started frying each juicy strip on chicken I realized they would be wonderful.  The chicken strips were extremely crunchy, moist, and tender.  The buttermilk added a tang that eggs alone would not have had.  I will use this method next time I want chicken strips.  As for the greens, I just used bib lettuce and romaine.  A tiny package of arugula is very expensive, so I wasn't about to use that as my primary green. I didn't add the dill either, but I chopped up some parsley in the lettuce.  I started added herbs to salads last year, and I really like the flavor it adds.  The dressing for this salad is extremely versatile with the herbs as well.  I had rosemary instead of tarragon, so that's what I used.  I would have like a thicker dressing, so next time I may add some arrowroot powder to thicken it.  The dressing would make a great dip or sauce on fish.

Weeknight Kitchen: Stir fried cabbage, chicken, and bean threads.

I know I'm behind on my Weeknight Kitchen posts.  I have not abandoned them, but I've just had a hectic few weeks.  I'm also looking for some substitutions for one of the recipes.  The grocery stores here do not carry a wide selection of bitter greens, so I'm researching, and I will present my findings soon.  I was able to make last week's recipe for Stir fried cabbage, chicken, and bean threads.  You can subscribe to this weekly recipe service by going here.

This recipe was extremely easy.  I was able to make it in my husband's kitchen.  My husband and I live apart during the week, and he doesn't cook much, so his kitchen equipment in minimal.  To give an example, his knife collection consists of steak knives and a serrated bread knife.  We eat out a lot when I come over.

 Showing off my husband's steak knife and cutting board (I use the term cutting board very loosely here)

 Minced garlic and ginger.  I did okay.

Everything cooking.  You see carrots here because we bought a pre-shredded coleslaw mix.  I wasn't about to break down a head of cabbage with a break knife.

The finished product tossed with cilantro and served over white rice.

The Verdict:

This was...okay.  That's it, just okay.  I wasn't horrible, but it was too bland for my tastes.  I added more soy sauce and if I would've been at home, I would have added hot sauce as well.  It is a great way to use up leftovers, but I wouldn't go out of my way to make it.  My husband enjoyed this more than I did.